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Thursday 25th of April 2024

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2020 Presidential election But if we re-elect him, knowing what a norm-destroying, divisive, corrupt liar he is, then the world will not treat the last four years as an aberration. It will treat them as an affirmation that w've changed. The world will not just look at America differently, but at Americans  differently. And with good reason. Thomas L. Friedman, New York Times, October 29, 2020 © 2019 Kwiple.com
2020 Presidential election It's time to put away the harsh rhetoric. To lower the temperature. To see each other again. To listen to each other again. To make progress, we must stop treating our opponents as our enemy. We are not enemies. We are Americans. Joe Biden, acceptance speech, November 7, 2020 © 2020 Kwiple.com
2020 Presidential election Martha, come up just fast! Fast! Fast! Come on. Quick! You got one minute! One minute, Martha! They don't want to hear this, Martha. Come on. Let's go. Quick, quick, quick, quick. Come on. Let's go! Donald Trump, commanding hitherto sycophantic Arizona Republican Senator Martha McSally, behind in the polls and a woman, to join him on the stage at his October 28, 2020, rally in Goodyear, Arizona, to laughing rally goers  © 2020 Kwiple.com
2020 Presidential election Mr Trump has been backed by 15 CEOs of companies in the S&P 500 index, including Jeffrey Sprecher of Intercontinental Exchange, Steven Roth of the property group Vornado and Sheldon Adelson, the Las Vegas Sands casino magnate who has poured $180m into the Republicans' 2020 war chest. Jeffrey Sonnenfeld, Financial Times, October 30. 2020 © 2020 Kwiple.com
2020 Presidential election Polls from mid-October showed that about 44 percent of voters approved of Trump’s job performance – and this was after he’d concealed aspects of his coronavirus infection from the public, shrugged off the larger meaning of it, established the White House as its own superspreader environment and cavalierly marched on. Forty-four  percent. Who in God’s name are we? Frank Bruni, NeW York Times, October 29, 2020 © 2020 Kwiple.com
Bullshitters say I WON THIS ELECTION, BY A LOT! Donald Trump, 10:36 AM - Nov 7, 2020 © 2020 Kwiple.com
COVID-19 coronavirus Trump's now back in charge. It's not the doctors. Jared Kushner, bragging to Bob Woodward in April, 2020, about sidelining scientists to reopen the economy © 2020 Kwiple.com
COVID-19 coronavirus as of late October 2020 Population ————— United States 328,000,000 China 1,393,000,000 (4.5×) Deaths from COVID-19 ————— China 4,380 United States 223,000 (50.9×) COVID-19 deaths as a % of population ————— China 0.000 003 144  United States 0.000 679 878  (216×) © 2020 Kwiple.com
Democracy If American democracy, long a beacon, cannot self-correct, then all democracies are at risk. Roger Cohen, New York Times, October 29, 2020 © 2020 Kwiple.com
Kwiplers say Calculate the minimum wage as follows: MW = CMHI / CMHS × WPY × HPW where: MW = Minimum Wage CMHI = Current Median Household Income, e.g., $65,000 CMHS = Current Median Household Size, e.g., 2.1 people WPY = Workdays Per Year, e.g., 240 HPW = Hours Per Workday, e.g., 8 [MW would be $16.12 using data above] © 2019 Kwiple.com
Kwiplers say Count votes in Congress by: 1. Calculating a Member's Proportional Vote (MPV) for each member, as follows: MPV = SPNP / NLRS where: SPNP = State's Percentage of the National Population NLRS = Number of Legislators Representing the State (in that legislature) 2. Totaling “yes” MPVs and “no” MPVs 3. Passing if total MPV is more than 50 OTHERWISE Abolish the Senate © 2019 Kwiple.com
Political inequality The present Republican Senate majority, which fast-tracked a third Supreme Court Justice to confirmation at a time when 60m had already cast their vote, represents 15m fewer Americans than the Democratic senators on whom they impenitently imposed their will. Sooner or later, these institutional anomalies will be redefined as gross injustices. Simon Schama, Financial Times, October 30, 2020 © 2020 Kwiple.com
Post-2018 Senate shituation 15 states (Alaska, Arkansas, Idaho, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Utah, Wyoming) 2018 population: 40,056,961 Senators: 30 Republicans 1 Senator per 1,335,232 people — 1 state (California) 2018 population: 39,776,830 Senators: 2 Democrats 1 Senator per 19,888,415 people 19,888,415 / 1,335,232 = 16, therefore: average 15er's vote is worth 16 times a Californian's, a Californian's vote is worth 6% of an average 15er's — 1 state (Wyoming) 2018 population = 573,720, therefore: 1 Senator per 286,860 Wyomians, a Wyomian's vote is worth 69 times a Californian's, a Californian's vote is worth 1.4% of a Wyomian's © 2016 Kwiple.com
Religion From about 2007 to 2019, the over-  whelming majority of countries we studied —43 out of 49—became less religious. The decline in belief was not confined to high-income countries and appeared across most of world. … Several forces are driving this trend, but the most powerful one is the waning hold of a set of beliefs closely linked to the imperative of maintaining high birthrates. Modern societies have become less religious in part because they no longer need to up- hold the kinds of gender and sexual norms that the major world religions instilled for centuries. Ronald Inglehart, Foreign Affairs, September/October 2020 © 2020 Kwiple.com
