#five Republican presidential

[bikerpoliticalreport]

Epic Republican Rally: Moms for Liberty Ignite Revolutionary Change in Education Policy

 In the bustling heart of Philadelphia, the Moms for Liberty “Joyful Warriors” National Summit stood resolute against a cacophony of insults such as “bigot” and “fascist,” hurled by a handful of protesters. These protesters, engaging in a transgender “dance protest,” starkly contrasted the conservative gathering within the summit venue on Friday and Saturday.

   Amid vibrant rainbow flags, loud music, and public speeches, the protest outside the summit was hardly discreet. It was heavily publicized in media stories, social media posts, and various signage placed strategically throughout the city. They had prepared for a larger crowd with stacked placards for on-the-spot protestors, assorted snacks, sidewalk chalk for ground-based insults, and tables loaded with persuasive literature. However, the protest’s anticipated impact seemed overestimated, with the cardboard signs barely utilized.

   Inside the venue, supporters of the Moms for Liberty Summit displayed a stark contrast. Encouraging messages echoed throughout the room, advocating conservative values. Attendees made it clear they would continue defending their beliefs, regardless of the labels imposed by those opposing their cause.

   Moms for Liberty is a grassroots conservative group born out of parents’ concerns regarding policies perceived as destructive during the Covid-19 pandemic two years prior. This concern culminated in a formidable political movement that attracted significant attention from five Republican presidential hopefuls, including Ron DeSantis, Nikki Haley, and former President Donald Trump, along with Asa Hutchinson, former Arkansas Governor, and Vivek Ramaswamy on a subsequent day. This attention drawn to the group was believed to be the cause of the protest.

   Ramaswamy, joined by his wife, a throat surgeon, and his two children, engaged in a lively discussion with Tiffany Justice, the co-founder of Moms for Liberty. They discussed proposed national policies, including his proposed changes to the educational system. His policies, particularly the idea of dismantling the U.S. Department of Education to facilitate school choice, found favor among many of the moms present. His suggestion of overhauling various federal agencies like the FBI, IRS, ATF, and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission also stirred a positive response.

   Ramaswamy, at 37, stands as the first millennial U.S. presidential candidate. His positions, such as acknowledging two genders, embracing fossil fuels, and recognizing parents’ rights to decide their children’s education, resonated with the crowd. He warned against the growing “woke” culture and what he described as a moral void being filled with damaging ideologies like “wokeism,” “transgenderism,” and “COVIDism.”

   The summit also hosted former Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson, an advocate for the future of education, particularly in computer science. As governor, he championed a comprehensive education program for computer science. If elected president, he aspired to establish such programs in all American high schools. Hutchinson, who had also been a federal prosecutor, stressed his commitment to border security and a balanced budget, further enhancing his appeal to the conservative audience.

   The Moms for Liberty “Joyful Warriors” National Summit served as a beacon for conservative values in the face of protest and opposition. Despite the external noise, the summit successfully hosted influential figures in the Republican Party, showcasing the strength of grassroots movements in shaping the national political conversation.

[navree]

genuinely would love for some of the "both parties are the same" people to name me a single election in the entirety of the twenty first century where the outcome for the country wouldn't have been better if a democrat had won

[relaxedstyles]

💯 ⬆️⬆️⬆️⬆️⬆️⬆️⬆️⬆️⬆️⬆️⬆️⬆️⬆️⬆️⬆️⬆️⬆️

[the-yearning-astronaut]

I think I'm going to be sick

[lets-steal-an-archive]

By Bernie Sanders | July 13, 2024

I will do all that I can to see that President Biden is re-elected. Why? Despite my disagreements with him on particular issues, he has been the most effective president in the modern history of our country and is the strongest candidate to defeat Donald Trump — a demagogue and pathological liar. It’s time to learn a lesson from the progressive and centrist forces in France who, despite profound political differences, came together this week to soundly defeat right-wing extremism.

I strongly disagree with Mr. Biden on the question of U.S. support for Israel’s horrific war against the Palestinian people. The United States should not provide Benjamin Netanyahu’s right-wing extremist government with another nickel as it continues to create one of the worst humanitarian disasters in modern history.

I strongly disagree with the president’s belief that the Affordable Care Act, as useful as it has been, will ever address America’s health care crisis. Our health care system is broken, dysfunctional and wildly expensive and needs to be replaced with a “Medicare for all” single-payer system. Health care is a human right.

And those are not my only disagreements with Mr. Biden.

But for over two weeks now, the corporate media has obsessively focused on the June presidential debate and the cognitive capabilities of a man who has, perhaps, the most difficult and stressful job in the world. The media has frantically searched for every living human being who no longer supports the president or any neurologist who wants to appear on TV. Unfortunately, too many Democrats have joined that circular firing squad.

Yes. I know: Mr. Biden is old, is prone to gaffes, walks stiffly and had a disastrous debate with Mr. Trump. But this I also know: A presidential election is not an entertainment contest. It does not begin or end with a 90-minute debate.

Enough! Mr. Biden may not be the ideal candidate, but he will be the candidate and should be the candidate. And with an effective campaign taht speaks to the needs of working families, he will not only defeat Mr. Trump but beat him badly. It’s time for Democrats to stop the bickering and nit-picking.

I understand that some Democrats get nervous about having to explain the president’s gaffes and misspeaking names. But unlike the Republicans, they do not have to explain away a candidate who now has 34 felony convictions and faces charges that could lead to dozens of additional convictions, who has been hit with a $5 million judgment after he was found liable in a sexual abuse case, who has been involved in more than 4,000 lawsuits, who has repeatedly gone bankrupt and who has told thousands of documented lies and falsehoods.

Supporters of Mr. Biden can speak proudly about a good and decent Democratic president with a record of real accomplishment. The Biden administration, as a result of the American Rescue Plan, helped rebuild the economy during the pandemic far faster than economists thought possible. At a time when people were terrified about the future, the president and those of us who supported him in Congress put Americans back to work, provided cash benefits to desperate parents and protected small businesses, hospitals, schools and child care centers.

After decades of talk about our crumbling roads, bridges and water systems, we put more money into rebuilding America’s infrastructure than ever before — which is projected to create millions of well-paying jobs. And we did not stop there. We made the largest-ever investment in climate action to save the planet. We canceled student debt for nearly five million financially strapped Americans. We cut prices for insulin and asthma inhalers, capped out-of-pocket costs for prescription drugs and got free vaccines to the American people. We battled to defend women’s rights in the face of moves by Trump-appointed jurists to roll back reproductive freedom and deny women the right to control their own bodies.

So, yes, Mr. Biden has a record to run on. A strong record. But he and his supporters should never suggest that what’s been accomplished is sufficient. To win the election, the president must do more than just defend his excellent record. He needs to propose and fight for a bold agenda that speaks to the needs of the vast majority of our people — the working families of this country, the people who have been left behind for far too long.

At a time when the billionaires have never had it so good and when the United States is experiencing virtually unprecedented income and wealth inequality, over 60 percent of Americans live paycheck to paycheck, real weekly wages for the average worker have not risen in over 50 years, 25 percent of seniors live each year on $15,000 or less, we have a higher rate of childhood poverty than almost any other major country, and housing is becoming more and more unaffordable — among other crises.

This is the wealthiest country in the history of the world. We can do better. We must do better. Joe Biden knows that. Donald Trump does not. Joe Biden wants to tax the rich so that we can fund the needs of working families, the elderly, the children, the sick and the poor. Donald Trump wants to cut taxes for the billionaire class. Joe Biden wants to expand Social Security benefits. Donald Trump and his friends want to weaken Social Security. Joe Biden wants to make it easier for workers to form unions and collectively bargain for better wages and benefits. Donald Trump wants to let multinational corporations get away with exploiting workers and ripping off consumers. Joe Biden respects democracy. Donald Trump attacks it.

This election offers a stark choice on issue after issue. If Mr. Biden and his supporters focus on these issues — and refuse to be divided and distracted — the president will rally working families to his side in the industrial Midwest swing states and elsewhere and win the November election. And let me say this as emphatically as I can: For the sake of our kids and future generations, he must win.

Bernie Sanders is the senior senator from Vermont.

