U.S. Politics: End Testing, Make Schools Safe Again!

[TrackerNeil]

5 hours ago, Martell Spy said:

The new administration drive to absolve Trump of responsibility and to speed up economic activity by encouraging people to go back to work follow the President's previously misjudged gamble to goad states that are now suffering terribly from the pandemic to open before they had properly suppressed the virus. 

It's utterly bananas that anyone thinks that the economy is suffering primarily due to restrictions, and not looming fear of infection and death. It is equally incredible that, three months before an election, Republicans are moving to make things harder for Americans impacted by the economic effects of the pandemic. I kinda-sorta understand the motivation--the GOP is reenacting the Masque of the Red Death in order to make Americans feel normal and boost Trump's chances in November. However, the party might want to read that story again, to remind themselves how it ended.

[mormont]

14 hours ago, Tywin et al. said:

cheap condoms.

Not an area where one ever wants to cheap out.

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

2 hours ago, mormont said:

Not an area where one ever wants to cheap out.

Well Planned Parenthood gives you a giant bag of them for free each time you go in.

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

So Art Laffer was just on T.V., sounding even more uninformed about economics and politics than I did when I was 12. Why have we let this man do so much damage to our country and the world overall? He should have been fired a long time ago. Out of a cannon. Into the Sun.

[Guest]

34 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

So Art Laffer was just on T.V., sounding even more uninformed about economics and politics than I did when I was 12. Why have we let this man do so much damage to our country and the world overall? He should have been fired a long time ago. Out of a cannon. Into the Sun.

Seconded. Make sure to reserve space for Stephen Moore also.

[Jace, Extat]

8 minutes ago, The Great Unwashed said:

Seconded. Make sure to reserve space for Stephen Moore also.

I called ahead, but space assured me we won't need a reservation. They have plenty of space.

[Fez]

This CNN article on the latest Supreme Court term is kind of amazing: https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/27/politics/john-roberts-supreme-court-liberals-daca-second-amendment/index.html

There's not really any earth-shattering information in there, but there is a level of detail that you almost never get about the court because the court basically never has leaks about anything. I guess a law clerk decided to talk; and I hope for their sake that it isn't found out who, because otherwise their career is done.

The big takeaway is that Roberts has been even more influential behind the scenes than it would appear, and was like that from the start of the term. For instance it is noted that Roberts was a vote to save DACA from the very beginning, there was no late flip like he did with the 2012 ACA case or 2019 census case. There was also a case about copyright law, where he took the majority away from Thomas when he didn't like the direction things were going (this was the odd April case where the final majority was Roberts, Kavanugh, Gorsuch, Kagan, and Sotomayor; Ginsburg and Breyer had one dissent and Thomas and Alito a different dissent). And the article confirms that he's strongly hinted that he doesn't want to further expand second amendment rights, which is why no gun cases were taken up for the coming year. It also sounds like Kavanaugh usually closely follows his direction on cases.

Also importantly, he has run with an iron fist how the court operates during the pandemic and setup protocols for how the remote hearings work that are different from regular hearings (e.g. questions get asked in order of precedence, which begins with him, rather than a free for all). And interestingly, they aren't using any video conferencing software, it's just an old fashion phone conference line that they're all on.

[Zorral]

5 hours ago, TrackerNeil said:

It's utterly bananas that anyone thinks that the economy is suffering primarily due to restrictions, and not looming fear of infection and death. It is equally incredible that, three months before an election, Republicans are moving to make things harder for Americans impacted by the economic effects of the pandemic. I kinda-sorta understand the motivation--the GOP is reenacting the Masque of the Red Death in order to make Americans feel normal and boost Trump's chances in November. However, the party might want to read that story again, to remind themselves how it ended.

They are disappearing cases now.  The 'reporting' of the numbers has been given to a private company and thus suddenly the numbers for USA new cases are supposedly flattening, even as they increase in the hot spots every day, according to local and hospital numbers.

