BS: American Presidential race 2024

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: gillymor
Date: 11 Sep 24 - 10:38 AM

I'm also not a fan of Swift's music, I suppose she's not trying to appeal to my demographic, but we need to take down that monster by whatever means possible and I'm grateful to her.
Btw, she signed her eloquent endorsement tweet, "Childless Cat Lady".

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 11 Sep 24 - 10:23 AM

I'm with you, Helen and Gilly. Although I am rather bemused by the idea that people's votes might be influenced by a moderately pretty, moderately-talented singer of moderately interesting pop songs. But hey, anything that buggers-up the Trumper-mob sounds good AFAIC.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: gillymor
Date: 11 Sep 24 - 09:37 AM

It was educational, the ex-prez informed us that they're executing infants in West Virginia. He's just preaching to his whack job choir with ludicrous statements like that and alienating most rational folks, I would guess.
One obvious takeaway for me was that elevating VP Harris to the top of the ticket was absolutely the right decision, as much as I admire President Biden.
I wish Taylor Swift would have chosen another moment to endorse Harris, it kind of got lost in the post-debate wash and the 911 rememberances.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Helen
Date: 11 Sep 24 - 05:01 AM

I recorded the debate and I'm halfway through watching it. My recorder has a function where I can fast forward by one click and they just speak very fast but they can be understood. It saves me having to listen to Trump turn every single topic of discussion into his badgering about immigration, so even when Kamala Harris directly confronted him about his actions leading to the Capitol riot on Jan 6 he twists his reply into another barb about immigration.

You're right, Joe. Kamala Harris's facial expressions, gestures, bemused looks, and great big open smile are absolutely priceless and so far her comments on abortion and women's right to make their own health decisions, and about Jan 6, and Trump's legal battles have been right on the money.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Joe Offer
Date: 11 Sep 24 - 03:49 AM

Kamala Harris has a VERY expressive face, and a million-dollar smile. Although she was not allowed to talk while Trump was talking, her expressions said so much. I'd say her performance during the debate was near-perfect.

Trump just scowled. And babbled. And repeated himself.

I covered my dog's ears when Trump was talking about people in Ohio eating pets. Say, doesn't Vance come from Ohio?

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Helen
Date: 11 Sep 24 - 12:59 AM

I haven't watched the debate yet, but I've heard some of the commentary from Oz ABC journalists. I might not manage to watch the whole debate, depending on how sick to my stomach Trump makes me, but I'll give it a go.

However, Taylor Swift has now said she will vote for Harris, and is encouraging her fans to register to vote, while - importantly - not telling them how they should vote.

Taylor Swift endorses Kamala Harris following first presidential debate with Donald Trump

I'm hoping that just motivating her fans to register to vote may sway the election outcome. Encouraging people to vote can only be a good thing, surely, but given that most of Swift's fans are young and female her influence may prove to be important.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 10 Sep 24 - 09:47 PM

There should be a drinking game to play with the "debate" this evening but Trump is so predictable we'd all be sloshed.

He's dreadful. Lies lies lies lies, about himself and her. And muting the mics doesn't seem to be working, he's still talking and interrupting the moderators and Harris.

Bleh. I tried turning on the CC setting but it wasn't working on the channels I tested.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 10 Sep 24 - 06:40 PM

I'll keep an eye on this via MSNBC and see what the liberal inteligencia goddess Rachel Maddow has to say about it.

We're a couple of hours away. Time for dinner, then setting up the TV in the den to watch (or read) the big event.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Helen
Date: 10 Sep 24 - 12:56 PM

I have a couple of images in my head of how I hope it plays out: a cat playing cat-and-mouse, letting the mouse think it is getting away and then quietly pouncing to keep playing with it; and what I call sheep-dogging. That is when a person quietly and determinedly rounds up the other person, no fuss, no bother, just pushing him into the sheep pen before he knows what is happening to him.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 10 Sep 24 - 12:47 PM

I agree with most of those topics, Helen. I don't think you'd want the party election of the president here, we don't have the same kind of prime minister setup you do.

Fingers crossed, as you say, and trying not to borrow trouble. The debate will be what it is, and we'll move forward.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Helen
Date: 10 Sep 24 - 12:33 PM

Closed captions and mute - that's a great idea. I can't stand to listen to him either.

