Category: coronavirus

Ilhan Omar Demands That President Trump Resign For Downplaying COVID-19

Posted on by LifeZette

Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) just called for President Donald Trump to resign once again, this time because he downplayed the COVID-19 pandemic while simultaneously admitting in interviews with Bob Woodward that he knew the virus was “deadly.”

Omar Demands Trump Resign

“Over and over again, Donald Trump downplayed the threat of COVID-19 — all while knowing how dangerous it was,” Omar tweeted on Thursday. “Almost 200,000 people have paid the price for his lies with their lives. If he refuses to resign, we will vote him out.”

RELATED: Ilhan Omar Claims Violent Riots Are Simply An ‘Uprising’ Against American Oppression

Omar posted this alongside a tweet of Trump’s from March 2020. In this tweet, the president pointed out that the common flu had killed more Americans than coronavirus.

“So last year 37,000 Americans died from the common Flu,” he tweeted. “It averages between 27,000 and 70,000 per year. Nothing is shut down, life & the economy go on. At this moment there are 546 confirmed cases of CoronaVirus, with 22 deaths. Think about that!”

Biden Also Downplayed COVID

Trump has said that he downplayed the COVID-19 pandemic because he did not want the public to panic. Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden did the exact same thing back in February, something that Omar is conveniently ignoring.

“Barack [Obama] and I, when we were — as president and vice president – we took on the virus that was threatening all of Africa and, uh, the rest of the world,” Biden said as he forgot the name of the Ebola virus. “And we set up a mechanism that worked.”

“But I want to take a moment to say it’s not a time to panic about coronavirus, but coronavirus is a serious public health challenge,” he added.

Omar Has Previously Called For Trump To Resign

This is far from the first time Omar has called for Trump to resign. She first called for his resignation in November 2019, during the House impeachment investigation into his alleged efforts to have Ukraine interfere in the election.

“The President of the United States broke our laws and betrayed our country,” Omar tweeted at the time. “He needs to resign.”

RELATED: Ilhan Omar Continues Funneling Money To Her Husband’s Firm, Despite Ongoing FEC Complaint

This piece was written by PoliZette Staff on September 11, 2020. It originally appeared in LifeZette and is used by permission.

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The post Ilhan Omar Demands That President Trump Resign For Downplaying COVID-19 appeared first on The Political Insider.

Senate Republicans privately more worried that Trump talked to Woodward than about his deadly lies

Posted on by Joan McCarter

Three days into the revelation that Donald Trump willfully lied to the American people about the deadly coronavirus from the absolute beginning of the crisis, and Senate Republicans are still hiding out, avoiding the press, pretending like they missed the biggest news of the week entirely.

"Haven't seen it." "Didn't read it." Or, in the case of Sen. Susan Collins, pretending like she's invisible. Collins "walked quickly into Thursday's morning series of votes, flanked by an aide who shielded her from a reporter who yelled a question in her direction about Trump downplaying the threat of coronavirus," The Hill reported. CNN adds she refused to take any questions on Wednesday or Thursday. At least her fellow vulnerable colleague, Iowa's Joni Ernst, took the question. She waffled it—"I haven't read it, I haven't seen it, so give me a chance to take a look"—but she answered the damn question.

We'll never get out of this crisis without taking back the Senate. Donate now to help make that happen.

Same with Arizona's Martha McSally and Colorado's Cory Gardner. Not reading or paying any attention to any news at all has become quite fashionable among Republicans. If you haven't read it or listened to the tapes with your very own ears, it didn't happen. At least that's Texan John Cornyn's take. He said he didn't have "personal knowledge" and didn't "have any confidence in the reporting," so he couldn't weigh in on it.

Others decided their best bet was going all in with the Trump excuse that he was trying to avert a national panic. Because if there's anything the guy who screams about antifa and Mexicans and Black Lives Matter protesters coming to rape and pillage and loot in the suburbs wants, it's not to cause a panic. North Carolina's Thom Tillis endorsed Trump's excuse. "When you're in a crisis situation, you have to inform people for their public health but you also don't want to create hysteria." When Tillis was pushed and asked if Trump should have been comparing the virus to the flu when he knew that it was far deadlier, Tillis wouldn't answer.

