"The August 2020 US Politics Thread is highly thought of, but nobody likes me. It can only be my personality. That's all."

I'd say it's a useful question solely as an example of what Jacob's tweet there says: Ultimate loyalty to a belief system can result in "abstract" human lives having no value.

Mainline Democrats have been slobbing on Cuomo's knob for months and, uh...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=21h0G_gU9Tw

xxp yes it also funcations that way

I guess it's just that political bias is baked into almost poll question. This logic could be applied to almost any polling: "Do you agree with separating children from their parents as the border as a disincentive to immigration?" I'm just not sure how this is any different.

Framing deaths from a pandemic disease, for which there is no effective therapy, as being "acceptable" or "not acceptable" is nonsensical anyway. What would it look like to "not accept" those deaths? No one knows what the 'correct' number of deaths would be. The polling question was transparently ill-formed and useless.

this is just not true. it doesn't say is there a "correct" number of deaths. It's broadly asking about reasonable expectations—as established by their leaders, by deaths in other countries, etc.

i acknowleged it's an ill-formed question, but framing it as a "gotcha" just seems weird to me. If, for instance, "only" 15,000 Americans had died, there would be no question re: "acceptability."

But there is now. The Republicans themselves have thrown in this variable of "acceptable death."

it's not like the idea is being imposed on them by sneaky pollsters

Ultimate loyalty to a belief system can result in "abstract" human lives having no value.

Human minds are not well-constructed to appreciate the value of "abstract" human lives, regardless of their belief system. People have difficulty imagining large numbers like 175,000. Any 1 of those 175,000 deaths might directly affect more than 50 other people, but when we scale that up to imagine all the families and social groups connected to those 175,000 dead, it defeats our imaginations. The number becomes inert, a lifeless abstraction without a graspable meaning, and therefore its value can't be grasped either.

What’s really bad is the other 43% all responded: 157,000 deaths isn’t acceptable. You know what’s acceptable? 157 million deaths

maybe if we tell them it's equivalent to 39,250 benghazis

To be fair, when you put it that way, that's an awful lot of Benghazis.

39,250 benghazis ain't going away

a single benghazi is a tragedy, a million benghazis is a statistic

On the other hand, the Democrats clearly did Benghazi, and rather than own up to their mistake and go to war with Benghazi, they let Benghazi go. That's on them.

googled "benghazi in platforms", so certain it'd been used and lol at the first result

I almost made that joke.

It's the first song I hum when I hear "Benghazi"

I think of "In on the Kill Taker."

The RNC announces there will be no GOP platform for the convention — just support for Trump’s second-term agenda, whatever that is https://t.co/P5RkqdsfDV

— Blake News (@blakehounshell) August 24, 2020

RESOVLVED

As I read that, they're keeping the 2016 platform, which convicted felon Paul Manafort rigged so as not to offend Putin by including language supporting the Ukrainian government against Russian interference. Way to go, Grand Old Party!

Wow, thank you @GOPconvention for this ringing endorsement of mail-in balloting. Good for you, guys. pic.twitter.com/bsHWjjkbbC

— Kevin M. Kruse (@KevinMKruse) August 24, 2020

xp

holy shit. i honestly figured that tweet would be a little hyperbolic, but no, when you read the statement, that is what it says. i mean yeah, coronavirus makes meeting more complicated, but the rest of the world is figuring out how to do it so uh, that's no excuse

and yet again, this blend of incompetency (RESOVLVED) and rolling over for the fascists

are there any edits we should make to the 2016 platform? no? ok, we're good, roll it out

*jack benny pause*

RASMUSSEN: 51% THANK YOU!!!!

Republican Party platform 2020: Whatever He Tweets, We Eats

hope you like poop

I knew some fucker would write this, because Pundit Law dictates that it had to be written, but I didn't think the headline would be quite so pathetically "Dems-In-Disarray":

Did The Democratic Convention Go Too Smoothly?

"the Democrats continue to stand in their own way by not standing in their own way this time"

Democrats in Array

But backstage, things were coming together . . .

Kellyanne Conway leaving the White House, guess the family drama is legit

Big yikes

Claudia is live on TikTok and just said that her parents were going to get divorced but they won't now because they want to keep her from getting emancipated. Says that dad doesn't care about her or even know her middle name. Says mom has been physically abusive her whole life.

— Molly McAleer (@molls) August 24, 2020

Also

Kellyanne Conway announces she's leaving the White Househttps://t.co/uxfEUswY2R

— Charles M. Blow (@CharlesMBlow) August 24, 2020

i do feel sorry for the daughter. both parents seem like publicity-hungry soulsuckers, for real. having them as your parents, while being a teenager, with everyone plugged in and knowing exactly who she is and what they both stand for? that sounds like a fucking nightmare.

"In time, I will announce future plans. For now, and for my beloved children, it will be less drama, more mama," she said.

fuuuuuuuuuuuuck

less drama, more mama, equal trauma

what her kids need is some half-rhyming catchphrases

less drama, more mama, all moron-a.

NEW: President Trump has released his second term agenda — a 50 point bulleted list 👇 pic.twitter.com/Oc9bJjwg7K

— Nicole Sganga (@NicoleSganga) August 24, 2020

There's some good'uns here. Like "Return to Normal in 2021." Yeah, no shit.

And Conway kid signing off twitter with "no hate to my parents please." Um, OK. Anyway, you can't say she didn't get results!

• Build The World's Greatest Infrastructure System

lol the cojones

xpost Not sure getting her mom to spend more time at home was the result she sought, though.

what does "end cashless bail" even mean?

He meant to write "And Christian Bale?"

He's just trying to get him involved somehow. Throwing things out there, seeing what sticks.

Lots of stupidity and shamelessness of course, but the foreign policy section is particularly incoherent. The education section approaches poetry in reconciling neoliberalism and conservatism

Trump: "Take a memo! Number one, North Korea is now illegal! Number two, I hereby declare Froot Loops America's Cereal! Three, fried food is now healthy! Four, no more bicycles! Five, ban covid deaths! Six, mandatory screenings of Gone with the Wind! Seven ... "

V Trumpy capitalisations on that list of stuff

what does "end cashless bail" even mean?

― contorted filbert (harbl), Monday, August 24, 2020 8:33 AM (six minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

I'm guessing they mean rolling back bail reform in places where it has been passed, especially since it's followed up with "Keep Dangerous Criminals Locked Up until Trial"

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/crime-courts/fair-or-dangerous-days-after-ending-cash-bail-new-york-n1111346