The Phony Campaign

2020-09-27 Update

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Another good week for Wheezy Joe, who eked out another small net gain (0.3 percentage points) in winning-probability from the wagerers. Is this despite or because of his habit of "calling a lid" on a day's campaigning at (for example) 8:34 am yesterday?

I'd be OK with all the politicians calling an immediate lid on campaigning for (say) the next month or so. Hey, a dude can dream. Guys, you can turn it back on a week or so before election day; that's plenty of time to make your case.

But instead, Pun Salad will be on the job chronicling the parade of phoniness.

Candidate WinProb Change
Since
9/20
Phony
Results
Change
Since
9/20
Donald Trump 43.5% -0.1% 1,540,000 -500,000
Joe Biden 53.9% +0.2% 569,000 -163,000
Jo Jorgensen 0.0% unch 126,000 +6,000
Howie Hawkins 0.0% unch 21,300 -3,400

Warning: Google result counts are bogus.

  • The Atlantic's Edward-Isaac Dovere has a scoop for those voters who might have confused the two: The Green Party's Howie Hawkins Is No Kanye West. It's an interview where Howie's interviewer spends time on what really matters: whether lefties voting for Howie instead of Wheezy will cause states to tip to President Bone Spurs.

    Howie has no problem seeing this problem from the other side:

    Dovere: Kanye West is also running, saying he’s the candidate of the Birthday Party—though he doesn’t seem to have a clear platform for why he’s running or a clear rationale for it. Should he be on the ballot?

    Hawkins: I think Kanye West is a Republican dirty trick. If Roger Stone didn’t think of it, he wished he had. The Birthday Party? I mean, come on. There has to be some criteria for getting on the ballot. Anybody with money can hire petitioners and get on the ballot. There should be some threshold for recognizing parties—a level of organization, so there’s really a base there, and they should be allowed to make their nominations by convention.

    Howie doesn't seem to realize that stricter "thresholds" and "criteria" would be designed by Rs and Ds. How likely is that to work out the way he expects?


  • Leslie Eastman of Legal Insurrection counts up Four Biden Brain Freezes That Should Chill Democrats' Hearts.

    For example, during a speech in Philadelphia, Biden said 200 million people have died of coronavirus infections.

    2020 Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden had another gaffe on Sunday when he said an estimated 200 million people have already died from the coronavirus, even though the number of American casualties is closer to 200,000.

    “If Donald Trump has his way, the complications from COVID-19, which are well beyond what they should be — it’s estimated that 200 million people have died — probably by the time I finish this talk,” he said during a campaign speech.

    As the population of the US is about 330 million, the former Vice President’s statement would mean that 2/3rds of Americans have died.  And while it is simply likely that Biden meant to say 200 thousand, there might have been a reason for Biden’s Freudian slip over the extreme number of cases. Everyone knows the dead vote Democrat.

    Which reminds me of a joke:

    The renowned cosmogonist Professor Bignumska, lecturing on the future of the universe, had just stated that in about a billion years, according to her calculations, the earth would fall into the sun in a fiery death. In the back of the auditorium a tremulous voice piped up: "Excuse me, Professor, but h-h-how long did you say it would be?" Professor Bignumska calmly replied, "About a billion years." A sigh of relief was heard "Whew! For a minute there, I thought you'd said a million years."

    I've flogged this dead horse before, but wouldn't it be neat if candidates would take a few basic tests including (in this case) numeracy?

    I should mention Leslie's other examples of Biden Brain Freeze:

    • Did Biden botch the Pledge of Allegiance? No.
    • Did Biden say he "lost that line" during a Telemundo interview, revealing that he was reading off a teleprompter? No.
    • Did Biden respond "Probably not" to a heckler who yelled, "You don't have a chance, Joe!". Eh. I looked at the video and it's unclear if who he actually said that to.

    It probably clear that Legal Insurrection will be in of pro-Trump, anti-Biden propaganda mode until (at least) November.


  • Of course, the Babylon Bee has the real story. Biden: 'It's Ridiculous To Say I Use A Teleprompter And Your PC Ran Into A Problem And Needs To Restart'.

    There have been some suggestions that presidential candidate Joe Biden has been using a teleprompter when he’s supposed to be spontaneously answering questions. The campaign has vigorously denied this, but the charge has resurfaced because of an unusual answer Biden gave recently at a video townhall.

    When Biden was asked about whether or not he uses a teleprompter, he answered, “It's ridiculous to say I use a teleprompter and your PC ran into a problem and needs to restart. We're just collecting some error info, and then we'll restart for you.” Biden then softened his tone a bit. “C’mon, man. Initiating TeleMatic boot sequence. Beginning demo mode. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua.”

    Some say this blog is written by an AI, but I say to them: Microsoft Windows XP has encountered a problem and needs to close. We are sorry for the inconvenience.


  • Ann Althouse analyzes the headlines: President Trump won't commit to a peaceful transfer of power after the election!. And finds that the question was a lot more problematic than Trump's answer.

    Let's break it down:

    Will you commit here today for a peaceful transfer of power after the election... Will you commit to making sure that there is a peaceful transferral of power after the election?

    First of all — "making sure." I have a tag for that. It's an insidious phrase, used by politicians to gloss over how they will achieve whatever the end is. Add "commit" to that, and you're deeper into fantasy land — "commit to making sure." Who can do that?! Where is this lack of peace coming from? How could Trump know in advance? It could be a crazy tantrum by people who hate him and who are saying we'll only stop if you resist litigating about voting fraud. Trump needs to reserve his right — and responsibility — to ensure that we get a fair and accurate vote count. He can't be at the mercy of the protesters and rioters. The question is quite obviously a trap, and Trump calmly stakes out appropriate ground […]

    I'm with Ann here. Note the questioner specifies a "peaceful transfer of power", which asks Trump to assume he's going to lose. Why should he respond to that at all?

    Well, because he doesn't know how to respond coherently to such garbage questions. Take a lesson from Bryce Harper, bro.


Last Modified 2024-01-21 11:02 AM EDT