Is there a Reason to Vote for Joe Biden?

“Mr. Trump, you want to talk about fear?” Biden asked last Monday.

“Do you know what people are afraid of in America? They’re afraid they’re going to get Covid. They’re afraid they’re going to get sick and die, and that is in no small part, it’s because of you.”

Joe Biden’s only chance of winning the election on November 3 is to convince voters that Trump’s mismanagement of the virus spread and the collapse of the economy is reason enough to deny him another four year term.

The collapse of the economy is a consequence of the spread of the disease. If there had been no virus Trump would be repeating over and over the claim that the low unemployment and the high stock market is the result of his management of the economy.

Joe Biden would be left with only two campaign issues. Donald Trump is a racist and social justice for all Americans.

On this Labor Day Biden accurately bemoans the loss of jobs in Pennsylvania and other rust belt states but that is not an issue caused by the Trump presidency. Factory job losses are an issue that is decades old. Businesses have been moving jobs overseas to save money. There is no way Joe Biden or Donald Trump can bring those jobs back to America.

I recently bought a new computer, printer, and a webcam. The computer was assembled in Mexico from parts made elsewhere. The printer was made in Thailand. The webcam was made in China. My new undershorts were made in Honduras.

Do you actually believe any of those items will ever be made in the United States in a future time?

Trump’s loss of the election will likely be the result of his own ineptitude and a set of beliefs and ideas that are not in tune with most Americans. His lack of respect for the military and his support of right wing conspiracy groups are his biggest Achilles heels. His push for a vaccine before election day will only bring cheers for his loyal supporters.

Biden’s loss of the election will likely be the result of his lack of specific ideas on how to help the economy recover and White fear of a minority invasion.

On the subject of social justice Joe Biden was one of 95 senators who voted for the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994. From FactCheck.org “Biden, as chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, largely wrote and shepherded through the legislative process. The Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 received bipartisan support at the time but has been criticized for some of its provisions, such as mandatory minimum sentencing, and its impact on mass incarceration.”

That law “grants to increase police presence, to expand and improve cooperative efforts between law enforcement agencies and members of the community to address crime and disorder problems, and otherwise to enhance public safety.” That law put people in jail for drug use rather than rehabilitation.

It was none other than Kamala Harris, in the first primary debate, who pointed out that Biden opposed school bussing as a way of encouraging integration.

Social justice, better paying jobs, a racially integrated society. Great ideas but I would not count on Joe Biden to make those goals a reality.

Biden’s campaign says he is doing just what a candidate should — pushing broad ideas while leaving room to negotiate the details.

This is troubling for me. What does Joe Biden stand for?

I am voting against Trump because he stands for hate, division, and destruction of the republic.

CNN Poll: Biden’s lead persists post-conventions

After two political conventions unlike any the United States had seen before (conducted with little live participation), Joe Biden maintains an advantage over Donald Trump in the race for the presidency, according to a new CNN Poll conducted by SSRS.

Among registered voters, 51% back Biden, 43% Trump. The difference in each candidate’s support when compared with a CNN poll conducted pre-conventions is within the poll’s margin of sampling error.

Both candidates boosted the share of their supporters who say they are voting more for their chosen candidate than against his opponent, though that figure is still higher for Trump than it is for Biden. For Biden, it’s up to 45%, from 38% pre-conventions, and for Trump, it’s now at 77%, up from 67% before the conventions.

Other polling organizations have shown similar results. The Economist/YouGov Poll also completed September 1 shows a 51% to 40% Biden lead. The IBD/TIPP also completed September 1 indicated a Biden lead 49% to Trump’s 41%.

Of course things can change between now and November 3. An October announcement of a COVID-19 vaccine could be a game changer. Even higher numbers of COVID-19 deaths could also be a game changer. Or perhaps something else that is not on anyone’s radar.

The Buck Stops…. Nowhere

I remember well when I had my first full time job as a youth, working in the hardware department of Sears. On the store manager’s desk was a prominent sign that read, “The Buck Stops Here.” He meant it. President Truman fostered the idea years before with the famous sign on his desk and it stuck with a lot of Americans. Like many of my generation, I embraced this philosophy as a very young man and it has guided my personal and professional life ever since. Personal responsibility is a necessity, not an option. It is what built America into a great country. However, things have become a tad different.

That was then and now is now. Today it is always about the blame game. When did this country slip on its ass and fail to get back up?

