The (no longer) much too early 2024 election thread

[N.E. Brigand]

Speaking of Rmaswamy, today he made this claim:

"40 years ago they told us an ice age was imminent. Now they tell us that the climate warming is an existential threat to humanity. Which is it? Neither. It’s really about dominion, control and punishing the west."

There was a period in the early to mid 1970s when there were some concerns that the planet might face global cooling, but studies that found global warming was the likelier outcome were always more numberous, leading five to one by 1979. I distinctly remember Mr. Castanien, my eighth-grade earth science teacher, explaining this to us in 1985.

Ramaswamy might as well claim that the earth is flat or that man never landed on the moon. His claim is that loony.

[N.E. Brigand]

There was a lot of consternation in 2020 about Democrats taking Hispanic votes for granted, so it's a shame that the Spanish-language version of the Biden 2024 campaign website apparently has some spelling mistakes.

[N.E. Brigand]

In this interview before a Donald Trump rally in New Hampshire yesterday, a Trump supporter calmly explains that the violence on January 6th was committed by a mix of Antifa and professional actors and stuntmen working for the deep state. Also Joe Biden was executed in 2020 and Donald Trump is in fact running a shadow government right now. He's not hung up in the least when the interviewer asks him "Do you like how everything's going with him [i.e., Trump] in office still?" because he says that you can't believe anything you see: "It's all a movie that we're watching."

[Sunsilver]

Speaking of Rmaswamy, today he made this claim:

"40 years ago they told us an ice age was imminent. Now they tell us that the climate warming is an existential threat to humanity. Which is it? Neither. It’s really about dominion, control and punishing the west."

There was a period in the early to mid 1970s when there were some concerns that the planet might face global cooling, but studies that found global warming was the likelier outcome were always more numberous, leading five to one by 1979. I distinctly remember Mr. Castanien, my eighth-grade earth science teacher, explaining this to us in 1985.

Ramaswamy might as well claim that the earth is flat or that man never landed on the moon. His claim is that loony.

N.E., our Gr. 11 geography teacher taught us about global warming, when we studied how the sun, the atmosphere and the rotation of the earth were responsible for global weather patterns and sea currents. This was back in 1967.

Re. your last post - wow, they just get loonier all the time! Who makes up this stuff?? It sounds like something out of a second-rate science fiction or horror novel!

[RoseMorninStar]

In this interview before a Donald Trump rally in New Hampshire yesterday, a Trump supporter calmly explains that the violence on January 6th was committed by a mix of Antifa and professional actors and stuntmen working for the deep state. Also Joe Biden was executed in 2020 and Donald Trump is in fact running a shadow government right now. He's not hung up in the least when the interviewer asks him "Do you like how everything's going with him [i.e., Trump] in office still?" because he says that you can't believe anything you see: "It's all a movie that we're watching."

Holy shit. And yet this person can probably easily and legally buy a gun.

[N.E. Brigand]

Here's an NBC story about Sen. Sherrod Brown (Democrat of Ohio), who seems to have been somewhat careless about his property taxes and tax credits. The article seems a bit sensationalized for the 2024 campaign given that it also includes this passage:

Jennifer Lockrey, a spokesperson for the Franklin County auditor, confirmed that the credit has been removed. The county's treasurer, Cheryl Brooks Sullivan, confirmed that a $616 payment was made Tuesday.

Lockrey noted that sometimes such errors are attributable to paperwork done by title companies.

"It’s not an unusual occurrence for owners of more than one property," Lockrey said.

But sauce for the goose, sauce for the gander.

[N.E. Brigand]

As I said in the other thread, I'm not a fan of Don Lemon, but as regards the historical facts in this interview with Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy -- and the New York Times has reported that Lemon's comments here led to CNN firing him (I am skeptical that's the whole story) -- Lemon is right and Ramaswamy is wrong.

"Vivek Ramaswamy Paid to Have His Soros Fellowship and Covid-Era Role Scrubbed from Wikipedia Page." (Mediaite)

And now on that Wikipedia page:

In May 2023, reports surfaced that Ramaswamy may have paid an editor to alter his Wikipedia page to appear more favorable to political conservatives before announcing his campaign. The edits in question include references to his Paul & Daisy Soros Fellowship for New Americans postgraduate fellowship and his involvement with the Ohio COVID-19 Response Team, both of which were temporarily removed.

