Fuck off, 2020.
Oregon man driving stolen car crashes into woman driving another stolen car https://t.co/Y3tpmPZZXT pic.twitter.com/U8PYLWd6Jb— New York Post (@nypost) July 8, 2020
Jul 8, 2020
Today's Tweet
Two Dots
Coupla semi-long ones. But not bad.
The connection for me is that there's been even more study thrown at "Voter Fraud" and everything still points to "No - there's nothing wrong with it."
In fact, we get some reinforcement that the typical GOP bullshit machine is hard at work telling us that it's a huge problem cuz the Dems are doing evil things, while the only real problems anyone ever discovers is what the Repubs are doing.
Reuters:
With the number of Americans voting by mail on Nov. 3 expected to nearly double due to COVID-19, election experts see little reason to expect an increase in ballot fraud, despite President Donald Trump’s repeated claims.
Voting by mail is not new in the United States — nearly 1 in 4 voters cast 2016 presidential ballots that way. Routine methods and the decentralized nature of U.S. elections make it very hard to interfere with mailed ballots, experts say.
While mail balloting has its drawbacks, it can help minimize the long lines, faulty voting machines and COVID-19-induced staffing shortages that have plagued some elections this year.
HOW SECURE IS IT?
Election experts say it would be nearly impossible for foreign actors to disrupt an election by mailing out fake ballots, a scenario floated by Attorney General William Barr.
For one thing, voters won’t just be selecting a president: They might be choosing candidates for city council, school board and weighing in on ballot initiatives. That can require hundreds of different ballot designs in a single county and the United States has more than 3,000 counties.
Ballots aren’t counted if they aren’t printed on the proper type of paper and don’t include specific technical markings.
States also require voters to sign the outside of their envelope, which they match to a signature on file.
Some 29 states and the District of Columbia allow voters to track their ballots to ensure they are received, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Fourteen states and D.C. also allow voters to return their ballots by hand if they don’t trust the mail.
Those envelopes are typically opened by a different group of workers than those who scan the ballots. Outside observers are allowed to monitor the process to ensure voter privacy.
IS FRAUD A PROBLEM?
As with other forms of voting, documented cases of mail-ballot fraud are extremely rare.
The conservative Heritage Foundation, which has warned of the risks of mail voting, found 14 cases of attempted mail fraud out of roughly 15.5 million ballots cast in Oregon since that state started conducting elections by mail in 1998.
The most prominent cases of mail fraud have involved campaigns, not voters. North Carolina invalidated the results of a 2018 congressional election after state officials found that a Republican campaign operative had orchestrated a ballot fraud scheme.
Experts say those scenarios can be minimized by nixing requirements — currently in place in 11 states — which instruct voters to get at least one witness to sign their return envelopes.
“All of these policies remove the need to hand over your ballot to someone you don’t know,” said Tammy Patrick, a former election official in Maricopa County, Arizona.
DOES IT HELP TURNOUT?
Turnout rates tend to be higher in states that conduct elections by mail. A Stanford University study found that participation increased by roughly 2 percentage points in three states that rolled out universal voting by mail from 1996 to 2018. It had no effect on partisan outcome and did not appear to give an advantage to any particular racial, economic or age group.
In Colorado, 77% of voting age citizens cast ballots in the 2016 presidential election, the highest figure in the country, according to the U.S. Election Assistance Commission. In Oregon, that figure was 72% and in Washington it was 68%, well above the national rate of 63%.
ARE THERE BARRIERS?
Like any other voting method, mail balloting has its drawbacks.
States rejected 1% of returned ballots in 2016 for arriving too late, missing signatures or other problems, according to EAC figures — though that figure was as high as 5% in some states. It can be more difficult to fix errors on mail ballots than on those cast in person, experts say.
Mail ballots can pose additional barriers to those who don’t speak English or have disabilities, and delivery can be problematic on Native American reservations, where residents sometimes don’t have street addresses.
