BS: American Presidential race 2024

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Bill D
Date: 24 Oct 24 - 05:10 PM

Yes, MaJo.. I've been following that Tina Peters case for awhile. MSNBC reported on it just recently. There were some folks in Georgia who made videos of allowing machine tamperers in. I can't remember what happened to them.

Subject: BS: Are Both Right? Is Neither?
From: Ebbie
Date: 24 Oct 24 - 10:43 PM

I just listened to Elon Musk speaking in Pennsylvania explaining to the audience that this election may be the last free election, that if Trump doesn’t win, our Constitution will be rendered null and void, that the ‘other’ side is trying to destroy America and all it stands for. This is not the first time I have heard MAGA present itself that way. It’s the equivalent of “God is on our side.” On BOTH sides.

Is 'God' sitting in the dining room watching the battle on his television, chortling all the while?

WTHF

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Helen
Date: 25 Oct 24 - 12:06 AM

No Ebbie. God is sitting in her/his loungeroom, rubbing her/his hands and saying, "My dastardly plan for the end of the world is working. Ha ha ha!"

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Thompson
Date: 25 Oct 24 - 04:42 AM

God is correct.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Ebbie
Date: 25 Oct 24 - 04:46 AM

There is a tune that we do, called The End of the World, from the long-ago dobro-playing Oswald Kirby. Players on the various instruments in our group take their turn at being featured, but because I can no longer play guitar because of my frozen shoulder I wrote a couple of verses to the tune, which we all sing when it’s my turn. They go:
“When the darkness gathers ‘round, silently, without sound
Voices bleak seem to speak through the gloom
Everything will disappear, erasing all that I hold dear
Then I believe that I can see the end of the world.

“But with the coming of the dawn when all trace of dark has gone
And the Earth knows its worth, again will bloom
And bright sun’s sweet caress brings me hope and happiness
Then I can see there’ll never be an end of the world.”

And that is the hope I cling to.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 25 Oct 24 - 12:17 PM

Right after Trump was elected a guy in Seattle started a Twitter account called "What the Fuck Just Happened Today?" and he would sum up the day's news in one long run-on sentence, followed by links to the news organizations where each phrase was sourced. I subscribed, and he kept it going during the Biden administration, more or less still focused on the bad behavior of The Former Guy. This came out on Tuesday (numbered by the day of the current administration):

Welcome to Day 1372.

Today in one sentence: 14 days until Election Day; more than 400 doctors and health professionals called on Trump to release his medical records, questioning his mental and physical fitness to serve; Trump has made more than 100 threats to investigate, prosecute, imprison, or punish his perceived opponents since 2022; Elon Musk, Trump’s billionaire backer, told the Life Center megachurch "that no one’s even bothering to try to kill Kamala" because it would be "pointless"; Trump’s plans for mass deportations, tariffs, and tax cuts would drive Social Security to insolvency by 2031 – three years earlier than currently projected; the Biden administration proposed a rule requiring private health insurance plans to cover over-the-counter birth control at no cost to patients; 79% of Republicans favor putting undocumented immigrants in encampments; and 60% of Americans between the ages of 18 and 34 support Harris for president.

Here's the site if anyone is interested in following along. You don't have to pay to read it.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Helen
Date: 25 Oct 24 - 12:56 PM

Thanks for your verse of hope, Ebbie.

I think it is more useful to focus on hope than on doom and gloom, and in the U.S. it is especially important in motivating people to vote. If they focus on despair they think there is no point in voting because the result is perceived to be inevitable. If they think their vote can make a difference, they will vote.

Subject: RE: BS: American Presidential race 2024
From: Helen
Date: 25 Oct 24 - 03:27 PM

The image of God sitting in a room of a house reminds me of my favourite cartoon ever. I saw it in a book about sci-fi many decades ago and I have a copy of it filed away somewhere safe, i.e. I can't remember where it is, so I can't give the name of the cartoonist.

Briefly, a man is in a space ship, travelling far, far away in the universe, sees lots of signs saying "Go back, end of the universe" then God (portrayed as a bearded old man) is sitting in his lounge room when a teeny-tiny spaceship jumps out of his aquarium-style container and lands on the floor. He picks it up, puts it on the mantle piece and says, "I'll just put that with all the others" and there are a few more spaceships lined up on the shelf.

Sorry for the discussion detour.