Posts Made By: James Brown

Rod likes to point out that the red states have been hammered by corvid this summer more severely than the blue states.  Obviously Rod is not very gracious in his approach, but I think his underlying point is indisputable.  Rod focuses on only one cause, when there are probably many factors affecting vaccination and infection rates.  

Anyway, a picture is worth a thousand words, so I manipulated the Worldometer graphs below in two ways.  First I squished the Texas graph down so that the native y axis units (total infections or deaths/day) matched the California y axis units exactly.  Then I stretched to Texas y axes back up by a factor of 1.36 x, since California has a population 1.36 times that of Texas.  Easy to do with PowerPoint, and I think quite accurate.  Now the graphs show the Covid infection and death rates, matched to account for population.  Apples to Apples.  The difference in the summer Delta wave between CA and TX is pretty dramatic.  

On the other hand, the differences in the pre-vaccination fall and winter of 2020 wave is not that noticeable.   This gives some ammunition to the anti-mask crowd, I suppose, since I imagine (don't really know) that mask discipline in CA was/is greater than that in Texas.  Jim

Originally Posted by Rod Kaufman

You're wrong, Jim.
https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/573040-poll-trump-dominates-2024-republican-primary-field
and:

https://www.cnn.com/2021/09/12/politics/cnn-poll-donald-trump-republicans/index.html

Hi Rod:

A poll taken three years before the election measures one thing only - name recognition.  If you weren't from Illinois the odds of you knowing the name Barack Obama three years before his election were close to 0%.  No one denies that Trump has enormous name recognition.  I'm counting on someone rising to the challenge of uniting the party and running against Biden, Harris, or whomever the D nominee might be.  Sure, I could be disappointed.  Have been many times before.

Jim

Originally Posted by Rod Kaufman

I think you need to do yourself a favor and have your cognitive functions evaluated, preferably today, by a physician. 

There you go, proving Jim M's point.  There really is no need to be such a tool, Rod.  Some folks simply can't be civil - it's in their DNA I guess.  Are you one of them?

Jim

Originally Posted by Greg Shaffer

I didnt buy it the 1st time around and this time is no different.....Trump does have his flaws but they are demonstrated pretty much every time he speaks publicly. 

Hi Greg:

Obviously I think less of Trump than you do, but I agree that the dossier was likely bogus as subsequent investigations proved.  You mentioned earlier that Trump is likely to run again...  If he does run again (and I hope he doesn't, but no one is going to ask me!) I can't believe that the Democrats would be so lame as to recycle the Steele Dossier.  My guess is that a move like that would turn off more voters than it attracted.  Only the hard core 40% (or so) of the D base thinks that the Russia collusion affair was based in reality.  The dossier and things like it are great for turning out that hard-core base, but would it be enough?

Trump has his approximately 40% too of course, so the primary concern if I were a strategist on either side would be how do I reach the 20% who might be persuaded one way or the other.

Jim

Originally Posted by Mel Maki

Well, I can hope the numbers are lower, a third for each and a third undecided?

Hi Mel:

Maybe, and I'd like a 1/3, 1/3, 1/3 split.   No doubt you are close to correct if we look at raw R, D, and Independent numbers.  I think I read that the D's have a slight advantage overall.

I'm guessing the 40% is closer to true for the rock bottom support level for a president.  That 40% might include some strong independent supporters for each candidate.  At the very end of Trump's term, after the "stop the steal" stunt and the riot at the Capital, I doubt Trump was getting positive job approval ratings from anyone except genuine die-hard supporters. His average approval number then was 39%.

If each party has 40% of the likely votes in the bag, then it does give the persuadable 20% a lot of power.  

Jim

Originally Posted by Rod Kaufman

Jim,
Do you agree parts of the Steele dossier, as noted in this link, are true?

https://www.newsweek.com/trump-russia-dossier-true-proven-929839

Of course - Russia meddled, that is what they do.  Russia had dirt on HRC, duh.  Who would expect otherwise?  None of the "true" stuff proves that Trump colluded with Russia, which would have been a very big deal, if proved.  Do you agree with the conclusion on criminal collusion reached by the Mueller team?  