Trump's little golfing buddy, Lindsey Graham, piped up: "I don't think he needs to go on TV and screaming we're all going to die." Georgia's David Perdue agreed. "I understand trying to manage the psyche of the country and also look at the actions that he took. […] I look at what he did—and it was certainly a strong response." In no universe whatsoever was it a strong response, but that's a popular lie among Republicans. "Actions speak louder than words," said Louisiana's Bill Cassidy, another Republican up for reelection. "The President tends to speak loosely. We know that. That's just his pattern." And of course there’s Sen. Mitch McConnell, who combined the professed ignorance and defense of Trump into one: "Well, I haven’t read the Woodward book, but we all knew it was dangerous. The president knew it was dangerous and I think took positive steps very early on, for which he should be applauded, not criticized," he said.

Anonymously, Republican senators were less bothered by Trump's lies to the American public about a pandemic that has gone on to kill 200,000 Americans than about the fact that he would talk to Bob Woodward. "Most of us say, 'What the hell is he doing talking to Bob Woodward at 11 at night?'" one of them told The Hill.

Remember back in March, when McConnell talked about how Trump's flat-footed response to the pandemic was the fault of House Democrats and impeachment? How he said that it "diverted the attention of the government?” Yeah, that. The refusal of McConnell and fellow Republicans to actually look at the evidence, to put country over party in the impeachment, has led directly to this: 200,000 people dead. McConnell's continued insistence on putting party over country means that six months into the pandemic, he's abandoned it.

Lordy, there’s tapes: vulnerable Senate Republicans squirm over Trump’s coronavirus confession

Posted on (Updated by Kerry Eleveld

Back in July, as Iowa Sen. Joni Ernst was being pressed on her previous assertion that two Ebola deaths on Obama's watch amounted to "failed leadership," Ernst told CNN that Donald Trump was really "stepping forward" on stemming the coronavirus. At the time, despite 130,000 Americans having already died, Ernst managed to squeeze out that claim with a relatively straight face.  

But now that we know Trump did exactly the opposite by admittedly downplaying the pandemic, Ernst, the erstwhile self-professed hog castrator, is running scared. Thursday marked the second day in a row the GOP incumbent senator who's locked in a very tight reelection race ducked questions about Trump's taped confession that he lied to the American public about how deadly the coronavirus is.

Wanna put the Senate back in the hands of people who actually care about saving American lives? Give $3 right now to boot Senate Republicans from power.

“I haven't read it, I haven't seen it, so give me a chance to take a look,” Ernst told CNN's Manu Raju of the revelations in Bob Woodward's latest book, Rage.

Notice what Ernst didn't say, she hadn't heard it. Yep, there's tapes and that's a big part of what makes this so sticky for Ernst and all her GOP colleagues struggling to hold on to power. Remember, earlier this year they all strapped themselves irrevocably to Trump when they voted to acquit him of impeachment charges without hearing from a single witness. GOP senators didn't care that Trump was willfully corrupting U.S. elections in order to win a second term, and now that he has deliberately brought death and destruction to the American people, they're either turning a blind eye or just running for the hills, à la Ernst.

Texas Sen. John Cornyn laughably pooh-poohed the reporting from arguably the most famous journalist of a generation who backed up his account with recordings of Trump himself. “I don't have any confidence in the reporting, so I'm not going to comment,” said Cornyn, who's got a 9-point advantage over his Democratic challenger M.J. Hegar, according to Real Clear Politics. Sorry, but at the risk redundancy, there's f'ing tapes. Cornyn may as well just say he doesn't have any confidence in Trump himself, since Trump’s the one who privately told Woodward back in early February how "deadly" the coronavirus was.

And North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis, who's trailing his Democratic challenger, suggested that Trump's pandemic response has been right on the nose.