[robertreich]

No Labels Isn't What It Claims to Be

The “No Labels” Party is not what it pretends to be. It’s a front group for Donald Trump.

Now I understand, if you’re sick of the two major parties, you might be intrigued by a party that claims to be a “common sense” alternative that finds the middle ground.

But if you or anyone in your life is planning to vote for No Labels — or any third party — in 2024, please watch and share this video first.

Here are three things you need to know.

First, No Labels is a dark money group with secret far-right donors. Investigative reporting has revealed that they include many of the same Republican donors who have pumped huge sums of money into electing candidates like Trump and Ron DeSantis. They also include the rightwing billionaire Harlan Crow, who spent years secretly treating Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas to a lifestyle of the rich and famous.

If the No Labels Party is backed by Trump donors, in an election where Trump is on the ballot, there’s actually a label we should give to “No Labels.” Clearly, they’re a pro-Trump group.

Second, the premise No Labels is based on — that Donald Trump and President Biden are at equally extreme ends of the political spectrum — is preposterous.

Trump has been impeached twice, found by a jury to have committed sexual assault, is facing 91 criminal charges in four separate cases — two of them in connection with an attempt to effectively end American democracy.

There is no “equally extreme” candidate as Trump!

Finally, the structure of the Electoral College means that as a practical matter, a third party only draws votes away from whichever major party candidate is closest to it. No third party candidate has ever won a presidential election.

And in this particular election, when one of the major parties is putting up a candidate who threatens democracy itself, we cannot take the risk.

Donald Trump has already tried to overturn one election and suggested suspending the Constitution to maintain power. It is no exaggeration to say that if he takes the White House again, there may not ever be another free and fair election.

Democracy won by a whisker in the last presidential election. Just 44,000 votes in Arizona, Georgia, and Wisconsin — less than one tenth of 1 percent of the total votes cast nationwide — were the difference between the Biden presidency and a tie in the Electoral College that would have thrown the election to the House of Representatives, and hence to Trump.

If candidates from No Labels— or any other third party, like the Green Party or the Libertarian Party —  peel off just a fraction of the anti-Trump vote from Biden, while Trump voters stay loyal to him, Trump could win the top five swing states comfortably and return to the Oval Office. And No Labels’ own polling shows they would do just that!

Let me be absolutely clear. Third-party groups like No Labels are in effect front groups for Trump in 2024, and should be treated as such.

The supposed “centrism” No Labels touts is nonsense. There is no middle ground between democracy and fascism.

Please share this video and spread the word.

[wilwheaton]

What the two different worldviews look like was on display earlier this month, when Republicans and a few Democrats in the Senate killed a bipartisan expansion of the child tax credit, a tax break for parents with dependent children. A hike in that credit during the pandemic cut child poverty dramatically, only for that rate to bounce back when the pandemic relief expired and dropped five million U.S. children back into poverty in 2022. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities noted that the change “underscores the fact that the number of children living in poverty is a policy choice.” On January 31, 2024, the House passed an expansion of the child tax credit that was smaller than the one in place during the pandemic, and Republican vice presidential hopeful Ohio senator J.D. Vance, who has been criticized for comments about “childless cat ladies,” seemed to support the measure when he said, “If you’re raising children in this country, we should make it easier, not harder. And unfortunately it’s way too expensive and way too difficult.” He then falsely accused Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris of calling for ending the child tax credit (she has actually called for expanding it).   But Vance missed the vote, and before it, Senator Thom Tillis (R-NC) told colleagues that passing the bill would “give Harris a win before the election.” According to Chabeli Carranzana of The 19th, Tillis “printed out fake checks made out to ‘millions of American voters’ with the memo: ‘Don’t forget to vote for Kamala!’”  ”

August 14, 2024 - by Heather Cox Richardson

[justinspoliticalcorner]

A.B. Stoddard at The Bulwark:

1. Trump’s Not Taking the L. . .

The last two weeks—the unveiling of the Harris-Walz ticket, and Kamala Harris’s surge in the polls—feels like some surreal dream state. Everything has changed. Have you noticed Harris has pushed Donald Trump right out of the comfy lead he’s held for an entire year? He’s noticed. From FiveThirtyEight to RealClearPolitics—pick your polling average—they all now show Harris out in front after only two and a half weeks.

Trump is no longer on track to win the election—which he has been for more than six straight months. Instead, the momentum, money, voter registration, volunteering, grassroots organizing, polling, and online engagement all favor the Democrats and it looks now like Trump could easily lose. But that won’t happen, because Trump doesn’t lose. He beat Joe Biden in 2020—remember? So if he’s not the rightful victor on November 5, an entire army of Republicans is ready to block certification of the election at the local level. No need to worry about mayhem on January 6, 2025 when Congress meets in joint session; the election deniers plan to stop a result right away if it looks like Harris is winning. Their goal: Refuse to certify anywhere—even a county that Trump won—and prevent certification in that state, which prevents certification of the presidential election. A Harris victory could become a nightmare.

An investigation by Rolling Stone identified “in the swing states of Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, and Pennsylvania . . . at least 70 pro-Trump election conspiracists currently working as county election officials who have questioned the validity of elections or delayed or refused to certify results.” Of those 70, 22 of them already have “refused or delayed certification” in recent past elections. Nationwide, Republicans have refused to certify results at least 25 times since 2020, in eight states—the most in Georgia.

The article describes social media posts from the zealots who have infiltrated election administration as showing “unapologetic belief in Trump’s election lies, support for political violence, themes of Christian nationalism, and controversial race-based views.” There are more than enough such individuals in these key posts to bring us to a constitutional crisis. “I think we are going to see mass refusals to certify the election” in November, Democratic election lawyer Marc Elias told Rolling Stone. “Everything we are seeing about this election is that the other side is more organized, more ruthless, and more prepared.” Sit with that.

Then there is this. Trump’s self-destructive attacks on Georgia’s popular governor made the headlines from his Atlanta rally last Saturday, but he also singled out for praise three little-known Georgians—Janice Johnston, Rick Jeffares, and Janelle King—calling them “pitbulls fighting for honesty, transparency, and victory.” Who are Johnston, Jeffares, and King? They are three of the five members of Georgia’s State Election Board. Three days after Trump’s speech, this past Tuesday, those three Republicans approved a new rule requiring a “reasonable inquiry” prior to election certification that—while vague and undefined—could be exploited to delay certification and threaten the statewide election certification deadline of November 22.

The law in Georgia, where Trump and fourteen1 others are charged with plotting to overturn the 2020 election result, requires county election boards to certify results “not later than 5:00 P.M. on the Monday following the date on which such election was held”—so this year, by the evening of November 11. The secretary of state is then to certify the statewide results “not later than 5:00 P.M. on the seventeenth day” after the election, so November 22.

Across the country, the November election results will have to be certified in more than 3,000 counties, and all state results must be final by the time electors meet in each state on December 17. Members of county election boards are not tasked with resolving election issues; certification is mandatory and “ministerial,” not discretionary. Disputes over ballot issues are separate from the certification process—investigated and adjudicated by district attorneys, state election boards, and in court. Election experts say the new rule could disrupt the entire process across the state by allowing local partisans to reject results. And Georgia appears to be at the center of Trump’s plans. Casting doubt on Fulton County, which makes up the bulk of Democratic votes in the state, will help him claim he won the Peach State as the rest of the results come in red.

But even without an explicitly permitted “inquiry” like the new Georgia rule provides, Republicans in other swing states still plan on acting at the county level to slow or stop certification. Because questioning the outcome at the very start of the process will create delay. Any doubt and confusion, and perhaps even violence, makes it easier to miss essential deadlines and can threaten the chance that the rightful winner prevails. Election deniers also hope that sowing chaos might prompt GOP legislatures to intervene—in Georgia, Arizona, or Wisconsin for example—a dangerous scenario I wrote about in April.

