Stealing an election has to be an inside job. The Russians can offer help but they’re outsiders. The Republicans are the ones who will have to steal the election, although probably with Russian assistance.
If we look like Europe in 8 weeks because of diligent mask wearing, and the economy is reopening, and the stock market is doing well, people are travelling, Trump will coast to victory. People don’t look at absolute numbers (unemployment will still be high no matter what), but direction – if things are getting better, they will vote to keep the party going.
Yeah, that’s why the Lincoln Project was founded. Because of Trump’s stance of face masks.
On the other hand, the Federal law prohibiting evictions due to non-payment of rent expires tonight, the Senate is still unable to reach an agreement on another aid package for unemployed Americans (and the $600 weekly boost to unemployment expires this week, as well).
And, the Payroll Protection Program, which helped many small businesses keep their workers employed, ran out a few weeks ago, meaning that many small businesses are laying people off (or closing entirely).
Even if Trump manages to get people to wear facemasks now, it feels to me that August is going to be a medical and economic disaster for this country.
I don’t think Trump will be able to walk it back that easily. If people all start wearing masks and the result is the death rate drops, then the Democrats will run campaign ads showing Trump repeatedly speaking out against wearing masks. Trump will have demonstrably been on the wrong side of the issue.
Well, suffice it to say that you and I disagree on this point. His path to reelection has always been narrow, but then again his path to election in the first place was narrow. He certainly doesn’t need a significant number of people who voted against him in 2016 to vote for him. He just needs to eek out the same narrow margins in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan, maybe flip Minnesota or New Hampshire to provide some insurance.
And prior to coronavirus, with the economy humming and Democrats seemingly locked in an ideological battle for the soul of the party, this was a likely outcome. Sure, at this point and as a result of his own disastrous handling of the pandemic, he’s in a hole. But a lot of people who voted for him in 2016 would welcome an excuse to “come back home” if only to console themselves that they didn’t fuck up when they pulled the lever for him. Imagine a scenario in the fall where the pandemic has significantly receded, people are getting out of their houses, small businesses are bouncing back and a vaccine is on the horizon. Don’t get me wrong – even in this scenario, pretty much everything (unemployment, public health, state and local budgets) will be worse than it was before the pandemic. But the moment will be one of optimism, and that could accrue to the President’s benefit.
That’s pretty much my point. Trump barely got elected in 2016 and that was after a string of lucky events broke in his favor.
I live in a very red part of the country (Mitch McConnell’s turf), and the general consensus here is that Trump was pressured into wearing the mask. He’s only doing it to placate people.
Ooooh! Weak !
I think Trump’s about-face won’t save him. He lost a lot of support over coronavirus (especially among the elderly core who supported him) and I think this loss is a long-term loss.
When George W. Bush screwed up over Hurricane Katrina, Bush lost a lot of permanent support. I think this hurt Bush as much as screwing up the follow up to the Iraq War. The screw-ups hit in 2005, and three years later the Republicans were still carrying some damage. (And then came the mortgage crisis.)
We had an infectious disease emergency in Walkerton, Ontario in May of 2000. The Conservative government wore the blame for that, shortly after winning a majority government (in 1999). The premier stepped down before the election, and his second-in-command took over and lost big time in 2003. They carried that burden for three years.
And that’s probably the truth. Every once in a while, when the external pressure gets very high, those around Trump will persuade him to take a position that he doesn’t agree with. So he’ll make a nice speech which he didn’t write, and as long as he doesn’t deviate from the teleprompter, even do a good job at it. But you can tell his heart isn’t in it. And he’ll revert to his previous stance almost immediately. This is one of those occasions.
https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/10/politics/trump-mask-walter-reed-coronavirus/index.html
Trump’s decision to model a mask in public view and tout it during a Fox News interview Thursday night came after a quiet lobbying campaign by some White House aides and political advisers, aides familiar with the discussions said – some of whom were spooked by the sight of so many maskless Trump supporters at a rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma, last month and concerned by the surge of coronavirus cases in the South.
One presidential adviser described the effort as more than a week of “lots of negotiation” and repeated “pleading” by aides who urged the President to set an example for his supporters by wearing a mask on the visit.