“When you're in a crisis you've got to strike the right balance (not to create) a panic,” Tillis told CNN’s Raju. Tillis apparently thinks 190,000 American deaths and counting is "the right balance."

All these spineless GOP lawmakers remain more concerned about their reelection bids than the toll their craven silence has taken and continues to take on the nation. Unconscionably sociopathic.

Senate Republicans don’t want to talk about what Trump knew about COVID-19 and when he knew it

Posted on (Updated by Joan McCarter

Donald Trump knew. He knew in February how dangerous, how deadly coronavirus was going to be and he deliberately played the severity of it down. Some of the revelations from the Bob Woodward interviews now surfacing are old news. Everyone watching knew he's been lying through his teeth from January onward about the disease and the crisis surrounding it.

No one knew better than the people closest to Trump, including Republican senators. When they voted to acquit Trump on February 5, they knew. They knew that he had obstructed justice, they knew that he was a liar and a cheat and they knew this epidemic had reached our shores and that Trump was likely the least capable person imaginable to deal with what was coming. They let this happen. And now that it's all out in public, not a one of them wants to talk about it. Especially Mitch McConnell. "I didn't look at the Woodward book," he told MSNBC's Kasie Hunt. "I will later. But I haven't even seen what you're referring to yet."

It's about basic decency. It’s about the lives of hundreds of thousands of Americans. Donate now to help save the nation.  

That must have been the talking point sent out to the conference. Sens. Ted Cruz and John Kennedy and Shelley Capito and Rob Portman—not a one of them would comment. They "haven't seen" it, "haven't read it," practically stopped up their ears when it was read to them. Florida man Sen. Rick Scott is the only one ready to make himself complicit by willfully burying his own head in the sand: "I have not read it. I don't want to read it. I think the president did the right thing by stopping flights from China."

You won't be shocked to find out that the Republicans up for reelection in a matter of weeks haven't been rushing out with statements. Remember what Sen. Susan Collins said in April? She said "the president did a lot that was right in the beginning." That's what she said. In the beginning, when he was telling Bob Woodward that he understood the disease was transmitted through the air, that he knew how deadly it would be, that he was deliberately downplaying its dangers. That he was setting up the deaths of tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of Americans. He "did a lot that was right," she said.

Here's what she said last week. Last. Week. "[H]e has also done some things right. […] On January 31st, he ended travel to and from China, where the virus and the pandemic originated. He was roundly criticized for that, but it saved lives." She said that. Just like Rick Scott. We haven't heard from her today, though. We haven't heard from most of them.

All these deaths, they're on Trump's head. But not on Trump's head alone. Every single one of those Republican senators who voted against his impeachment bear responsibility. They could see what was coming. They knew Trump would be just as likely to do precisely what he did—try to figure out a way to profit from it, lie about it, blame everyone else for it, and fail to protect the people who elected them.

Republicans think 175,000 dead Americans is okay, and that’s not all

Posted on by kos

The sorry, sad state of the morally bankrupt Republican Party: 

57 percent of Republicans think 176,000 coronavirus deaths (and counting) is acceptable. Holy shit. pic.twitter.com/dd737aoOmj

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) August 23, 2020

By double-digit margins, Republicans think 175,000 Covid-related deaths (and counting) are “acceptable.” These are the same Republicans who now think that Russian meddling in our politics is okay, that “family values” was a cynical joke on our moral discourse, that “law and order” was something that mattered, that no one stood above the law, that leading the world in pursuit of shared democratic ideals is best replaced by boyish fandom of murderous despots, and that the entire purpose of the Republican Party is nothing more than the singular worship of their idiotic man-boy president. 

