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"the moral fabric of the country"

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I'm inclined to give these people full agency.

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I will bet a substantial sum that every one of his yeehaw enthusiastic Tulsa groupies would regard your "completely swindled" remark as just another example of a self-righteous liberal patronizing them with a pat on the head.

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This was Trump’s first rally since Sen. Bernie Sanders dropped out of the Democratic primary, leaving Biden the party’s presumptive nominee. In Tulsa, Trump appeared to be testing several lines of attack against the former vice president, including that Biden is a “helpless puppet of the radical left.”

“Joe Biden has surrendered to his party and to the left-wing mob,” Trump said, using a term he employs to lump together peaceful protesters, looters and progressive members of Congress. “He has no control. Does anybody honestly think he controls these maniacs? ... He has absolutely no control.”

Trump continued: “If the Democrats gain power, the rioters will be in charge, and no one will be safe. No one will have control. Joe Biden is not the leader of his party. Joe Biden is a helpless puppet of the radical left.”

These attacks on Biden were clearly designed to rile up Trump’s supporters the same way that his attacks on Hillary Clinton had prompted crowds to chant “Lock Her Up!” in 2016.

But time and again, Trump’s mention of Biden’s name failed to fire up the crowds in Tulsa.

This hints at a broader problem Trump is facing as he mounts a campaign against the former vice president: For a candidate like Trump, who fares better when voters are angry than when they’re not, Biden may not arouse enough anger in Trump’s supporters to really mobilize them.

This observation is supported by polling, which consistently shows that the majority of Americans have a favorable view of Biden, something that was not true for Clinton four years ago.

The most recent Fox News survey of the 2020 race, released last week, found that Biden’s favorability ratings are net positive 9 points, with 53% of respondents saying they hold a favorable view of him, versus 44% who view him unfavorably.

That same poll, however, found that Trump’s favorability was net negative 13 points, with 43% reporting a favorable view of the president and 56% an unfavorable one. Taken together, this means Biden has a 22 point lead over Trump in favorability.

Some candidates might see this gap and take it as a sign to focus more energy on expanding their support among different groups. But judging from the president’s speech on Saturday, Trump has no plans to temper his grievance-driven, divisive campaign rhetoric in an attempt to broaden his appeal.

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In any case, I am trying to maintain my humanity and reserve my “I hope you just die” feelings for only one individual....

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I'm hoping I-1 remains quite healthy, at least through Nov. 3rd.

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President Donald Trump insisted on Tuesday that he was serious when he revealed that he had directed his administration to slow coronavirus testing in the United States — shattering the defenses of senior White House aides who argued Trump’s remarks were made in jest.

“I don’t kid. Let me just tell you. Let me make it clear,” Trump told reporters, when pressed on whether his comments at a campaign event Saturday in Tulsa, Okla., were intended as a joke.

“We have got the greatest testing program anywhere in the world. We test better than anybody in the world. Our tests are the best in the world, and we have the most of them. By having more tests, we find more cases,” he continued.

Administration officials as high-ranking as Vice President Mike Pence have scrambled in recent days to clean up Trump’s statements last Saturday in Tulsa, Okla., where he reprised his dubious logic regarding testing rates before an arena of supporters.

“When you do testing to that extent, you’re going to find more people,” Trump said during the rally. “You’re going to find more cases. So I said to my people, ‘Slow the testing down, please.’”

White House trade adviser Peter Navarro suggested Sunday the president never issued such an explicit directive, telling CNN Trump’s remarks were “tongue in cheek.”

“It was a comment that he made in jest,” White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany added at a news briefing Monday, saying: “Any suggestion that testing has been curtailed is not rooted in fact.”

Even Pence sought to help manage the political fallout, telling governors in a conference call Monday that Trump’s testing comments were merely a “passing observation," according to a CBS News report.

But in an interview Monday, Trump did not deny making the ask of his administration to curtail coronavirus testing, instead contending that “if we did slow it down, we wouldn't show nearly as many cases.”

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Originally posted by wtg:
Coming home after the rally. I saw this photo on the news this evening; he looked terrible.

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Look at the amount of makeup on his collar