Religion It once was generally assumed that religious beliefs shaped political views, not the other way round. But recent evidence indicates that the causality can run the other way:  panel studies have found that many people change their political views first and then become less religious. Ronald Inglehart, Foreign Affairs, September/October 2020 © 2020 Kwiple.com
Selfie I have the support of the police, the support of the military, the support of the Bikers for Trump – I have the tough people, but they don't play it tough – until they go to a certain point, and then it would be very bad, very bad. Donald Trump © 2020 Kwiple.com
Snapshot [H]e is the exclamation point on our consistent failure to live up to our own self-image. Donald Trump portrayed by Jamelle Bouie © 2020 Kwiple.com
Snapshot I would bring Donald Trump to our CEO summit years ago and the top tier CEOs would say “Don't bring him in here. We don't consider him a top CEO.” Donald Trump portrayed by Jeffrey Sonnenfeld, Yale School of Management, 2020 © 2020 Kwiple.com
State of the union He has shown that inspiring revulsion in one half of a split country is a workable strategy. For it seems that my revulsion, and that of those like me, does not merely correspond to enthusiasm on the other side, it adds to enthusiasm on the other side. Robert Armstrong, on Trumpism, Financial Times, November 6, 2020 © 2020 Kwiple.com
Supreme Court Something is not right around the Court. And dark money has a lot to do with it. Special interests have a lot to do with it. Donors Trust and whoever's hiding behind Donors Trust has a lot to do with it. And the Bradley Foundation orchestrating its amici over at the Court has a lot to do with it. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, confirmation hearing for Amy Coney Barrett, October 13, 2020 [Donors Trust is an identity scrubber for rich conservatives] [The Bradley Foundation funds legal cases and amicus briefs under dozens of names per case for conservative clients] © 2020 Kwiple.com
Trumpism Conservatives love to jeer Democrats for being obsessed with Trump, for letting him live, as many put it, rent-free in our heads. It's a cruel accusation, like setting someone's house on fire and then  laughing at them for staring at the flames. The outrage Trump sparks leaves less room for many other things – joy, creativity, reflection – but every bit of it is warranted. The problem is the president, not how his victims respond to him. Michelle Goldberg, New York Times, October 29, 2020 © 2020 Kwiple.com
Trumpism For as much as it seems that Donald Trump has changed something about the character of this country, the truth is he hasn't. Everything we've seen in the last four years – the nativism, the racism, the corruption, the wanton exploitation of the weak and unconcealed contempt for the vulnerable – is as much a part of the American story as our highest ideals and aspirations. Jamelle Bouie, New York Times, October 29, 2020 © 2020 Kwiple.com
Trumpism The surreal nature of his presidency was captured on Saturday when his lawyers, including former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani, held a press conference at a nondescript small business on the outskirts of Philadelphia called Four Seasons Total Landscaping, nestled between a crematorium and a sex shop called Fantasy Island. Financial Times, November 8, 2020 © 2020 Kwiple.com
Trumpism Trump has severed America from the idea of America. Liberty's torch cannot be the symbol of a country committed to building walls. Roger Cohen, New York Times, October 29, 2020 © 2020 Kwiple.com
Trumpists say This is a great, great teachable moment here, this whole thing with Trump and McCain. [Americans] have not seen an embattled public figure stand up for himself, double down and tell everybody to go to hell. Rush Limbaugh, defending Trump for saying John McCain, who spent years as a POW rather than receive early release not offered to enlisted men, was not a war hero © 2020 Kwiple.com
Wealth inequality The rich should certainly worry about which way the wind is blowing. According to a survey by Pew Research, Americans' views of why people are rich have changed significantly over the past few years. A growing share of respondents said the main reason people were rich was because they had more advantages than others; between 2018 and 2020 the figure rose from 42 to 65 per cent. Rhymer Rigby, FT Wealth, October 2020 © 2020 Kwiple.com
 
Wealth inequality Since the beginning of the pandemic, the total net worth of America's billionaires, all 686 of them, has jumped close to a trillion dollars. In September, nearly 23 million Americans reported going without enough to eat, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. Ben Ehrenreich, New York Times Magazine, Novenber 8, 2020 [That's close to $1,457,725,948 per billionaire] [~ $1,000,000,000,000 / 23,000,000 = ~ $43,478 per food insecure person] © 2020 Kwiple.com