I'm hoping, with all fingers and toes crossed, that Harris presents some solid policy statements and really pushes the important policies e.g. economics, abortion and women's issues and rights, etc but also that she wipes the floor with him using her arsenal of prosecutorial skills.

She has been consistently ahead in the polls for most states by a few percentage points but she really needs to push forward at least another few points and hold that position so that she can't be beaten by the electoral college.

[You don't know how polite I have been about the US electoral system, especially the electoral college as opposed to "one person one vote", the lack of compulsory voting, and electing a president instead of voting in a political party by a majority of successful candidates. I could really cut loose on all of that, but I have been restraining myself for the sake of maintaining international relations in Mudcatland. :-) Instead I am projecting good thoughts and lots of hope for this election.]

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 10 Sep 24 - 11:47 AM

Tonight is the big event. I'm wondering what it would look like if I set up the closed captions and mute every time Trump opens his mouth. I can't stand to listen to his voice but the gibberish from his mouth might be . . . instructive.

There is a double-standard at play here. Trump is expected to lie, to talk over the top of Harris, to be a deranged fool. Harris must be perfect in every way.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 09 Sep 24 - 11:41 AM

MaJoC I've spent the weekend thinking about what you said about perhaps they "found his grandchildren." I'm sure there is a great deal of that calculation going on behind the scenes. And the court decision is a lot bigger issue than the usual ones around here: I live in a state where in past years people were reluctant to put out Biden signs because of the Trump hooligans who might drive by and decide to shoot the sign, regardless of it being in front of a building permeable to bullets. I've seen a few Harris/Walz signs, and there will soon be a couple set up here. (I live in a "rock house" so maybe as long as they miss the windows we're ok?)

It looks like politics is going to have to settle this once and for all - defeating Trump at the ballot box, regardless of what he says about accepting the results, will end it. (I'd love to see him flee the country after this is all over.)

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 08 Sep 24 - 03:07 PM

Same story was discussed back on 27th of August

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Helen
Date: 08 Sep 24 - 01:19 PM

I saw something on (Oz) ABC News about Trump's minions fiddling the electoral college system in Georgia. The article hasn't shown up yet on the ABC News site.

Will he get away with this?

I found this article about it:

How Georgia’s pro-Trump election board could help him steal an election

"At a rally in Georgia days before a crucial vote at the state’s election board, Donald Trump praised three of the board’s five members as 'pit bulls fighting for victory'.

“'I don’t know if you’ve heard, but the Georgia State Election Board is in a very positive way,” Trump said in Atlanta on August 3. “They’re on fire. They’re doing a great job.'

"Those members — Rick Jeffares, Janelle King and Janice Johnston — ultimately voted for sweeping rule changes to how counties can certify election rules in a state that the former president lost by narrow margins in 2020, and where he is now criminally charged for his attempts to reverse that loss.

"Election analysts predict the state could come down to even smaller vote margins in November, potentially inviting challenges from Trump-allied groups to do what Trump couldn’t in 2020, thanks to new, potentially illegal rules that could invite partisan investigations. The Democratic Party and a group of Georgia Democrats — with the support of Kamala Harris’s campaign — are now suing over the changes.

“'Everyone who cares about American democracy and who wants to make sure their vote counts should be alarmed,' Georgia Democratic Representative Sam Park told - The Independent."

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 08 Sep 24 - 12:23 PM

The presidential debate is coming up on Tuesday (Sept. 10), and as this new campaign with Harris replacing Biden is working at breakneck speed to do everything it needs to in the reduced time due to circumstances, the conservative media are howling that Kamala isn't making time for "The Press." They want to pepper her with stupid talking points from Trump to make his campaign ads with. They'll get lots of soundbytes on Tuesday.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: MaJoC the Filk
Date: 07 Sep 24 - 06:55 AM

> Merchan really needed to sentence Trump to a prison
> sentence

When I heard about the delay, I had a flashback to when the head of the Wagner group stopped his march on Moscow. One comment at the time was: They've found his grandchildren.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: The Sandman
Date: 07 Sep 24 - 02:57 AM

What are the differences in foreign policies?a question not a statement

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 06 Sep 24 - 05:25 PM

Damn damn damn. It makes it better for Trump, of course. Merchan really needed to sentence Trump to a prison sentence to make the point that he is a convicted felon.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 06 Sep 24 - 02:03 PM

How is the sentencing delay going to affect things? Good or bad!

