Here's my hot take -- one I kinda believe, even as I suspect no one will agree.
COVID-19 ultimately didn't hurt, and may have helped, Trump & the GOP in the election.
Arguments:
1. Biden will end up winning by amount he was beating Trump in head to heads pre-pandemic. (1/x)
2. COVID-19 became THE STORY, crowding out...well, all of the other stories.
3. It *IS* a pandemic, & 1 that throughout October became increasingly terrible across the world. Blaming Trump for COVID-19 much less fair than blaming him for cutting taxes for rich, anti-ACA, etc 2/x
4. Trump got to make essentially unchallenged claim that economy all good pre-COVID-19. Why blame him for a pandemic also crushing Europe.
5. Biden spent shockingly little time describing the medhanics of Trump's HHS/CDC effing up pandemic response, just assumed people knew. 3/x
6. So Dem critique became focused on something that felt fluky rather than predictive. How many more pandemics will we have?
7. While I am hard core on pandemic, I do think "COVID fatigue is real." Could totally see anti-maskers being drawn to Trump. (4/x)
8. Biden's basement campaign really underscored pre-existing concerns about Biden and age -- and literally meant there was little campaign travel until the end. Including key surrogates (where WAS Michelle, btw?).
9. Dem refusal to do ground with protocols was perverse. (5/x)
10. Blaming Trump for COVID, and running on COVID alone, did NOTHING to hurt downballot Republicans.
An attack on the GOP's tax scam...
their attacks on the ACA...
etc... all implicate full ticket more. (6/x)
Probably could come up with more, but I think vague blaming of Trump for a pandemic...
rather than detailed attacks on Trump governance that implicated Congressional GOP...
while Trump hustled hard as Biden & Harris did Zoom fundraisers to raise $ for useless TV ads.... (7/x)
In impermanent conclusion.... COVID-19 helped the GOP. (8/x)
1 addition: As in 2016, I'm AMAZED that the Dems had no economic message...
that they didn't attack Trump's business record as indicative of how he would, or had, run the executive branch.
etc
Trump's core strength is economy, & he was allowed to run it unopposed twice. (9/x)
Lest anyone think my focus on the need to describe in detail how Trump messed up COVID-19 response across executive branch....
Now it is up to a President Biden -- and forgive me, we DO know that is what's happening -- to view running the executive branch effectively as the main way to both deliver results and de-radicalize the country. (2/x)
Biden GESTURED at this theory of the case, but with no detail. And pelosi's STEADFAST AVERSION to oversight made it an unnecessarily hard story to tell. (3/x)
My thoughts on the failed Schumer-Feinstein approach to #SCOTUShearings:
1. Polling to determine the best message for paid media is not relevant to earned media strategy. This ought to be basic, but it's been hard for Establishment Democrats to understand FOR YEARS. (1/x)
2. There's a kabuki style of question deflecting that means that Democratic Senators can NOT get the storyline out of straightforward substantive questions they seek.
So ACA, Roe, etc polling is irrelevant to what questions should be asked. The question is what can get noticed!
3. Democratic Senators should ask principally about:
A) Her violation of innumerable Washington DC laws in attending restaurants and the like while she and her family were REQUIRED BY LAW to quarantine.
1. Deaths statistic is being treated as factual even when we know it's a WILD undercount. This is deeply irresponsible. EVERY sentence referencing the stats MUST include the fact it is SERIOUSLY too low.
I *strongly* suspect red state/rural counts are WAY off, given inadequacy of testing & political incentives.
Why does this matter? By underplaying the human cost of our irresponsibly delayed social distancing, "stats based" people are facilitating a premature return to normalcy.
Statistics *seem objective,* and so limitations must be highlighted.
Questions I have about Bloomberg's financial disclosures, which he will hide from the public until after most delegates have been allocated: apnews.com/430ff49ba38506…
2. How recently was bloomberg long natural gas (directly or indirectly), and did that time frame intersect with his (otherwise wholly meritorious) anti-coal contributions? (2/x)
3. How many of Bloomberg's investments have a stake in who is the next Comptroller of the Currency?
4. How many of Bloomberg's investments have a stake in who is the next Chairperson of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC)? (3/x)
@PeteButtigieg Portends pretty badly for antitrust policy in a Butigieg Administration that @PeteButtigieg thinks it's fine to have worked on pricing for a price fixing company & that's not one of the McKinsey clients about whom he is currently squeamish.