President Trump

[DavidG]

I have a similar wager with Jim for an '89 Lynch Bages, but I got points. Trump has to exceed his 2016 electoral college total of 304 for me to lose.

The one good thing that is guaranteed to come of this is that we’ll be drinking 1989 Lynch Bages. Paraphrasing Napolean or Churchill or someone: in victory we deserve it; in defeat we need it.

[AKR]

Man I admire you guys for your confidence, I am simply not there yet.
I’m like the Atlanta Falcons when it was 28-3 in the Super Bowl, and some of them on the Falcons sideline said, yeah, but THEY got Tom Brady.
Yeah, we’re winning at halftime, but they got a political monster like nothing we have ever seen.

one danger to everyone - DJT can cause plenty of mischief even when he is out of office. He could issue himself a preemptive blanket pardon for all actions, and then foment great mischief on the outside, unfettered by Presidential constraints. He might continue having rallies, abusing the social media, and promoting his mercurial ideas. It would only be worse if he decides that he was cheated of reelection and promotes that as a storyline. With his ability to lie effortlessly that story could eventually could gain validity over time, just from repeating it. The bigger the lie, and the more its repeated, the easier it is to convince people its the truth.

Now that rioting in our major cities has become normalized behavior, he might encourage his fanatical hordes that they too need to do that. If the modern police will not stop the chaos, maybe that is the next stage.

[Claret]

The forthcoming John Bolton book will be interesting.

[Blanquito]

Trump approval rating at 39% in a recent Gallup poll.

Harry Etten writes (with my emphasis added):
“[A] previous estimate from FiveThirtyEight's Nate Silver suggested that a president with a 40% approval rating in the June before the election had only about a 20% chance of winning the upcoming election. That's largely jibes with more sophisticated models that take into account a slew of indicators.

Can Trump be one of the 20%? Obviously. Don't round 20% down to 0%.

Remember, though, that Trump's approval rating has been steadier than any president before him. There's no particularly strong reason to think he'll get a larger than average boost in his approval rating and therefore his reelection chances.

The inability for Trump to move his own numbers is probably why he goes after Biden so much. Biden's less defined than Trump, and dragging Biden down may be the only chance Trump has to win.”

[Blanquito]

538 is (finally) turning it’s quantitative attention to the 2020 election. The early summaries are looking very favorable for Biden, even more than I thought. The only “bad” state right now for Biden is PA.

Nate Silver:
“We'll have our national and state polling averages coming out soon.

Note that these are polling averages only; they're NOT yet blended with any sort of demographic priors.

Here's what the draft versions are currently showing....
National: Biden +7.6

CO: Biden +15.6
ME: Biden +12.4
VA: Biden +9.5
MI: Biden +8.2
NE-2: Biden +7.4
NH: Biden +6.6
WI: Biden +5.9
NV: Biden +5.7
MN: Biden +5.5
PA: Biden +3.7
AZ: Biden +3.6
FL: Biden +3.5
NC: Biden +2.0
OH: Biden +1.6
GA: TIE
TX: Trump +1.4
IA: Trump +1.6”

[Blanquito]

If you sum states up where Biden is currently >+5% based on these polls, he has 259 Electoral College votes.

The next 4 states in line (PA, FL, AZ, NC) are worth 75 EC votes, and Biden’s is currently leading in those states by a range of 3.7% to 2.0% points— if Biden wins just one of those four states, he’s the next president.

[Blanquito]

Clearly Biden’s best shot in those states is PA— if these polling averages hold up overall, PA is looking like ground zero for the Biden campaign.

Meanwhile, Trump needs to defend his own turf in Texas, Georgia, Iowa, Ohio, Florida, North Carolina, and Arizona. If Trump loses just one of these states, Biden is the next president.

[AKR]

Did anyone catch the story about Trump having some issue with drinking a glass of water the other day? I think he is much more ill than he lets on.

Last Thanksgiving I conducted a remote mental diagnosis of him based on his texts/activities, but my (licensed) family members said that they would not participate since it was a violation of the Hippocratic Oath.

How sad this next Thanksgiving will be when we won't have the prospect of discussing favorite topics like his worst Tweet, or greatest gaffe.

Maybe he will just quit so that he can claim that he had a perfect record in elections, the 72 Dolphins of Presidents.

