If Harris picks Mark Kelly as her VP, it will help her in this regard. He's more centrist, astronaut, and would lend a tough guy element to the ticket.

Speaking of VP picks, JD Vance was the dumbest thing i've seen politically, since ... the mid-terms ... when the Republicans championed a ban on abortion - despite polling showing an overwhelming percentage are against that - even registered Republicans!

Vance is supposed to bring the hill-billy vote, but didn't Trump have that covered already? Why wouldn't you go for a demographic that you're weak in? Like women or blacks - Tim Scott would have been a solid choice. But no, let's double down on abortion & alienating women.

After the shooting, i thought he couldn't lose. It seemed like he was the President, as you said. If it'd been Chen Shui-bien style, on the eve of the election, he would certainly have won.

But then the end of the Biden charade, the appointment of someone who wasn't in or approaching their 80s, managed to break the news-cycle & steal his thunder somewhat.

Whatever, between the lot of them, not a single word on the origin of Covid.

On the-big-one, cyber-attack, we can assume there will be goals to be achieved behind it. If it was to come from China, for example, you could invade Taiwan without anyone giving a shit. The world would be so 'disrupted' it'd barely know it'd happened.

For sure there would be a new level of security measures domestically - to keep us safe - same as 911 & Covid. I think you mentioned before it could be used to roll-out CBDCs, biometric authentication.