US Elections 2020

[MrFanti]

I don't know enough about this, but it seems to me that just as there has been a transformation in the US with regard to its attitudes to the Roman Catholic church, I do wonder what impact churches might have on issues such as abortion, divorce and same-sex relationships. The assumption must be that people of 'faith' are more conservative than they are liberal. So your point about a cleavage between Christians and the Democrats must be taken seriously, with the question being on social policy, can the 45th President with his rhetoric of insult, abuse and hate really present himself as an authetic champion of 'Christian values' when he has none for himself?

So you are correct when it comes to the Catholic Church - no argument from me here. However, most of their "believer base" is still there. And that "believer base" regardless of how we feel here about abortion, divorce, and same-sex relationships see things differently than we members of this forum. But what I was eluding to earlier in my previous post is that if they (to include the Black church) are pushed by Democrats to a point where they feel their rights are threatened, then the Democrats might as well forget their vote. The question after that is IMHO whether or not this voting base moves towards an Independent arena or Republican.

[MrFanti]

One last thing...
With regards to the Hispanic community, they are not a "slam dunk" Democrat voting base which is why the Obama administration spent so much attention towards trying to capture the Hispanic voting base.
As you can see the below, the Hispanic community is divided somewhat like the Black community is.

https://www.oann.com/goya-foods-face...I0jqKyzMWDwSz8

[KnightHawk 2.0]

He either takes responsibility for the economy or the excess death toll and in my view most fair if it's both. We were told that we were going to tolerate more deaths because the economy is important. Everyone rational told him that the economy would tank even worse if he allowed outbreaks to get out of control.

People want to know what he could have done differently, the truth is everything. Every stupid thing that came out of his mouth, from his claim that 99% of people have no complications when the hospitalization rate is 20% to his refusal to wear a mask to his insistence that the cure is worse than the disease. His job was to inform people because maybe it's not so easy for everyone to digest what's going on....well apparently his cognitive difficulties are worse than most people's. Also consider his nauseating and disingenuous populism about how opening the economy was for the common man, who apparently would prefer to be ventilated in order to get a paycheck than to have the government provide reasonable assistance and subsidies.

He was so focused on number of cases but if there's a relevant scoreboard it's for deaths. And those people have family members who mourn them. And a large percent of those who died would not have died if our response was competent.

We talk about how us Democrats should want to nominate someone with an inspiring agenda. I completely agree. But as Trish said, we know the alternative. This guy is the alternative. Nearly started a catastrophic war with Iran. Made nuclear threats to North Korea on twitter. And has run the most incompetent, corrupt administration ever.

Completely Agree 1000%.

[fred41]

We talk about how us Democrats should want to nominate someone with an inspiring agenda. I completely agree. But as Trish said, we know the alternative. This guy is the alternative. Nearly started a catastrophic war with Iran. Made nuclear threats to North Korea on twitter. And has run the most incompetent, corrupt administration ever.

I liked your answer and pretty much agreed, except for this last paragraph. You should have ended it after the second sentence...if we’re being honest. Why?...lol...name any Republican you can think of that you would definitely vote for against Biden in this election.

[broncofan]

I liked your answer and pretty much agreed, except for this last paragraph. You should have ended it after the second sentence...if we’re being honest. Why?...lol...name any Republican you can think of that you would definitely vote for against Biden in this election.

I see your point. Fortunately for me when you hit the thumbs up it's a yes or no kind of thing, so no exceptions

[Stavros]

We are through then since your obvious bias has clouded your ability to look at this based on facts.
Note that I've given credit where due to BOTH Obama and Trump.

That being said, I do hope that you've learned a bit more about our Black American community than what's been shown to you.

It is a pity you choose to end a debate by not addressing its issues -for example, my argument that this President has not done good things for Black Americans if they are a) disabled, and b) have severe financial debts owing to family illness. How Black Americans have experienced the general issues that affect Americans is just as important as those which you claim are specific to them, which does tend to collapse a more general problem into a 'black' one.

It means you avoid talking about drugs, gangs and above all, guns, guns, and then guns. How many people would have been shot in Chicago last weekend if the men involved did not have such ease of access to guns? The 2nd Amendment is the death warrant of America, not just its Black ciizens.