[JCNorthway]

Today's headline in the Detroit Free Press read, "Trump in Trouble in Michigan," with polls showing him behind here. Recent polls have him trailing Biden by from 7 to 12 points, the most of any state that he won in 2016.

In contrast, yesterday "hundreds" of pleasure craft boats cruised south on Lake St. Clair toward Detroit to celebrate Trump's birthday. For those not familiar with local geography, the shores of Lake St. Clair on the US side are mostly in Macomb County (just north of Detroit) which was a hotbed of Trump support in 2016. I would speculate that a substantial portion of that county's population are the next generation or two of whites whose relatives fled from the city and nearby communities in the 60s and 70s, which would somewhat explain their political persuasion.

[JimHow]

Did anyone catch the story about Trump having some issue with drinking a glass of water the other day? I think he is much more ill than he lets on.

Yeah, that was a pretty scary scene. Does he have Parkinsons or something?

[JimHow]

So who are we picking for Joe's Veep?

I'd like to see Liz but I predict it'll be someone gross (politically) like Kamala.

[Blanquito]

I really hope it’s not Kamala.

[JimHow]

I like the Michigan governor.

[JimHow]

A good day for Trump, his numbers will be back in no time.

9 new coronavirus cases in Maine in a population of 1.4 million. No new deaths. Time to reopen. Which our very cautious governor has just finally ordered.

Everything is open but, bizarrely, we can't do trials in corona-free places like Maine and Alaska until at least September, at the earliest. Meantime, the poor continue to sit in county jails waiting for their "constitutional" <rolls eyes, what a joke> rights to the presumption of innocence and a speedy trial.

HQ back up to 59.

[JimHow]

Interesting Electoral College analysis in The Economist:

https://projects.economist.com/us-2020- ... 2020-06-18&

If The Economist says Joe has a 9 in 10 chance of winning, that should be good for an HQ point.

HQ = 58.

[Comte Flaneur]

I think Trump has now completely lost the plot. If you read this interview he clearly needs a lot of help, he is very mentally ill.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/trump-talk ... 1592493771

[Blanquito]

538's advanced polling average has been launched (advanced in that they weight polls based on the accuracy track-record of the pollster):

[Blanquito]

I get why people doubt the polls, especially after the way the media presented them in 2016 (AKA a forgone conclusion). But the polls (and the models built on them) weren't really that bad in 2016 and were extremely accurate in 2018, and so my starting point for thinking about 2020 is based on this data.

Can things change over the next 4.5 months until the election? Absolutely. 2016 was super volatile, both due internal (Hillary's swoon) and external events (Access Hollywood, Comey), over the final 2 months.

But clearly, if the election were tomorrow, Biden would win easily.

[stefan]

Quote without comment:

>>
“I did something good: I made Juneteenth very famous.”
“It’s actually an important event, an important time,” Trump argued, “But nobody had ever heard of it.”
>>

[Blanquito]

I think Trump has now completely lost the plot. If you read this interview he clearly needs a lot of help, he is very mentally ill.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/trump-talk ... 1592493771

Could someone post the article here? I don't have a subscription, and lone posting seems like fair use to me.

[JimHow]

Trump Talks Juneteenth, John Bolton, Economy in WSJ Interview
President says that U.S. is nearing end of coronavirus pandemic and that he believed China might have encouraged spread of Covid-19 to destabilize competing economies


By Michael C. Bender
Updated June 18, 2020 3:07 pm ET

WASHINGTON—President Trump said that there was some systemic racism in the U.S. and that removing Confederate names from military bases would further divide the country, and took credit for popularizing Juneteenth, the commemoration of the end of slavery.

In an interview on Wednesday in the Oval Office, Mr. Trump mounted a broad defense of his handling of the dual crises affecting the country in the year of his re-election bid: the coronavirus pandemic and the wave of protests following the killing of George Floyd, a black man, in Minneapolis police custody.

Mr. Trump expressed interest in rooting out racism in America and said his plan to heal the country’s racial wounds exposed by the killing of Mr. Floyd and other high-profile cases of alleged police brutality was to build a strong economy. He expressed cautious optimism that any structural racism that exists in America’s economic and criminal-justice systems is getting better.

“I’d like to think there is not” systemic racism, Mr. Trump said, “but unfortunately, there probably is some. I would also say it’s very substantially less than it used to be.”


Demonstrators headed toward the White House and away from the U.S. Capitol June 6, protesting for reforms in the wake of the killing of George Floyd by Minneapolis police May 25.