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: MaJoC the Filk
Date: 04 Sep 24 - 12:49 PM

Any fixed-rule system can be gamed; and if the rules themselves are gamed, however laudable the reason, the system becomes even more fragile. Gödel's Undecidability Theorem doesn't just apply to mathematics (or maths's red-headed step-child, the computer).

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 04 Sep 24 - 12:28 PM

You would be wrong, because the parties of those names did a reverse-polarity thing back in the years after Lincoln. The party that put in the slave-holding parts of the constitution are now functioning as the GOP.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 04 Sep 24 - 08:50 AM

Because of the electoral college and the way it favors smaller states (put in place by the slave-holding state to prevent the rest of the nation from getting rid of their ability to own slaves) the GOP always has an advantage

Correct me if I am wrong but surely the slave holding states overwhelmingly supported the Democratic party and the Republicans emerged to combat the spread of slavery into the western territories. If the Southern Democrats put in a system to maintain their advantage, then the Democratic party can't complain if the pendulum has swung the other way towards the GOP.

DC

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Helen
Date: 04 Sep 24 - 06:13 AM

Anthony Scaramucci says a second Donald Trump presidency would isolate the United States, leave NATO stranded and project 'cruelty'

The article is based on an interview on an Oz ABC TV show called 7.30. Scaramucci expresses a lot of opinions which I won't try to summarise. He also has an opinion on how Kamala Harris could be more successful by being more persuasive [he uses the term "aggressive"] with her political agenda.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 03 Sep 24 - 10:51 PM

A federal judge today again denied the Trump team's request to move the activity on the hush money case to federal court.

From the AP: Federal judge rejects Donald Trump’s request to intervene in wake of hush money conviction

NEW YORK (AP) — A federal judge on Tuesday swiftly rejected Donald Trump’s request to intervene in his New York hush money criminal case, spurning the former president’s attempt at an end-run around the state court where he was convicted and is set to be sentenced in two weeks.

U.S. District Judge Alvin Hellerstein’s ruling — just hours after Trump’s lawyers asked him to weigh the move — upends the Republican presidential nominee’s plan to move the case to federal court so that he could seek to have his conviction overturned in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court’s presidential immunity ruling.

Hellerstein, echoing his denial of Trump’s pretrial bid to move the case, said the defense failed to meet the high burden of proof for changing jurisdiction and that Trump’s conviction for falsifying business records involved his personal life, not official actions that the Supreme Court ruled are immune from prosecution.

In a four-page ruling, Hellerstein wrote that nothing about the high court’s July 1 ruling affected his previous conclusion that hush money payments at issue in Trump’s case “were private, unofficial acts, outside the bounds of executive authority.” (emphasis mine)

A bit further down in the article is information about the thing that many of us are on the lookout for - statements from the judge in the hush money case:

Merchan is expected to rule soon on two key defense requests: Trump’s call for the judge to delay his Sept. 18 sentencing until after the November election, and his request that the judge overturn his conviction and dismiss the case in the wake of the Supreme Court’s ruling.

Merchan has said he will rule Sept. 16 on Trump’s motion to overturn the verdict. His decision on delaying sentencing has been expected in the coming days.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 03 Sep 24 - 08:23 PM

Because of the electoral college and the way it favors smaller states (put in place by the slave-holding state to prevent the rest of the nation from getting rid of their ability to own slaves) the GOP always has an advantage (until we get rid of the electoral college!) so the Democrats have to be several points ahead to pull up even.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Helen
Date: 03 Sep 24 - 03:40 PM

I check this page with polls fairly often. I posted the link on
Date: 30 Aug 24 - 02:22 PM.

Currently the summary of the polls shows that Trump is 45.4% and Harris is 49.4%, and this has been steady for a few days. Harris overtook Trump on 6 August.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Helen
Date: 03 Sep 24 - 02:07 PM

Neil D, I am sure that the reason Trump or his political strategists thought it was a good idea to go to Arlington was to counteract the bad publicity from the suckers and losers comment. Unfortunately it rebounded on him and his campaign. He has a short memory- he spits out commentary and then forgets what he has said almost immediately - and he hopes his potential voters do too.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Neil D
Date: 03 Sep 24 - 12:09 PM

I don't know where to view it. It's not on Youtube and what I saw was a very short clip included in a video montage. It's even possible they used a similar clip from a different incident now that I think about it. And speaking of not showing up for commemoration ceremonies, Trump refused to go to the main D-day graveyard in Normandy because he said the dead were a bunch of suckers and losers.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 02 Sep 24 - 02:24 PM

Did you find a place to view that video? I haven't seen it appear anywhere. I agree - she is probably terrified of being the center of the Trump mob's attention. In this CNN report they read the statement released by the Army, supporting their employee at the event (while not mentioning Trump by name - but the meaning is clear.)