– A man kills a lion but pleads it was his guide’s fault.

– A man kills another man and says it was the Twinkie’s fault.

– A man gets lung cancer and claims it was Marlboro’s fault.

– One mass killing after another and it’s always the gun manufacturer’s fault.

– A woman burns herself with hot coffee and it was McDonald’s fault.

– A teenager gets fat and claims it was Coca Cola’s fault.

– (You can fill in the list yourself from here.)

It took the U.S. government decades to finally acknowledge its responsibility for the many health problems suffered by U.S. service personnel because of Agent Orange. Even then, they tried to shove the blame off to chemical companies who made the stuff. Through the years, personal responsibility has fully given way to blame gaming and has transformed our once proud humanity into a listless mob seeking to foist our personal responsibility onto others.

In basketball, when a player makes a foul, he raises his hand to acknowledge responsibility. It’s one of the few examples left in which responsibility is openly accepted. When something goes wrong in the rest of America, the government and its people tend to just shrug and say, “The buck stops…. nowhere.” The very concept of responsibility seems to have vanished in America. Maybe we need more basketball players in government and in our society as a whole.

Responsibility cannot and should not be passed to someone or something else.

If you have an opinion on this subject, please share it here. As for my opinions, “The Buck Stops Here!”

author Allen E. Rizzi

My response:

Sadly in Trump’s world someone else is to blame. The Chinese are to be blamed for the corona virus. Past presidents are blamed for everything that is wrong in America. The media is blamed for reporting information that puts Trump in a bad light. The political polls are all formatted to report he, Trump, is behind. Loss in the November election will be blamed on millions of fraudulent ballots.

Kristen Welker of NBC asks Trump whether he takes responsibility for the lag in making test kits available.

Trump’s reply:

No.

I don’t take responsibility at all.

Hubris and the Wizard of Oz

The word is a noun meaning Excessive pride or self-confidence. Used in a sentence: Hubris leads to the downfall of many celebrities and politicians.

That is what we saw at the RNC displayed by Donald Trump. His words four years ago, “I alone can fix it” is still his opinion of himself.

His supporters are blindly supporting his view of himself.

“Empires always have the hubris to think they are indestructible, when in fact they are always unsustainable.” Marianne Williamson, former presidential candidate

“The silent killer of all great men and women of achievement – particularly men, I don’t know why, maybe it’s the testosterone – I think it’s narcissism. Even more than hubris. And for women, too. Narcissism is the killer.” Conservative James Woods, actor, producer of both movie and television programs

“Incumbent White House parties have won 10 of the last 18 presidential elections; the odds are tight, but they favor Obama in 2012. And so gloomy Democrats, check your despair; gleeful Republicans, watch the hubris.” Jon Meacham, author and former Newsweek editor

“We live in a world in which data convey authority. But authority has a way of descending to certitude, and certitude begets hubris.” Bret Stephens, Pulitzer Prize winning American conservative journalist, editor, and columnist.

The Wizard of Oz was not all powerful nor is Donald Trump. Trump has not fixed violent rioters in Portland, Oregon or Kenosha, Wisconsin. The corona virus continues to spread with about 900 new deaths daily. The economy is in shambles with 1 million new unemployment claims weekly. “Justice for all” has become a slogan not a reality.

The president is a blustering bully similar to the Wizard.

The five dumbest Republican arguments for Trump

Summary of Jennifer Rubin’s opinion piece in today’s Washington Post.

None of Republicans’ commonly deployed arguments for reelecting President Trump are tethered to reality. The paucity of logic and factual support for their rationales suggests many on the right, even “respectable” columnists and elected officials, actually support him for reasons they’re loath to admit, whether it’s because they share his apocalyptic view of crime encroaching on the suburbs or are eager to see a country purged of immigrants.

He will give us law and order: No wonder Trump loves to highlight any domestic scene of disorder, mayhem and looting he can to frighten White Americans, arguing that if law enforcement “dominates the streets,” we will have public order. This is preposterous. We cannot go to war with millions of demonstrators.

He has vanquished the pandemic: The level of delusion necessary to sustain the fiction that Trump has handled the pandemic well is unfathomable. We have more deaths due to the disease than any other country on the planet, many more deaths per capita than many advanced countries and no national testing-and-tracing program. We remain cloistered at home and children cannot attend school in person in most places after weeks of shutdowns, largely because Trumped egged officials into reopening prematurely. He has hawked dangerous and unproven remedies and pressured government health experts to weaken or change guidelines to minimize dangers and restrictions on activities. As he did Thursday night, he gathers large crowds without masks and social distancing, creating his very own potential superspreading events.