Oh, and the response to anything is whine, whine, whine:

.@GOPChairwoman responds to @CBSNewsPoll showing 57% of Republicans say the number of those dead from #COVID19 is acceptable at 175,000: "I think that is a really unfair poll..Republicans do not want to see people suffering from this pandemic." pic.twitter.com/E43B4p9rck

— Face The Nation (@FaceTheNation) August 23, 2020

Republicans literally are okay with people suffering during this pandemic because they—like their dear leader—are utterly devoid of empathy for their fellow neighbors. It’s the reason so many still resist wearing face masks, putting everyone around them at risk. It’s the reason Republicans continue to support their president despite knowing what they know now, which is exactly what they knew then:

Ted Cruz knew. Rand Paul knew. Nikki Haley knew. Marco Rubio knew. Kellyanne Conway knew. Mike Pompeo knew. Glenn Beck knew. Rick Perry knew. Susan Collins knew. They all knew. pic.twitter.com/73XyJkiNkv

— act.tv (@actdottv) August 21, 2020

Nothing about Donald Trump has been a surprise. Everything that has happened was predictable. We didn’t know we’d suffer a global pandemic, but we knew Trump would be tested during his first term—every president is—and that he would fail spectacularly. 

What wasn’t predictable was how quickly his whole party would become as sociopathic as Trump himself, how quickly they’d acquiesce to his rampant lawlessness. The party that once went into hysterics because former President Bill Clinton had a quick chat on an airport runway with Attorney General Loretta Lynch is now silent as the curent attorney general acts as Trump’s private lawyer. The same party that went into hysterics and filed multiple lawsuits over former President Barack Obama’s executive orders now turns the other way as Trump escalates the same practice. 

And a whole party that once declared fealty to “law and order” is totally mum as Trump literally thumbs his nose at the Supreme Court. What army do they have, anyway? 

USCIS makes it official. They will ignore SCOTUS ruling and, "will reject all initial DACA requests from aliens who have never previously received DACA and return all fees." Furthermore, renewals will be limited to one year. https://t.co/RUIZ3LXw3n

— Ali Noorani (@anoorani) August 24, 2020

There is a single constitutional remedy for such defiance of our nation’s laws: impeachment. But Republicans decided that they were okay with Trump’s lawlessness, and he’s returned the favor by making an even greater mockery of the very institutions that make our democracy work. 

It turns out they're quite fragile, indeed. All it takes is one despot and an enabling party to watch those institutions crumble. Turns out, the only thing keeping them in place was a belief in our democratic system. Republicans don’t care for our system. Or democracy.

The “party of life” never was, but at least now everyone can stop pretending. Their opposition to abortion has nothing to do with “life,” and everything to do with controlling women. 

The “party of national security” is a laughable joke. Russia strongman Vladimir Putin pulls the strings. 

The party of “law and order”? Trump has literally argued that as president, he is above the law, and Republicans have been happy to play along. 

Tax cuts is all that’s left of what Republicanism was all about. The rich and powerful still get their payday. They always do. Nothing like global economic devastation to redistribute even more wealth to the top 0.01%. 

But the stuff that was supposed to trickle down to the masses? All of that is shredded, in tatters, as the Republican Party devolves into an outright cult of personality and Q-inspired conspiracy mongering. 

Susan Rice: Loss of Over 150,000 American Lives To COVID Is On Donald Trump

Posted on by Rusty Weiss

Susan Rice, in an interview with the ladies of “The View,” blamed President Donald Trump for the lives lost during the coronavirus pandemic, claiming the previous administration had set him up for success.

That’s right – Rice, whose only notable accomplishment as Barack Obama’s former National Security Adviser was shirking responsibility for a terrorist attack – believes the President must shoulder the blame.

Co-host Sunny Hostin set Rice up with a perfect slow-pitch softball toss, making her line of questioning seem almost assuredly scripted and coordinated.

“Ambassador, I do want to talk to you then about the coronavirus because President Trump has said nobody could have predicted this pandemic,” she said before walking her through the answer.

“But the Obama administration did predict a pandemic and you personally tried to prepare the incoming administration for something just like this, leaving essentially a pandemic playbook that warned of this type of virus happening,” Hostin alleged.

“So who is really to blame for the abysmal response here and the death of 150,000 Americans?”

