Donald Trump Archives - Page 24 of 56

Voting for the incumbent, save one

Paul Tonko v. Liz Joy

I voted yesterday, in person, at one of the six polling places in Albany County, and the only one in the city of Albany. I voted by mail in the June primary. Now my fear of being disenfranchised is greater than the threat of COVID.

If you don’t know who I voted for in the Presidential race, I’ve been far too subtle. There are three Congressional races in this television market. Only one, of course, is for my district.

NY-19

South of here is the 19th Congressional district. The incumbent is Anthony Delgado (D), who won the nomination in a very crowded primary field in 2018. In that general election, he knocked off one-term Congressman John Faso, plus two other candidates, including Diane Neal, formerly on the TV show Law and Order: SVU.

In 2020, Delgado is running against Kyle Van De Water (R), as well as Steven Greenfield (Green) and Victoria Alexander (Libertarian). But I’ve only seen Delgado commercials here, mostly him touting how he keeps in touch with his constituents, even during a pandemic.

NY-21

The most contentious race in the area is in the 21st district, north of here, between incumbent Elise Stefanik (R) and Tedra Cobb (D). This is a rematch of their 2018 race, which the Republican won by 13.7 percentage points. Stefanik had replaced retiring incumbent Bill Owens (D), beating Aaron Woolf (D) handily back in 2014.

Both campaigns use a combination of inspirational and negative ads. Stefanik touts helping small businesses in her district, sort of helping to make pizza. She’s with a group of police officers when she, and they, note they “back the blue”; she’s even wearing blue jeans, perhaps to emphasize the point. She paints Cobb as a tax-and-spend liberal.

Cobb portrays Stefanik, who appeared at the 2020 Republican National convention, as a Trump clone. Her best ad shows her and her adult daughter discussing the fragility of having health coverage.

NY-20

In my district, the 20th, Paul Tonko (D) was first elected in 2012. He had been a long-time member of the New York State Assembly. I could name none of his opponents prior to this year.

In August, I saw a couple of lawn signs, not far from my house, for Liz Joy. I have no recollection of lawn signs from any of Tonko’s previous opponents.

Then she ran this damn TV ad. She’s leading a bunch of women down the streets and spouting some law-and-order blather. She suggesting Paul Tonko and the Democrats are seeking to destroy the police and the country. I was appalled with the Sarah Palinesque tactic. If I saw her, I’d say, “Oh, come ON, Liz! Tonko as a wide-eyed radical?”

I met Liz Joy once. She was a blogger for the Times Union, though her blog is down for the duration of the campaign. Mike Huber, who was the blogmeister at the time, wanted to find some more conservative voices, and she qualified.

One of the other TU bloggers had a small gathering – six or eight of us – at their apartment, perhaps in the late autumn of 2016, and she was invited. There’s a photo somewhere. She was very pleasant. We DIDN’T talk politics at all.

The one ad I saw of Tonko’s was a fairly boring one about him serving his constituents. I don’t know him, but I’ve run into him several times. He’d be at an Underground Railroad event, an economic development session, the 50th anniversary of FOCUS churches celebration, and the like. If he’s in town, and not in DC, he’s meeting the citizens.

Liz Joy would not be unsurprised that I am voting for Paul Tonko.

The infodemiology of QAnon

I’ve grown numbingly accustomed to the bizarre, the phony, the dishonest in public discourse. Still, when IMPOTUS retweeted the notion that the Benghazi raid was staged, I shook my head. And what was the presumed rationale? “To cover up a Navy SEAL blood sacrifice.” This literally hurt my head.

“The account… promoting the link also has ties to the QAnon movement, a far-right conspiracy theory that Democrats are running a Satanic pedophile cannibal ring.” Of course, it did.

My buddy Jeff Sharlet wrote in Vanity Fair this month about how QAnon crept into his mind and “turned conspiracy into reality.”

Jeff notes: “What Trump is describing is no more nor less exotic than the popular evangelical concept of spiritual war, the conflict thought to be raging always, around us and within, between believers and ‘principalities’ and ‘powers,’ according to Ephesians, or demons, in the contemporary vernacular.

“QAnon has translated the concept from King James into Trumpish, but Trump is no more reading Q ‘drops’ than undead John-John, JFK Jr., is writing them.”

You DO know that they think the late son of the 35th President is alive? The article in Rolling Stone from July 2019 describes that absurd theory.

Newsweek reports that scientists are taking aim at the “misinformation pandemic.” But it likely won’t help. “The technology has generally done more to help those who purvey this misinformation than those trying to defend against it,” says Travis Trammell, an active-duty Army lieutenant colonel skilled in the field.

