He’s the match; we’re the ammo. Only we can stop ourselves - Trump thread 86

[TheClaws]

This is one of the most apt political cartoon I’ve seen.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/3393501-Couldnt-think-of-a-pithy-quote-so-have-this-instead-Trump-85

'Secretary of State Pompeo calls for end to fighting in Yemen'
mobile.reuters.com/article/amp/idUSKCN1N502G?__twitter_impression=true

'Yemen crisis: Three stats that reveal the scale of world's worst humanitarian crisis.
Children are "so malnourished they don’t even have the energy to cry." '
www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/ncna923741?__twitter_impression=true

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Well, it is not quite a 'secret' as they wish:
'What billionaires want: the secret influence of America’s 100 richest.
A new study reveals how the wealthy engage in ‘stealth politics’: quietly advancing unpopular, inequality-exacerbating, highly conservative policies.'
www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/oct/30/billionaire-stealth-politics-america-100-richest-what-they-want
www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/sep/26/koch-brothers-americans-for-prosperity-rightwing-political-group

The fake rabbi wasn’t even a real fake rabbi.
twitter.com/mattyglesias/status/1057465820694175745?s=21

Loren Jacobs, who was invited onstage by VP Pence to speak at a rally in Michigan, was defrocked 15 years ago, according to a spokeswoman for the Union of Messianic Jewish Congregations.
www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/jews-assail-so-called-christian-rabbi-who-appeared-pence-so-n926406

Did something happen to these people in their childhood? I have discovered even more layers of despair.

Ryan Zinke appointed Steven Chancellora Trump fundraiser who’s an avid trophy hunterto his Wildlife Conservation Council. Chancellor got permits from the government to import at least 3 lion heads.
twitter.com/crewcrew/status/1057482329038430208?s=21

www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/steven-chancellor-lion-trophy-import-permits-ryan-zinke-advisory-council_us_5bd78157e4b017e5bfd4dfaf

So moved to see the singing peaceful protesters in Pittsburgh.

'Having it Both Ways.
Centrist dogmatism and the corporate media’s see-no-evil syndrome.'
thebaffler.com/latest/having-it-both-ways-neiwert

'How Dare People Accuse Trump of Fomenting Hatred and Violence With His Rhetoric!
The president was the real victim of this past week’s attacks.'
amp.slate.com/news-and-politics/2018/10/trump-synagogue-shooting-mail-bombs.html?__twitter_impression=true

It was so beautiful and poignant, Quantum, and so appropriate to the circumstance forced on the grieving community.

I am taking a break to recharge before next week. C J Sansom's new book is waiting on my Kindle, and my kitchen cupboards and my freezers require a lot of pre-Christmas attention, while Alexa plays me a suitable singalong selection from the 60s

Wow. The fabricated Mueller sex attack story is quite something. Wohl and others have displayed an incredible amount of stupidity.

Whoops forgot to link- here a summary of what’s known so far.

https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/robert-mueller-smear-faileduss_5bd363f4e4b055bc948bad9d

Ha! I see you have the Mueller story well covered earlier in the thread (just reading it now).

and for the break, ohmymimi.

Thank you for all your sterling work.

Thank you for the new thread, TheClaws. Thank you for all your hard work, ohmymimi, enjoy your break in real life Across, I hope you are OK.
This popped up on my FB newsfeed just now, by someone called Joe Lowndes. I have no idea who he is nor why I see him, he is mysterious on Twitter, too, but I like what he says here on Trump and birthright citizenship.
"I’m unsure whether the question of whether Trump has the Constitutional authority to revoke birthright citizenship is the right one. Almost all legal scholars from left to right appear to agree that he doesn’t. But it also seems like whistling past the graveyard to say that this is merely a ploy to rally the base for the midterms. The speed and velocity with which proto-fascism has entered mainstream politics, fully commandeering one of the two major parties, should give us pause in thinking that anything is off the table, particularly with regard to immigration. We have repeatedly watched the previously unimaginable become imaginable, and the imaginable become concrete reality.

Trump, through the militarized panic he is creating at the southern border, has already provoked violence and death. He now uses it to elevate Michael Anton’s bad interpretation of the 14th Amendment and make it sound like common sense to his base. In doing so he has likely moved the public discussion of birthright citizenship decisively rightward. Yes, it is about the midterms, but remember Trump as a populist-turned-fascist is a permanent campaigner.

We don’t really know how the Supreme Court would respond to an actual executive order, but we shouldn't be sanguine about it given that the ground beneath our feet is slipping all the time these days. In any case, there are many ways to strip people of citizenship socially, culturally, and legally in an increasingly authoritarian society. For that reason, the question of birthright citizenship ultimately seems more like a political question - subject to the play of forces - than a safely sequestered Constitutional one. We shouldn’t assume that the institution will protect anyone here. We will have to defeat Trumpism in toto to defeat this latest attack, just like all the others."