[...] It’s crucial that these plans are widely publicized. And they can be. Just like Project 2025, which was virtually unheard of and is now in the forefront of the political debate. Putting a media spotlight on this issue will force Republican officials to address what they are well aware of and are refusing to call out. Yesterday CBS News reported Biden said in his first interview since leaving the presidential race he is “not confident at all” there will be a peaceful transfer of power if Trump loses. Harris isn’t likely to talk about this in her campaign, so it’s critical that other high-profile surrogates do. President Obama, President Clinton, Hillary Clinton, and others must educate voters about the plot underway to force more public pressure and accountability on the process. Every Republican must be asked about local certification of elections, electors honoring the popular vote of their state, preventing political violence—all of it. Repeatedly. As Elias told an interviewer, there are things we can do, as citizens willing to invest some time, to take action. This isn’t a threat from abroad. This year—and likely for years to come—we will all have to continue to fight against what our fellow Americans are doing to subvert elections. Because without free elections—and facts and truth—we cannot be a free country.

A.B. Stoddard wrote in The Bulwark that Republicans will seek to cause chaos post-election to try to block certification of a potential Kamala Harris win.

[probablyasocialecologist]

Donald Trump railed against immigrants, presenting them as a threat to a supposed American way of life. Kamala Harris, for her part, embraced this same narrative, if not the rhetoric, and yet had nothing to show for it on Wednesday morning. It was an unsupportable, immoral, and unpopular position. And Harris gained nothing.  It was a typical Democratic folly: the wrong position that is also bad politics. There was a way out of the race to the bottom in the immigration debate — and there still is. If Harris and the Democratic Party are to have any hope, they must learn on this issue, like so many others, to address it by examining its root causes.

[...]

About 71 percent of Americans, including majorities across the political spectrum, believe economic factors are largely behind the recent influx of migrants, whether it’s better opportunities in the U.S. or poor conditions in their home countries, according to a report from the Pew Research Center. Sixty-five percent pointed to violence in migrants’ home countries as a major reason for driving so many people to the U.S.  Notably, the report also found that a sizable majority of Americans consider the influx of migrants a crisis or at least a major problem. Though Republicans were more likely to view it as a crisis, Democrats still mostly viewed the situation as a major problem. Only 7 percent of Democrats surveyed said it’s not a problem at all.  Harris touted herself as a former border-state prosecutor who would be tougher on the Southern frontier than Trump. During the presidential debate, Harris bragged about supporting a border bill that would have “put 1,500 more border agents on the border.”

7 November 2024

[beggars-opera]

I still find it really, really horrifying funny how many people think that they are going to magic a universally beloved third-party presidential candidate out of thin air and that their revolution is going to sway both the democratic and undecided voters to change their political alliances and vote for this nonexistent mystery person in in *checks watch* the next five months, thus overriding the republican base who has nearly 100% rallied around their one guy for the past decade and show no signs of wavering and, by the way, is also 100% behind funding genocide and various other crimes against humanity along with undoing every single decent thing the other guy has done. But sure. Vive la revolution

[contemplatingoutlander]

Finally, The New York Times Editorial Board says Trump is unfit to hold the Office of the President of the United States!

This is a "gift🎁link" so you can read the entire, HISTORIC editorial by The New York Times Editorial Board stating in no uncertain terms that Donald Trump is unfit for office.

Below are some excerpts from the five subsections of the editorial: I Moral Fitness, II. Principled Leadership, III. Character, IV. A President's Words, and V. Rule of Law

I. MORAL FITNESS MATTERS

Presidents are confronted daily with challenges that require not just strength and conviction but also honesty, humility, selflessness, fortitude and the perspective that comes from sound moral judgment. If Mr. Trump has these qualities, Americans have never seen them in action on behalf of the nation’s interests. His words and actions demonstrate a disregard for basic right and wrong and a clear lack of moral fitness for the responsibilities of the presidency.

He lies blatantly and maliciously, embraces racists, abuses women and has a schoolyard bully’s instinct to target society’s most vulnerable. He has delighted in coarsening and polarizing the town square with ever more divisive and incendiary language. Mr. Trump is a man who craves validation and vindication, so much that he would prefer a hostile leader’s lies to his own intelligence agencies’ truths and would shake down a vulnerable ally for short-term political advantage. His handling of everything from routine affairs to major crises was undermined by his blundering combination of impulsiveness, insecurity and unstudied certainty. [...] The Supreme Court, with its ruling on July 1 granting presidents “absolute immunity” for official acts, has removed an obstacle to Mr. Trump’s worst impulses: the threat of legal consequences. What remains is his own sense of right and wrong. Our country’s future is too precious to rely on such a broken moral compass. [color emphasis added]

Below the cut are excerpts from the other four subsections.

II. PRINCIPLED LEADERSHIP MATTERS

Republican presidents and presidential candidates have used their leadership at critical moments to set a tone for society to live up to. Mr. Reagan faced down totalitarianism in the 1980s.... George H.W. Bush signed the Americans With Disabilities Act.... George W. Bush, for all his failures after Sept. 11, did not stoke hate against or demonize Muslims or Islam.

As a candidate during the 2008 race, Mr. McCain spoke out when his fellow conservatives spread lies about his opponent, Barack Obama. Mr. Romney was willing to sacrifice his standing and influence in the party he once represented as a presidential nominee, by boldly calling out Mr. Trump’s failings and voting for his removal from office. These acts of leadership are what it means to put country first, to think beyond oneself. Mr. Trump has demonstrated contempt for these American ideals. He admires autocrats, from Viktor Orban to Vladimir Putin to Kim Jong-un. He believes in the strongman model of power — a leader who makes things happen by demanding it, compelling agreement through force of will or personality. In reality, a strongman rules through fear and the unprincipled use of political might for self-serving ends, imposing poorly conceived policies that smother innovation, entrepreneurship, ideas and hope. During his four years in office, Mr. Trump tried to govern the United States as a strongman would, issuing orders or making decrees on Twitter. He announced sudden changes in policy — on who can serve in the military, on trade policy, on how the United States deals with North Korea or Russia — without consulting experts on his staff about how these changes would affect America. Indeed, nowhere did he put his political or personal interests above the national interest more tragically than during the pandemic, when he faked his way through a crisis by touting conspiracy theories and pseudoscience while ignoring the advice of his own experts and resisting basic safety measures that would have saved lives. [...] A second Trump administration would be different. He intends to fill his administration with sycophants, those who have shown themselves willing to obey Mr. Trump’s demands or those who lack the strength to stand up to him. He wants to remove those who would be obstacles to his agenda, by enacting an order to make it easier to fire civil servants and replace them with those more loyal to him. This means not only that Americans would lose the benefit of their expertise but also that America would be governed in a climate of fear, in which government employees must serve the interests of the president rather than the public.... Another term under Mr. Trump’s leadership would risk doing permanent damage to our government. [color/ emphasis added]

III. CHARACTER MATTERS

Character is the quality that gives a leader credibility, authority and influence. During the 2016 campaign, Mr. Trump’s petty attacks on his opponents and their families led many Republicans to conclude that he lacked such character. Other Republicans, including those who supported the former president’s policies in office, say they can no longer in good conscience back him for the presidency. “It’s a job that requires the kind of character he just doesn’t have,” Paul Ryan, a former Republican House speaker, said of Mr. Trump in May.

Those who know Mr. Trump’s character best — the people he appointed to serve in the most important positions of his White House — have expressed grave doubts about his fitness for office.His former chief of staff John Kelly, a retired four-star Marine Corps general, described Mr. Trump as “a person who admires autocrats and murderous dictators. A person that has nothing but contempt for our democratic institutions, our Constitution and the rule of law.” Bill Barr, whom Mr. Trump appointed as attorney general, said of him, “He will always put his own interest and gratifying his own ego ahead of everything else, including the country’s interest.” James Mattis, a retired four-star Marine general who served as defense secretary, said, “Donald Trump is the first president in my lifetime who does not try to unite the American people — does not even pretend to try.” Mike Pence, Mr. Trump’s vice president, has disavowed him. No other vice president in modern American history has done this. “I believe that anyone who puts themselves over the Constitution should never be president of the United States,” Mr. Pence has said. “And anyone who asked someone else to put them over the Constitution should never be president of the United States again.” [...] It may be tempting for Americans to believe that a second Trump presidency would be much like the first, with the rest of government steeled to protect the country and resist his worst impulses. But the strongman needs others to be weak, and Mr. Trump is surrounding himself with yes men. The American public has a right to demand more from their president and those who would serve under him. [color/ emphasis added]

IV. A PRESIDENT’S WORDS MATTER

When America saw white nationalists and neo-Nazis march through the streets of Charlottesville, Va., in 2017 and activists were rallying against racism, Mr. Trump spoke of “very fine people on both sides.” When he was pressed about the white supremacist Proud Boys during a 2020 debate, Mr. Trump told them to “stand back and stand by,” a request that, records show, they took literally in deciding to storm Congress. This winter, the former president urged Iowans to vote for him and score a victory over their fellow Americans — “all of the liars, cheaters, thugs, perverts, frauds, crooks, freaks, creeps.” And in a Veterans Day speech in New Hampshire, he used the word “vermin,” a term he has deployed to describe both immigrants and political opponents.