“The explosion of disinformation that has upended American life and now threatens its democratic institutions has given rise to a new branch of science called ‘infodemiology.’ Inspired by epidemiology, the study of how diseases spread through a population, infodemiology seeks to understand how misinformation and conspiracy theories spread like a disease through a free-wheeling democracy like America’s, with the ultimate goal of understanding how to stem its spread.”

Super-spreader-in-chief

How do you stem its spread when IMPOTUS, on national television, sidesteps the question about QAnon? First, he says that he doesn’t know about them. This is unlikely, “particularly because the FBI labeled the movement as a domestic threat more than a year ago.”

Then he asserted, “Let me just tell you what I do hear about it is they are very strongly against pedophilia and I agree with that… And I agree with it very strongly.” (N.b.: we’re all against it.) QAnon supporters embraced his support.

In the past couple of years, the Guardian reports that “kidnappings, car chases and a murder appear to have been fueled by belief in a fictional narrative.”

In fact, QAnon is a convoluted conspiracy theory. “The heart of it asserts that… the anonymous ‘Q’ has taken to the fringe internet message boards of 4chan and 8chan to leak intelligence about Trump’s top-secret war with a cabal of criminals run by politicians like Hillary Clinton and the Hollywood elite. There is no evidence for these claims.”

Hear, if you can stand it, how some people get sucked into QAnon.

Did I mention the 2020 Congressional candidates who appear to be true believers? And at least one of them will make it.

It’s difficult to dissuade someone of a lie when they are convinced there MUST be “something to it.” QAnon is one more reason I fret about America in 2020.

Worrying about the fate of Social Security

FICA

There was a television ad from the White House incumbent’s campaign I’ve seen several times. It said that he’d always support Social Security and Medicare. As someone who is dependent on both, I was wary.

An article in USA Today addressed this a few months ago. He did not say he would terminate Social Security. “The posts [from Social Security Works] came after Trump signed a series of executive orders on August 8 intended to provide relief from the detrimental economic impact of the coronavirus pandemic.”

The concern comes from the fact that “the vast majority of Social Security is financed through the payroll tax, according to the Social Security Administration.

“One of the Aug. 8 executive orders instructed the Treasury Department to allow employers to defer payment of payroll taxes for employees who make less than $100,000 each year… The order also instructed Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin to “explore avenues, including legislation, to eliminate the obligation to pay the taxes deferred.”

Where’s the money?

And the regime promised to eliminate the payroll tax altogether. “It’s a tremendous saving for people. And we’re going to be doing it, and we intend to terminate it at the end of the appropriate period of time.”

Where would the revenue come from then? “We’ll be paying into Social Security through the general fund.” And that is scary to me. If re-elected, he “could continue to defer the payroll tax with executive orders.”

However, “he could not eliminate the payroll tax entirely or provide a new source of funding for Social Security without support from Congress.” Right. A dysfunctional Congress dealing with massive debt from a pandemic.

As USA Today admitted, “In defense of its posts, Social Security Works argued that advocating for termination of the payroll tax and termination of Social Security are the same. The payroll tax is known as the Federal Insurance Contribution Act tax, after all.”

In the October 2020 AARP Bulletin, the incumbent repeated the claim that he would not cut Social Security. “I’m looking at numbers now that look like the best quarter ever in terms of hiring people.” In other words, Social Security will be paid for by projected economic growth. Of course, he has been known to…let’s say, abandon the truth.

Conversely, his opponent, Joe Biden said in the same publication that he “would not change payroll taxes for anyone making less than $4000,000. However, “everyone making more than that will pay the same payroll tax on wages over $400,000 ss they pay on their first $137,000.” This would, Biden claims, make Social Security “secure for a long, long time.”

As Buffalo Springfield once sang, “You know what they say about a bird in the hand.” I like my safety nets paid for.

October rambling: showering less

Covita

From https://wronghands1.com/2020/09/22/abridged-cinema-the-wizard-of-oz/

Thomas, Alito Urge SCOTUS to ‘Fix’ Marriage Equality

Climate Change Activists Warn California’s First Gigafire Is the Sign of Things To Come

Policy Lab’s resource page specifically for clinical research associated with bullying and Cyberbullying in the Age of COVID-19

Why People Dropped Out of the Labor Force

The Final Five Percent re: traumatic brain injuries

He Faced Down Entrepreneurship’s Hidden Demons –and Emerged a Better Leader

Two Ticks (voting in New Zealand)

Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: Election 2020

Debt Collectors Are Thriving This Year — and Now They’re Filing Even More Suits

Flights to Nowhere Are the Weirdest COVID Trend

How the English language spread around the world

Shaun Rootenberg: profile of a romance scammer

Grandson of 10th U.S. president dies at 95

‘Clean’ Author Makes The Case For Showering Less

The economics of vending machines

Inside Cameo, the celebrity shoutout app hungry for fame and Notes from a user

Grapefruit Is One of the Weirdest Fruits on the Planet

Subway bread is not bread, Irish court rules

Is Pandemic Brain Changing Your Taste in Music? You’re Not Alone

If Donald Got Fired – Randy Rainbow (featuring Patti LuPone!)

