Busines Insider – Friday July 24, 2020 – Commentary
Donald Trump versus Joe Biden
The election is 100 days from Sunday. This has been the weirdest of all presidential campaigns — hardly a campaign at all. Joe Biden, who seemingly has not left his basement since March, has quietly issued extraordinarily vast and progressive policy proposals.
President Trump meanwhile has been talking about all kinds of weird things, notably the dementia test he took and the urban invasions he is ordering. The pandemic rages, recession shadows the country, and Americans have scarcely noticed that we’ve entered a very, very cold war with China.
It promises to be a strange and sad sprint to November. Here are the eight things we’ll be watching in the next 100 days.
- How do the mechanics of voting look? Republicans fear a surge in Democratic voters animated by Trump-hatred, and the GOP and Trump campaign are maneuvering to make voting difficult. Is the pandemic hot enough that it will prevent in-person voting? Is mail-in balloting working smoothly, or are there legal and technical obstacles? Electoral mechanics are arguably the most important issue in a year warped by pandemic and potential foreign meddling.
- Is Trump’s fear message resonating? The president is running a scare campaign about urban chaos and violence — and explicitly trying to create chaos and violence so he can play strongman. Will that work?
- Can Trump maintain this week’s pose of sobriety? Cancelling the convention and admitting the seriousness of the pandemic are bare minimum standards of human decency, but can he maintain that, giving some alienated voters enough hope that he’s changed for them to stick with him?
- Is the pandemic easing and can Trump take credit for that? It’s pretty clear the government has criminally botched the pandemic response, but perhaps other forces will stop it — herd immunity, better community behavior, an early vaccine.
- Is the economy recovering or staggering? Republicans will be in dire trouble if the economy isn’t feeling better in November.
- Has Biden been demonized, or does he remain an inoffensive opponent? One of Trump’s biggest problems is that Republicans don’t fear or dislike Joe Biden they did Hillary Clinton. The invisible nature of the campaign is also helping Biden, since he’s just not present enough in voters’ minds to make them angry. Can the Trump campaign find a way to attack Biden that makes Republican voters fearful enough to vote for Trump?
- What’s the surprise event? The world and the nation are hideously unstable. A war, a terrorist attack, Russian or Chinese mischief, the death of a Supreme Court Justice….the possibilities are endless, and could alter the polls.
- Who’s defending the legitimacy of the election?: Will key Republican officials and judges emphasize in advance that they’ll accept the results and the integrity of the vote, nipping in the bid a potential Trump challenge? — DP
Comments
The situation in the US is no so sadder than in Guyana where the Election losers who controlled the ballot boxes, have for many months refused to concede and hand over the reigns of power to the legally and internationally recognized winners..