The amount of grift, graft, and corruption during his time as president is stunning. His entire con is to deny reality and repeat the lies so much that people will believe it. He accuses others like President Biden of dealing with China when he was renting an entire floor of one of his properties to the Chinese when he was president. He makes his money scamming people and working with corrupt governments. He made more money easier as president than ever in his life, and he wan’ts that money mill back again. We must not let him. Hugs. Scottie
Category: MAGA / Republican
China-linked ‘Spamouflage’ network mimics Americans online to sway US political debate
This seems important.
By DAVID KLEPPER Updated 11:56 AM CDT, September 3, 2024
WASHINGTON (AP) — When he first emerged on social media, the user known as Harlan claimed to be a New Yorker and an Army veteran who supported Donald Trump for president. Harlan said he was 29, and his profile picture showed a smiling, handsome young man.
A few months later, Harlan underwent a transformation. Now, he claimed to be 31 and from Florida.
New research into Chinese disinformation networks targeting American voters shows Harlan’s claims were as fictitious as his profile picture, which analysts think was created using artificial intelligence.
As voters prepare to cast their ballots this fall, China has been making its own plans, cultivating networks of fake social media users designed to mimic Americans. Whoever or wherever he really is, Harlan is a small part of a larger effort by U.S. adversaries to use social media to influence and upend America’s political debate.
The account was traced back to Spamouflage, a Chinese disinformation group, by analysts at Graphika, a New York-based firm that tracks online networks. Known to online researchers for several years, Spamouflage earned its moniker through its habit of spreading large amounts of seemingly unrelated content alongside disinformation.
“One of the world’s largest covert online influence operations — an operation run by Chinese state actors — has become more aggressive in its efforts to infiltrate and to sway U.S. political conversations ahead of the election,” Jack Stubbs, Graphika’s chief intelligence officer, told The Associated Press.
Intelligence and national security officials have said that Russia, China and Iran have all mounted online influence operations targeting U.S. voters ahead of the November election. Russia remains the top threat, intelligence officials say, even as Iran has become more aggressive in recent months, covertly supporting U.S. protests against the war in Gaza and attempting to hack into the email systems of the two presidential candidates. (snip-More)
Letters from an American-September 3, 2024
So much information today!
September 3, 2024 by Heather Cox Richardson Read on Substack
Last night the Boston Globe published a leaked email from a top volunteer with the Trump campaign, former Massachusetts Republican Party vice chair Tom Mountain, telling volunteers that the Trump campaign “no longer thinks New Hampshire is winnable” and is “pulling back” from that important swing state. He urged volunteers to turn their attention instead to Pennsylvania. After the story dropped, the Trump campaign cut ties with Mountain.
Stephen Collinson of CNN and Isaac Arnsdorf, Josh Dawsey, and Marianne LeVine of the Washington Post reported today that Trump’s team has given up on trying to get Trump to talk about the economy and other issues voters care about. The former president has decided to spend the rest of the campaign attacking Vice President Harris to destroy her popularity and drive voters away from her, rather than trying to attract them to himself. The Washington Post reporters noted that likely voters view Trump unfavorably and his team has concluded that while he can’t improve his own standing, he can damage hers.
Collinson dubbed Trump’s plans a “feral political offensive.”
It is not clear that this will work. As Collinson notes, Harris has refused to get dragged into the gutter with Trump, and Sarah Longwell of The Bulwark, who studies focus groups, notes that voters appear to want to put the nastiness of the past several years behind them. Still, the media-tracking company AdImpact reported that between August 23 and August 29, 57% of the total television spending for political ads was on Republican attacks on Harris.
Trump also continues to demand that Republicans support his attempt to suppress voting. Having failed to pass any of the necessary appropriations bills before going on August recess, Congress will be in a rush when it comes back into session next week. It needs to fund the government before the end of the fiscal year on September 30 in order to prevent a partial shutdown. Last Thursday, Trump told right-wing podcast host Monica Crowley that he would “shut down the government in a heartbeat” unless the government funding package includes the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) Act—which would give credence to the idea that noncitizens are voting in national elections despite the fact it is already illegal—and a bill restricting legal immigration.
Zeeshan Aleem of MSNBC today took public notice of Trump’s “deteriorating ability to clearly communicate.” His speeches “seem to be growing more discursive and difficult to comprehend by the day,” Aleem wrote. “Those speeches are making it hard, if not impossible, for people listening to them to understand what he wants to do with his power in office, and they’re reportedly turning off voters.” A reporter for The Guardian pointed out that attendees at Trump’s rallies are leaving as he rambles for nearly two hours, and complaining that he is “babbling.”
For his part, Trump says his wandering speech is deliberate. He calls it “the weave.” I’ll talk about, like, nine different things, and they all come back brilliantly together, and it’s like, and friends of mine that are, like, English professors, they say, ‘It’s the most brilliant thing I’ve ever seen.’”