RELATED: CBS Runs Mail-In Voting Experiment That Goes Horribly Wrong – Trump Wonders If Election Should Be Delayed

Rice Points the Finger

Rice smirked prior to answering as if to say “thanks for the setup.” And then she unloaded on President Trump.

“So the fault here, the tragic loss of 150,000 Americans and counting is on Donald Trump and his gross mishandling of this pandemic,” she claimed. “He said it would go away. He likened it to the flu.”

Nowhere did she mention Andrew Cuomo shoving elderly patients into nursing homes. Nowhere did she mention the Democrat impeachment hoax being conducted while the pandemic was hitting our shores.

She did not blame Nancy Pelosi who encouraged her constituents to tour Chinatown in late February because coronavirus fears were “unwarranted.”

She did not blame Bill de Blasio who told New York City residents to “get out on the town despite coronavirus.”

No, every misstep along the path of a historical pandemic was the President’s and the President’s alone.

Maybe he should have just blamed the whole thing on an obscure YouTube video.

RELATED: Black Democrat Lawmaker Goes Off On MSNBC Host When Asked If He’s Being Paid To Support Trump

Pandemic For Dummies

Rice, who is desperately angling for the Vice President role for Joe Biden’s campaign, claimed everybody knew the coronavirus pandemic was “inevitable.”

“We prepared the incoming administration with a ‘Pandemic for Dummies’ playbook and a tabletop exercise and so many other briefings,” she said.

The media have been anxiously pushing a narrative that the Trump administration ditched that playbook. The reality, according to White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany, is that the Obama pandemic response plan was inadequate.

“Some have erroneously suggested that the Trump administration threw out the pandemic response playbook left by the Obama-Biden administration,” McEnany told reporters. “What the critics failed to note, however, is that this thin packet of paper was replaced by two detailed, robust pandemic response reports commissioned by the Trump administration.”

Additionally, the Obama administration’s response to the swine flu epidemic in 2009 left the nation with a significant shortage of medical masks, something they never bothered to replenish.

Masks, of course, have been the key to fighting off the spread of this virus.

That year also saw Obama scrap the White House Health and Security Office, which worked on international health issues.

Aside from thinking Trump is the only man responsible for the pandemic, Susan Rice has made other wild claims, including the notion that citing the virus’ origin from China is “shameful” and “designed to stigmatize people of Asian descent.”

As House Judiciary Committee member Matt Gaetz has said: “If lies were music, Susan Rice would be Mozart.”

The post Susan Rice: Loss of Over 150,000 American Lives To COVID Is On Donald Trump appeared first on The Political Insider.

Obama To Biden: We Always Took Responsibility For Our Mistakes

Posted on by Rusty Weiss

Former President Barack Obama had a sit down with Joe Biden where the duo spoke about how their administration always took responsibility for their mistakes.

Biden posted a video to his Twitter account of the socially-distanced meeting along with the caption “44 + 46,” a reference to their possible presidential line numbers.

The video is a teaser of the conversation between the previous president and vice president.

In the clip, Biden and Obama criticize President Trump’s response to the coronavirus pandemic.

“Can you imagine standing up when you were president and saying ‘it’s not my responsibility. I take no responsibility.’ Literally. Literally,” Biden asked.

“Those words didn’t come out of our mouths when we were in office,” replied Obama.

RELATED: Biden To Muslim Voters: I Wish We Taught Islamic Faith In Our Schools

Blamed Benghazi on a YouTube Video

Now, when you’re dealing with two skilled and accomplished liars in Biden and Obama, there is a lot to unpack in their comments. Even with just a couple of short sentences.

Let’s begin with Biden’s claim that Trump hasn’t taken responsibility for the pandemic.

While it is true that the President said he doesn’t “take responsibility at all” over four months ago when it was clear that Democrats had impeded congressional efforts to address COVID-19 by hosting an impeachment circus, more recent comments have differed.

In an interview with Fox News’ Chris Wallace, he said: “I take responsibility always for everything because it’s ultimately my job, too. I have to get everybody in line.”

