So, for people out there in Portland, Chicago, New York, etc or wherever else Trump and his Faux are describing as violent hellholes that Mr. Wannabe Dictator/Strongman wants to send “Federal Agents” into to restore “Law and Order”, *how bad* are things, really?! I know he’s using “protecting federal buildings” as his “hook” to get his people in there but that’s obviously not what they’re doing- or all of what they’re doing if recent news reports are any indication.

I've listened to a few of them and while I'm heartened by much of what they have to say, they do still sometimes veer into the Republican habit of warning about the consequences of Democrats going "too far to the left", which sometimes bugs me. But if they're all in for a Democratic tidal wave in November, I'm fine. Where we might be 2-4 years later remains to be seen how much they might become more active participants in terms of the Democratic Party agenda or if they'll turn on us after Trump is gone, if we start enacting policies that they feel are "too far left". I also don't want to see them having an outsized influence on the Democratic Party/DNC. I mean, it's fine if they want to support us and give us assistance but I just don't want us to feel like we have to start bending in their direction and towards their agenda, which AFAIK is still likely going to be an aggressively pro-corporate agenda, in exchange for said support. One of the things that Biden would have to work on right off the bat is fixing the damage Trump inflicted on the Affordable Care Act and possibly expanding it some with a Public Option, which I'm not sure whether or not Never Trumpers even support?

It just occurred to me the other day that, while I know that Never Trumpers via The Lincoln Project and other means are aggressively working to elect Joe Biden and UN-elect Trump in 2016, do we know if they are also working to re-elect a Republican Senate as well (House seems like it's going to safely remain Democratic in 2020)? Does it seem likely that they will split their tickets in 2020 and vote for Biden at the top but still vote solidly Republican in the downballot races? And if so, will that blunt or hurt our efforts to re-take the Senate in 2020? Has anybody heard anything that this might be the case? While their alliance against Trump is useful in the grander (and more important IMHO) goal of defeating and getting rid of Trump in 2020 is certainly a beneficial one, I fear that, if Republicans are able to hold the Senate, they will just return to their obstructionist tactics honed during the Obama years, ESPECIALLY if Moscow Mitch gets re-elected (which seems more likely than not in all honesty).

Some of them online are like, "Wear a mask if YOU want to!" or "Stay home if YOU'RE scared!" They don't register that this is a bad virus that people can both catch AND transmit (and transmit even if they don't know they have it). I guess we will someday need to think about teaching basic epidemiology in school. I was mentioning to my wife too the other day, maybe mask-wearing while sick should become a norm in our country like it is in Asian countries. Just think how much healthier we might all be if we did that?

Aside from outright rigging/cheating in this election (which I don't want to get into here), is there ANYTHING substantive that could potentially change between now and Election Day that would be either extraordinarily beneficial to Trump to help him win re-election or extraordinarily damaging to Biden that would depress his vote and cause him to lose? Any other complicating factors (i.e. additional "major party" candidates joining the race) that could cause the polls to tighten or make the margin close enough for Trump to limp to re-election? At the moment, the race appears to be Biden's to lose, but we're still fairly far enough out that anything could still happen and I'm trying to maintain some perspective.

that *that* race was as close as it was

Too many people always seem willing to give lame a** Republicans a chance to govern after a successful Democratic Presidency instead of another highly qualified Democrat. I understand why people don't want to keep electing a succession of Republicans after they sh*t the bed but I don't get why they feel like they have to switch after a successful two-term Democratic Presidency. Do Republicans just get super-activated and we just get complacent and don't show up? If we as a country are doing well under Democratic Presidencies, why wouldn't we want that good streak to continue? I don't get it.

Although, frankly, I don't even understand the "give him a chance crowd" in 2016 and why they felt that it was even remotely acceptable to give a reality star with a reputation for a string of bankruptcies, a history of racist actions, unspeakably crude manners, misogny, admitted sexual assaulter, etc. "a chance" instead of going with a woman whose entire life was dedicated to public service, was a Senator for several years, a Secretary of State, intelligent, etc.

And lets not forget that, as bad as things are, he's still got legions of people and entire states that are going to still vote for him in in the EC a few months from now.

But, hopefully, some of the factors that helped cause this won't exist this time. The 2018 mid-terms were encouraging and things have only gotten worse for Trump since then. And hopefully, there won't be any serious third- or fourth-party contenders whom help dice the vote up. And people are wiser about Russia and online disinformation. Keeping fingers crossed. Won't breathe easy until Biden is peaceably inaugurated in January 2021.

1. Development of a vaccine/treatment(s) are the basic responsibility of any government confronted with a pandemic. If Trump achieves this by October/November, great, but it's the bare butt minimum that any government would be expected to do. So, if one is developed and proven safe and starting to get administered, great, but it won't be "game over" for COVID-19 quite yet. It will have to be administered to millions of people over a course of several months (possibly with multiple doses), so we would still need to maintain some level of caution until it is available widespread and people are beginning to become inoculated against the virus.
2. Having a vaccine available does NOT wipe out Trump's lack of responsiveness to the pandemic, nor his lack of leadership and, at times, his totally awful leadership during the pandemic.
3. Having a vaccine does not bring back the hundreds of thousands of people whom have died and the thousands that will continue to die every week from it until it is no longer an issue, not to mention all of the people who got the virus and may have developed long-term medical issues due to their exposure to it. Trump and others will likely argue that it could have been worse (hundreds of thousands of dead people is still appalling IMHO and the counter hasn't stopped yet), but there is a counterfactual argument to be made that it could have been better had certain things been in place, faster response time, more restrictions, and, most importantly, competent national leadership.

that I find even more galling is that- even while they are telling everybody to go back to work, the gym, bars, pools, churches (in some cases threatening to sue states whom keep things restricted), etc., they themselves are continuing to work remotely, keeping their distance, taking unproven medications (HCL), being frequently tested, all things they are not encouraging the rest of us to do or enabling the rest of us to do. The rest of us are expendable to them. They are placing their own needs and fortunes ahead of the rest of ours. Trump may be wanting his supporters to risk their lives to come see him at his rallies but you can bet he's taking every precaution imaginable to ensure that he doesn't catch the virus and he would be bigly pissed if he ever did and probably find somebody to sue the pants off of.