He said that the country was nearing the end of the coronavirus pandemic and that he believed China might have encouraged the international spread of coronavirus as a way to destabilize competing economies.

“There’s a chance it was intentional,” Mr. Trump said. The president and some international critics have said China should have moved more quickly to contain the coronavirus in December and January. Beijing has defended its response and denied it concealed the extent of the spread.

Transcript of the Interview
The seven-day average of daily new coronavirus cases in the U.S. was about 22,600, according to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data through Tuesday. Anthony Fauci, the U.S. government’s top infectious-disease expert, told The Wall Street Journal earlier this week that the country is still in the first wave of the pandemic.

Mr. Trump said testing for Covid-19 was overrated and allowed for the possibility that some Americans wore facial coverings not as a preventive measure but as a way to signal disapproval of him. Many public-health experts say testing followed by quarantining sick individuals and their close contacts is crucial to contain the spread of the virus.

The president said his bigger problem with masks was that many people fidget with the coverings, which he said made them more likely to be infected. The federal-government guidelines stipulate that wearing cloth face coverings helps slow the spread of Covid-19 and recommends washing hands before putting on the mask.

“They put their finger on the mask, and they take them off, and then they start touching their eyes and touching their nose and their mouth,” Mr. Trump said. “And then they don’t know how they caught it?”

Mr. Trump declined to say how far he believed the unemployment rate, currently at 13.3%, might drop by Election Day but expressed optimism that recent monthly record gains for jobs and retail sales signaled a quick recovery. Many economists project it could take years for the U.S. economy to recover, and recent increases in coronavirus cases in more than a dozen states are casting a cloud over reopening efforts.

“We will have created a lot of jobs prior to Nov. 3,” Mr. Trump said. “I expect a tremendous increase in GDP. And we’ll be heading for the top. We’ll be back.”

Asked to identify one new initiative he would undertake in his second term, Mr. Trump repeatedly pointed to actions taken the past three years. The president said his focus would be on building “a really strong, powerful economy,” suggesting his plan would rely on a combination of regulatory cuts and negotiating international trade deals.

Mr. Trump said China might have had economic motives for letting coronavirus spread beyond its own border. Asked if that was to extend economic consequences, Mr. Trump said: “Correct. They’re saying, man, we’re in a mess. The United States is killing us. Don’t forget, my economy during the last year and a half was blowing them away. And the reason is the tariffs.”

The president said he had no intelligence to support that claim, only an internal sense. He said there was a better chance it was incompetence or a mistake. “I don’t think they would do that,” Mr. Trump said about the possibility of Beijing letting coronavirus spread beyond China. “But you never know. But it has had an impact.”

The first major outbreak of the contagion was in Wuhan, the central Chinese city that recently tested nearly all of its 11 million people after a handful of fresh cases emerged last month. Mr. Trump said he wouldn’t seek to replicate such widespread testing if there was a similar re-emergence in the U.S.

“I personally think testing is overrated, even though I created the greatest testing machine in history,” Mr. Trump said, adding that more testing in the U.S. led to an increase in confirmed cases that “in many ways, it makes us look bad.”

While more testing does result in more cases, Dr. Fauci said in the interview this week that higher percentages of positive tests in many states “cannot be explained by increased testing.”


The seven-day rolling average of coronavirus tests that were positive in the U.S. was 4.6% as of Wednesday, according to the Covid Tracking Project. That trend has been relatively stable in June.

Mr. Trump spent a significant portion of the interview criticizing John Bolton, his former national-security adviser, for writing a scathing book about the president’s handling of foreign policy. In the book, Mr. Bolton says that Mr. Trump’s decision making prioritized his re-election over the national interest and that the president had a penchant for “giving personal favors to dictators he liked.”

“The only thing I liked about Bolton was that everybody thought he was crazy,” Mr. Trump said. “When you walk into the room with him, you’re in a good negotiating position, because they figure you’re going to war if John Bolton was there.”

On race issues, Mr. Trump said a black Secret Service agent told him the meaning of Juneteenth as the president was facing criticism for initially planning to hold his first campaign rally in three months on the day.

The rally is scheduled to be held in Tulsa, Okla., where, in 1921, a mob of white residents attacked and killed black community members, destroying a thriving black business district.