He has been great for the economy: Multiple fact-checkers have repeatedly demonstrated that the economy under President Barack Obama’s was stronger by multiple measures than the economy under Trump. (GDP growth under Obama was 2.4% and 2.5% under Trump). This disparity was due in part to tariffs Trump imposed, which amount to a tax hike for U.S. consumers. If Trump falsely thinks he inherited a rotten economy, it’s inarguable that it got worse even before he crashed it by attempting to ignore a pandemic.

Joe Biden is a socialist: Not even the Republicans have the nerve to make that argument. Instead, they argue that Biden will be tricked or led around by the nose by forces on the left. This is entirely speculative and ignores Biden’s decades-long record in office (remember the 1994 crime bill?) and policy choices during the campaign, among them his opposition to Medicare-for-all.

“Life”: One can respect those deeply opposed to abortion in evaluating the candidates, but by the same token, a president who prioritizes the economy over preventing a pandemic, rips children from the arms of their mothers, refuses to denounce killings of unarmed Black Americans and willfully declines to protect the lives of our troops on whose heads Russia placed bounties is not respectful of human life in any meaningful sense.

Harangue for 70 minutes

President Trump’s Thursday night convention speech making the case for his re-election was lower-rated than his challenger Joe Biden’s speech one week ago, according to overnight Nielsen ratings. No wonder. It was a long and boring acceptance speech that included a history lesson from someone who most likely never read a history book. Included was a long list of lies and distortions.

The attacks on Joe Biden were to be expected. Donald Trump wants the public to decide between two candidates rather than a referendum on his job performance.

Re-election of a president is a decision based on performance. George H. W. Bush and Jimmy Carter were not re-elected because a majority of Americans decided they had not done a good job.

Trump’s strategy is obvious. Create fear that a Biden presidency will result in chaos in the country and a destruction of the American society.

In other words create FEAR!

This strategy has worked before. Richard Nixon ran as the law and order candidate. George H. W. Bush used the same tactic against Michael Dukakis.

I am opposed to Donald Trump because
1) He refuses to honor the laws and the constitution.
2) He is a racist.
3) He has made our allies into enemies.
4) He admires dictators.
5) He has branded the press as “the enemy of the people.”

Mild mannered and moderate Joe Biden will have a difficult time responding to Trump’s daily attacks.

The corona virus is killing thousands of people and the economy is in shambles. Biden’s response should be the question asked by Ronald Reagan in the October 28, 1980 presidential debate “Are you better off today than you were four years ago?”

We Deserve Total Honesty from our President

First Lady Melania Trump delivered a speech supporting her husband’s re-election from the Rose Garden at the White House. It was a very well prepared speech that was non-confrontational. The speech was meant to sooth concerns about her husband and to that extent it was a success.

She offered sympathies for those hit hardest from the COVID-19 pandemic, briefly stressed the need for unity amid racial conflict, the need to remove the stigma around drug addiction.

“…honesty is what we as citizens deserve from our president. Whether you like it or not, you always know what he’s thinking, and that is because he’s an authentic person who loves this country and its people and wants to continue to make it better.”

What? Better for who?

Donald Trump has been a continuous liar.

- He has told us that Covid 19 will magically disappear.

- He has promoted Hydroxychloroquine as a cure for the virus.

- He renegotiated NAFTA with another agreement with a new USMCA that is no more than an update of NAFTA.

- He has worked diligently to destroy the Affordable Care Act with a non-existent replacement.

- He has made the countries that were are friends into enemies.

- He has treated immigrants as unwanted parasites.

- He has conducted a war against everyone who is not a WASP.

- He has tried to reverse California’s regulations on car emissions.

- He has claimed to have absolute power over everything in the government base upon the constitution’s Article 2.

- He is now talking about a third and fourth term in office even though the constitution limits him to two terms.

- And these actions are just the tip of the iceberg.

Former President Barack Obama was correct when he said at the DNC

“So I am also asking you to believe in your own ability — to embrace your own responsibility as citizens — to make sure that the basic tenets of our democracy endure.

Because that’s what at stake right now. Our democracy.

“This administration has shown it will tear our democracy down if that’s what it takes to win.”