NYT: Coronavirus Live Updates: Virus Response Widens Political Divide in Swing States

[Celerity]

In swing states, the virus has become a polarizing issue.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/14/us/coronavirus-news-updates.html?type=styln-live-updates&label=u.s.&index=0#link-7788f9c8



In Wisconsin, residents woke up to a state of confusion on Thursday after the conservative majority on the State Supreme Court sided with the Republican majority in the Legislature on Wednesday night, overturning a statewide stay-at-home order issued by Gov. Tony Evers, a Democrat. In Michigan, hundreds of protesters, many of them armed, turned out at the State Capitol in a drenching rainstorm after the state had closed the Capitol and canceled the legislative session after threats directed toward Gov. Gretchen Whitmer. (Amber McCann, a spokeswoman for the Senate majority leader, Mike Shirkey, said that while some senators were concerned for their safety, that was not the main reason for canceling the session.)

And in Pennsylvania, some county lawmakers defied the Democratic governor’s orders to keep nonessential businesses closed, and President Trump flew to Allentown for a politically charged visit to a medical supply facility. “You have the one group that’s like, ‘Yay!’” said Patty Schachtner, a Democratic state senator from western Wisconsin. “And the other group is like, ‘Man, life just got complicated.’”

In the three states that determined the 2016 presidential election — and could determine the one in 2020 — the response to the coronavirus is becoming a confused and agitated blend of health guidance, protest and partisan politics, leaving residents to fend for themselves. “My anxiety for this pandemic is not having a unified plan, that we’re all on the same page, and listening to science and the same rules,” said Jamie O’Brien, 40, who owns a hair salon in Madison, Wis., that remains closed because of a local stay-at-home order.

Across Wisconsin, the court ruling left some residents in a festive mood; they headed to taverns to celebrate. Others were determined to stay home, just as they had been doing, worried that it was too soon to return to crowded restaurants and shops. It was a microcosm of a country increasingly unable to separate bitter political divisions from plans to battle a deadly disease. Democratic governors in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania, backed by public health experts, have urged caution before reopening. Republican legislatures in those states have been pushing in the opposite direction, arguing that the extended restrictions are threatening their personal freedoms.

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The one issue I take with the article is that it left out Florida as one of the most key states. All Trump needs to do is hold FL and WI, and we have almost no path, (even if we win MI, PA, NV, NM, NH, CO, MN, and VA), to beating him short of flipping AZ or NC or IA, and do we really want to come down having all our eggs in those 3 Rethug run (more or less) states?

IF we win FL and MI (and hold CO, MN, and VA, all 3 states where he is massively underwater atm), it basically breaks his back, as he can win WI, PA, OH, GA, AK, IN, TX, IA, AZ, NC, MO, KS, ME-2, NE-2, and either NH or NV and he still loses.(but not both, both plus all those others listed yields him 271 EV's, so even if we flip ME-2 and/or NE-2, he wins either with a 270 or 269-269 tie EC outcome, with the House (26 Rethug state delegations at worst, they could have more) putting him over the top in the latter 269-269 tie scenario, which would be a disastrous outcome that will cause massive chaos and violence, especially as many of the Rethug House majorities are due to illegal gerrymandering)