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He's gonna win. A viral outbreak like this has no precedent for anyone still alive. So it's hard to criticize the government based on personal experience. If th

by jcfrei 7y ago

He's gonna win. A viral outbreak like this has no precedent for anyone still alive. So it's hard to criticize the government based on personal experience. If they demonstrate leadership and decisive action that should be enough for a reelection. Any candidate simply cannot compete with the media exposure the president gets during times of a national crisis.

Trasmatta 7y ago
> So it's hard to criticize the government based on personal experience No it's not. You had every expert in the world talking about the potential dangers for months, while Trump kept talking about how it was just a flu that would magically go away on its own, and that there wasn't anything to be concerned with. The US's preparation has been incredibly bad and late in comparison to certain other countries. On top of Trump firing the Pandemic Response Team in 2018. The optics are going to start looking increasingly bad for him as the US death rate starts to climb. I don't claim to predict the outcome of the election, but you can't claim that it's "hard to criticize the government" based off of this, or that any future "decisive action" is going to be enough once the death rate hits tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands.
- jcfrei 7y ago
  I was trying to emphasize the "based on personal experience" part. Of course you can still criticize the government. But elections have time and time again shown that the opinion of experts matters much less to the electorate than their personal experience. That's one of the reasons why the state of the economy is so important for the reelection of a president. That being said, if the US economy really does tank that could make his reelection more difficult but I think he can easily blame that on the virus.
- enitihas 7y ago
  > You had every expert in the world talking about the potential dangers for months? Experts have been also talking about dangers of climate change for years, yet Trump manages to win election while calling climate change a hoax. So not sure his base cares about expert advice. >while Trump kept talking about how it was just a flu that would magically go away on its own, and that there wasn't anything to be concerned with. You should read trump's tweets, there is a shockingly large number of people agreeing with him on this like everything. As long as trump can manage to limit the damage to the US, he will have strong arguments for a re-election.
- TMWNN 7y ago
  >On top of Trump firing the Pandemic Response Team in 2018. Ah yes, yet another person who looked at the Snopes piece's headline and nothing else. One would think reading it, and the Twitter thread it is based on, that to save money (or because the Trump administration hates science, or something) the entire "US Pandemic Response Team" agency was cut to save money, causing everyone in a large DC office building to lose their jobs. Actually reading the contemporary NBC News https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politics-news/tom-bossert-trump-s-homeland-security-adviser-resign-n864321 https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politics-news/tom-bossert-t... and Washington Post https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/to-your-health/wp/2018/05/10/top-white-house-official-in-charge-of-pandemic-response-exits-abruptly/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/to-your-health/wp/2018/0... articles it cites, they seem to have been a handful of people in one team in the National Security Council hierarchy, that the new National Security Advisor reassigned to related agencies. Ziemer resigned because he wanted to keep his team the way it was. COVID19 was not a surprise; that is, it was known to exist in China some time before the first cases appeared in the US. It is not unreasonable for a government to assemble a team to respond to something like a pandemic as needed, as opposed to having people dedicated solely to the purpose and nothing else. And that's exactly what the US did, implementing the ban on non-American travelers who'd been to China in late January, among other things. You may or may not agree with this. But please don't claim that this is somehow prima facie proof of the Trump administration's malfeasance/evilness. PS - No, Trump did not "cut the CDC budget!" either. https://apnews.com/d36d6c4de29f4d04beda3db00cb46104 https://apnews.com/d36d6c4de29f4d04beda3db00cb46104
mnm1 7y ago
Are you joking? This is the worst response to this crisis imaginable. It's impossible not to criticize the government for completely fucking everything up (already listed the top things in another post so I won't rehash). Nothing has been done. We've had a good six or more weeks and still nothing. It's a total disaster. That said, I think you're right about the election. People are too stupid to even be informed. but if we have a few hundred thousand or million deaths, who knows? I still doubt the fox news crowd will change their mind.

by jcfrei 7y ago

Trasmatta 7y ago

> So it's hard to criticize the government based on personal experience No it's not. You had every expert in the world talking about the potential dangers for months, while Trump kept talking about how it was just a flu that would magically go away on its own, and that there wasn't anything to be concerned with. The US's preparation has been incredibly bad and late in comparison to certain other countries. On top of Trump firing the Pandemic Response Team in 2018. The optics are going to start looking increasingly bad for him as the US death rate starts to climb. I don't claim to predict the outcome of the election, but you can't claim that it's "hard to criticize the government" based off of this, or that any future "decisive action" is going to be enough once the death rate hits tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands.

jcfrei 7y ago
I was trying to emphasize the "based on personal experience" part. Of course you can still criticize the government. But elections have time and time again shown that the opinion of experts matters much less to the electorate than their personal experience. That's one of the reasons why the state of the economy is so important for the reelection of a president. That being said, if the US economy really does tank that could make his reelection more difficult but I think he can easily blame that on the virus.
enitihas 7y ago
> You had every expert in the world talking about the potential dangers for months? Experts have been also talking about dangers of climate change for years, yet Trump manages to win election while calling climate change a hoax. So not sure his base cares about expert advice. >while Trump kept talking about how it was just a flu that would magically go away on its own, and that there wasn't anything to be concerned with. You should read trump's tweets, there is a shockingly large number of people agreeing with him on this like everything. As long as trump can manage to limit the damage to the US, he will have strong arguments for a re-election.
TMWNN 7y ago
>On top of Trump firing the Pandemic Response Team in 2018. Ah yes, yet another person who looked at the Snopes piece's headline and nothing else. One would think reading it, and the Twitter thread it is based on, that to save money (or because the Trump administration hates science, or something) the entire "US Pandemic Response Team" agency was cut to save money, causing everyone in a large DC office building to lose their jobs. Actually reading the contemporary NBC News https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politics-news/tom-bossert-trump-s-homeland-security-adviser-resign-n864321 https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politics-news/tom-bossert-t... and Washington Post https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/to-your-health/wp/2018/05/10/top-white-house-official-in-charge-of-pandemic-response-exits-abruptly/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/to-your-health/wp/2018/0... articles it cites, they seem to have been a handful of people in one team in the National Security Council hierarchy, that the new National Security Advisor reassigned to related agencies. Ziemer resigned because he wanted to keep his team the way it was. COVID19 was not a surprise; that is, it was known to exist in China some time before the first cases appeared in the US. It is not unreasonable for a government to assemble a team to respond to something like a pandemic as needed, as opposed to having people dedicated solely to the purpose and nothing else. And that's exactly what the US did, implementing the ban on non-American travelers who'd been to China in late January, among other things. You may or may not agree with this. But please don't claim that this is somehow prima facie proof of the Trump administration's malfeasance/evilness. PS - No, Trump did not "cut the CDC budget!" either. https://apnews.com/d36d6c4de29f4d04beda3db00cb46104 https://apnews.com/d36d6c4de29f4d04beda3db00cb46104

mnm1 7y ago

Are you joking? This is the worst response to this crisis imaginable. It's impossible not to criticize the government for completely fucking everything up (already listed the top things in another post so I won't rehash). Nothing has been done. We've had a good six or more weeks and still nothing. It's a total disaster. That said, I think you're right about the election. People are too stupid to even be informed. but if we have a few hundred thousand or million deaths, who knows? I still doubt the fox news crowd will change their mind.