Subterms
Trump attempts to save himself in battlegrounds as Covid surges
Weekly case average is rising in 48 of the 50 states
Whitmer: Trump ‘inciting domestic terrorism’ with rally chant
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Cornel West is a thinker. Readers of Prospect magazine recently voted him the world’s fourth-best thinker. And right now he is thinking about 3 November, and whether the United States will reject or endorse Donald Trump. No one knows what will happen; not even West, not least because in the US he sees contradictions that even he can’t fully explain.One such contradiction was Charlottesville, Virginia on the day in August 2017 when far-right activists menaced a community, killed a woman protesting against racism and then basked in the affirmation of Trump calling them “some very fine people”. West – always dapper in black suit, black scarf, white shirt, gleaming cufflinks and with his grey-flecked afro standing proud – was there.“I remember seeing those folk looking at us and cussing at us and spitting at us and carrying on. And then the charge, and the anti-fascists coming in to save our lives. But what I also remember is walking by the park and seeing these neo-fascist brothers listening to some black music. I said: ‘Wow, this is America, isn’t it? These neo-fascist brothers listening to some Motown just before they going to mow us down.’ Ain’t that something?”What West says matters because of his CV and because he straddles so many platforms: in academia, in the media, in popular culture. He seems too learned to be embraced by popular culture and too popular to have sway in academia, and yet he manages both. It’s capital he intends to expend between now and November.“I am not crazy about Biden,” he says. “I don’t endorse him. But I believe we gotta vote for him. I am not in love with neoliberal elites either. I think they have to take some responsibility for this neo-fascist moment. But in the end, this white supremacy is soooo lethal … and it cuts so deep.” More
With little more than two weeks to reverse his dismal standing in the polls, and amid a coronavirus resurgence that could sink his pursuit of a second term, Donald Trump has embarked on a tour of battleground states.New US daily cases of Covid-19 are averaging above 55,000, their highest level since July, according to government figures, and rising in more than 40 states, including many the Republican president must win on 3 November.Yet despite trailing Democratic challenger Joe Biden by double digits in almost every national poll, all of which show a substantial deficit in approval over handling the pandemic, Trump is continuing to host large rallies with few supporters wearing masks and little social distancing.Trump was in Nevada on Sunday, attending church in Las Vegas before a rally. Thousands were expected at events in other swing states on Monday (Arizona), Tuesday (Pennsylvania) and Wednesday (North Carolina). Trump is expected to continue to prioritise hopes for economic recovery above measures including new lockdowns.In an interview on a Wisconsin radio station, Trump was asked if rallies at which mostly maskless supporters are packed tightly together sent the wrong message.I’m not a big shutdown believerDonald Trump“I don’t think so because I’m not a big shutdown believer,” he said. “If you take a look at your state, they’ve been shut down and they’ve been locked down and locked up and, you know, they’ve been doing it for a long time.”Trump won Wisconsin by less than one point in 2016 but trails there now by more than seven, according to FiveThirtyEight.com. At a rally in Janesville on Saturday the president insisted again that the fight against the pandemic was being won, despite statistics from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention continually showing the opposite.Only Vermont and Missouri have reported a decrease in the average number of reported cases over the past week. Connecticut and Florida lead the nation, with increases by 50% or more. Another 27 states rose between 10% and 50%, according to Johns Hopkins University. More than 8.1m US cases have been confirmed, the death toll near 220,000.“We’re doing great, we’re doing really well,” Trump said in Wisconsin. “We’re rounding the corner. We have unbelievable vaccines coming out real soon.”On NBC’s Meet the Press on Sunday, the health secretary, Alex Azar, pleaded with the American people to “hang in there with us. We are so close. We are weeks away from monoclonal antibodies for you, for safe and effective vaccines. We need to bridge to that day, so please just give us a bit more time of your individual, responsible behavior of washing your hands, watch your distance, wear your face coverings when you can’t watch your distance.”Azar dodged questions about why the president could not deliver such advice.As my grandfather would say, ‘This guy’s gone around the bend if he thinks we’ve turned the corner’Joe BidenIn North Carolina on Sunday, Biden told supporters: “As my grandfather would say, ‘This guy’s