July 30, 2020

Before you obsess about Trump's comments about "delaying the Election"

This is NOT the next step in imposing a dictatorship. This is Trump free-associating as he does endlessly, and generating buzz which makes him the center of attention. He won't be delaying or canceling the election because he can't.

July 30, 2020

Joe Biden campaign ad: "Backbone"

7-figure ad buy in Ohio

July 30, 2020

Florida Closing All State-Run COVID-19 Testing Sites Ahead of Storm

Source: Spectrum News 9

As Florida struggles to contain an ongoing surge of COVID-19 cases, Tropical Storm Isaias formed late Wednesday in the Caribbean.

So, in preparation, the state is closing its testing sites at 5 p.m. Thursday.

Florida’s Division of Emergency Management said Wednesday in a news release that its testing sites simply can’t hold up to the threat of a potential tropical cyclone because they include tents and other free-standing structures.

“Remember, they’re just in tents so even if we get only 20 mph winds... even that’s the kinda thing that can blow over tents and can be a dangerous, so it does make sense why they just want to take the safe route and take the stuff down,” Spectrum News Meteorologist Brian McClure explained.

Read more: https://www.baynews9.com/fl/tampa/news/2020/07/29/florida-closing-all-state-run-covid-19-testing-sites-ahead-of-storm

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I guess, when it rains it pours...

July 30, 2020

UVA: Excluding Undocumented Immigrants from the 2020 U.S. House Apportionment

July 30, 2020

If Biden wants to double down on a 'third Obama term,' he should pick Susan Rice

Washington Post

This piece is part of a series where I make the strongest case for various possible Democratic vice presidential picks.

Joe Biden is an intensely conventional presidential nominee: a 77-year-old, White, male former vice president who has spent his career balancing the progressive and moderate wings of his party. When Biden won enough delegates for the presidential nomination, many expected him to pick a running mate with a traditional résumé: maybe California Sen. Kamala D. Harris, Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar or New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham.

While some of those candidates are reportedly still in the mix, a highly unconventional choice has entered the top tier. Susan E. Rice, who served as Barack Obama’s national security adviser and his ambassador to the United Nations — has confirmed that Biden is considering her for the vice presidential slot.

Rice has never pursued elected office, so it would be unusual for her to jump directly into the second most visible political job in the country. But Rice — who works well with Biden personally, reinforces his key campaign message and fills in some of his demographic gaps — would be a smart choice for this moment.

Rice’s biggest advantage in the veepstakes is her long relationship with Biden. Biden has emphasized that he needs to have a good working relationship with his vice president. He wants to delegate major policy problems to her, trusting that she’ll run with the ball and craft her own initiatives.

July 30, 2020

In Detroit summer school, temperature checks and health questions before math and reading

Washington Post

DETROIT — A morning line of second-graders waits patiently outside the entrance of Munger Elementary-Middle School on the city’s southwest side. Milagra Fernandez steps forward, and a staff member in a blue T-shirt emblazoned with “Auntie” starts running through her questions.

“No cough, sore throat or runny nose?” she asks. “No upset stomach? Having any problems with taste or smell?”

The staffer is wearing a white N95 mask. Milagra sports a rainbow-sequined version. The 7-year-old answers “no” again and again and then steps onto the sidewalk sticker that will keep her six feet from the boy who had just gone through the same drill. A few minutes later, the children are called in one by one, first to a long table with hand sanitizer, a bowl of extra surgical masks and a contactless thermometer for temperature checks. All get a prepacked breakfast, and another day of summer school officially begins.

Everyone in sight is masked and will remain so for the next four hours.

July 30, 2020

Rachel Bitecofer: Trump is losing big to Biden in voter polls. Here's how this will likely play out

CBS Marketwatch

“The only poll that matters is the one on Election Day.” This election adage gets tossed out pretty much every time a new political poll drops — a product of the many election night surprises seen over the years, where the winner of the election ended up being the loser of the polls.

This is exactly what happened in the 2016 U.S. presidential election, when key Midwestern states in the Democrats’ “Blue Wall” consistently produced leads for Hillary Clinton over Donald Trump that were well outside of the margins of error, but where Trump ended up with narrow victories — a trifecta of upsets for the record books.

The 2016 election has left many voters in 2020 with polling PTSD. During the Democratic primary period, Joe Biden, now the party’s presumptive nominee and then one of only two Democratic prospects with name recognition high enough to conduct head-to-head ballot tests against President Trump, enjoyed on average a 4.5-point advantage against Trump — just outside most survey’s margins of error.

Had the dynamics of the race stayed there, Democratic hand-wringing and poll-doubting would no doubt still be quite intense. At that time only my forecasting model was confident of a Biden victory in November’s general election. But a once-a-century global pandemic has altered American life, sent the U.S. economy into a tailspin, and tested America’s “chaos president” — a test many voters now say Trump is failing.

July 30, 2020

Pelosi: Republicans have a 'disdain' for working Americans

Source: The Hill

Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said late Wednesday that the Republican Party has a “disdain” toward working people as the lawmakers continue to clash during stalled negotiations over the next coronavirus stimulus package.

CNN host Anderson Cooper asked Pelosi if there was any progress made toward helping working-class people, with the added unemployment benefits included in the March coronavirus relief package set to formally expire on Friday.

Pelosi responded by saying her colleagues across the aisle do not trust how Americans without a job are using the additional $600-per-week federal benefit during the pandemic.

“While they have a disdain or sort of a condescension toward working people it seems because they don’t trust how they might use the $600. That kind of thing. ‘Oh, they have money to pay the rent. They are just not paying the rent,’” she said.

Read more: https://thehill.com/homenews/house/509726-pelosi-republicans-seem-to-have-a-disdain-for-working-americans

July 30, 2020

'Now it is your turn': John Lewis issues call to action in posthumous op-ed

Source: Politico

The late congressman and civil rights leader John Lewis revealed Thursday that he had been “inspired” in his final days by nationwide protests against racial injustice and police brutality.

In an op-ed authored shortly before his death and published on the day of his funeral by The New York Times, the Georgia Democrat reflected upon his own calling to join the civil rights movement following the lynching of Emmett Till.

But Lewis also used his posthumous column to pass the torch of social justice activism on to a new generation of Americans.

“While my time here has now come to an end, I want you to know that in the last days and hours of my life you inspired me. You filled me with hope about the next chapter of the great American story when you used your power to make a difference in our society,” he wrote.

Read more: https://www.politico.com/news/2020/07/30/john-lewis-posthumous-op-ed-387770

July 30, 2020

Dodd draws fire -- and praise -- as Biden VP vetter

Politico

As Joe Biden readies to make one of the biggest decisions of his political career — choosing a woman, and possibly a woman of color, as his running mate — he’s leaning on a 76-year-old male colleague from his days in the Senate for help.

Chris Dodd, a one-time Connecticut senator and lobbyist, is officially just one of four people on a vice presidential selection committee that’s been operating behind closed doors for months.

But this week he burst into public view after POLITICO reported Dodd complained to a prominent donor that Kamala Harris, the frontrunner in the veepstakes, had shown “no remorse” for tearing into Biden during the first Democratic primary debate last summer.


The backlash was swift.

“Chris Dodd” was soon trending on Twitter Monday morning. A chorus of voices asked whether Biden had wrongly empowered an old friend from his time in the overwhelmingly male Senate to steer his potentially historic pick. They accused Dodd of singling out Harris for the kind of behavior that's rarely criticized when a man does it — aggressively going after an opponent in a debate.