As for Obama saying of shirking responsibility that “those words didn’t come out of our mouths” – what absolute gall.

This was an administration – from Obama to Biden, down to Hillary Clinton and Susan Rice – who refused responsibility for the Benghazi terrorist attack in 2012 that killed four Americans, instead deliberately crafting a lie to the public involving an obscure anti-Muslim YouTube video.

At first, they tossed Rice under the bus, forcing her on news stations to repeat the lie over and over again. Clinton would later be tossed under the bus as well.

It took several weeks for Obama to suggest he took any responsibility for the lives lost in Libya, and only did so as the controversy refused to subside and he faced election against Mitt Romney.

Biden, on the other hand, continued to lie.

RELATED: Meadows Expects Indictments From Durham Investigation Into Spying On Trump – ‘Time For People To Go To Jail’

Doesn’t Stop at Benghazi

When did Obama and Biden take responsibility for spying on Trump’s presidential campaign? We must have missed it.

Some Obama-era officials may have no choice but to accept responsibility for the biggest political scandal of our time according to White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows.

In discussing the investigation by U.S. Attorney John Durham into the origins of the Russia collusion probe, Meadows said he “expect(s) indictments.”

“It’s all starting to come unraveled,” he said. “It’s all unraveling. And I tell you, it’s time that people go to jail and people are indicted.”

Aside from that, Obama and Biden took responsibility for everything else.

Just kidding.

One of Obama’s favorite targets for finger-pointing was his predecessor, former President George W. Bush:

And, of course, Obama blamed Fox News for everything that ailed his failure of a presidency. He blamed Russia for Hillary’s 2016 election loss. Not the fact that he was essentially on the ballot for a third term by proxy.

Despite their claims in the Biden video, passing the buck during difficult times was a hallmark of the Obama presidency.

The post Obama To Biden: We Always Took Responsibility For Our Mistakes appeared first on The Political Insider.

Former Ohio Republican governor to speak at the Democratic convention

Posted on by kos

Ohio has burrowed itself deep in impeached president Donald Trump, who may or may not be hiding in his bunker at this time. It’s not a state that will decide the presidency. Trump won it by eight points in 2016, and if he loses it this year (and chances are growing by the day), he will already have lost Arizona, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and several other states—giving presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden more than enough electoral votes to end our long national nightmare. Yet his campaign has now made Ohio the second-largest recipient of advertising dollars, behind only Florida. 

So how do you think Trump will react when he finds out that former Ohio two-term Republican governor John Kasich is scheduled to speak at the Democratic National Convention? Hilarious, right? 

The Daily Beast has leaked details on Democratic plans for the mostly online convention, which includes the information on Kasich’s participation. The Associated Press has more information on the Kasich coup, and adds this hint: “Kasich is among a handful of high-profile Republicans likely to become more active in supporting Biden in the fall.” The Biden campaign, feeling secure in its base, is clearly focused on expanding his potential base of support, and the never-Trump crowd, while small, could have a big impact in close races up and down the ballot. 

Ohio is a perfect example, a state in which Trump’s standing has fallen more precipitously during the coronavirus pandemic (and because of it) than most places. 

Civiqs Results

As noted in a previous analysis, Trump’s general election matchup numbers are closely correlated to his approval numbers. His 47% approvals here means he’s getting between 47-49% in the head-to-head matchups versus Biden. That’s enough for victory, but barely. Trump is hanging on for dear life in a state that he comfortably won in 2016, and which shouldn’t be in play given its demographics—mostly white, mostly non-college.  