What a president says reflects on the United States and the kind of society we aspire to be. In 2022 this board raised an urgent alarm about the rising threat of political violence in the United States and what Americans could do to stop it. At the time... the Republican Party was in the middle of a fight for control, between Trumpists and those who were ready to move on from his destructive leadership. This struggle within the party has consequences for all Americans. “A healthy democracy requires both political parties to be fully committed to the rule of law and not to entertain or even tacitly encourage violence or violent speech,” we wrote. A large faction of one party in our country fails that test, and that faction, Mr. Trump’s MAGA extremists, now control the party and its levers of power. There are many reasons his conquest of the Republican Party is bad for American democracy, but one of the most significant is that those extremists have often embraced violent speech or the belief in using violence to achieve their political goals. This belief led to the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, and it has resulted in a rising number of threats against judges, elected officials and prosecutors. This threat cannot be separated from Mr. Trump’s use of language to encourage violence, to dehumanize groups of people and to spread lies. A study by researchers at the University of California, Davis, released in October 2022, came to the conclusion that MAGA Republicans (as opposed to those who identified themselves as traditional Republicans) “are more likely to hold extreme and racist beliefs, to endorse political violence, to see such violence as likely to occur and to predict that they will be armed under circumstances in which they consider political violence to be justified.” The Republican Party had an opportunity to renounce Trumpism; it has submitted to it. Republican leaders have had many opportunities to repudiate his violent discourse and make clear that it should have no place in political life; they failed to. [...] But with his nomination by his party all but assured, Mr. Trump has become even more reckless in employing extreme and violent speech, such as his references to executing generals who raise questions about his actions. He has argued, before the Supreme Court, that he should have the right to assassinate a political rival and face no consequences. [color/ emphasis added]

V. THE RULE OF LAW MATTERS

The danger from these foundational failings — of morals and character, of principled leadership and rhetorical excess — is never clearer than in Mr. Trump’s disregard for rule of law, his willingness to do long-term damage to the integrity of America’s systems for short-term personal gain. As we’ve noted, Mr. Trump’s disregard for democracy was most evident in his attempts to overturn the results of the 2020 election and to encourage violence to stop the peaceful transfer of power. What stood in his way were the many patriotic Americans, at every level of government, who rejected his efforts to bully them into complying with his demands to change election results. Instead, they followed the rules and followed the law. This respect for the rule of law, not the rule of men, is what has allowed American democracy to survive for more than 200 years.

In the four years since losing the election, Mr. Trump has become only more determined to subvert the rule of law, because his whole theory of Trumpism boils down to doing whatever he wants without consequence. Americans are seeing this unfold as Mr. Trump attempts to fight off numerous criminal charges. Not content to work within the law to defend himself, he is instead turning to sympathetic judges — including two Supreme Court justices with apparent conflicts over the 2020 election and Jan. 6-related litigation. The playbook: delay federal prosecution until he can win election and end those legal cases. His vision of government is one that does what he wants, rather than a government that operates according to the rule of law as prescribed by the Constitution, the courts and Congress. [...] So much in the past two decades has tested these norms in our society.... We need a recommitment to the rule of law and the values of fair play. This election is a moment for Americans to decide whether we will keep striving for those ideals. Mr. Trump rejects them. If he is re-elected, America will face a new and precarious future, one that it may not be prepared for. It is a future in which intelligence agencies would be judged not according to whether they preserved national security but by whether they served Mr. Trump’s political agenda. It means that prosecutors and law enforcement officials would be judged not according to whether they follow the law to keep Americans safe but by whether they obey his demands to “go after” political enemies. It means that public servants would be judged not according to their dedication or skill but by whether they show sufficient loyalty to him and his MAGA agenda. Even if Mr. Trump’s vague policy agenda would not be fulfilled, he could rule by fear. The lesson of other countries shows that when a bureaucracy is politicized or pressured, the best public servants will run for the exits. This is what has already happened in Mr. Trump’s Republican Party, with principled leaders and officials retiring, quitting or facing ouster. In a second term, he intends to do that to the whole of government. [color/ emphasis added]

[qqueenofhades]

I just read an article on The Conversation that states: "Today, most data has Trump narrowly beating Biden in the national popular vote, albeit within the statistical margin of error." (Source for that data: https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/polls/president-general/)

In your opinion, is that true? How can that be possible after everything Trump has done? After the Insurrection? I'm terrified 😕

(For reference, the original article can be found at https://theconversation.com/five-reasons-why-trumps-republican-opponents-were-never-going-to-beat-him-223288?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=The%20Weekend%20Conversation%20-%202888329325&utm_content=The%20Weekend%20Conversation%20-%202888329325+CID_fceedfd21410eb8a7b6fd6e1124d9d54&utm_source=campaign_monitor_uk&utm_term=five%20reasons)

Short answer: no, I don't think it's true.

Long answer: no, I really don't think it's true. Here's why.

Broader context. A Republican has won the popular presidential vote only twice in the 21st century, and in the first of those occasions -- 2000 -- I use "won" very advisedly. We all know, or at least we should, about all the fuckery that went down in Florida with Bush vs. Gore and SCOTUS stepping in to stop the recount (which almost surely would have gone to Gore) and handing Florida, and thus the presidency, to George Dubya Bush by a mere 537 votes. Dubya then did win re-election and the popular vote/EC in 2004, in the throes of patriotic war fervor and the GOP's Swiftboating of John Kerry (who was a pretty terrible candidate to start with). Other than that? None. Zip. Nada. None. Even in 2016 when Trump squeaked out a win (and thus the presidency) in the Electoral College, he lost nationwide to HRC by over 3 million votes. He lost to Biden by 7 million votes nationwide last time. Also, the reason the GOP loves the antidemocratic Electoral College is that it always works in their favor, and because red states with relatively scant population are given the same power in the Senate. That's why California, with 40+ million people, gets two (Democratic) senators, and Wyoming, with 400,000 people, gets two (Republican) senators. There is just no way that red states can get the actual raw numbers to win the popular vote against heavily blue urban population centers. The only one that comes close is Texas, and while it's something of a white whale for Democrats who think fondly that it'll surely turn blue this election cycle (and then it doesn't), it's not giving all its votes popular-vote-wise to Republicans. So yeah. The numbers aren't there. Biden is about 99% certain to win the popular vote, but because this is America, the question is whether the EC will follow.

(Although, I gotta say. In the deeply unlikely event that Biden loses the popular vote but wins the Electoral College -- i.e. the exact same thing Trump did in 2016 -- the right wing would lose their fucking minds and it would be incredibly hilarious. Also, we might finally get some red states willing to sign up to the National Popular Vote Compact, which is just a few ratifications away from going into effect. As noted, the Republicans will cling onto the Electoral College with their last dying breath because it's the only thing that makes them competitive in nationwide elections. If it fucked Trump, they might finally listen to ideas about changing it.)