In California, which started transitioning to mail ballots in 2018, Black and Hispanic voters were twice as likely to cast their ballots in person, according to David Becker, head of the Center for Election Innovation and Research.
So 45* continues to spout off about the sheer horribleness of it all, and those few Repubs with the sense god gave a fuckin' stump can't figure out how to ride 45*'s coattails and not be as completely stoopid as he's making them all look.
WaPo:
President Trump’s relentless attacks on the security of mail voting are driving suspicion among GOP voters toward absentee ballots — a dynamic alarming Republican strategists, who say it could undercut their own candidates, including Trump himself.
The connection for me is that there's been even more study thrown at "Voter Fraud" and everything still points to "No - there's nothing wrong with it."
In fact, we get some reinforcement that the typical GOP bullshit machine is hard at work telling us that it's a huge problem cuz the Dems are doing evil things, while the only real problems anyone ever discovers is what the Repubs are doing.
Daddy State Awareness, Rule 1:
Every accusation is a confession
Reuters:
With the number of Americans voting by mail on Nov. 3 expected to nearly double due to COVID-19, election experts see little reason to expect an increase in ballot fraud, despite President Donald Trump’s repeated claims.
Voting by mail is not new in the United States — nearly 1 in 4 voters cast 2016 presidential ballots that way. Routine methods and the decentralized nature of U.S. elections make it very hard to interfere with mailed ballots, experts say.
While mail balloting has its drawbacks, it can help minimize the long lines, faulty voting machines and COVID-19-induced staffing shortages that have plagued some elections this year.
HOW SECURE IS IT?
Election experts say it would be nearly impossible for foreign actors to disrupt an election by mailing out fake ballots, a scenario floated by Attorney General William Barr.
For one thing, voters won’t just be selecting a president: They might be choosing candidates for city council, school board and weighing in on ballot initiatives. That can require hundreds of different ballot designs in a single county and the United States has more than 3,000 counties.
Ballots aren’t counted if they aren’t printed on the proper type of paper and don’t include specific technical markings.
States also require voters to sign the outside of their envelope, which they match to a signature on file.
Some 29 states and the District of Columbia allow voters to track their ballots to ensure they are received, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Fourteen states and D.C. also allow voters to return their ballots by hand if they don’t trust the mail.
Those envelopes are typically opened by a different group of workers than those who scan the ballots. Outside observers are allowed to monitor the process to ensure voter privacy.
IS FRAUD A PROBLEM?
As with other forms of voting, documented cases of mail-ballot fraud are extremely rare.
The conservative Heritage Foundation, which has warned of the risks of mail voting, found 14 cases of attempted mail fraud out of roughly 15.5 million ballots cast in Oregon since that state started conducting elections by mail in 1998.
The most prominent cases of mail fraud have involved campaigns, not voters. North Carolina invalidated the results of a 2018 congressional election after state officials found that a Republican campaign operative had orchestrated a ballot fraud scheme.
Experts say those scenarios can be minimized by nixing requirements — currently in place in 11 states — which instruct voters to get at least one witness to sign their return envelopes.
“All of these policies remove the need to hand over your ballot to someone you don’t know,” said Tammy Patrick, a former election official in Maricopa County, Arizona.
DOES IT HELP TURNOUT?
Turnout rates tend to be higher in states that conduct elections by mail. A Stanford University study found that participation increased by roughly 2 percentage points in three states that rolled out universal voting by mail from 1996 to 2018. It had no effect on partisan outcome and did not appear to give an advantage to any particular racial, economic or age group.
In Colorado, 77% of voting age citizens cast ballots in the 2016 presidential election, the highest figure in the country, according to the U.S. Election Assistance Commission. In Oregon, that figure was 72% and in Washington it was 68%, well above the national rate of 63%.
ARE THERE BARRIERS?
Like any other voting method, mail balloting has its drawbacks.