[N.E. Brigand]

"Hillsdale County votes out election-denying clerk." That's in rural Michigan and the home of famously conservative Hillsdale College, cited by Ron DeSantis as his model for revamping Florida's New College. The clerk, Stephanie Scott, had "allegedly refused to allow a contractor to perform preventive maintenance and failed to conduct accuracy tests" and at one point suggested that the county shouldn't run its local elections in 2021 because the machines couldn't be trusted. Eventually her constituents had enough and got a recall election on yesterday's ballot. She lost by a 65%-34% margin.

[N.E. Brigand]

An supposedly independent and fairly well-funded organization called "No Labels" has been courting some more-or-less centrist politicians for a possible third-party 2024 campaign, which likely as not would probably split Democrats and help Donald Trump get back into the White House. This Puck News report includes a secretly recorded conversation in which one potential supporter was told that if she was bothered by the group taking money from billionaire Harlan Crow, "this isn't the place for you." That was just a few weeks before ProPublica broke the story about how Crow has been secretly providing lavish gifts to conservative Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas.

[N.E. Brigand]

S.V. Dáte makes a good point about a weird omission in reporting on Donald Trump's 2024 campaign:

"If a serial killer or a child molester ran for president, we'd expect to see that fact in every news story about him, right? So why do we almost never read of Trump's attempted coup in stories about *his* presidential campaign? Failing to mention Jan. 6 in a story about Trump is akin to writing about Neil Armstrong without mentioning the moon landing or about Jeffrey Dahmer without bringing up cannibalism."

I have been guilty of that mistake in posts here and shall endeavor not to forget this moving forward.

[RoseMorninStar]

Even with his first campaign people brushed aside his bankruptcies, cheating, scandals, etc.. etc..

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Ad from Liz Cheney's PAC (narrated by her), that is set to play on CNN during their "town hall" with him.

[N.E. Brigand]

Obviously the twice-impeached insurrectionist will have to be asked tomorrow night about having been found liable today for sexual abuse and defamation.

[RoseMorninStar]

Obviously the twice-impeached insurrectionist will have to be asked tomorrow night about having been found liable today for sexual abuse and defamation.

I wouldn't count on it.. depending upon who makes up the audience. It's a town hall, not an interview or debate. He's also very good at non-answer answers and he will whinge about the unconstitutionality/he didn't get a chance to defend himself, yadda yadda.

[N.E. Brigand]

HuffPost's S.V. Dáte lists some accomplishments of the leading Republican presidential candidate:



Most of these are Donald Trump being corrupt -- as he has been his whole adult life -- or Trump scrambling to hold on to power, both to enable further corruption and to protect himself from the consequences of his corruption.

But the most fascinating and deadly item is the "botched COVID response." I think it was born from the same desperation that led Trump to threaten Ukraine and ultimately to stage a coup, but it also shows Trump's enormous stupidity. Awful as the pandemic was, it was a gift to an incumbent political office holder: the public often rallies around leaders in times of crisis, and Donald Trump's approval ratings actually rose in March-April 2020. With just a bit more competence, he likely would have been reelected seven months later. Operation Warp Speed itself was a valuable and generally timely program, although I think a Democratic administration would have moved quicker still. But Trump was terrified that acknowledging the seriousness of the problem would undermine his popularity, so everything else he did regarding Covid, from claiming that China had the matter well in hand to holding passengers on a cruise ship to pushing various quack miracle cures, was disastrously based on the notion that he had to pretend nothing was wrong.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

There has been a lot of criticism of CNN for their townhall with the twice-impeached, sexual harasser and accused insurrectionist and espionagist ex-president (heck, even on CNN) but as usual, AOC hits the nail on the head:

[RoseMorninStar]

Did anyone watch the town hall?

[Dave_LF]

I found this profoundly affecting. Much as I hate to just drop a link without adding anything of my own, I don't really feel up to writing any sort of response right now (if I ever will):
https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1656 ... 39456.html

[RoseMorninStar]

I did not watch it but I've heard plenty. It was a horrible move on CNN's account all the way around. Just horrid. Disgusting. AOC makes an astute point. I had not realized it was known when the verdict would be out that far in advance.

As for the article/post you link to Dave (and another NYT post linked within that post) religion, Christianity in particular, has a lot to answer for.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Of course it was not known in advance when the verdict would be but I don't think that makes CNN any less irresponsible.