 

[Jace, Extat]

https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/27/health/florida-covid-children-hospitalizations/index.html

Ring around the dead kid,

pocket full of covid

Sent to school with a back-strapped-pack

Becca wears a mask but held hands with Jack

Mommy starts to cough

Daddy gonna die

Jack's folks are too smart to buy the covid lie

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

2 hours ago, The Great Unwashed said:

Seconded. Make sure to reserve space for Stephen Moore also.

No, there must be balance. Moore gets fed to the sharks. 

2 hours ago, Jace, Basilissa said:

I called ahead, but space assured me we won't need a reservation. They have plenty of space.

Perhaps......
 

 

[DMC]

Eye-popping North Carolina poll from NBC/Marist:  Biden up 51/44, Cunningham up 50/41, and Cooper up 58/38 (!).

[Fragile Bird]

Geez, what could go wrong in the next 99 days...

[DireWolfSpirit]

So if you've been getting 600 a week under the enhanced unemployment benefit it sounds like you could expect the new figure to be around 200 a week according to the latest article I saw.

Eta: 70% wage replacement seems to be the target goal for the policy. Currently avg worker making roughly $933 weekly. Average state unemployment being roughly $373 with the extra 200 giving laid off worker around $573 in replaced wages under the proposal, which sounds close to the 70% they are shooting for.

[DMC]

1 minute ago, DireWolfSpirit said:

So if you've been getting 600 a week under the enhanced unemployment benefit it sounds like you could expect the new figure to be around 200 a week according to the latest article I saw.

That's the GOP's negotiating position.  We'll see what the final result is.  It'd be nice if they could just split the difference and call it 400 so they can pass the damn thing already, but that way too much sense for Congress.

[Jace, Extat]

Now that Republicans have opened at $200 the proper course is to end negotiations. 

"The people deserve the right to have their voices heard regarding how much assistance they are worth. Because we Democrats know it's a helluva lot more than $200 bucks a month."

Take Mitch's 2016 line, wrap it up with a hint of Andrew Yang's bribery attempt, feast.

[DireWolfSpirit]

4 minutes ago, DMC said:

That's the GOP's negotiating position.  We'll see what the final result is.  It'd be nice if they could just split the difference and call it 400 so they can pass the damn thing already, but that way too much sense for Congress.

Yeah they need to get this settled, millions in stress over the damn uncertainty and people are hurting financially right now.

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

23 minutes ago, DMC said:

Eye-popping North Carolina poll from NBC/Marist:  Biden up 51/44, Cunningham up 50/41, and Cooper up 58/38 (!).

Aren't most polls kind of eye popping these days?

5 minutes ago, DMC said:

That's the GOP's negotiating position.  We'll see what the final result is.  It'd be nice if they could just split the difference and call it 400 so they can pass the damn thing already, but that way too much sense for Congress.

Are you gonna become a gigolo for me to make up the difference? If not keep your mouth shut and continue teaching children how to sell loosies. It's not like you want them to turn to lives of hard crime in these desperate times, after all. Have some respect for your community.

[DMC]

Just now, Tywin et al. said:

Aren't most polls kind of eye popping these days?

I don't know what this means.  Biden's 538 average is 3 points, that's why the lead is eye popping compared to other polls.  Plus Cooper up by 20.  I'd say Cunningham's margin is surprising too, but actually quite a few polls lately have shown him up by that much.

3 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

Are you gonna become a gigolo for me to make up the difference? If not keep your mouth shut and continue teaching children how to sell loosies. It's not like you want them to turn to lives of hard crime in these desperate times, after all. Have some respect for your community.

Another failed attempt at humor I see.  And I don't teach children.  Well, they're not legally children.  Either way, I'm the one who's unemployed right now so I'd say I have a vested interest.

[Fez]

Marist still isn't weighting by education (though they claim to be doing other stuff to keep their polls accurate). Until they start doing that, I don't think we can consider them a gold standard poll anymore.

They had a pretty bad Dem lean in 2018, and it's almost certainly still there.

[DMC]

3 minutes ago, Fez said:

They had a pretty bad Dem lean in 2018, and it's almost certainly still there.

That's not how I remember it, and 538 has their partisan lean at R +0.3.