[GT] US election - It's 2020, what could possibly go wrong?

[Snuffleupagus]

Originally Posted by Cali Panthers Fan

Just to shift gears a little bit back toward something positive...

I just received an email from our county supervisor of elections. Lots of details about how the election was run and how few challenges there were despite a pandemic. Based on their assessment, it was an overwhelming success in a year where turnout was a record high.

How record was that high turnout? In our county, 76.3% of the registered voters participated in this election which meant over 778 000 votes were cast just in this county. When general turnout is maybe a little more than 50%, that's an incredible turn of events. To me it underscores that America is still a strong democracy at the population level, and with a few more controls on executive power in place, it will remain a strong democracy for generations to come.

Still, one wonders where the other 23% of voters are, but I figure it boils down to people unable to vote or confused on how to do it properly under pandemic circumstances. I figure the turnout would be closer to 85-90% if not for the virus.

The Florida election bugs me, like you my relatives in Tampa they were sure Trump was loosing, about 40% Latino votes in Florida for Trump but only 27% nation wide.

If there was any election fraud it was Florida, Governor DeSantis is a pure snake.

[activeStick]

Originally Posted by JohnnyB

Some of my friends in consulting have found that their time is even more occupied since going to wfh. They used to be able to get some breaks in the day if they had travel to engagements or meetings in different locations, but since everything has become remote there's no more time like that blocked out in their calendars and the expectation is that people should be good to come right out of one meeting immediately into the next one all through the day.

Yup and I'd say that from what I hear, this applies to folks who aren't in consulting. Many are finding that WFH has actually translated to working more hours.

[DeluxeMoustache]

Originally Posted by activeStick

Yup and I'd say that from what I hear, this applies to folks who aren't in consulting. Many are finding that WFH has actually translated to working more hours.

Depending on your viewpoint as to what you consider work to be, and how much travel is involved.

Not sure what you are hearing, but having experience with jobs where I had to travel 3 weeks a month, there are lots of flights and drives that eat up evenings and put you in hotels near midnight, having to figure out what the heck you are going to eat, then preparing and being sharp first thing in the morning.

Most people I know who are used to travel miss it in certain ways, and significantly so, and also value how much more productive they are within business hours.

[activeStick]

Originally Posted by Dion

https://twitter.com/user/status/1339989080667516929

It blows my mind that elected officials are trying to reason that an initial $1200 cheque followed up by a $600 cheque 7 months later would be reasonable for people. I wonder what they think about Canada giving $2000 every 2 weeks?

[rubecube]

Originally Posted by nfotiu

It's a compelling enough speech. I really question what problem these $1200 checks are solving though. Does a one time check really do much for someone who's been out of work a few months because their industry is shut down? Should workers who've been working at home get them? It's such a random disbursement that doesn't offer any real help to people who really need it

I'll break it down in simple terms:

$1200>$0

[Cali Panthers Fan]

Originally Posted by Snuffleupagus

The Florida election bugs me, like you my relatives in Tampa they were sure Trump was loosing, about 40% Latino votes in Florida for Trump but only 27% nation wide.

If there was any election fraud it was Florida, Governor DeSantis is a pure snake.

There were reports of bunches of mail-in votes going missing in the mail, but I didn't see any follow up to that. Outside of that story, there was nothing that indicated voter fraud to me.

The latino vote shouldn't shock too much. The Biden team was very concerned about how they were polling among latinos in Florida and made a last ditch effort to reach out to them. Trump's team did a fantastic job campaigning to them for months, and they were strongly in his camp by the time Biden came around to them. Too little too late. Lesson learned for next election.

In the end it doesn't matter. Biden campaigned to the groups he needed to most: Rust Belt and white working class. That's what won the election.

[GGG]

Originally Posted by Snuffleupagus

The Florida election bugs me, like you my relatives in Tampa they were sure Trump was loosing, about 40% Latino votes in Florida for Trump but only 27% nation wide.

If there was any election fraud it was Florida, Governor DeSantis is a pure snake.

Claims of election fraud with no evidence should not be being made.

You are using the same arguments as Trump is to discredit a very reasonable outcome. You even tagged the racist undertones of many trump arguments by lumping all latinos into one homogeneous block. If you believe Florida is rigged without any evidence why do you think Michigan and Wisconsin aren’t?

[GirlySports]

Originally Posted by Cali Panthers Fan

There were reports of bunches of mail-in votes going missing in the mail, but I didn't see any follow up to that. Outside of that story, there was nothing that indicated voter fraud to me.

The latino vote shouldn't shock too much. The Biden team was very concerned about how they were polling among latinos in Florida and made a last ditch effort to reach out to them. Trump's team did a fantastic job campaigning to them for months, and they were strongly in his camp by the time Biden came around to them. Too little too late. Lesson learned for next election.

In the end it doesn't matter. Biden campaigned to the groups he needed to most: Rust Belt and white working class. That's what won the election.

Democrats need to be in the Latino community now. Get on local radio and media and discuss issues to improve quality of life and break down barriers. Not just pander every 2 years

They need to get into the weeds, not call Trump voters idiots or even worse, "white". Latinos in Florida have legit concerns and politically are shaped by where they live, their ancestry, age, education, income and faith, among other factors

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

The logistics of the Florida mail-in system seem to have been done really well. I imagine it's due to them having had more practice with it, and probably some reforms put in place after the 2000 fiasco. Other states should just copy them.