0:00 / 5:24
Juneteenth: What Companies and Employees Aim to Achieve
Juneteenth: What Companies and Employees Aim to Achieve
Companies are observing Juneteenth as a holiday for the first time following nationwide protests calling for racial equality. Employees up and down the corporate ladder explain what they hope the day will achieve. Photo: Bastiaan Slabbers/NurPhoto
Holding a rally on that day, particularly as racial protests continued throughout the country, was insensitive, African-American leaders told Mr. Trump. He eventually pushed the rally back a day to June 20.

“I did something good: I made Juneteenth very famous,” Mr. Trump said, referring to news coverage of the rally date. “It’s actually an important event, an important time. But nobody had ever heard of it.”


Mr. Trump said he polled many people around him, none of whom had heard of Juneteenth. Mr. Trump paused the interview to ask an aide if she had heard of Juneteenth, and she pointed out that the White House had issued a statement last year commemorating the day. Mr. Trump’s White House has put out statements on Juneteenth during each of his first three years.

“Oh really? We put out a statement? The Trump White House put out a statement?” Mr. Trump said. “OK, OK. Good.”

Forty-seven states and the District of Columbia commemorate or observe Juneteenth, according to a Congressional Research Service report released earlier this month. Some are calling on the three remaining states—North Dakota, South Dakota and Hawaii—to formally recognize the holiday as well. Companies including Twitter Inc. and Target Corp. have for the first time declared the day an official company holiday. Some activists are asking all workers to strike on the day in solidarity.

Mr. Trump said he hadn’t asked his black supporters or the Secret Service agent for their thoughts on removing the names of Confederate officers from 10 Army bases around the country. The president explained his opposition to the move, saying that the bases were named after Civil War generals as a way to help unite the North and the South. The bases were named during a period that began in 1917 and stretched into the 1940s, largely in response to white sentiment in Southern states.

“And now you’re going to take them off? You’re going to bring people apart,” he said.

Mr. Trump said he had no regrets over his controversial tweet at the start of the protests that “when the looting starts, the shooting starts.” The president said the tweet could be read as either a threat or a fact. Asked how he intended it, Mr. Trump said “a combination of both.”

Mr. Trump also said he wouldn’t have handled his walk to St. John’s Church in Washington, D.C., any differently. The decision to forcibly remove a crowd of peaceful protesters before he walked through Lafayette Square to a fire-damaged church and posed for photos drew broad criticism earlier this month, while garnering praise from some conservative backers.

He said he made the decision to visit the church “very quickly,” revealing a clue as to why his top military advisers later said they didn’t know the full details of the event and expressed regret about attending.

Mr. Trump said he didn’t bring any black supporters to the church because there were none at the White House. He said he held up a Bible for pictures instead of praying or reading a verse because it was “very, very noisy” from protesters several blocks away.

“You have people screaming all over the place, and I didn’t think it was exactly the right time to pray—I’m on the sidewalk,” Mr. Trump said. “And the church itself, I didn’t want to go in because they had a lot of insurance reasons. You know, the church was boarded up. The entire church was boarded up, and I knew that. So I went there, stood there, held up the Bible, talked to a few people and then we left. I came back, and I got bad publicity.”

Mr. Trump said he was eager to return to the campaign trail and looking forward to Saturday’s rally. “It’s going to be a hell of a night,” Mr. Trump said.

The rally in Tulsa will be Mr. Trump’s first since the outbreak of coronavirus. The city’s mayor said he can’t assure the health of rallygoers, some of whom have already started lining up outside the arena. The Trump campaign has said it would do temperature checks and provide masks to attendees, but won’t require they be worn. Mr. Trump said that some attendees might catch the virus, adding “it’s a very small percentage.”

Asked if he would be fine with Ivanka Trump, his eldest daughter and a senior White House adviser, sitting in the crowded audience inside the arena, he said he would. “First of all, she’s young,” he said, adding that elderly Americans were more likely to become severely ill or die from the disease.

Write to Michael C. Bender at Mike.Bender@wsj.com

[Blanquito]

Mr. Trump said testing for Covid-19 was overrated and allowed for the possibility that some Americans wore facial coverings not as a preventive measure but as a way to signal disapproval of him.

This should prompt a mask manufacturer to make a mask with "Screw You, Trump!" emblazoned across it.