States rejected 1% of returned ballots in 2016 for arriving too late, missing signatures or other problems, according to EAC figures — though that figure was as high as 5% in some states. It can be more difficult to fix errors on mail ballots than on those cast in person, experts say.
Mail ballots can pose additional barriers to those who don’t speak English or have disabilities, and delivery can be problematic on Native American reservations, where residents sometimes don’t have street addresses.
In California, which started transitioning to mail ballots in 2018, Black and Hispanic voters were twice as likely to cast their ballots in person, according to David Becker, head of the Center for Election Innovation and Research.
So 45* continues to spout off about the sheer horribleness of it all, and those few Repubs with the sense god gave a fuckin' stump can't figure out how to ride 45*'s coattails and not be as completely stoopid as he's making them all look.
President Trump’s relentless attacks on the security of mail voting are driving suspicion among GOP voters toward absentee ballots — a dynamic alarming Republican strategists, who say it could undercut their own candidates, including Trump himself.
In several primaries this spring, Democratic voters have embraced mail ballots in far larger numbers than Republicans during a campaign season defined by the coronavirus pandemic. And when they urge their supporters to vote by mail, GOP campaigns around the country are hearing from more and more Republican voters who say they do not trust absentee ballots, according to multiple strategists. In one particularly vivid example, a group of Michigan voters held a public burning of their absentee ballot applications last month.
The growing Republican antagonism toward voting by mail comes even as the Trump campaign is launching a major absentee-ballot program in every competitive state, according to multiple campaign advisers — a delicate balancing act, considering what one strategist described as the president’s “imprecision” on the subject.
“It’s very concerning for Republicans,” said a top party operative, who like several others interviewed spoke on the condition of anonymity to avoid drawing Trump’s ire. “I guarantee our Republican Senate candidates are having it drilled into them that they cannot accept this. They have to have sophisticated mail programs. If we don’t adapt, we won’t win.”
The president, however, has been arguing the opposite. Nearly daily in recent weeks and usually on Twitter, Trump has attacked mail balloting, leveling many unsubstantiated allegations. He has claimed without evidence that it will lead to widespread fraud and that foreign governments will try to dump millions of forged ballots into U.S. elections. He has accused Democrats of using the pandemic to expand mail balloting for political gain.
“Because of MAIL-IN BALLOTS, 2020 will be the most RIGGED Election in our nations history — unless this stupidity is ended,” the president tweeted late last month. “We voted during World War One & World War Two with no problem, but now they are using Covid in order to cheat by using Mail-Ins!”
Veteran Republican campaign operatives, who note that the party has long had strong absentee-ballot programs in states including Arizona and Florida, have cringed at such comments.
“It does reduce the likelihood of Republicans embracing this process,” said a senior GOP strategist. “Especially for older, more rural voters, that could be important for Republicans getting out the vote in 2020. I don’t want ‘I will not vote by mail’ to become a political statement. But it may be too late.”
Trump campaign spokesman Tim Murtaugh said the president is critical of universal mail balloting, not the kind of absentee voting available to only a narrow group of qualified voters, such as older voters or those out of the country on Election Day.
“What the president is talking about is efforts on the Democrats’ part to weaken the integrity of our elections,” Murtaugh said.
However, in 29 states — including Florida, where Trump himself voted by mail this year — there is no such distinction. Any voter is allowed to cast a ballot by mail.
Justin Clark, a senior Trump campaign adviser, said “people don’t give voters enough credit,” saying they are able to separate what the president is saying about absentee ballots vs. mass voting by mail.
“The president is absolutely right when he says vote by mail is less secure,” he said, adding about Trump’s stance: “I haven’t seen any data or evidence that it is dampening voter turnout.”
The campaign has launched what another adviser, Chris Carr, called an “aggressive” effort to get voters to cast ballots by mail, including direct contacts with those who have voted absentee in the past and a successful test run in a recent California election.