MUSIC

Balm in Gilead – MUSE/IQUE (vocalists Ben Harper and Maiya Sykes, drummer Jimmy Paxson, bassist Michael Valerio, violinist Charles Yang, and keyboardist Deron Johnson, joined by Herman Cornejo, principal dancer with American Ballet Theater)

Billboard: Eddie Van Halen’s 15 Best Songs and Thanks, Eddie (RIP)

Stir It Up – Johnny Nash (RIP).

We’re All Doomed – Trump vs. Biden, featuring “Weird Al” Yankovic

K-Chuck Radio: The real debate … Helen Reddy or Mac Davis? (Both RIP)

Live From SpragueLand Episode 11 – Peter Sprague Plays The Beatles

Piece for Chamber Orchestra by Edward Bland

Sounds from St. Olaf – Episode 1: A St. Olaf Ensemble Showcase

Colors – Black Pumas

American Standard: Teach Me Tonight – James Taylor

Always Look on the Bright Side of Life – Julien Neel

Mad World – Pentatonix

Lift Ev’ry Voice and Sing -San Diego Master Chorale. Arrangement and solo by Zanaida Robles. Singing starts at 29 minutes.

American Tune – Paul Simon

Coverville 1327: Human League Cover Story and Thomas Csorba Interview and 1328: 50th Anniversary of Led Zeppelin III

Dr. Rick Bright resigns from the National Institute of Health

failed White House leadership

Dr. Rick Bright has resigned from the National Institute of Health on Wednesday, October 7, 2020. Here is his letter.

Of all the tools required for an effective U.S. response to the coronavirus pandemic, one that is sorely missing is the truth. Public health guidance on the pandemic response, drafted by career scientists at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, has been repeatedly overruled by political staff appointed by the Trump administration. Career scientists throughout the Department of Health and Human Services hesitate to push back when science runs counter to the administration’s unrealistically optimistic pronouncements.

Public health and safety have been jeopardized by the administration’s hostility to the truth and by its politicization of the pandemic response, undoubtedly leading to tens of thousands of preventable deaths. For that reason, and because the administration has in effect barred me from working to fight the pandemic, I resigned on Tuesday from the National Institutes of Health.

BARDA

Until April, I had for almost four years been director of the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority. When I strongly objected this past spring to the Trump administration’s insistence that BARDA support widespread access to chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine, two potentially dangerous drugs recklessly promoted by President Trump as a COVID-19 cure, I was shunted to the NIH and assigned a more limited role in the pandemic response.

My task at the NIH was to help launch a program expanding national COVID-19 testing capacity. The program is well underway and should reach nearly 1 million daily tests by the end of the year. Since early September, though, I was given no work; my services apparently were no longer needed.

I fear the benefits of dramatically improved testing capacity will be wasted unless it is a part of a coordinated national testing strategy. My recommendations to support a national plan were met with a tepid response. In an administration that suffers from widespread internal chaos, such coordination may be impossible — especially when the White House has seemed determined to slow down testing and not test people who might have asymptomatic infections.

Making it worse

From the beginning of the coronavirus outbreak, the administration’s failure to respond with a coordinated strategy only heightened the danger. Now the nation, and the world, are in the worst public health crisis in over a century. More than 1 million people worldwide have died from the pandemic; more than 211,000 Americans are dead. More than half of the states in this country are reporting rising COVID-19 cases.

Nine months into the pandemic, the United States continues to grapple with failed White House leadership. Instead, we get the recent spectacle of the president exploiting his own illness for political purposes and advising the nation, “Don’t be afraid of COVID.” Ironically, he was only able to leave the hospital after receiving two treatments that I had pushed for in January.

Meanwhile, there is still no coordinated national strategy to end the pandemic. Federal agencies, staffed with some of the best scientists in the world, continue to be politicized, manipulated, and ignored.

The country is flying blind into what could be the darkest winter in modern history. Undoubtedly, millions more Americans will be infected with the coronavirus and influenza; many thousands will die. Now, more than ever before, the public needs to be able to rely on honest, non-politicized, and unmanipulated public health guidance from career scientists.