The media are incredibly biased, and so is Nate Silver. Silver first rose to prominence as an independent geeky Data Guy elections whiz-kid, and was relatively good at being unbiased. That is not the case anymore. He's now affiliated with the New York Times and has started echoing the smugly anti-Biden framework of both that paper and the mainstream media in general. I'm not necessarily saying his data is total bunk, but he's extremely eager to frame, narrate, and explain it in ways that artificially disadvantage Biden (in the same way the NYT itself is all in on "BUT HIS AGEEEEE," just as they were with "BUT HER EEEEEEMAILS" in 2016) And that's a problem, because:

The polls are shit. Like, really, really shit. Didn't we just go through this in 2022, where everyone howled about how All The Data pointed to a Red Wave and then were /shocked pikachu face when this was nothing more than a Red Dribble of Piss (and frankly, the best midterm election result for the ruling party since like, the 1930s?) We've also had major, real-time proof that the polls are showing a consistent pro-Trump bias of 10 or more points, which is a huge error and keeps getting corrected whenever people actually vote, but the media will never admit that, because TRUMP IS WINNING WE ARE ALL DOOMZED!! We heard about how Biden might lose New Hampshire because he wasn't even on the ballot and that would be a critical embarrassment for him. He cruised easily with 68% (all write-in votes and FAR more than any other Democratic "candidate.") Meanwhile, Trump won New Hampshire by about 15% under what the polls had predicted for him (after doing the same and barely squeaking over 50% in Iowa, one of the whitest, most rural, most Trump-loving states in the nation). The number ballparked for Biden in the NV Democratic primary was something like 75%; he got over 90% (and twice as many votes as any candidate in the Republican Primary/Caucus/Whatever That Mess Was). The number for what he was supposed to get in the SC primary was in the high 60% (driven by the media's other favorite "Black voters are abandoning Biden" canard); he absolutely crushed it at 97% statewide. When Biden is winning by whopping margins and Trump is underperforming badly, in both cases by gaps of ten percent or more, it means the polls are simply not showing us an accurate state of the race. This could be because of media bias, bad data, selective polling, inability to actually connect with voters (especially young voters, who are about as likely to eat a live scorpion as to pick up an unsolicited phone call from an unknown number). This also shows up in:

Special elections. We've heard tons of Very Smart Punditry (derogatory) about how Democrats kicking ass in pretty much every competitive election since Roe was overturned in 2022 totally means nothing for the general election. (Of course, if the situation was reversed and Republicans were cleaning up at the same rate, we would be hearing nothing except how we're all destined for Eternal Trumpocracy... wait. no... we're still only hearing this. Weird.) In the last special election in early February, Democrat Tom Suozzi won back his old U.S House seat (NY-03) by over eight points, after polls had given him at most a two- or three-point edge. (Funnily, once again a Democrat did far better than the media is determined to insist, so Politico hilariously called a thumping eight-point win "edging it out.") This represents almost a 16-point blue swing from even just 2022, when The Congressman Possibly Known as George Santos won it by 7 points. On that same night, a Democratic candidate in a Trump +26 district in deep, deep red Oklahoma only lost by 5 points, marking another massive pro-blue swing. This has been the case in every special election since Roe went down. Apparently blah blah This Won't Translate to the General Election, because the media is very smart. Even when Democrats (historically hard to motivate and muster in off-year election cycles, or you know in general) are turning up in elections that don't involve Trump to punish terrible Trumpist policies, we're supposed to think they won't be motivated to actually vote against the guy himself? And not just them, because:

Trump is a terrible candidate. Which we know, and have always known, but now it's really true. We've had up to half of Haley voters stating they will vote for Biden over Trump if that is the November matchup (which it will be). Haley, amusingly, actually outraised Trump in January, because it turns out that the Trump Crime Family's open promise to send every single donor or RNC dollar to pay El Trumpo's legal fees hasn't been a terribly effective message. We had Republicans in NY-03 telling CNN that they voted for the Democrat Suozzi because they're so fed up with the GOP clown show in the House and don't think Republicans can govern (which uh. Yeah. Welcome to reality, we all knew that ages ago too). We have had up to a third of Republican voters saying they won't vote for Trump if he's convicted of a felony before the election (and technically he already has been, but we're still hoping for the January 6 trial to go ahead). Now, yes, Republicans are a notoriously cliquey bunch and might change their minds, but for all the endless bullshit BIDEN SHOULD STEP DOWN BECAUSE DEMOCRATS ARE DISUNITED narrative the media has been pushing like their kidnapped grandmothers' lives depend on it, Democrats aren't actually disunited at all. Instead, Trump is in chaos, the GOP is in chaos, sizeable chunks of Republican voters are ready to vote for someone else and in some cases have already done so, and yet, do we hear a peep about how Trump should step down? Nah. In related news, did you hear that Biden is old?!?! Why isn't anyone writing about this?!?!

Now, I want to make it clear: Trump's chances of winning are not zero, and they are not inconsiderable. We need to face that fact and deal with it accordingly. Large chunks of the country are still willing to vote for white Christian nationalist fascism. Trump still has plenty of diehard cultists and the entire establishment Republican party in his pocket, and it's been made very clear that Putin is bringing the full force of his malevolent Russian fascist machine to bear on this election as well. Case in point: we spent four years hearing about HUNTER BIDEN HUNTER BIDEN SECRET CORRUPTION GIANT SECRET BUSINESS SCANDAL, and it turns out that the GOP's "star informant" has been actively working with Russian spies the whole time and fed them complete bullshit disinformation, which they were eager to repeat so long as it might hurt Joe Biden. (And it would hurt Ukraine, so, twofer! I cannot emphasize enough how much it was all a deliberate collaboration by some of the worst people on earth.)

In 2016, people naively assumed that Trump could never win, and so they were especially willing to throw away, spoil, or otherwise not exercise their vote, or throw purity hissy fits over HRC (likewise fed at the toxic teat of Russian disinformation). That was exactly what allowed Trump to squeak out a win in the EC and put us in the mess we are currently in. If people act in the same way in 2024 that they did in 2016, Trump's chances of winning are drastically increased. So once again, as I keep saying, it's up to us. If we all vote blue, and we get our networks to vote blue, Biden is very likely to win. If we don't, he won't, and Trump will win. It's that simple. We had better decide what we're doing. The end.

[phoenixyfriend]

The Shift in America's Support of Israel as of 3/25/24

Okay, so there have been three specific incidents recently that I'd like to cover for you guys.

Chuck Schumer's speech calling for a new election in Israel, which I have spoken about here and here. (3/14/24)

Congress voting to ban UNRWA funding until 2025, which I've seen a lot of people talking about, but often without an actual understanding of what the situation actually is. (It's bad, but it's not the same type of bad as people think.) (3/24/24)

The US abstaining from a UN Security Council vote, which is effectively voting against Israel when they have thus far been the only ones to use veto power in this manner. (3/25/24)

I'm not going to go into detail about Schumer, since I've already covered it. tldr: it's a very specifically worded speech that does not explicitly threaten Israel, but if you do even the slightest bit of reading between the lines, that is absolutely what is happening.

Also, before I move forward: the US may not be donating to UNRWA for the rest of the fiscal year, but you can. They have direct donation links.

UNRWA funding has been on hold for a while, but this is... complicated. Not morally, because UNRWA does need funding and to defund it is truly unconscionable, but many of the "Biden signed it into law" posts are approaching it with this implied message that UNRWA would have funding if not for Biden signing it.

Except that isn't really how the US government works. Especially this government.

Funding for 2024 was supposed to be passed months ago. We are on the verge of another government shutdown. UNRWA funding is not on the table until the House swings blue. I hate to be the one to say this, but it's... like, it's not something I can change alone. I know you're tired of hearing it, but voting in November is the key to fixing a whole lot of problems.

One of the core duties of Congress is passing budgets. For those budgets to pass, they need to be approved by the House (Republican Majority), the Senate (Democrat Majority), and the President. The reason it has taken five months to pass a yearly budget (the deadline iirc was September or October) is because anything approved by one chamber is shot down by the other.

UNRWA's de-funding is tied to Ukraine funding (and a few other things). Biden refusing to sign would not have brought back UNRWA funding. The funding is already on hold. We do not have the votes to bring it back. We just straight up do not have enough seats in the House to make that happen. Biden refusing to sign would have resulted in both UNRWA and Ukraine not having funding, indefinitely. Signing it resulted in one of the two getting funding.

This is not a situation where funding was approved and now cut. This is not a situation where money was already flowing to UNRWA. This is a situation where money wasn't going anywhere, because Congress is a split shitshow.

Think of it like this: Funding is water coming from a spigot. Congress can turn it on or off, and it's currently off. Biden can smack away the hand coming to twist the valve, but he can't touch the valve himself. That's what the presidential veto is. Unfortunately, the spigot is already off, and Biden can't twist it back on when Congress isn't already reaching to do so.