The president’s message “doesn’t mean we don’t push absentee in a state that allows it,” Carr said.
The challenge for Republicans is particularly acute because the pandemic has dramatically changed the way voters are casting ballots — with mail-voting rates in some states rocketing from below 10 percent in previous elections to upward of 70 percent in this year’s primaries. A Democratic advantage is emerging in those turnout numbers.
In Virginia, 118,000 voters applied for absentee ballots for Democratic primaries June 23, while only 59,000 voters did so for the Republican primary — even though Republicans voted in a statewide Senate primary contest, while Sen. Mark R. Warner (D-Va.) was unopposed for his nomination.
Mail voting also soared in Kentucky’s June 23 primary; only about 10 percent of Democratic votes were cast on the day of the election, while 20 percent of GOP votes were.
Similarly, in Georgia’s June 9 primaries, about 600,000 voters cast mail ballots in Democratic primaries, while about 524,000 did so in Republican contests, according to the Georgia secretary of state’s office.
“It’s a legitimate question whether or not the president’s rhetoric changes voter behavior on the Republican side,” said Josh Holmes, a longtime adviser to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.). “I think there’s some evidence to suggest that it has.”
Some of the surge in Georgia and Kentucky can be attributed to increased overall enthusiasm on the Democratic side; Democrats turned out in larger numbers than Republicans in Georgia, for instance, with 1.2 million votes compared with just under 1 million.
But the trend line concerns Republicans at a time when efforts to expand voting by mail for the fall are the subject of court battles around the country.
According to a Washington Post-ABC News poll in late May, a sharp partisan divide has emerged over whether to make it easier for people to cast an absentee ballot, with 87 percent of Democrats and 33 percent of Republicans saying it should be easier.
Democratic and Republican campaigns alike have long sought to “bank” votes before Election Day — amassing as many votes as early as possible, whether at early-voting sites or through absentee ballots. That way, a sudden turn of events — such as an economic collapse or a surge in coronavirus infections — is less likely to dampen turnout.
If Republican candidates lock down fewer votes than Democrats, they are more susceptible to the whims of Election Day — long lines, closed polling locations and the possibility that their voters decide to stay home.
And anti-mail-balloting sentiment has recently been cropping up in races around the country.
Last month, Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) posted a simple message for her Facebook followers, exhorting them to vote in the next day’s primary and offering a link with “information on how to return your absentee ballot,” a process Iowa made easier to reduce the risks of coronavirus infection.
Not everyone welcomed the suggestion. “I will be voting, in person, for you,” wrote one supporter. “Senator, I can’t believe you’d support absentee ballots,” wrote another. “We need in-person voting with ID or no voting at all."
Two things:
- Like Brother Bob Cesca says - Trump always makes things worse for Trump
- Don't get happy - get busy - get shit done
COVID-19 Update
Headed for 4,000,000 cases and 150,000 dead before August.
Scientists warned on Wednesday of a potential wave of coronavirus-related brain damage as new evidence suggested COVID-19 can lead to severe neurological complications, including inflammation, psychosis and delirium.
A study by researchers at University College London (UCL)described 43 cases of patients with COVID-19 who suffered either temporary brain dysfunction, strokes, nerve damage or other serious brain effects.
The research adds to recent studies which also found the disease can damage the brain.
“Whether we will see an epidemic on a large scale of brain damage linked to the pandemic – perhaps similar to the encephalitis lethargica outbreak in the 1920s and 1930s after the 1918 influenza pandemic – remains to be seen,” said Michael Zandi, from UCL’s Institute of Neurology, who co-led the study.
COVID-19, the disease caused by the new coronavirus, is largely a respiratory illness that affects the lungs, but neuroscientists and specialist brain doctors say emerging evidence of its impact on the brain is concerning.
