Miscellaneous And Off Topic Subjects

[Dr. Strangelove]

Cook Political Report has changed 20 House races this morning and every one of them moved towards the Democrats. The most personally interesting one to me is Steve Chabot of the 1st Ohio. Even if Chabot survives this year, that district is almost certainly going to be redrawn in a way that favors Democrats once the new map comes out. That's one of the most blatantly gerrymandered districts in the state.

Seeing Chip Roy ousted would be interesting too.


EdIQLQqWsAAuHEy?format=jpg&name=small.jpg

[Dr. Strangelove]

Speaking of Trump, I just saw my first ad today attacking Biden for the Defund the Police, BLM riot stuff. It's obviously where Biden would be the most vulnerable. We'll see if it helps at all.

That stuff will never shove aside coronavirus/economy as the most important issue for the majority of voters unless the pandemic is brought under tight control before November. I don't think it will be. The only people who will be receptive are non-swing voters that have been 100% in Trump's camp since 2015. The more time Trump devotes to non-covid topics the more he leaves the impression among swing voters that coronavirus is not a priority to him.

They have a problem sticking to one strategy against Sleepy Joe. They want to bring up his record, but his record shows him as being probably a slightly right-of-center Democrat. Trump wants to bash him for the 90's crime bill (because it was too tough) while also himself promising to be tougher on crime. Bringing up Biden's past also makes it harder to sell him as just "AOC in disguise".

[Dr. Strangelove]

Maybe a fluke month but this trend can't be comforting to Republicans

EdD6YBEWAAA6mO2?format=png&name=900x900.png

[Hannibal]

They need to stay away from Biden's past and hang AOC, BLM, Defund the Police, and Ilhan Omar around his neck like an albatross. It's their only way of having a chance at winning.

[iam416]

Right. He can't seem moderate. They have to make him seem beholdent to the nutjob left. And even then I'm almost certain that doesn't get the job done.

The reality is that it's going to be very tough to paint Biden as wackjob left with enough voters to matter. His record isn't particularly nutjob. Now, I firmly believe he'll move way left, but that hasn't happened, yet. They'll go after him in 2022 and 2024 with lots of ammunition, but 2020 is a lost cause.

[iam416]

Jim Geraghty summarizes four areas for Covid (provided in link form instead of Buchanan Melville form): https://www.nationalreview.com/2020/...e-coronavirus/

(1) communicability of current strain may be 10X higher than earlier Asian strains suggesting best practices may not do much; (2) fatality rate is low, but infection rate still means a bunch of people die; (3) very encouraging on vaccine front, but still 2021; and (4) end could still be a long way off.

He's typically less optimistic than others, but he's generally fair and open to revising his opinion.

[Ghengis Jon]

Good news on the presidential election front. A candidate with a clear voice of the people has finally emerged.

https://apnews.com/ada5b48355b5a663b3121a3c4c9a8b28

[*JD*]

Bullseye, right here:

https://twitter.com/joelockhart/stat...83331697709058

[lineygoblue]

And the alternative is a guy who calls himself Joe Biden, who is only a shadow of the man he was in 2009. That Joe Biden wouldn't be a great president either, but he'd be better than the current version. This Biden will only be allowed to speak when he has the permission of The Squad, or Chuck and Nancy. He'll be sequestered in the basement of the WH, and only allowed to speak when they need him to sign their newest demands into law. And, he won't even be doing that for any longer than 18 months, because Kamala Harris will be elbowing him out of the way so she can cater to BLM and Antifa.

Good times ahead!

[Dr. Strangelove]

Pentagon effectively bans the Confederate flag from all military property but they did it in a clever way that makes it difficult for Trump to overrule them. They didn't single out the Confederate flag. Instead they listed the flags that will be allowed to be displayed: the US flag, flags of all states and territories, and flags representing service branches and units. That's it.

