Voters face tough choice between rising crime or worsening virus

By Ray Hanania

American voters face a tough choice in the November 3 General Election for president that goes beyond the obvious divisive sniping between President Donald Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden.

The real choice comes down to two important issues. Do you care more about safety and fighting crime, or do you care more about the threat of the Coronavirus?

If you are concerned about how the national Democrats have mishandled and defended the Black Lives Movement, bullying mainstream Americans about allegedly not caring about racism, and marginalizing the violence that has surrounded BLM protests including looting, arson and physical attacks, then you will most likely vote for Trump.

If you are concerned about how the national Republicans have mishandled the real threat of the coronavirus, COVID-19 pandemic, refusing to wear face masks, dragging their feet on approving anti-virus treatments and medications, then you will most likely vote for Biden.

The national news media has pretty much made up their minds based on the slanted coverage of the presidential election exaggerating Trump’s errors, statements and Tweets and slamming him more harshly than they have ever slammed any prior president. They are soft-balling scrutiny of Biden and ignoring his issues, but inadvertently, I think, helping to strengthen Trump’s re-election chances.

It is ironic that under the worst news media assault ever against any president this country has ever had, worse than the media’s obsession with President Richard M. Nixon, the media bias is actually helping Trump in the election.

How is it helping? The media is creating an issue that is distracting voters from the real issues regarding Trump’s performance in office, evaluating his policies and his actions. While his haters on the Left are focused on all that, the people who supported Trump in 2016, rightwing extremists, evangelicals, mainstream conservatives and conservative Democrats are offended by the media bias and have focused on that. The media bias has distracted Trump’s followers from engaging in a substantive analysis of his performance, which really hasn’t been great.

But then, Biden’s performance as vice president and the performance of the president he served under, Barack Obama, wasn’t that great either.

We will never have a balanced discussion on the real issues because the media is blocking it with their hate-driven coverage.

The Left loves the media’s bias. It gives them ammunition to attack Trump and the Right even more than they do in a normal political environment of political partisanship.

And yet I still think the election will come down to two issues.

Which issue is more important? Your safety, or your health? That’s ironic because both issues directly threaten our lives and existence but it’s a choice that voters are facing now in early voting and on election day on Tuesday, November 3.

“FANMAIL FROM SOME FLOUNDER”

Quoting from Rocky and Bullwinkle … I love getting emails especially when they are creative. But you can email me at rghanania@gmail.com and I will make sure to reply. This email came last week:

“I can’t figure out if you are pro-Trump or Pro-Biden. Which is it? Are you a Republican or a Democrat?”

RJ, Orland Park

Well, “RJ,” good questions. I don’t’ see much real difference between Republicans and Democrats locally and I vote on the issues. In Northern Illinois there are very few Republicans, so what’s the real choice.

Nationally, I love issues. I believe there is no such thing as “100 percent” when it comes to government and politics – if I agree with someone 65 percent, I feel that’s good enough. And, like many voters, I vote “against” as often as I vote “for.” Trump was a great story in 2016, especially since I did not like Hillary Clinton and what I perceived as her arrogant attitude of entitlement. She hurt herself by presenting herself like she was above Trump, and worse when she described Trump’s supporters as “the deplorables.”

My main criticism is against the national mainstream news media which clearly has taken sides become partisan advocates of candidates they prefer (usually on the Left), while excessively trashing those they dislike. Their attacks against Trump have been excessive and misleading. He’s done some bad and he’s done some good. That may make me look like a Trump supporter, but that’s because in today’s world, truth is no longer a criteria for our political debate. We pander to ourselves.

There are things about President Trump and Joe Biden that I like, and things about Trump and Biden that I dislike.

But the national news media is the scourge, which is why I love the community press so much more, including here at the Patch and for the Southwest News newspaper group where I write, also.

COVID-19 is a contagious virus. Hate is a terrible disease. We can deal with the coronavirus and find cures, but for some reason we are willing to tolerate hate when it suits our individual political leanings. That really needs to stop.

As for who will win? Don’t believe the polls. Media Polling is focused on the popular vote and I think Biden will beat Hillary who got 43 million more votes than Trump in 2016. I think Biden will get 4 million more votes than Trump but that’s because of the push in major cities dominated by Democrats. In reality, the polling doesn’t really take into account areas outside of the Democratically dominated major cities where getting 65 percent of the vote is the same as getting 90 percent of the vote when it comes to electoral college votes.

(Ray Hanania is an award-winning former Chicago City Hall political reporter. His mainstream Op-Ed columns appear in newspapers in the Chicagoland region, here at the patch, while his Middle East writing appear at the Arab News newspaper at ArabNews.com. If you are interested in his perspectives on the Middle East, catch his live Detroit radio show every Wednesday morning by connecting online through Facebook.com/TheArabNews or on his Facebook page at Facebook.com/rghanania.)