Reuters:
Scientists warned on Wednesday of a potential wave of coronavirus-related brain damage as new evidence suggested COVID-19 can lead to severe neurological complications, including inflammation, psychosis and delirium.
A study by researchers at University College London (UCL)described 43 cases of patients with COVID-19 who suffered either temporary brain dysfunction, strokes, nerve damage or other serious brain effects.
The research adds to recent studies which also found the disease can damage the brain.
“Whether we will see an epidemic on a large scale of brain damage linked to the pandemic – perhaps similar to the encephalitis lethargica outbreak in the 1920s and 1930s after the 1918 influenza pandemic – remains to be seen,” said Michael Zandi, from UCL’s Institute of Neurology, who co-led the study.
COVID-19, the disease caused by the new coronavirus, is largely a respiratory illness that affects the lungs, but neuroscientists and specialist brain doctors say emerging evidence of its impact on the brain is concerning.
Seems like maybe Reuters needs to check their shit. This piece makes it sound like COVID-19 is somehow primarily a respiratory thing, when it isn't.
Its primary entryway is thru the lungs, but they're finding out that it finds its way into practically every little nook and cranny by attacking the endothelial cells (basically the linings of the blood vessels), which of course are everywhere.
So if you get even a "mild" case, you could be left with damaged tissue anywhere you can name. And it's not limited to organs like kidneys and livers - it's a systemic thing.
There are people losing legs because the damage COVID-19 is doing to their circulatory system decreases blood flow to muscle tissue.
There are people left with what are more or less permanent conditions akin to fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue and myocarditis.
This thing is a monster straight outa your worst sci-fi nightmare.
So if you get even a "mild" case, you could be left with damaged tissue anywhere you can name. And it's not limited to organs like kidneys and livers - it's a systemic thing.
There are people losing legs because the damage COVID-19 is doing to their circulatory system decreases blood flow to muscle tissue.
There are people left with what are more or less permanent conditions akin to fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue and myocarditis.
This thing is a monster straight outa your worst sci-fi nightmare.
WEAR THE FUCKING MASK
Jul 7, 2020
How It Works
Protesters don't block traffic in an attempt to gain our support. They do it so you can get an idea of what it's like to be stuck in a situation where you're powerless.
How do you respond to this? Are you calm and peaceful? Do you intend to spend the next several years organizing political rallies and looking for ways to negotiate with the leaders of your government?
No. You wanna run over those protesters. Kill 'em. Kill 'em all.
If you feel like killing protesters who have you stuck in traffic, imagine what you might do to a whole system that patrols, harasses and kills you.
The sooner you learn a little perspective on this shit, the sooner protesters stop fucking up traffic.
No. You wanna run over those protesters. Kill 'em. Kill 'em all.
If you feel like killing protesters who have you stuck in traffic, imagine what you might do to a whole system that patrols, harasses and kills you.
The sooner you learn a little perspective on this shit, the sooner protesters stop fucking up traffic.
An Ad
The Lincoln Project - Whispers
They may be "on our side" for now, but the rat-fucking Never-Trumpers who put these things together will be right back to pulling this shit on us at their earliest opportunity.
On That Rioting Thing
 |
| Branden Michael Wolfe |
A St. Paul security guard was wearing stolen police gear when he was arrested Wednesday, six days after he’s accused of helping to burn down the Minneapolis Police Department’s 3rd Precinct during riots following the death of George Floyd.
Branden Michael Wolfe, 23, was fired June 3 from his security job at Menards on University Avenue after the store learned of social media reports that identified him as a participant in the May 28 rioting.
A Menards employee called police after Wolfe tried to enter the store later that day wearing stolen body armor and a law enforcement duty belt and carrying a police baton, according to a complaint filed Monday in U.S. District Court.anden Michael Wolfe.(Courtesy of the Hennepin County Sheriff’s Office)
St. Paul police found him in a vehicle several miles from the store, still wearing the body armor and duty belt, which was affixed with handcuffs, a baton, a knife and an ear piece. His name was handwritten on duct tape attached to the back of the body armor, according to the complaint.