Is this bad? Yes! UNRWA's funding should never have been cut! We should still be very, very upset about this! But I need you to understand that the way the US government works is not a dictatorship. Biden cannot just overrule Congress, especially when we're on the verge of another shutdown.

I do not think it is fair or even really acceptable that UNRWA's funding was viewed as an appropriate point of compromise. I'm just, unfortunately, also aware that this particular legislation is a tug-of-war that was never going to end with funding going to Palestine, not with the current Republican control of the House.

"But Biden sent money to Israel a bunch of times--" Yeah, and he's paying for it in the polls. He's aware that people are pissed at him. That choice is already biting him in the ass.

Biden is not perfect and I am never going to claim he is, but please recognize that the UNRWA funding pull is not a current action. It is a past action that is now being sustained because the House is red. You want to bring back UNRWA funding? Get rid of Marjorie Taylor Green and her entire cohort.

The other reason I'm less than eager to view that UNRWA thing as Biden being pro-Israel is because the US has finally abstained on a UN vote instead of vetoing.

When the US has been the only voice on Israel's side in the Security Council this whole time, abstention is functionally voting against them. We already knew that 13-14 of the other 14 members were going to vote pro-ceasefire. They have been this entire time. The US abstaining is functionally agreeing.

Why did the US not just vote for the ceasefire, then? No idea. Might be a treaty thing. I don't really need to know, because the result is that the UN Security Council has finally passed a measure against Israel, and those things are legally binding, and we know it's a big step because Israel's government is not happy.

When paired with the Schumer speech from a week and a half ago, it indicates a major shift in US foreign policy.

From the Al Jazeera article:

The US had repeatedly blocked Security Council resolutions that put pressure on Israel but has increasingly shown frustration with its ally as civilian casualties mount and the UN warns of impending famine in Gaza. Speaking after the vote, US Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield blamed Hamas for the delay in passing a ceasefire resolution. “We did not agree with everything with the resolution,” which she said was the reason why the US abstained. “Certain key edits were ignored, including our request to add a condemnation of Hamas,” Thomas-Greenfield said. [...] The White House said the final resolution did not have language the US considers essential and its abstention does not represent a shift in policy. But Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said the US failure to veto the resolution is a “clear retreat” from its previous position and would hurt war efforts against Hamas as well as efforts to release Israeli captives held in Gaza.

This action has also resulted in Israel pulling plans for "a high-level delegation" to visit the US for discussions on the invasion of Rafah (which Biden has purportedly been warning against for a while).

“We’re very disappointed that they won’t be coming to Washington, DC, to allow us to have a fulsome conversation with them about viable alternatives to them going in on the ground in Rafah,” [John] Kirby told reporters. [...] Last week, Netanyahu promised to defy US appeals and expand Israel’s military campaign to Rafah even without its ally’s support.

There are other complications and details here, such as that the resolution does not call for a permanent ceasefire, and that US tensions with Russia and China are still somehow playing a role in the negotiations over the ceasefire text, but ultimately...

The US abstaining is a good thing. Schumer's speech is a good thing. They are not enough, but they are good things. They are steps forward.

The pull of funding from UNRWA is not a good thing. It is, in fact, a very, very bad thing. It just also looks a lot like it was unavoidable.

So call your reps, and vote come November. It's a long slog and we all know it, but we can't make change without dedication.

To support my blogging so I can move out of my parents’ house, I do have a ko-fi. Alternately, you can donate to one of the charities I list in this post.

[mariacallous]

The nomination of Vice President Kamala Harris as the Democratic presidential candidate has shaken up the race in ways that have yet to fully play out. However, given the fact that she could become the first woman U.S. president, it is surely worthwhile to consider the role of the women’s vote in November’s election.

One need only look back to the 2022 midterm election, where the women’s vote was arguably instrumental in rebuffing a predicted “red wave,” leading Democrats to exceed electoral expectations. That election occurred less than five months after the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision that overturned Roe v. Wade, allowing states to greatly restrict access to abortion. This led to a greater-than-expected Democratic vote among women, especially young women, for House of Representatives and other state candidates.

Now, just weeks after most polls had President Joe Biden trailing his Republican rival Donald Trump, the emergence of Vice President Harris as the Democratic candidate has already injected enthusiasm among many Democrats, especially women. As my Brookings colleague Elaine Kamarck has argued, women’s health, abortion, and reproductive freedom—issues Harris has championed—will once again be leading issues for this election. Harris has also voiced support for issues important to women including paid parental leave, child care, and the economy, as well as other policies that have the support of many younger and minority women. Indeed, the broader support of women’s groups for Harris’s candidacy has already been evident in funding and outreach.

With Harris’s nomination, will new enthusiasm and a voting surge among women be enough to power her to victory in November? To address this question, this analysis first reviews the role of women’s votes in recent presidential elections and which women’s demographic groups were most favorable to Democratic candidates. It next shows how gender differences in voter turnout have provided women with a numerical electoral advantage over men. The analysis proceeds to look at changes in the demographic make-up of women voters, from 2012 through the present, showing the rise of Democratic-favorable groups within their ranks. It concludes with a voter simulation of 2024 election results showing what recent polls imply, if we assume that the new enthusiasm for Harris translates into higher voter turnout and increased Democratic support among women, both dynamics that could help increase her chances for victory in November.

Women have a history of backing Democratic candidates in presidential elections

Examining gender differences in presidential voting preferences shows that women have voted for Democrats over Republicans in every presidential election since 1984.1

This is evident for recent elections, as seen in Figure 1, which shows the D-R (Democratic minus Republican) vote margins by gender for presidential elections between 2000 and 2020. In each case, the D-R margins are positive for women and generally (though not always) negative for men, and women voted more strongly Democratic than men, regardless of whether a Democrat or Republican ultimately won the presidency.

Election year 2020 showed sharp gender disparities for the seven battleground states, displayed in Figure 2. In each of these states, only one of which (North Carolina) Trump carried, women registered positive D-R margins compared with negative margins for men. The widest gender disparities were in the three “blue wall” states of Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and Michigan, as well the southern state of Georgia.

Gender differences also pervaded demographic groups in the 2020 presidential election (see figure 3), as was the case in earlier elections. D-R margins are higher for women than for men in groups where women voted strongly Democratic: Black voters, Hispanic voters, and voters aged 18 to 29. Even for non-college white women voters—who favored Republicans—the negative D-R margins are not as large as those of men. Only among Asian American voters were men’s D-R margins higher than women’s.

Women’s turnout rates are higher

Perhaps even more important than partisan preferences, turnout rates—the share of eligible voters who vote—will help dictate women’s influence in the coming election. Turnout rates for women have exceeded those for men in presidential elections dating back to 1980. Figure 4 depicts gender differences in turnout for presidential elections since 2000. The 2020 election showed the highest overall turnout rates in decades. Because of their higher turnout rates, and the fact that women live longer than men, the 2020 election had 9.7 million more female than male voters.

Largely because of their higher turnout rates, women comprised more than half of all voters (53%) in 2020. Yet their shares vary across demographic groups (see Figure 5).  Women comprised 58% of all Black voters, 55% of Asian voters and 54% of Hispanic voters. Fifty-four percent (54%) of voters aged 65 and older were also women. And among white non-college graduate voters, a group that tends to vote Republican, women still comprised a majority (52%).

The female electorate is becoming more diverse and highly educated

As the size of the female electorate increases, its demographic makeup is changing. Figure 6 shows the shifts in the profile of eligible women voters between 2012 and 2024 by race and education. Notably, there are gains in women’s groups that tend to vote Democratic—white college graduates and people of color—and a decline in the women’s group that tends to vote Republican—white non-college graduates. For the first time in a presidential election, the latter group will make up less than 40% of the women’s electorate.

The seven battleground states, shown in Figure 7, also display similar shifts in the demographic profiles of their female electorates. In each, there is a decline in the share of white non-college graduate women, and an increase in the share of women of color. This is occurring in the “whiter” states of Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and Michigan, as well as the more diverse states of Arizona, Nevada, Georgia, and North Carolina. In Nevada, for example, the share of women who identify as white non-college graduates declined from 48% in 2012 to 35% in 2024, while at the same time the share of women who identify as Black, Hispanic, Asian or other nonwhite races rose from 36% in 2012 to 47% in 2024. Thus, with respect to demographic attributes, the female electorates in each state have become more Democratic-leaning in their voter profiles.