[JCNorthway]

After today's Supreme Court ruling stopping his dismantling of the DACA program, he sent this tweet out -

“These horrible & politically charged decisions coming out of the Supreme Court are shotgun blasts into the face of people that are proud to call themselves Republicans or Conservatives,” Trump said in one tweet. “We need more Justices or we will lose our 2nd. Amendment & everything else. Vote Trump 2020!”

[Jay Winton]

Based on the Bolton book article in the WP, I think Pompeo may be walking the plank soon.

[JimHow]

Just watching Orange Head come off the plane in Tulsa tonight, I gotta raise his HQ to 60. Wow! Remember the mincemeat he left behind back in 2016? Here he comes, Dems, I hope you (we) are ready! Our victory is not just going to "happen."

HQ = 60.

Seriously, you know what raises it even more for me, the Nancy Pelosi Dems overplaying their hand and calling for vote canvassers, voting by mail, etc., etc.
Playing right into the hands of Herr Orange and Herr Barr, and the upcoming delegitimization of the vote....

[JimHow]

Watching the Orange speech in Tulsa.
Holy... fucking... shit.

[JimHow]

So...

The most fascist speech that I am aware of since World War II..

You guys and your polls...

Good luck, guys.

This is a MONSTER.

Major upgrade in the HQ for Donald "Harry Truman" Trump....

HQ = 75.

[Blanquito]

I guess we know how Jim is gonna vote...

[JimHow]

Biden. I just fear the arrogance of the left, Patrick, it is very weak when it comes to presidential politics.

[JimHow]

Watching Fox. They are in euphoria.
CNN not only didn’t cover it, they didn’t even mention it.

[Racer Chris]

So...

....

HQ = 75.

A lot of empty seats.
His audience is dwindling.

[JimHow]

Lol... Fake news?

[danzur]

https://twitter.com/RexChapman/status/1 ... 3875028992


The place wasn't even half full. They spun it after that protesters scared off his supporters and wouldn't let them in-which was not true. His support is dwindling. The millions of folks who were on the fence, didn't like Hillary, thought a new approach would be a good idea have all now seen that it was a bad idea. Childish behavior and Tweeting insults is not a good look for the leader of the USA. Those votes will mostly all go to Biden begrudgingly as we need someone in the White House to act like an Executive and an adult. What a mess this is, and what a mess the next 6-7 months will be.

[JimHow]

Ok, I will reduce the HQ back down to 59 after viewing all those empty seats.
But he was rabid last night, I watched about 90% of it.

HQ = 59.

[JimHow]

It is a volatile situation.

[Chateau Vin]

Watching Fox. They are in euphoria.
CNN not only didn’t cover it, they didn’t even mention it.

Our beloved BD seems to be watching too much of faux news and getting carried away... I am sure faux news didn’t pan the camera across all the empty seats. Never mind, the cancellation of outdoor speech and dismantling of outdoor set for the ‘overflowed’ rally attendees...lol...

[JimHow]

One one little thing that caught my attention in the past 48 hours:
Barr talking about rigged voting systems with the mail-ins, ballot-collection canvassing, etc.
Stay tuned for more....

[Chateau Vin]

One one little thing that caught my attention in the past 48 hours:
Barr talking about rigged voting systems with the mail-ins, ballot-collection canvassing, etc.
Stay tuned for more....

Yes, that is more concerning as Barr et al are making a concerted effort to put in place a DOJ process to delegitimize or invalidate lot of mail-in votes in the name of voter fraud or questionable votes...

[AKR]

That small point DJT made about fidgeting with masks is totally true though. I have a real hard time not scratching my nose when I'm wearing one. I can't imagine how workers who have to wear them all the time (like grocery/medical types) can deal with the itchiness & hotness.

[marcs]

Ok, I will reduce the HQ back down to 59 after viewing all those empty seats.
But he was rabid last night, I watched about 90% of it.

HQ = 59.

I can't believe this thread. Jim, you seriously watched that rambling garbled incoherent speech and thought it increased the chance of Trump winning?

Listen man, if you really believe your insane prediction then put your money where your mouth is. I will give you EVEN MONEY on Trump winning -- if Trump wins, you can pick any six bottles from my cellar and I will ship them to you. If Trump loses, I get to pick any six bottles from your cellar and you ship them to me. Deal?

If you really believe your nutty prediction above then you are getting excellent odds, I am giving you even money when you believe you have a 60-40 shot. If you don't believe it, stop saying it!