Meanwhile, Kasich left office a popular politician, with a 52-36 rating the last time Quinnipiac checked in before he was termed out of office in 2018. But even then, there were storm clouds that hinted at a party split: “Ohio Gov. John Kasich gets a 52-36 percent job approval rating, doing better with Democrats than he does with his fellow Republicans, Democrats approve of Kasich 57-33 percent. Republicans are divided as 46 percent approve and 44 percent disapprove.” You see, he had run against Trump in the 2016 Republican primary, and Trump hit him for, among other things, giving his state’s residents health care via Obamacare Medicaid expansion. 

pic.twitter.com/ZQ0osiFEJQ

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 11, 2016

The campaign eventually ended, but the feud never did. For example, here was a typical interaction between the two, in 2018:

pic.twitter.com/wqtmN9SwhT

— John Kasich (@JohnKasich) August 13, 2018

Pretty good, right? Kasich also attacked his party for looking the other way as Trump made a mockery of party orthodoxy, steel and aluminum tariffs, as well as for tolerating Trump’s attacks on national institutions like the FBI and the Justice Department. After the 2019 Dayton mass shooting, Kasich called Trump “sensitive” and “thin-skinned.”  

Kasich spent some seconds this year “running against Trump in the GOP primary,” but no one took that seriously. The Republican Party is the Party of Trump, and vice versa. There’s no longer any room for Kasich-style moderate fiscal conservatives in the GOP. We don’t want them either! But at least this year, those never-Trumpers realize the damage that Trump is doing to the country. As Kasich told the Washington Post, “[The Republican Party] coddled this guy the whole time and now it’s like some rats are jumping off of the sinking ship. It’s just a little late. It’s left this nation with a crescendo of hate not only between politicians but between citizens. ... It started with Charlottesville and people remained silent then, and we find ourselves in this position now.”

Kasich may be the highest-profile Republican to flip to Biden right now, but there is definitely something happening among Republicans. Look at Trump’s approval ratings among Republicans: 

Civiqs Results

So 87-9 seems ridiculously high, right? Except that during the impeachment hearings, that number was 91-6. That means that in just a few short months, Trump has lost a net-seven points of support among Republicans. 

Don’t scoff. Every Republican that gives up on Trump is one less vote. They may vote for Biden and say the heck with it, they’ll vote for Democrats in critical Senate and House races. Or maybe they stay home in frustration, which is almost as good. 

Every Republican defection makes it harder for Trump to bounce back. How is he going to expand his coalition if he can’t even hold on to his own core base? 

Kasich isn’t a play to win Ohio. We don’t need Ohio. Let Trump piss his money away on a state that is irrelevant to whether he wins or loses. While there are two Republican-held House seats that could be in play, control of the U.S. House isn’t at stake. 

But there are Republicans who aren’t happy being associated with a racist sociopath who is putting our children at risk to boost his reelection chances, and Kasich is a signal to them freeing them from Trumpism. There are alternatives. Because this thing, whatever it is that Republicanism has become? It really hasn’t quite worked out well for the country now, has it.

But even if Kasich doesn’t swing a single vote—which is quite possible—the inevitable Trump tantrum will be reason enough to stand up and clap. You know it’ll be glorious. 

Sen. Joni Ernst says 130,000 American deaths show Trump is ‘stepping forward’

Posted on (Updated by Hunter

Though it is a holiday weekend, the Sunday news shows continued on in mostly the usual fashion. Trump ally Sen. Joni Ernst, one of the corrupt man-child's most ardent defenders as the Republican Senate nullified impeachment charges against Trump without investigation, once had a lot to day about two (2) Americans dying of Ebola under President Barack Obama, saying it showed "failed leadership." CNN host Dana Bash asked Ernst whether 130,000 Americans dying in the (now fully out-of-control) COVID-19 pandemic also is showing "failed leadership."

Sen. Joni Ernst replied with yet another response seemingly hand-tailored to show just how corrupt, incompetent, and buffoonish the Republican Party has become. After a long filibuster resulting in Bash repeating of the question: "No, I think that the president is stepping forward," she clowned.

CNN's Dana Bash: You said in 2014 that Obama showed "failed leadership" with Ebola, when only 2 Americans died. Would you say Trump's showed failed leadership with coronavirus as 130,000 Americans have died? Sen. Joni Ernst: "No, I think that the president is stepping forward" pic.twitter.com/WQqSC82OSt

— Justin Baragona (@justinbaragona) July 5, 2020

Lord, now that was just pathetic. I’m embarrassed for both of them.