Originally Posted by Rod Kaufman

Jim,
Do you agree parts of the Steele dossier, as noted in this link, are true?

https://www.newsweek.com/trump-russia-dossier-true-proven-929839

Here's what I think is important Rod; bits and pieces of the collusion mythology may be true, but these bits and pieces do not add up to Russia and Trump colluding to sway an election.  

I like Matt Taibbi's reporting on the collusion myth.  As you probably know he was formerly a prominent political writer for the Rolling Stone.  He is no conservative.  In his opinion, journalism as an industry face planted on the Russiagate story.  They so wanted it to be true, that they abandoned all pretense of journalism.  

Some of this stuff below is dated, some is new, this is just a sampling.  In my opinion,  Taibbi is one journalist who kept a clear head even though he hates Trump as much as anyone.

https://taibbi.substack.com/p/konstantin-kilimnik-russiagates-last

https://taibbi.substack.com/p/aaugh-a-brief-list-of-official-russia

https://taibbi.substack.com/p/russiagate-is-wmd-times-a-million

https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/political-commentary/christopher-steele-britain-insanity-909539/

Originally Posted by Rod Kaufman

You and the polls are a million miles apart:
https://www.cnn.com/2021/09/15/politics/cnn-poll-most-americans-democracy-under-attack/index.html
https://www.grinnell.edu/news/52-americans-believe-democracy-facing-major-threat
The main reason is Trump's big lie and that is what January 6th was all about...

According to a new Gallup poll, 41% of Americans now believe we are visited by aliens in spacecraft.  Gallup is the gold standard of polls of course.  https://news.gallup.com/poll/350096/americans-believe-ufos.aspx  This is more than approve of Biden's presidency, which is pretty darned scary and amazing. 

In my opinion, anyone who thinks democracy is under legitimate threat because of the the morons who rioted and committed various crimes on Jan 6, (A) has no appreciation of the robustness of our democracy, and (B) is about as smart as those who believe we are visited by alien spacecraft.  Do the folks who think that Trump actually came close to motivating a legitimate and potentially successful insurrection on the 6th think whack-a-doodles in buffalo hats are going to stand up to a coordinated police presence? the army?  the national guard?

To misquote Aragorn (from the movie), 'there may come a day when the great US democracy fails, but January 6, 2021 is not that day.'  Aren't most of the rioters who actually breached the Capitol being prosecuted?  Frankly I have not been following the story.  What more do we need than effective prosecution, conviction and sentencing of the miscreants?

Some percentage of voters believes Trump's big lie, that the steal was on.  There is not much we can do about such foolishness.  Just as there is not much we can do about the 41% who believe we are visited by space aliens.  Democracy will survive stupidity.

Jim


  

Originally Posted by Rod Kaufman

Jim,
I wish it were that simple and I wish I could agree with you but, most unfortunately, it goes far beyond what you've stated. 
The Republican party is the party of Trump. Republicans who are advancing his big lie are the ones who are enacting a myriad of voter restriction laws throughout the red states based upon the lie of election fraud. Republican candidates are running on this lie and have a cult like following in a number of states including candidates who advocate endless election audits and/or who will be in a position to overturn the results of an election if they don't agree with the results. This is part of a co-ordinated plan within the GOP to maintain power, not on the merits of what the voters want or on the merits of any sort of a coherent political platform but, rather, a thinly veiled scheme to prevent any erosion in the grip of the states they reside in.

Pretty sure we won't reach agreement on this Rod, so I'll let it go.  I do run with a lot of Republicans at work and in my family.  (Lot's of Democrats too).  In my circle of acquaintances, I'm not seeing the R party as "the party of Trump."  I totally understand that this is how the press and D's are characterizing the R party, and I expect it to continue for a long time.  Jim

Originally Posted by Jim Moscheck

Dude, I didn't write the story. It's breaking news. The names are being withheld, but they said they will openly testify to congress.

Hi Jim:

I think I agree with Rich here - although he used too many words, so I quit reading his diatribe.  There is absolutely nothing wrong with organizing a rally of course.  rallies are Constitutionally protected speech and association.   Did these guys organize a break-in at the capitol or otherwise conspire to commit a crime?  That would be big news.  

Jim