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/07/17/pentagon-bans-confederate-flag-367550

[iam416]

Boy, you wanna talk about a "spike" ... of course, no one really cares about it....DEFUND AND ABOLISH!!!!

https%3A%2F%2Fd6c748xw2pzm8.cloudfront.net%2Fprod%2F63c8da70-c775-11ea-8955-bf23bf8cc4da-standard.png?dpr=1&fit=scale-down&quality=highest&source=next&width=700.png

[iam416]

A nice glimpse into the near future as Progressives take control of the Federal government. San Francisco dealt with its homeless/coronavirus problem by, incredibly, designating 5,000 homeless people as “emergency front-line workers” and then paid $200 a night to quarantine each of them in luxury hotels that are currently empty of tourists.

https://www.city-journal.org/san-fra...n-for-homeless

Thomas Wolf, a self-described recovering addict and former homeless person, tweeted in May that “homeless placed in hotels in SF are being delivered Alcohol, Weed and Methadone because they identified as an addict/alcoholic for FREE. You’re supposed to be offering treatment. This is enabling and is wrong on many levels.” The city’s Public Health Department responded that “these harm-reduction based practices . . . help guests successfully complete isolation and quarantine and have significant individual and public health benefits in the COVID-19 pandemic.”

Away we go....

[Jeff Buchanan]

In FL today, unemployment dropped and so did hospitalizations in all three S. FL hospital systems. R(t) values for the state are trending down. % positive continues to drop from their previous highs and that is likely attributable to improved compliance with mitigation measures. There has been a significant public awareness campaign for the value of masking and distancing on local TV. All three S. FL counties have imposed restricted hours on restaurants, bars are closed. Miami Dade has prohibited indoor dining and has a 10pm curfew. The other two S. FL counties have no curfew, allow indoor dining but have to close at 11pm. Beaches remain open but there are courtesy patrols to enforce the rules.

Observationally and in Broward County, compliance is high. We have four regular places we dine at. We go early but generally people dining in them are acting responsibly and staff report less people are giving them a hassle when reminded to wear a mask when entering, leaving or moving about. I am told that drinking and the crazy behavior among the 20-35yo set that has been depicted on the news has declined in the Los Olas and Beach districts if not hard to find at all anymore.

But never mind all the good shit that's happening down here FLORIDA IS THE WORLD'S COVID EPICENTER and residents are dropping like flies.

It's no secret that as more folks become infected, even if R(t) stays the same, there will be an upward sloping GR ..... it's fucking logarithmic people. More testing, more dipping into the pool of uninfected, more fish your gonna catch. BTW, CA, TX and AZ have all brought their R(t R(t) numbers down significantly in the last three weeks from highs a week ago. Today, AZ is <1 ....... NOT SPREADING!!!! Let's not lose sight of the way we should be looking at the data. R(t) is a good measure.

https://rt.live/

IRT increased transmissibility of SARS-CoV-2. There is one pre-peer reviewed study that I am aware of that looked closely at this...... there's more anecdotal evidence that seems to suggest the virus is becoming more transmissible and is behind the "spikes." I don't think it is. Nationally, the spikes are coming from places that heretofore had few cases and now have a lot - the virus is catching up to them. The research paper was published in late May and started appearing in the medical press about 2w later. The researchers could find no evidence that the virus was becoming more transmissible or more lethal and models used to predict if it would become more transmissible or deadly failed to demonstrate that it would. Pretty sure the decreasing R(t) suggests it is certainly not becoming more transmissible.

I've heard about the 10X more deadly, 10X more transmissible talk. It's just that. Science trumps bull-shit.

https://medicalxpress.com/news/2020-...ssibility.html

[iam416]

I agree with you re "transmissibility". I think it's just hit new areas.

[Jeff Buchanan]

RBG is probably on her last legs, The 87yo Supreme has liver CA. Upbeat comments attributed to her are nice and hate it that she has the big C but liver CA is never good and rarely has a good outcome.

Trump may get another Kav before he's gone but the D's will resist and Biden will probably name her replacement.