Also, a follow-up to the smear by Senator Cotton on Sunday, Biden and Harris were not invited to the event that he says they ignored.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Neil D
Date: 02 Sep 24 - 01:12 PM

SRS I believe that the fear of repercussions by the Trump mob is probably why she chose not to press charges. Because, after seeing the video, what happened to her absolutely fit the legal definition of assault.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 01 Sep 24 - 06:45 PM

Trump's puppets on the Sunday morning news shows tried to blame Biden and Harris - saying that they'd been invited to the family event at the cemetery also, and if they'd done their nation proud and attended this wouldn't have happened. You know how many events happen in the nation every day that they probably have to consider? And this is a tiny family thing. Trump decided to take advantage of it and his team still have political ads using the photos and video. They accuse Biden of sitting at the beach and Harris of just sitting in her mansion four miles away.

When they have no good policies or answers, they start name calling and slinging mud. That has been the pattern all along. They own that Arlington Cemetery debacle; I just hope the Army employee who they pushed aside stays out of harm's way as far as stalking and doxing.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 31 Aug 24 - 06:16 AM

I know we’re not supposed to use the ‘N’ word (no, not that ‘n’ word!) but, the more I read and hear, the more I’m reminded of 1930s Germany.

It’s terrifying.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 31 Aug 24 - 05:21 AM

Another really good piece from Raw Story

The real reason corporate media won't cover Trump's attacks on democracy

I don't know who they are but this makes sense to me.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 30 Aug 24 - 03:02 PM

I'm not worried that she hasn't done interviews - Trump just wants to make a case of anything he can think of. She's awfully busy being the vice president and simultaneously a political candidate setting up a new campaign under highly unusual circumstances.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Helen
Date: 30 Aug 24 - 02:22 PM

Also, in the lawyers' filing that you quoted, "...President Trump — the leading candidate in the 2024 presidential election..." - well, that is not according to the polls I've been looking at e.g. The Hill & DDHQ but as you say, the only poll that matters is the election.

I watched a few snippets of the CNN interview with Harris and Walz, mostly on the Oz TV show Planet America Fireside Chat. One of the possible explanations proposed by John Barron for Harris' hesitation in conducting live interviews was that, being a Prosecutor she would be carefully weighing every word she utters in a courtroom context so she may be weighing everything she says in interviews as well. That makes a nice change from listening to Trump's out of control utterances.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 30 Aug 24 - 12:32 PM

Trump is trying to move his sentencing in the hush-money case to Federal court, to delay it until after the election. As the New York Times suggests, "it's a long shot."

Former President Donald J. Trump sought to move his Manhattan criminal case into federal court on Thursday, filing the unusual request three months after he was convicted in state court.

The long-shot bid marks Mr. Trump’s latest effort to stave off his sentencing in state court in his hush-money trial, in which he was convicted of falsifying records to cover up a sex scandal.

He is scheduled to receive his punishment on Sept. 18, just seven weeks before Election Day, when he will square off against Vice President Kamala Harris for the presidency.

“The ongoing proceedings will continue to cause direct and irreparable harm to President Trump — the leading candidate in the 2024 presidential election — and voters located far beyond Manhattan,” Mr. Trump’s lawyers, Todd Blanche and Emil Bove, wrote in the filing.

Well, guys, he ISN'T "President" Trump, he's ex- or former-president Trump, who has an inflated view of his own importance. He's scared of Harris, who appears to have moved ahead of him in most polls (but never trust them - the only one that counts is the voting booth). All hopes are on Marchan pronouncing a prison sentence in September.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Neil D
Date: 29 Aug 24 - 11:24 PM

Too add to what SRS said about Big Business raising prices, and instead of hiring they do stock buybacks (those used to be illegal) and other things to boost CEO pay and reward investors. The big achievement of the first year of the Trump administration was a massive tax cut, especially generous to the wealthy with corporate tax rates at an all-time low. Now you will notice that whenever Republicans want to push their corporate welfare agenda those rich arseholes become "Job Creators". Well it's a lie. At the end of Trumprule the GAO studied the effect of those corporate tax gifts and found that very little of that money was used to create jobs. It was used to pay down debt and buy back their stock.
It's always a rehashing of Reagan's trickle down economics which George H.W. Bush (the primary rival not the running mate) tagged as "Voodoo Economics" whenever they want another corporate handout. It's always a lie.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 29 Aug 24 - 10:37 PM

Far be it my intention to tell people from another country who they should vote for.