If it's who I think he is, he's a political scientist. 🙂

Oh, right, thanks, cozietoesie - good to know I think that might be what my daughter could do when she grows up (she's studying political type stuff for her Master's now). She has no plans for the mo, but I'll suggest it to her as a possible career choice

If it's he, then this is one of many for her.

Thank you, cozietoesie, I'm sure that must be him.

Pahahah!

A particularly dim Republican candidate in Illinois, Dr Nick Stella, has used a picture of Jaywick Sands in our very own Essex, the most deprived area in England, as an attack ad against the Dems.

Except the text of the ad starts:
"Congratulations Madame Speaker Pelosi

followed by appeal to the voters:
Only YOU can stop this becoming reality
[old pic of rundown street]

Jaywick has just had a £6.5m improvement programme and that street is now brand spanking new.

So if you know, the ad appears to be saying that only people who vote Republican can stop Jaywick regeneration becoming reality.

Essex village used in 'appalling' Trump candidate ad
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-essex-46047494

Can only be good news. (Just hope it doesn't become fake news.)

Midterms 2018: Early voting by young people up 500% in Texas and Georgia

Numbers suggest potential surge in enthusiasm for Democratic candidates
www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/midterms-2018-election-early-voting-texas-georgia-beto-orourke-ted-cruz-trump-a8609916.html

Meanwhile in Montana

Jon Tester in danger as Trump seeks vengeance
The Democratic senator is trying to hang on in Trump country, but the president is coming after him this weekend.
www.politico.com/story/2018/10/31/jon-tester-montana-senate-2018-948774

Trump is out for revenge after Tester helped derail his pick to run the Veterans Affairs department, Ronny Jackson, earlier this year. And now a deluge of money from outside groups and visits from anti-Tester surrogates, including Trump himself, threaten to tip a race that everyone agrees is tightening.

Though Tester has a narrow lead, the race is statistically tied, according to new Republican polling viewed by POLITICO. Republicans think a late surge of GOP enthusiasm tied to Trump’s visit this coming weekend could produce a major upset of a two-term incumbent who has never cleared 50 percent of the vote.

Tester is upbeat about his prospects, saying he’s been preparing for this moment ever since the 2016 election.

“We knew it was going to be a close race two years ago. ... That’s just the nature of the beast,” Tester said. ”Do I think I’m going to win? Damn right I think I’m going to win.”

Tester is relying on his dry sense of humor, boisterous laugh and penchant for salty language to make his case that no one knows Montana better than he does. The farmer from Big Sandy was raised here, while his opponent has a Maryland accent rivaling Barbara Mikulski’s Baltimorese.

Yet Tester has poked the president more than any other endangered Democratic senator. And though Tester is a relative moderate in today’s Senate, his state has gone from nearly supporting Barack Obama in 2008 to full-on Trump country.

Now they're trying to tell Native Americans in Sioux County SD that their votes will be disqualified on the basis of the color of the ink they use to vote.

Apparently they're going to throw everything they've got at this. Just astonishing.
twitter.com/maddow/status/1057377903506325506?s=21

More good news.

A Latino Wave Is Voting For Democrats
www.politicususa.com/2018/10/31/latino-wave-democrats.html

Latinos appear to be energized and have joined other demographics in putting up record engagement numbers for the midterm election.

Yahoo News reported:

According to early-vote totals compiled by Political Data, Inc., Latino turnout in Southern California’s most competitive House contests is already far outpacing 2014 — even equaling 2016’s presidential-year turnout in some cases. At this point in 2014, for example, Latinos in CA-25 had cast less than 11 percent of all ballots; right now, that number is hovering around 15 percent, just like in 2016. In CA-39, Latinos’ early vote share has grown from 12.2 percent four years ago to 16 percent today — less than half a point shy of the 2016 benchmark. And Latino voting levels have increased in CA-45, CA-48, and CA-49 as well. (PDI compiles their figures using lists of voter surnames and “country or state of origin” data on registration forms.)

Such across-the-board increases in Latino turnout jibe with election results from earlier this year. In June, Latinos made up 21.2 percent of the primary electorate in California’s 39th Congressional District — a nearly eight-point jump from 2014. Subsequent reports by UCLA’s Latino Policy and Politics initiative concluded that the “Latino vote increased more than any other demographic in Los Angeles County from June 2014 to June 2018” and that “in Orange County, ballots cast in majority-Latino precincts were up over 2014 numbers by as much as a 245 percent.” And California isn’t alone: a new analysis by University of Florida Professor Daniel A. Smith finds that Latino early vote there has tripled in 2018 compared to 2014.
In Texas, Hispanic voter turnout is up 214%, which showed that the mobilized Latino isn’t limited to California.

🎃 Happy Halloween🎃