That's one of the hopes I have, as well - I think people are going to be voting early precisely because of these scares. There might not be a time when Trump actually leads in the states he needs to. There's no perfect time to call for a win if you're never ahead. That said, I wouldn't bank on it.

SI

That's what Barr's working on. Shit like the Luzerne County stunt are done to call all the voting into question.

Yep. That's a real shut down, but a lot of places didn't do that, did it haphazardly and at various strange times. Georgia, for one, never had a mask mandate (and the Governor tried to block cities from implementing their own. A lot of areas in suburban and rural GA openly defied limits on restaurants with no repercussions. And then the shutdown was lifted in 3 weeks while cases were rising (which also led to some people from other states flowing in).

If we all did the shutdowns as you note Boise did with a mask mandate for a month or month and a half things would have ended up much better. Even better outcomes would be if we started the shutdowns a week or two earlier than most areas did.

Agreed. To really have the kind of results most here are looking for, we would have needed to have a unified national plan - which isn't how our system works really, but consistent and responsible messaging would have gotten us closer to that - and much better competence & willingness when it comes to tracing and testing.

When I see shit like this, I start to think that the only thing that might keep me from voting on election day is because I get arrested for punching some dumb motherfucker in the mouth on the way in because he decided to get in my way.

My county typically goes 90% Republican, just FYI. And yet I can completely see stupid fuckers taking this seriously to keep the one Asian family, the 5 Latinos and the 2 black guys from voting blue twice.

This article seems to be a decent summary of the points being discussed here

China has almost eliminated Covid-19. What can the world learn? | WIRED UK

Definitely going to be some people shot on Election Day.

BiDeN IS iN MEntAlly dEcLIne:

Bill Maher created one of the best ads for the Democrats, ever. �� pic.twitter.com/30hc0nHcf6

— Mystery Solvent (@MysterySolvent) September 26, 2020

I honestly hope that is not the case, no matter how it goes, but when you have leadership that stokes the flames the way he does, it is sadly a strong possibility.

Right. That is where we are headed, and when he 100% declares victory "on election night" as he looks to be ahead in a variety of swing states based on in-person voting counted so far (not not all the mailed-in ballots having been counted yet), that will be the specific point in time that the moths remember. Suddenly the Americans who voted by other fully legal means will be criminals, illegals, fraudsters, and the like, and the Trumpster moths will argue with clear throats that those voters should all be ignored, if not prosecuted.

I am mortified at the prospect of "who has the guns in the right place" becoming what matters. But if you're not afraid of that as a potential outcome here, you're whistling past the graveyard.

Saw a good one on Twitter this football Saturday morning from the MediasTouch guys. Opens with full football stadiums full of cheering fans and then shows two together with the number 100,000 on each, the capacity of the stadiums...and how many have died from COVID-19 so far

A federal judge has ruled, in a case that might give precedent to other Trump appointees, that the the commisioner of the Bureau of Land Management, served unlawfully for 400+ days by not being confirmed by the Senate and that all actions he undertook may not be legal either. Very happy to see this because the guy's done some pretty horrible things as Commisioner and is as racist and conspiracy-filled as Trump it looks like:

Judge removes Trump’s public lands boss, William Perry Pendley, after governor sued – The Colorado Sun

That's really promising if it stands. We need to be fix the damage done by Trump's cadre of "so-and-so serving with the duties of a (position that's supposed to be confirmed)" that is such a naked end around of Congress.

SI

Turns out Dems could do more than tweet if they really wanted to.

Somehow the NYTimes got Trump's tax returns. A lot is going to come out, but here's the first morsel.

Just Posted: The NYT has obtained the president’s tax return information for thousands of personal and corporate returns going back decades. Here’s our first story. Watch this space for additional articles in the coming weeks. @russbuettner & @mmcintire https://t.co/0FJt4VkqWt

— Susanne Craig (@susannecraig) September 27, 2020

Sigh.

"You mean he's corrupt and sketchy? We had no idea."

Well that will certainly change the vote of literally anyone.

(It won't actually change the vote of literally anyone)

The only thing Trump could do to lose votes at this point would be to back down on the SCOTUS nominee and/or nominate a moderate.

Of course, there's not much he can do to gain votes either, which is why it's still a bit of a problem for him.

The tax returns might steal some news cycles, which is something, I guess. But Lord knows that October is going to be crazy season this year - there's going to be some weird crap thrown at the wall to see what sticks and I have no idea what that is going to be.

SI

Nothing is a safe bet. I think at this point the election simply comes down to what percentage of votes are counted.