But Donald Trump seems to be a very strange character, Did anyone else see the interview where he kept saying how intelligent he was?

Still apparently half the country want him as president.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Helen
Date: 29 Aug 24 - 03:08 PM

MaJoC, I thought the Democrat symbol was a donkey, but Trump is at the ass end spilling out all kinds of stuff which other people have to try to clean up.

His poor political strategists must be losing sleep over what he might do at the political debate whereas Harris and her crew are probably rubbing their hands with glee and planning how to use all that manure to grow productive crops.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 29 Aug 24 - 11:55 AM

Trump can gaslight all he wants, but the bottom line on those positions that canvass elections is that they SHALL do the job. Not they "can if they want, or do whatever they want." It comes from much higher up than that Georgia board (and calling those two latest members "pitbulls" is an insult to pitbulls.) The results being contested by those folks will be local, and chances are good that other down-ballot elections will be perturbed enough by the delayed results that local lawsuits will result to get results released promptly. It is the job of each state's attorney general or other high-up election official to do the investigations, not that of the local zealots.

Trump is desperate and addled, that's all there is to it. His followers drank the Kool-aid (Flavor Aid was actually what was used at Jonestown) but may survive, though they may never recover their senses; admitting you were that wrong for that long is a difficult thing to do.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 29 Aug 24 - 11:11 AM

Good read and analysis of what is going on with Trump's attempts to fix the results

The path to destroy American democracy runs through Georgia

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: MaJoC the Filk
Date: 29 Aug 24 - 08:22 AM

Nice one, Helen; doubtless Herself will be spluttering into her plonque rouge. It's just a shame that the appropriate animal is the campaign symbol for the Democrats, or you'd have got the triple score.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Helen
Date: 28 Aug 24 - 06:36 PM

This thought just popped into my head. I'm probably not the first to make the connection but if Trump thinks he's a stable genius, maybe that makes him a horse's ass?

Trump - stable genius

I've been checking the polls and he has been behind Harris by a few points, his crowd sizes are a lot less, and the money in his donations fund are a lot less too. Cautious optimism, but I'm not getting the crystal ball out just yet.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: MaJoC the Filk
Date: 28 Aug 24 - 01:03 PM

Oops: that was a reply to Sandman's link.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: MaJoC the Filk
Date: 28 Aug 24 - 12:57 PM

To quote Mandy Rice-Davies: Well he would, wouldn't he?

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 28 Aug 24 - 12:49 PM

Meanwhile, Trump was trying to set up a photo-op that would show him respecting military fallen at Arlington National Cemetery, a federal site with very specific rules about conduct and photos:

“Federal law prohibits political campaign or election-related activities within Army National Military Cemeteries, to include photographers, content creators or any other persons attending for purposes, or in direct support of a partisan political candidate’s campaign,” the statement said, adding that “a report was filed” over the incident.

“Arlington National Cemetery reinforced and widely shared this law and its prohibitions with all participants,” the statement said.

The staffers were trying to video Trump laying a wreath in a ceremony for 13 US service members killed in a suicide bombing in Afghanistan.

In a statement, Arlington acknowledged one of its representatives became involved in the altercation with two Trump staffers, telling them that only cemetery representatives were allowed to take video and photographs in Section 60, an area where recent US casualties mostly from Iraq and Afghanistan are buried.

The Trump staffers pushed aside the cemetery official, who would be a civilian US Army employee, verbally abused them, and went ahead posing and taking photos like this and this video. In the video he was apparently speaking to the family of that fallen soldier, but the family can't give him access with private photographers to the grave.
So in his usual Trump style, the event is characterized as the employee being mentally disturbed and shouldn't have a job there.

“For a despicable individual to physically prevent President Trump’s team from accompanying him to this solemn event is a disgrace and does not deserve to represent the hallowed grounds of Arlington National Cemetery,”. . .

