On to November and Beyond

Law & Order:  During the four days of the Republican convention 3,688 people died from the coronavirus, that’s more people than died on 9.11; that puts the total number of US COVID deaths at over 180,000.  Nevertheless, most of those who attended Trump’s White House RNC event, the one that violated the Hatch Act, believe the whole coronavirus thing is yesterday’s news as none of them socially distanced and only a few wore masks.  A good number of those unmasked have preexisting conditions including Commerce Secretary/octogenarian Wilbur Ross, fresh from a recent hospital stay, Rudy Giuliani, a prostate cancer survivor who was sweating profusely and wiping his hands all over his current flame, and former baseball player/cancer survivor Darryl Strawberry.  Striving to join Tulsa fatality Herman Caine wherever it is that he’s still tweeting from, perhaps?   From what I understand, because to be honest I didn’t have the fortitude to sit through another night of lies and loathing, the event went off as planned.  Ivanka, who wants us to believe that all those COVID deaths sadden her father, said that he is the greatest while also repeatedly patting herself on the back, no surprise as she’s jockeying with her brother Don Jr to see which Trump gets to run for the roses in 2024 assuming Trump doesn’t pull off that reign extension thing that he keeps talking about. By the way, we probably shouldn’t assume that son Eric isn’t competing for that mantle too, he was caught on camera attending a Homeland Security Meeting with his father yesterday, maybe getting pointers on who to contact in Russia about Biden dirt?  Getting back to the speakers, Rudy trashed everyone’s favorite punching bag NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio for turning NYC into a lawless city, more than implying that Joe Biden would do the same to the rest of the country.  Fun fact, despite the current shooting spike in NYC, homicides are half of what they were during the last year of Rudy’s reign. Uber conservative hawk Senator Tom Cotton alleged that Biden was responsible for selling the US out to China and would hand off whatever hadn’t been handed off during the Obama/Biden regime on day one of his administration.  And of course everyone, most notably Trump himself blamed every Democrat ever born for every violent crime committed this year, ignoring that he is in charge and that much of the current wave of violence is attributable to the climate of hate that he’s fostered, the economy that he’s destroyed, his failure to control the pandemic and the widespread gun ownership that he’s done nothing to curb. There’s nothing funny about Trump, the most criminal president we’ve ever had going with the LAW & ORDER theme especially since, pushing that “the minorities are going to invade your suburbs” theme might actually win him enough votes in those key swing districts to win the electoral college. The road to election day, and beyond, is going to be very bumpy indeed.

The Democrats:  Speaker Pelosi suggested that Biden shouldn’t bother debating Trump since all Trump does is lie.  Appearing on a few news shows during the day, Biden said despite Pelosi’s advice, he plans to go forward with the debates and that in the absence of a fact checker, he’ll check the facts himself in real time. He also said that he’s going to hit the campaign trail after Labor Day, but that unlike Trump he plans to adhere to local virus control rules. VP candidate Kamala Harris showed why she was picked to join the ticket by offering a very effective prosecutorial pre-rebuttal of Trump’s acceptance speech yesterday afternoon slamming his handling of the “relentless” coronavirus pandemic as catastrophic, saying that you can’t “create a distraction and hope it will go away.”  She also called Trump petty and vindictive because he is.

Et Cetera: It looks like sports will be back on in a few days no thanks to either son in law Jared Kushner or  Trump who both weighed in with their own comments on the players’ response to racial injustice and the James Blake shooting.  When asked about the suspension of the basketball playoffs, Trump commented on the NBA’s TV ratings, saying that they are down because of their politics.  And the tone deaf Kushner who was being trashed on Twitter last night as the worst blind date ever by countless Jewish women who’d been set up with him back in his pre-Ivanka days, who inherited his fortune from his father and married a woman who similarly inherited hers, said that the players were "very fortunate" to be in a financial position to "take a night off from work."  VP Pence weighed in calling the player protests absurd and his spokesmen, Marc Short, called them silly. By the way according to his father James Blake, the now paralyzed Black man who was shot in the back seven times by the police is currently handcuffed to his bed.  Rittenhouse, the 17 year old high school drop-out/police obsessed Trump fan who traveled to Kenosha to “protect” the citizenry but who instead killed two peaceful protestors and shot another but was offered water by the police who initially seemed reluctant to even stop him is now facing homicide charges.  Sean Hannity’s lawyer is soliciting donations for his defense.  Who knows, by October maybe Rittenhouse will be standing alongside some of Trump’s pardon winners chanting lock her up at a Trump rally.  On the press front, it looks like the Trump team has had it with Washington Post journalist David Farenthold, after he published another one of his pieces looking into how much money the government has been spending at Trump branded resorts, White House spokesman Judd Deere accused the Pulitzer Prize winning journalist of interfering with the Trump businesses, blurting out that the administration is building a dossier on him. The fearless Farenthold responded by tweeting out a request for anyone with more details about that “dossier” to contact him, confidentially of course, with what they know.  And, not that anyone in Trump’s fan base cares, 100 former John McCain staffers and 30 former Mitt Romney aides came out against Trump yesterday, endorsing Biden. Lastly, Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe resigned this morning due to intestinal illness, very relatable because who doesn’t feel sick to their stomachs this morning?