Simulating the 2024 election after Harris announcement

Polls taken both before and after the shift from Biden to Harris as the likely Democratic nominee offer crude indications of what the 2024 election might hold. Three polls of likely voters conducted by the New York Times/Siena College on June 26, July 3, and July 25—after Biden bowed out of the race and endorsed Harris—reveal the changes that took place in men’s and women’s D-R voting margins (see Figure 8).

The D-R margins for women–at 14% for Harris vs. Trump on July 25, were especially high, though countered by a still-high negative D-R margin of 17% for men.

Still, the high women’s D-R margin favoring Harris greatly reduced the overall D-R margin compared with the earlier two Biden vs. Trump margins shown in Table 1. That is, in the two polls taken while Biden was still the assumed Democratic nominee, the negative D-R margins of -4% and -6% (44%  Biden vs. 48% Trump on June 26; and 43% Biden vs. 49% Trump on July 3) strongly favored Trump. Yet, the July 25 poll for Harris vs. Trump reduced the D-R margin to just -0.6% (47.5 for Harris vs. 48.1 for Trump) when we applied this to a simulation model discussed below.

Of course, the July 25 poll was taken just after Biden withdrew and endorsed Harris as the likely Democratic nominee. Clearly, Harris’s campaign had not yet fully begun and the immediate support from many women’s groups suggests that both female turnout and voting preference could increase on Harris’s behalf in the weeks and months ahead. To estimate these likely effects, we conducted simulations of national D-R margins—a base simulation—and two additional simulations based on assumptions of greater women’s turnout and a stronger voter preference for Harris (see Table 1).

All three simulations begin with the 2024 national female and male eligible voter populations reported in the Census Bureau’s monthly Current Population Survey. The “base” simulation applies the 2020 election female and male voter turnout rates, presented above, and the Harris vs. Trump voter margins from the July 25 poll shown in Figure 8. The second simulation alters the base simulation by increasing women’s turnout rate by 10%, from 68.4% to 75.2%, larger than the 5.1% rise in female turnout which occurred between 2016 and 2020. The third simulation alters the second simulation by also increasing the female D-R voting margin by 5 percentage points.

The results in Table 1 show that while the base simulation yields a small Trump advantage, a 10% rise in women’s turnout would bring a small Harris advantage. Moreover, both increasing women’s turnout by 10% and the women’s D-R vote advantage by 5 percentage points would yield a clear Harris win (49.2% Harris vs. 46.3% Trump). These assumptions, reflecting a rise in women’s enthusiasm for Harris between now and Election Day, could put a popular vote win for her well within reach. It is also possible that the strong Trump voter preference for men, reported in the New York Times/Siena College poll, could shift as more male voters become familiar with her campaign.

The impact of an energized women’s voting base

The simulations conducted here make plain that rising women’s enthusiasm for Kamala Harris’s candidacy could lead to consequential shifts in the 2024 election through increases in voter turnout and voter preference. This is especially notable given the recent history of women’s support of Democratic candidates in national and congressional elections. Beyond looking at polls alone, simulations such as these show how taking into account the eligible voter base and rising voter turnout rates can affect election results.

These simulations should not be viewed as predictions; much will depend on how well Harris can continue to energize an already favorable female voter base. It also depends on her performance in crucial battleground states, which will determine how she fares in the Electoral College. What these simulations do show is how an enthusiastic voting bloc, when translated into voter turnout and voting preferences, could impact the final election result this coming November.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Michael de Adder, Halifax Chronicle Herald

* * * *

Trump promises to eliminate future elections

July 29, 2024

Robert B. Hubbell

Last Friday, Trump told Christian rally-goers that “You won’t have to vote any more” if they elect Trump in 2024.

Let that sink in. A presidential candidate promised to eliminate future elections.

The media yawned.

Actually, the media ignored the story (except for The Guardian) until commentators on social media and the Harris Campaign shamed journalists into acknowledging Trump's antidemocratic threat—which they did in a dismissive, begrudging manner.

It is tiresome to highlight the media’s failings, but this incident is so egregious that it is important on many levels. Most importantly, it underscores that Democrats cannot relent in their effort to warn the American people that Trump hopes to end fundamental democratic norms—like the peaceful, regular transfer of power as prescribed by the Constitution.

Among the issues that should drive voters to the polls in 2024, Trump’s repeated promises to end democracy should be the most alarming. But concepts like “democracy” and “tyranny” strike many voters as “abstract.” Taking away the right to vote is not abstract; doing so would render all other rights illusory.

Let’s turn this incident against Trump by convincing voters that Trump really, truly wants to eliminate the right to vote after 2024. And we must not let him (or his surrogates) weasel out of the plain meaning of his words.

What did Trump say?

 At a rally in Florida on Friday, Trump said,

Christians, get out and vote! Just this time – you won’t have to do it any more. You know what? It’ll be fixed! It’ll be fine. You won’t have to vote any more, my beautiful Christians. I love you. Get out – you gotta get out and vote. In four years, you don’t have to vote again. We’ll have it fixed so good, you’re not gonna have to vote.

See The Guardian, Trump tells supporters they won’t have to vote in the future: ‘It’ll be fixed!’.

Like most of Trump's statements, it is simultaneously inscrutable and blazingly obvious. He is promising the end of democracy if he is elected. “In four years, you won’t have to vote again.”

The same words uttered by most other politicians might be susceptible to innocent interpretations. But those words uttered by this president can mean only one thing: He wants to eliminate elections in America. He tried to override the will of the people in 2020 by canceling their votes through coup and insurrection. He says he will do so again if he is re-elected. We should believe him.

To repeat: A presidential candidate has promised that 2024 will be the last time that Americans will vote because “everything will be fixed.” That is the equivalent of a five-alarm fire for democracy.

How did the GOP, the media, and the Harris campaign respond? You can probably predict their responses, but let’s look for ourselves.

The GOP response

In typical GOP fashion, the GOP response was (a) he didn’t mean what he said, (b) he said the opposite of what you think you heard, and (c) Trump says weird things all the time, so chill out!

The typical Republican response was delivered by New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu, who laughed off the statement by saying, (a) it was “hyperbolic,” (b) Trump was trying to make the point that “We want everyone to vote in all elections,” and (c) it was a classic “Trumpism.”

Saying that the statement was hyperbolic and “a Trumpism” are. not serious responses because they do not address the substance of what Trump actually said. Trump incited an insurrection by telling people to “Fight like hell” moments before the attack on the Capitol.” We are long past claiming that Trump's words should not be taken seriously and literally.

Claiming that Trump's statement means the exact opposite of what Trump said is depraved. Sununu’s interpretation of “We want everyone to vote in all elections” vs. Trump's “You’re not gonna have to vote again” is depraved. The depravity of Sununu’s perverse interpretation is not diminished because Sununu delivered the lie with a hearty laugh.

Other Trump apologists (on social media) argued that Trump was saying only that Republicans would not need Christian evangelical votes after 2024 because Trump would do such a great job of fixing all problems in America, “you’re not gonna have to vote.” That explanation makes no sense; even if Trump “fixed” all the problems in America in the next four years, the Constitution still requires an election in 2028.

There is simply no reasonable interpretation of Trump's words other than his declaration that in four years, he intends to eliminate elections (if he can).

The media’s response

As noted above, The Guardian gave serious coverage to Trump's statement. US media outlets, not so much. See, for example, Lucian K. Truscott IV’s description of the NYTimes’ pathetic response. As Truscott notes in his Substack, the Times relegated the statements to “a few lines in a wrap-up piece about what’s happening in the presidential campaign . . . and they buried it on the Times website.” The Times then breezily moved on to pedestrian coverage of the campaigns as if they were reporting the details of an itinerary rather than one of the most shocking statements ever by a major-party candidate for the presidency.

Perhaps even worse was the pathetic interview of Chris Sununu by Martha Raddatz on ABC. Raddatz asked Sununu, “What the heck did he [Trump] mean there [in the statement]?” As noted above, Sununu responded,

(a)  The statement was hyperbolic; (b)  Trump meant that everyone should vote in every election; and (c)  That statement is a Trumpism.