gone around the bend if he thinks we’ve turned the corner’. Things are getting worse, and he continues to lie to us about circumstances.”Biden’s running mate, California senator Kamala Harris, canceled events over the weekend after an aide tested positive for Covid-19. She will return to the trail in Florida on Monday, that state’s first day of early in-person voting.Trump is targeting several states he won in 2016 and cannot afford to lose if he is to secure the 270 electoral college votes he needs to stay in the White House. Polling continues to suggest he is in serious trouble. His deficit to Biden in Pennsylvania, which he won from Hillary Clinton by fewer than 45,000 of 6m votes, is currently more than six points. In Arizona, he trails by about four, the margin by which he won in 2016.Ronna McDaniel, chair of the Republican National Committee, said she did not believe the polls. “I am seeing more enthusiasm than I saw in 2016,” she told ABC’s This Week. “I study the data every day. We know that our voters are going to turn out on election day. They don’t trust the mail-in balloting as much. They are getting out in these early vote states right now.”Trump will face Biden on Thursday in a final debate in Nashville, Tennessee, following a first meeting marked by the president’s interruptions and evasions. A second debate was cancelled after Trump contracted coronavirus and spent three days in hospital, then refused to hold the debate virtually. More
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Leaders from Viktor Orbán to Jair Bolsonaro are wary of a return to geopolitics as usual More
Pete Buttigieg, a former challenger for the Democratic presidential nomination and a member of Joe Biden’s transition team, believes his own marriage is under threat from Donald Trump’s supreme court nominee, Amy Coney Barrett.Speaking on Fox News Sunday, Buttigieg, who married his husband Chasten in 2018, indicated that the court’s 2015 decision that made same-sex marriage legal was among a number of rulings a strong conservative majority could look to overturn.Republicans are seeking to seat Barrett before the 3 November general election. The Senate judiciary committee will vote this week on forwarding the nomination to a full floor vote.“Right now as we speak the pre-existing condition [healthcare] coverage of millions of Americans might depend on what is about to happen in the Senate with regard to this justice,” Buttigieg said.“My marriage might depend on what is about to happen in the Senate with regard to this justice. So many issues are on the line.”The right to same-sex marriage were enshrined in Obergefell v Hodges, the culmination of a years-long fight incorporating challenges from several states and decided by the landmark 5-4 ruling.Buttigieg, a former mayor of South Bend, Indiana, said Republicans pushing through Barrett’s nomination days before the election, in the middle of the coronavirus pandemic, sent the wrong message to voters.“It’s not in the spirit of our constitution, or our legal system, or political system for them to do this,” he said. “Most Americans believe that the American people ought to have a say. We’re not talking about an election that’s coming up, we’re in the middle of an election, millions of Americans are voting and want their voice to be heard.”He added: “There’s an enormous amount of frustration that this Senate can’t even bring itself, with Mitch McConnell, to vote through a Covid relief package. People are suffering, people are hurting, there’s no clear end in sight.“There’s been a bill we brought to them months ago coming out of the house, they won’t touch it, they won’t do anything but suddenly they have time to rush through a nomination that the American people don’t want.“Whatever specific word you use for it, wrong is the word I would use.”Buttigieg defended himself against a claim from Wallace that he had talked about expanding the court to 15 justices, so-called court packing.“My views haven’t changed,” he said. “Bipartisan reform with the purpose of reducing the politicisation of the supreme court is a really promising idea. Let’s also be clear that a president can’t just snap their fingers and do it.” More
Pelosi says president’s rhetoric is turning voters against him
Whitmer aide: rhetoric against Michigan governor ‘has to stop’
Trump trails Biden as campaigns head for battleground states
Trump hopes fade in Wisconsin as economy boast unravels
Traitor: American perfidy, from Benedict Arnold to Trump
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Donald Trump has described his Democratic presidential rival, Joe Biden, as the ‘worst candidate in history’ at a rally in Wisconsin. ‘If I lose … what do I do? I’d rather run against somebody who is extraordinarily talented, at least this way I can go and lead my life.’ Trump again insisted that he was immune from Covid-19, saying he ‘got better fast’ and that he ‘can now jump into the audience and give you all a big kiss, the women and the men’
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