On a personal note, I was one of those public-facing park rangers many years ago when a local NY US congressman and a couple of friends rode out to Ellis Island on an Army Corps of Engineers tug (not a boat authorized to land at or transport people to the national park). The boat captain was the brother-in-law of the congressman. This was before Ellis restoration, when there was a lot of dangerous building decay and tours followed a set route with covered walkways and barriers; they walked all over the place and when I found them I tried to get them to return to their boat. They in turn patronized, insulted, and dismissed me; my supervisor heard of this and tagged along the rest of the time (so they wouldn't kill themselves) as they did what they wanted, asserting privilege based upon the congressman's status as an elected official. I was so pissed off that I wrote the Case-Incident report to include dialog - how rude they were, and how they suggested I should just go away and be a good little girl, that the Congressman had a right to do what he wanted. I was reading a lot of Steinbeck at the time so I quoted our conversation as dialog in the way he would have. Clear, and interesting to read.

The federal report forms documenting their trespass and abuse, written by me and by my supervisor and appended with a report from the Supt of the monument, moved up through NPS ranks and landed on a desk somewhere in Washington. In the end, the Corps of Engineers and the Congressman's office had to offer me a written apology. When you know your site, and you know the regulations, and when the misbehavior is challenged, it can come back to bite the offender in the ass. There's a reason for all of the federal regulations and the reports we had to file. On the bottom of my report I was allowed to state that I felt it was reprehensible for employees of another federal agency to behave that way on our site. The Arlington National Cemetery is run by the Army, and they're more strict about regulations than NPS. Trump's group could end up getting a citation or something out of this, if anyone bothers to follow-up.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: The Sandman
Date: 28 Aug 24 - 12:15 PM

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/aug/28/trump-blames-biden-harris-assassination-attempt
link from uk guardian newspaper

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 28 Aug 24 - 11:47 AM

The political opinions of people in non-partisan office are generally kept to themselves. The part of the population with MAGA views are working to infiltrate lower level offices thinking they can save the day for Trump, but rational individuals understand this means courts will have to force them to do their ceremonial jobs as appointed (or probably step down). The fact that they held those MAGA opinions may have impressed enough people to get them into those offices (we don't legislate against ideas, with the usual exceptions of harming others, shouting fire in theaters, etc.) but these are usually pockets of influence. Though it does puzzle me that enough people could agree that MAGA makes sense to re-elect people like Marjorie Taylor Greene and Matt Gaetz. A few of those other crackpots.

Meanwhile, there is an "unwritten" Justice Department rule about not bringing charges or cases against presidential candidates within 60 days of an election. Or even thinking about them - it is a widely held opinion that when James Comey announced that Hillary's aid's laptop turned up with more emails that they were going to look into it; there was an opinion shift that came with that, and when he announced just before the election that there was nothing to see there the harm was done. But Trump is different, he has been in and out of courts for a couple of years now and these current cases are moving forward. It will be interesting to see what happens after September 5, if there is a pull-back by the Justice Department. The AG was so disappointingly slow in getting that started (waiting until the January 6 investigation by Congress turned up all of the evidence) that if he were to slow the work that is finally happening he might find himself the focus of some pretty nasty memes by Democrats.

Finally, I heard an interview recently about why Trump appeals to the wide swath he does - many of them white men without college educations. If they're feeling a pinch in getting jobs or advancing in jobs or being able to afford the usual things in life - cars, houses, beer, they are tending to blame other citizens (Black, Hispanic, immigrants, and these days, women) or Biden or Obama or whoever they can instead of realizing that our problem here is the extreme consolidation of banks, grocery businesses, agricultural product businesses, hospitals, and Big Pharma. When all of those businesses become almost monopolies in their arenas they can raise prices, and instead of hiring they do stock buybacks (those used to be illegal) and other things to boost CEO pay and reward investors. Food, services, housing, drugs, medical care, they all become less affordable. Blaming immigrants or the Democrats instead of blaming big industry is what got us here. And until we can get industry and big money back out of politics (the Supreme Court decision that said corporations are "persons" and can voice opinions via unlimited donations is called "Citizens United.") Trump ignores his big business friends and has set about turning Americans against each other. Blame the Democrats, blame the liberals, blame anyone else except the billionaire class.

/end of US politics 101 for today/

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 28 Aug 24 - 03:42 AM

I'm astounded that anyone with partisan views, such as these election deniers, has been allowed anywhere near the voting process. Surely there must be a method to remove them before they can do any damage. If they have stated, against all known facts, that Trump won the last election their mental health can be called into question at least!