Again, the whole premise of so-called "news" programs is invalidated if political leaders are simply allowed to bullshit their way through each with no repercussions. Bash's question was spot-on, probing whether a sitting senator's supposed outrage at one pandemic would translate to the next. Clearly, it did not.

What, then, should the repercussions be for being so transparently a hack? Should a buzzer sound? Should a duck drop from the ceiling? During the pandemic itself physical solutions are largely out of bounds, as most of the people praising Donald Trump's brilliant handling of a pandemic now expected by the White House to result in at least a quarter million dead are praising him from inside their own homes because it is simply too unsafe to travel to the studios as usual. That means the best solution is, for now, right out; nobody is going to agree to have a pie-throwing machine installed in their den.

Hecklers, then. I'm going to propose the "news" shows liven up their broadcasts with professional hecklers. If any politician says something as egregiously tawdry as Joni Ernst says regularly, ninety seconds of interview time will be given to a team of hecklers to point it out and roast their target into oblivion.

Hey, it's more news than what's currently being broadcast. If the nation's top political reporters are incapable of bringing shame to those that quite transparently deserve it, we need to bring in people with more appropriate skills.

Hillary Clinton: I Would Have Done a Better Job As President Handling Coronavirus

Posted on by Rusty Weiss

Hillary Clinton took a swing at President Trump’s response to the coronavirus pandemic, saying she would have done a “better job” in managing the crisis.

In an interview with the Hollywood Reporter, Clinton even claimed she would have done a better job in handling the economic fallout.

“We wouldn’t have been able to stop the pandemic at our borders the way that Trump claimed in the beginning, but we sure could have done a better job saving lives, modeling better, more responsible behavior,” she claimed.

“I don’t think we necessarily should have had as deep an economic assault on livelihoods and jobs as we have,” Clinton added. “So I know I would have done a better job.”

RELATED: Hillary Clinton Says It’s Time For a ‘Real President’

She Crazy

She’s a two-time failed presidential candidate, failed to implement new health care as First Lady, failed to protect Americans as Secretary of State, but we’re supposed to believe she could have done a better job than Trump.

It’s hard not to imagine Hillary locking down the entire nation if she had the power of the presidency behind her, meaning an economy in utter shambles. She celebrated Governor Cuomo, after all, who has done the very same thing – ruined his state’s economy, led the nation in COVID-19 cases, and personally sent thousands of seniors to nursing homes resulting in their deaths.

While locking down Americans, she likely would have never shut down travel from China or other nations that were hotspots for the virus, meaning many more lives lost.

Not to mention, we know all about her crisis management skills from Benghazi. Perhaps she could have blamed the pandemic on a YouTube video.

RELATED: Rep Dan Crenshaw Lights Hillary Clinton Up Over Her Latest Attack on Trump

Fantasy Land

This isn’t the first time Hillary openly fantasized about being the President, and it certainly won’t be the last time.

Several weeks ago, Clinton criticized Trump’s coronavirus response by saying, “We need a real President.”

“Donald Trump isn’t responsible for the coronavirus,” she tweeted recently. “But he is responsible for the disastrous lack of leadership that has led to 122,000 deaths in the U.S. and counting.”

And in April, the former First Lady shared a Washington Post story and quote with her social media followers which falsely alleged the President took over two months to treat the pandemic seriously.

Rep. Dan Crenshaw slammed Clinton when she mocked the President for America becoming the leader in coronavirus cases, a fact only possible if you believe nations like China and Iran had accurately reported their numbers.

“Delete your account. This isn’t the time,” Crenshaw replied. “This can’t be the new normal, where American tragedy is applauded for the sake of political opportunism.”

Additionally, Clinton told the Hollywood Reporter that she would beat Trump if she were on the ballot again in November, but added that running again was “not in the cards.”

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