It means you avoid the structural issues in the US economy which has seen a significant decline in manufacturing jobs that Black Americans had access to -why else did they migrate from the South to North, or South to West (ie, California)? Globalization is being used as an excuse to emphasise National rather than than global economics, but is it the case that service sector jobs rather than manufacturing jobs have left Black Americans worse off, and is it not the case that Black Americans are most likely to suffer from job losses if it is the urban economy that changes most as businesses adapt to Covid 19?

What I think is crucial, that you have also avoided, is, since the 1970s of the decline of Blue Collar support for the Democrats, but the rise of the public or civil servant as the foundation of the party's electoral support. It is, I think, one of the few areas where developments in the UK have also been found in the US: as the working class vote in the UK for Labour declined after 1979 -think of Thatcher's three consecutive election victories- so the Party found its most loyal voters in local government, and public services such as health, education and transport. As markets failed, or succeeded in the pure sense that to survive, capitalism exported jobs from Europe and North America to Asia and Latin America (less so to Africa), so the State, be it central/Federal government, or as defined in the US, State and County authorities, stepped in to compensate, with the result on one level that millions of Americans now work for some form of State authority. On another level this is where Libertarians like you step in to criticize this process, though you have not told us what happens when markets fail -or maybe that this form of Keynesian economics produces hardened arteries in the economy that means it doesn't work efficiently.

The critique of the EPA you offered last year, I think it was, was if I recall based critically on its efficiency as a Federal agency, but however it is run, has the US since 2016 advanced the cause of environmental politics and its issues by making it easier for industrial businesses to damage and pollute the environment? While many jobs in the EPA have been shredded, some if not all I assume with your blessing, has it made a positive difference, or is it not the case that basic rights local people have to clean water and unpolluted rivers and streams have been replaced by no rights at all? How many of the residents of Flint, Michigan, whose water from the tap was/is brown and undrinkable, are Black? Is that water problem their fault?

Finally, the point for African Americans, and tell me if I am wrong about this, is that with or without a college degree, most of the routes into a steady job are found in Federal/State/County agencies, that without this 'salariat' the Democrats would not have the solid base that they need to take care of if they are to win elections, even before they seek the votes of other workers. And is it also not the case, that when the axe is taken to such jobs, it is Black workers who are at the front of the redundancy line?

I can't force you to debate these issues, but I feel there is a lot more going on than can be expressed in your frustration with some of the very real problems Black Americans face at work and at home, and many of them are not unique but can be found in all sorts of places. That this Republican Party is indifferent to most of the USA is what undermines its claim to represent them, and not just because they are in effect, a minority party themselves. There is some sort of crisis in the US when it comes to defining what is good for the collective mass of Americans and the Individual, you can see it played out with some of the nonsensical things some Americans on tv (as shown on Channel 4 News in the UK last night) have said about wearing, or not wearing a mask in public. And perhaps nothing confirms the trend to individualism at the expense of the country, is the President pardoning his friends because he has attempted to re-write history, or shall we say, without the statues, erase the history he doesn't approve of, and replace it with his own -an illegal campaign that resulted in an enquiry and jail time, is now a 'hoax'. But when Bolton says on numerous occasions in his book that the President cannot and does not distinguish between his personal interests and the interests of the USA it is logical for him to pardon criminals if they are his mates- and to criminalize his enemies. That it makes the USA look like a Banana Republic does not seem to matter to a lot of people, but how can we, in the UK, trust a nuclear-armed power when the Head of State is so unworthy of our trust?

[Stavros]

In the case of Roger Stone I should correct my point at the end, Stone has had his prison sentence commuted, he was not pardoned.

[blackchubby38]

I liked your answer and pretty much agreed, except for this last paragraph. You should have ended it after the second sentence...if we’re being honest. Why?...lol...name any Republican you can think of that you would definitely vote for against Biden in this election.

I can think of two Republicans that I would vote for against Biden in this election. The former governor of Ohio, John Kasich and the current one Mike Dewine.

[MrFanti]

I can think of two Republicans that I would vote for against Biden in this election. The former governor of Ohio, John Kasich and the current one Mike Dewine.

Yes..
Biden is like the Romney/McCain of the Democrats - MUCH better Democrat candidates who should be in there instead of Biden.

[MrFanti]

Why?...lol...name any Republican you can think of that you would definitely vote for against Biden in this election.

Just like Sith
Why should one vote Republican or Democrat only?

But since you've limited yourself to one 2 parties, I'll still answer your question. Susan Collins, and BLACK moderate Republican Will Hurd are 2 that I would definitely pick over Biden.