In a police interview, Wolfe admitted he stoked the 3rd Precinct fire by pushing a wooden barrel into the flames.
He also reportedly admitted to stealing several items from inside and identified himself in multiple photographs that showed a man standing in front of the East Lake Street precinct holding a police baton as the building burned behind him.
Was the whole "rioting" thing a put on by agents provocateur? Of course not.
But there's an obvious attempt going on to paint the demonstrations as "left wing mob violence", and that's just not true.
“Radical left-wing mobs seek to tear down our monuments & our memorials—everyone from George Washington to Abraham Lincoln to Frederick Douglass & even Gandhi. Misguided movements such as ‘Defund the Police’ seek to leave our communities more vulnerable than ever.” -@PressSec pic.twitter.com/nvbv2lbdgX— GOP (@GOP) July 7, 2020
COVID-19 Update
The Death Rate ticks up by about .005, and the date we see 150,000 dead gets closer by 10 or 12 days.
It should be obvious that just doing the basics - semi-quarantine, masks, hand-washing and staying out of enclosed spaces - makes a huge difference.
In every country in the world where they've stuck to the program, they're getting a better handle on it than we are.
And still, there's a big bunch of folks who insist on believing the media is overhyping this thing - that it's "not as bad as they say it is" - that "we just need to get out there and let our natural immunity work its wonders and blah blah blah."
I will never understand how we let ourselves get so fooled by such foolish people.
The institute promoting the “laissez-faire capitalism” of writer Ayn Rand, who in the novels “Atlas Shrugged” and “The Fountainhead” introduced her philosophy of “objectivism” to millions of readers, was approved for a Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loan of up to $1 million, according to data released Monday by the Trump administration.
The Ayn Rand Institute: The Center for the Advancement of Objectivism in Santa Ana, California, sought to preserve 35 jobs with the PPP funding, according to the data.
The institute advocates the Russian-American writer’s philosophy and “applies its principles to many issues and events, including ones Rand herself never discussed,” according to its website. It “focuses on areas that have a long-term multiplying impact on the direction of our culture — notably, education and policy debates,” the website says.
It should be obvious that just doing the basics - semi-quarantine, masks, hand-washing and staying out of enclosed spaces - makes a huge difference.
In every country in the world where they've stuck to the program, they're getting a better handle on it than we are.
And still, there's a big bunch of folks who insist on believing the media is overhyping this thing - that it's "not as bad as they say it is" - that "we just need to get out there and let our natural immunity work its wonders and blah blah blah."
I will never understand how we let ourselves get so fooled by such foolish people.
Today's "Irony Is Dead, part ∞
The institute promoting the “laissez-faire capitalism” of writer Ayn Rand, who in the novels “Atlas Shrugged” and “The Fountainhead” introduced her philosophy of “objectivism” to millions of readers, was approved for a Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loan of up to $1 million, according to data released Monday by the Trump administration.
The Ayn Rand Institute: The Center for the Advancement of Objectivism in Santa Ana, California, sought to preserve 35 jobs with the PPP funding, according to the data.
The institute advocates the Russian-American writer’s philosophy and “applies its principles to many issues and events, including ones Rand herself never discussed,” according to its website. It “focuses on areas that have a long-term multiplying impact on the direction of our culture — notably, education and policy debates,” the website says.
Remember when Trump told us we were going to Mars?
Shit - we can't even go to Europe now.
Jul 6, 2020
Today's Tweet (updated)
Here it comes.
(longer video)
(longer video)
WATCH: @MiguelMarquez and team inside San Antonio Methodist Hospital with patients and doctors. "I don't think I've seen anything like this, ever," RN @AdamSahyouni says pic.twitter.com/3h1bRyEPY1— Brian Stelter (@brianstelter) July 2, 2020
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)