Sununu’s pathetic response was enough to satisfy Radattz, whose follow-up question was, “Ok. Let's turn to President Biden and Kamala Harris.”

I won’t pick on Raddatz (much). Almost every journalist on mainstream media is as pathetic as Raddatz. The inability to ask follow-up questions to ludicrous rationalizations of attacks on democracy is staggering. Most are entertainers, not journalists. Their presence on “news” shows is insulting to their viewers.

Raddatz’s failure to challenge Sununu’s answer and her immediate transition to a question about President Biden and Kamala Harris demonstrates the media’s dangerous addiction to mindless “balance” and false equivalency. Nothing Kamala Harris did over the weekend deserves to be in the same news block as a story about a presidential candidate promising to end the need for elections. Nothing.

Having watched the media fail miserably for seven years with Trump, nothing should surprise us. But the guy tried to overturn one election already and is saying he will do it again. What will it take for the media to realize that Trump is a unique threat to democracy who deserves coverage that applies only to aspiring dictators?

Even if the Times and Raddatz believed that Trump's remarks had a benign explanation, they failed to acknowledge the more plausible, malign interpretation. Instead, they were willing to assume that Trump's remarks were harmless “Trumpisms.” They are not. We saw what happened after Trump told his followers on January 6, 2021: “We fight like hell. And if you don't fight like hell, you're not going to have a country anymore.”

So, continue writing those letters to the editor and comments to stories highlighting the media’s failings. And become a messenger for Harris by amplifying her campaign’s messaging. Read on!

The Harris Campaign’s response

Kamala Harris’s campaign organization has been reacting to Trump's missteps and threats like a rapid response force to each. Early Saturday morning, the Harris campaign posted a clip of Trump's comments and attached the following statement:

Statement on Trump's Promise to End Democracy When Vice President Harris says this election is about freedom she means it. Our democracy is under assault by criminal Donald Trump: After the last election Trump lost, he sent a mob to overturn the results. This campaign, he has promised violence if he loses, the end of our elections if he wins, and the termination of the Constitution to empower him to be a dictator to enact his dangerous Project 2025 agenda on America. Donald Trump wants to take America backward, to a politics of hate, chaos, and fear —this November America will unite around Vice President Kamala Harris to stop him.

The Harris campaign’s statement is spot-on for several reasons. First, the campaign issued the statement just after noon on Saturday morning, showing a willingness and ability to rebut Trump quickly. By responding within the same news cycle, the Harris campaign shaped the social media response, which ultimately prodded the major media to acknowledge Trump's threat.

Second, the Harris campaign identified Trump's threats in plain language, including

“Trump's Promise to End Democracy.” “Last election Trump sent a mob to overturn the results.” “He has promised violence if he loses” “He has promised the end of elections if he wins” “He has promised to terminate the Constitution” “To become a dictator” “To enact dangerous project 2025”

Dangerous threats demand plain language. The Harris campaign rose to the challenge.

The campaign’s statement was strong in another respect: In identifying Trump as a threat to democracy, it identified Kamala Harris as the point of unity to stop Trump. A very smart move! Kamala Harris is giving Democrats the antidote to Trump's cult of personality. The campaign is fashioning Kamala Harris as a champion of democracy. And it is working!

Concluding Thoughts

Trump's threats present a dilemma. Should we take them seriously? Or does our attention give them credence and heft they do not carry on their own? As with most things in life, there is tension in truth. We must take Trump's threats literally and seriously. But we must not ascribe superpowers to Trump or self-executing inevitability to his threats. By taking his threats seriously, we can prevent them from coming to fruition. So, do not despair or cower in fear. Raise the alarm as we work to defeat Trump and stop his dark plans.

Meanwhile, Democrats continue to rally around Kamala Harris. She held her first fundraiser in Pittsfield, MA at the Colonial Theatre. The event was sold out, with an overflow crowd in front of the theater. Kamala Harris spoke after an all-star warm-up that included former Governor Deval Patrick, Senators Warren and Markey, Rep. Neal, and Heather Cox Richardson.

According to those in attendance, the evening was “electric.” The crowd was so enthusiastic, Kamala Harris had difficulty quieting the cheers so she could say “Thank you.” She gave a great speech and pumped up the crowd even further.

In eight short days, Kamala Harris has unified and inspired Democrats in a way that has defied expectations of pundits and career politicians. She is doing so at the precise moment that Trump's veneer of invincibility is cracking. We need to sustain the wave of enthusiasm for Kamala Harris and spread it to others—so that we can push Trump’s downward trajectory past the tipping point of no return. We can do that!

[Robert B. Hubbell Newsletter]

[transgenderer]

Peanut was an eastern gray squirrel found and rescued in 2017 by Mark Longo after the squirrel's mother was killed by a car in New York City. Longo sought a shelter for Peanut but was unsuccessful, and he bottle-fed the squirrel for the next eight months before deciding that Peanut should be returned to the wild. Longo released the animal into his backyard, but about a day later, he found Peanut on his porch with half of its tail missing. Longo said he "opened the door, [Peanut] ran inside, and that was the last of Peanut's wildlife career." It is illegal to keep squirrels as pets in the state of New York, and in the seven years spent in Longo's care in his hometown of Norwalk, Connecticut, no license was obtained to legally keep Peanut. Longo has stated that he was in the process of filing paperwork to have Peanut certified as an educational animal at the time of the seizure, however, he has not explained why he did not pursue a license in the preceding seven years.

While in his care, Longo created an Instagram account sharing videos of Peanut, and by October 2024 the account had amassed 534,000 followers. Peanut's social media following also helped steer viewers to Longo's OnlyFans account, where he called himself "Peanut's dad" and produced pornography, drawing in $800,000 over one month. In April 2023, Longo and his wife moved from Norwalk to upstate New York to found the P'Nuts Freedom Farm Animal Sanctuary. They contributed to half of the sanctuary's expenses, most of which was raised through Peanut's social media presence. According to them, the sanctuary had rescued over 300 animals by November 2024, however, Longo was not licensed as a wildlife rehabilitator.

The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (NYSDEC) began investigating Mark Longo in January 2024 after complaints were received alleging that Longo was keeping wildlife illegally. In an interview with the New York Post, Longo speculated that the anonymous complaints were motivated by jealousy due to the success of his OnlyFans account.

On October 30, 2024, the NYSDEC took Peanut, along with a pet raccoon named Fred, from Longo's home in Pine City, New York. Two days later, government officials alleged that after his seizure, Peanut had bitten one of the personnel involved, and the pets were euthanized to test for rabies, as there are no ante-mortem rabies testing methods for animals approved by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Longo stated that the decision to euthanize the squirrel "won't go unheard". The incident has been widely criticized as an example of excessive government intrusion into personal lives and pet ownership rights. Longo claimed that the NYSDEC used excessive force during the raid, which, according to Longo, lasted five hours.

Peanut's death triggered widespread public backlash, social media outcry, condemnation from several lawmakers, and a proposed bill aimed at preventing similar incidents in the future.

The death of Peanut was used as a cause célèbre by the MAGA movement, who blamed it on Democrats. Several prominent Republican figures complained about the killing of the squirrel, with some Trump campaign supporters claiming that the Biden-Harris administration was too firm regarding licenses for owning wild animals like squirrels as pets. Both New York governor Kathy Hochul and Vice President Kamala Harris turned down a request to comment on the incident. The Republican vice presidential candidate of the 2024 U.S. election, JD Vance, posted on X that "Don is fired up about P'Nut the squirrel"; the official Trump campaign TikTok account also condemned Peanut's death. Nick Langworthy stated his irritation with the NYS DEC, saying that "instead of focusing on critical needs like flood mitigation in places like Steuben County, where local officials have to struggle just to get permits from the DEC to clear debris-filled waterways, they're out seizing pet squirrels." Former New York governor Andrew Cuomo of the Democratic Party also criticized the DEC, as did actor William Shatner. On X (Twitter), Elon Musk commented that "Government overreach kidnapped an orphan squirrel and executed him."

Jake Blumencranz, a NYS Assemblyman from Long Island's 15th Assembly District, has proposed a bill called "Peanut's Law: Humane Animal Protection Act", an amendment to the New York State Environmental Conservation Law limiting government animal seizures

Really an incredible tale