[octothorp]

Originally Posted by CorsiHockeyLeague

The logistics of the Florida mail-in system seem to have been done really well. I imagine it's due to them having had more practice with it, and probably some reforms put in place after the 2000 fiasco. Other states should just copy them.

Pennsylvania Democrats had tried to pre-process as many votes as possible before election day, but it was blocked by Republicans in the legislature. Why? Presumably because their plan all along was to create an opportunity to halt the counting mid-count, and an early count would have prevented that.

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/...d-it-down.html

[nfotiu]

Originally Posted by rubecube

I'll break it down in simple terms:

$1200>$0

Probably somewhere around 25% of people are significantly financially hurt by COVID. Giving that other 75% a one time $1200 payment makes no sense to me. You could be giving 4 times as much to the people who really need it. The Senator saying that they shouldn't be told to go stand in unemployment lines is just silly rhetoric. The unemployment system is how this money should be funneled. There was a lot of issues with state unemployment systems when this started, but people I know in Virginia and Colorado are now able to apply online fairly easily.

I just don't get the motivation of checks to everyone. It seems more about juicing the economy, and buying votes, than helping real people who need it.

[KootenayFlamesFan]

Hahahahaha, I thought this was from The Onion at first.

https://twitter.com/user/status/1340349856574038017

[direwolf]

Lol, wow. These people really are living in their own insane cartoon fantasy world. Hollywood's best screenwriters couldn't come up with this s***.

And we still have at least another month of this.

[#-3]

Originally Posted by nfotiu

Probably somewhere around 25% of people are significantly financially hurt by COVID. Giving that other 75% a one time $1200 payment makes no sense to me. You could be giving 4 times as much to the people who really need it. The Senator saying that they shouldn't be told to go stand in unemployment lines is just silly rhetoric. The unemployment system is how this money should be funneled. There was a lot of issues with state unemployment systems when this started, but people I know in Virginia and Colorado are now able to apply online fairly easily.

I just don't get the motivation of checks to everyone. It seems more about juicing the economy, and buying votes, than helping real people who need it.

I think you might be misreading the intent of the payments.

If goal were to prop up people who have fallen behind because of pandemic, you would probably look at a much faster/friendlier bankruptcy regime for those situations (probably under a different name, to avoid stigma).

This looks a lot closer to economic stimulus, keep the economy humming so things don't start to increase the odds of avoiding a spiral from lack of activity.

[nfotiu]

Originally Posted by #-3

I think you might be misreading the intent of the payments.

If goal were to prop up people who have fallen behind because of pandemic, you would probably look at a much faster/friendlier bankruptcy regime for those situations (probably under a different name, to avoid stigma).

This looks a lot closer to economic stimulus, keep the economy humming so things don't start to increase the odds of avoiding a spiral from lack of activity.

The video that started the conversation was about helping the working people who are having financial hardships.

I agree that the economy needed a stimulus back when the first round went out. But that really isn't the case in the US right now.

[HockeyIlliterate]

Regarding stimulus checks:

I didn’t get one because our last year’s income was too high.

But I got laid off this year.

Now, admittedly, I got a decent severance package, and so my income this year will be too high to qualify for another stimulus check.

But, let’s be honest for a moment:

If the government is going to be handing out money, then I’d sure like to get some of it. I sure do pay enough in taxes to “deserve” it (certainly compared to my mother, who is on social security and gets a small pension, pays very little in federal taxes, and yet she got a stimulus check).

And if the point is to keep the economy humming or to keep the unemployed afloat, then, yeah, stimulus checks should go out to everyone, including those on unemployment regardless of what their income last year was, AND there should be an unemployment adder that is closer to $600 a week than $300.

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

EDIT: Never mind.

[KootenayFlamesFan]

Covering for Putin/Russia until the bitter end.

https://twitter.com/user/status/1340372298541527040

[Ped]

Originally Posted by KootenayFlamesFan

Covering for Putin/Russia until the bitter end.

https://twitter.com/user/status/1340372298541527040

Trump's suggesting China may be behind it. What a clown.

[FlamesAddiction]

Originally Posted by nfotiu

Probably somewhere around 25% of people are significantly financially hurt by COVID. Giving that other 75% a one time $1200 payment makes no sense to me. You could be giving 4 times as much to the people who really need it. The Senator saying that they shouldn't be told to go stand in unemployment lines is just silly rhetoric. The unemployment system is how this money should be funneled. There was a lot of issues with state unemployment systems when this started, but people I know in Virginia and Colorado are now able to apply online fairly easily.

I just don't get the motivation of checks to everyone. It seems more about juicing the economy, and buying votes, than helping real people who need it.

Totally agree.

For most people, that money probably isn't even going to stimulate the economy. The money has already been spent and will likely go to paying debts to landlords, utility companies, credit card companies, medical bills, banks, etc.. It's going to get funneled up the ladder where it is going to eventually sit in some wealthy person's bank account.

The best way to help people is widescale debt relief. just reset everyone. It will never happen of course, but a one time $1,200 cheque is not going to help much in the long run.