I just had a preview of Thanksgiving on a call with my parents. I don't live in Louisville but I work downtown. They asked how long it would be until it was safe to go back and I told them that aside from a few isolated incidents, not much has happened. They reacted like I told them WWII was a small skirmish on an island in the Pacific, informing me that there was a ton of violence and that I need to stop watching "the alphabet channel." When I explained that I don't watch infotainment news and that this is a local news story for me that dropped off as the headline story about 2-3 days after the announcement, they told me I was crazy and should not go to work any time soon.

Meanwhile, my employer - who owns several buildings in downtown - is opening our offices as usual tomorrow morning. But of course, Fox News knows better...

Welcome to Portland.

My wife's younger brother came to visit this weekend and my wife's step-dad called last weekend to make sure it was safe for him to fly up with Antifa and BLM running up and down the coast starting fires so I get it.

As tax fraud comes out this is going to be very bad news for Trump. NY prosecutors don't give a shit about persuadable voters.

But his bigger problem is going to be the hundreds of millions in loans coming due with seemingly little way to pay them other than selling his properties.

The grifter will come up with some way to have his base build a go fund me to pay off these

Dude, he will just get another loan. This has been his m.o. for decades. Borrow to pay for other loans, file bankruptcy if you can't borrow more. This is how the rich stay rich.

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That's pretty easy if he's still the President, but if he's not...

That was the best political ad I have ever seen.

I like Doug Jones but he doesn't have much of a shot. Hopefully, if Biden wins, he has room for someone like him in the administration.

Literally the best political ad Doug Jones possibly could have run.

It has been about 25 years since the campaign for the 2016 election but didn't POTUS say he was going to fix the tax laws because he knew all of the loopholes and had been using them to avoid paying taxes? Did I dream that?

JPhillips, I hate to break this you, but he was doing this before he was president. He has filed bankruptcy several times, and yet banks still give him billions in loans. People like him never end up holding the bag, and he won't this time either.

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He's lost all of his domestic creditors and now has to rely on pretty shady foreign sources. They won't just refinance for a guy on trial for tax fraud. He's uniquely fucked because he's always been a shit businessman and he actually has lost the ability to get money from most banks.

(I realize I have several posts from last week that I should reply to. Busy times. Will try to get to it tomorrow.)

Meanwhile...Former Trump campaign manager Brad Parscale barricaded himself while armed in his Ft. Lauderdale home and threatened to harm himself.

He's been taken to the hospital and held under the Baker Act which is the Florida equivalent of a 5150 psychiatric hold

https://t.co/bEvAYLeAqv

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I found a looter.

Gee, I wonder if he did anything illegal.

A handful of months ago I would've insisted that Parscale was the person most entrenched in the Trump carnival.

so far I’ve seen two pretty liberal attorneys (one a friend from HS, the other on Twitter,) who are saying that this isn’t illegal, but is a commonly-used-by-the-wealthy legal loophole that only the super rich can afford to employ, and it points to how broken the system is.L, but probably not to a xrime

I'm sure FOX News will shortly be beating the drum about this isn't illegal and it actually shows how smart a businessman he really is .

Cocaine is a helluva drug

Man, that's pretty horrible-I'm glad he didn't hurt himself or his wife and is getting the help he needs now.

And a big FU to the all the people on Twitter cheering this news

Nono, I meant Parscale. This sounds like a flip-out after a realization of "oh crap, I'm screwed."

ahhhhh. Got it.

yes, and yes

Nothing to celebrate. Does suggest a guilty conscience, though.

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I think his real legal problems will come from using different valuations depending on what benefitted him the most. All of that in writing is a nightmare for the whole family.

I've just assumed that there are so many loopholes for this sort of crap if you're rich. I'm not sure how much they'll find that is illegal /illegal/. Not in a tax return, anyways. Though that might give some state attorneys general some juicy spots to go looking if they want to dig deeper into his finances. I mean, we should sure as hell be mad that a supposedly billionaire hasn't paid any taxes in a couple of decades but we'll get distracted by some jangly keys and/or "well, he's just smart".

SI

Agree, it's just sad that people would celebrate something like this. As contentious as these times are and as much as I despise so many associated with the Trump circus, I don't wish anything bad on any of them. It is the most basic of human tenets, that should be foremost in any decent humans mind.

Since we all know the official stance on Trump's taxes will eventually switch to "he never said he didn't pay taxes.", then to "he didn't pay taxes, but it doesn't matter." and eventually settling on "he didn't pay taxes, but that's smart!".....how much of a dipshit do you have to be to still openly buy in at "fake news"?? Asking for a half-dozen Facebook friends.

Also, there is a non-zero chance Trump just shuts down & walks out in the middle of a debate, right?