The real issues

While the world waits with bated breath for the USA to determine who will be their president from 2021, their exit polls have some really interesting findings which should cause us to reflect on the position of the traditional media and the Democratic Party during the campaign. 

According to exit polls posted by CNN, the top three concerns of voters were; the economy, climate change, and the pandemic in that order, with the economy, mattering most to a third of those polled. This seems to once again, support James Carville's memorable prognosis in 1992, that "It's the economy, stupid. "  

That clearly remains of foremost interest to voters in  US elections.

To explain how it arrived at the results, CNN posted this statement. "Exit polling traditionally involves interviews with a randomly selected sample of voters conducted as those voters leave their polling places. Unlike pre-election polling, where voters can only be identified using screening questions or a history of voting on a voter file, meeting voters where they ensure that those included in the survey have actually cast their ballots." So while these results cannot  100% accurate, they at least provide a useful guide. 

These findings should come as a surprise to many in the mainstream media who have been pushing the narrative that with the USA having such a high rate of infection and death, the poor and delayed handling of the pandemic by the Trump regime would have made the election a slam dunk for  Biden. It is however easy to say it is not so, even at this early stage where the final outcome of the election still hangs in the balance.

While I could never support Trump because of his uncouth manner and especially his disgraceful behavior towards women in general and women of color in particular, I have always supported his stance on the pandemic which boils down to; learn to live with it!

No, I didn't swallow the sale's pitch that he came up with at the end of September, that he had been infected by the coronavirus, had been cured and had risen from the ashes, to become almost superhuman physically. I think he lied about being infected, just as he lies about every other thing. For had he been, with his pre-existing conditions, he would have been far more ill and slower to recover.

But I digress.

The real point is, Trump, has always maintained that the economic disaster caused by locking down the country would be far more devastating than the health effects, despite the high death rate from the virus. 

While many challenge this approach, I have always maintained that this is indeed true, especially in poorer countries where people do not have a wealthy state to subsidize those on the fringes who have lived on the verge of starvation long before the pandemic. And even the World Health Organization now recognizes this as they see the rapid rate at which poverty is growing worldwide. 

I currently reside in Florida where the pro-Trump republican governor has opened up the economy totally, and where the Trump re-election win is not at all in dispute. The fact is that the vast majority of people here are happy to be able to go about their business.  But people are personally responsible, so understanding that the pandemic remains a serious threat and since they do not wish to become ill,  most are taking the necessary precautions. So despite the governor warning that public health measures should not be legislated, individuals and business people almost everywhere you go,  are all following the advice of the scientists. 

Most people are therefore fully masked and socially distancing. Yes, there are still some nonbelievers trying to resist these sensible measures, but they are being shunned and prevented by most others.

The fact is, we have to learn to live with this virus until there is a cure. Full stop.

As a postscript to Tump's win in Florida, let's look at the issue of socialism. While I stood up and fought diligently to resist the possibility of socialism being introduced into Jamaica in the 1970' s,  I  am not convinced by the charge that a win by Biden would cause socialism to be introduced in the USA. Yes, you have the fringe element led by Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Cortez-Ocasio, who would fight tooth and nail to introduce this backward economic philosophy here, but capitalism is just too entrenched in the psyche of the American population for them to succeed.

However, I will not fault those whose roots were in Cuba, Venezuela, and Columbia who are the main anti-socialist campaigners in the state.  Those three countries suffered for decades and terribly because of socialism. While in Colombia, socialism was never introduced fully, the Revolutionary Armed Forces which was a Marxist/Leninist guerilla group, caused thousands of deaths and stymied the economy there from 1964-2017. So it is no wonder that Colombians who managed to escape to the capitalist USA would want to leave all tinges of that retrograde philosophy behind them.

So now, we wait to see how the referendum on the Trump presidency, pans out in the overall USA.