Aleem notes that this less-focused, less-capable Trump would be exceptionally dangerous in office a second time. And yet, he was dangerous enough the first time. Today Adam Klasfeld and Ryan Goodman of Just Security released a study showing at least twelve times that Trump used the power of the presidency to retaliate against his political enemies. They note that there is no evidence that President Joe Biden or anyone else at the Biden White House ever took similar actions.
John McCain’s son Jimmy today announced that he has switched his voter registration from Republican to Democrat and will work to elect Vice President Harris and Minnesota governor Tim Walz in 2024. The younger McCain enlisted in the Marine Corps at 17 and is now an intelligence officer in the 158th Infantry Regiment of the Arizona Army National Guard. He said he is speaking out because Trump’s conduct at Arlington National Cemetery was a “violation.”
Last Friday, just before the long weekend, Trump announced that he would vote against a Florida ballot measure that would essentially enshrine in the Florida state constitution the abortion rights formerly protected by the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision. When Trump had bowed to popular support for abortion rights and expressed uneasiness at the state’s current six-week ban—a cutoff reached before most women know they’re pregnant—antiabortion activists launched fierce attacks on him. So, on Friday, Trump switched his position and announced he would vote against restoring access to abortion in Florida.
That announcement has given wings to the Democrats’ messaging about Republicans’ determination to end abortion rights. It did not help the Republicans that more videos have been unearthed in which Republican vice presidential nominee J.D. Vance said that “a childless elite” is ruling the country. He went on to excoriate this elite for what he claimed was their pride that they didn’t have children and that they had abortions, and said “they look down on people who invest their time and their future in their children. And that is a dangerous place to live as a country.” Even a right-wing Newsmax interviewer suggested that he was “painting this group with perhaps a broad brush?”
On October 1, in Louisiana, a law will go into effect that reclassified the drug misoprostol as a controlled dangerous substance. Misoprostol can be used for abortion. It is also used for routine reproductive care and during medical emergencies to treat postpartum hemorrhage. It is on the World Health Organization’s list of essential medications, a list containing those medications that are the most effective and safe to meet a health care system’s most important needs. After antiabortion activists targeted the drug, Louisiana governor Jeff Landry signed a law reclassifying it as a controlled dangerous substance. The reclassification means that the drug will no longer be easily available on obstetric hemorrhage carts.
“Take it off the carts?” one doctor said to Lorena O’Neil of the Louisiana Illuminator. “That’s death. That’s a matter of life or death.”
The Harris campaign said: “Let’s be clear: Donald Trump is the reason Louisiana women who are suffering from miscarriages or bleeding out after birth can no longer receive the critical care they would have received before Trump overturned Roe. Because of Trump, doctors are scrambling to find solutions to save their patients and are left at the whims of politicians who think they know better. Trump is proud of what he’s done. He brags about it. And if he wins, he will threaten to bring the crisis he created for Louisiana women to all 50 states.”
Vice President Harris’s campaign started its “Fighting for Reproductive Freedom” bus tour today in Palm Beach, Florida, where it drove past the Trump Organization’s Mar-a-Lago club. The bus will make at least 50 stops across the country.
Pollster Tom Bonier today continued his examination of new registrants to vote. This time his focus was North Carolina. The pattern he has found across the country continues: “surges in registration are being driven by women.” In North Carolina, he writes, the number of registrants was almost 50% higher during the week of July 21 than in the same week in 2020, and the gender gap was +12 women, compared to +6 women in 2020. The new registrants were +6 Democratic, and 43% were younger than 30.
The Harris-Walz campaign today joined the Democratic National Committee in announcing a transfer of nearly $25 million to support Democratic candidates in down-ballot state and federal races. The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee will get $10 million each in hopes of supporting a Democratic majority in each chamber of Congress in the new administration.
The Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee, the organization devoted to winning state legislatures, will receive $2.5 million. The Democratic Governors Association and the Democratic Attorneys General Association will get $1 million each.
Finally, today, a federal judge issued a preliminary injunction to stop the Trump campaign from playing the song he likes to dance to at his rallies: “Hold On, I’m Coming.” The estate of Isaac Hayes Jr., the artist who co-wrote the song, filed a copyright infringement lawsuit against Trump, his campaign, and a number of his allies, noting that they have never obtained a public performance license for the song although they have used it at least 133 times.
—
Notes:
https://www.cnn.com/2024/09/03/politics/trump-quest-destroy-harris-momentum/index.html
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/09/02/trump-strategy-campaign-harris/
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/donald-trump-government-shutdown_n_66d21e56e4b013957161cd53
https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/trump-age-harris-ramble-rcna168979
https://www.cnn.com/2024/09/03/politics/jimmy-mccain-decries-trump-arlington-appearance/index.html
https://www.washingtonpost.com/elections/2024/09/03/harris-25-million-transfer/
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/trump-isaac-hayes-hold-on-im-coming-lawsuit/
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/sep/03/mccain-trump-arlington-democrat
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lorenaoneil/status/1831123870507552901
Pop up the popcorn!
Federal judge rejects Donald Trump’s request to intervene in wake of hush money conviction
By MICHAEL R. SISAK Updated 6:47 PM CDT, September 3, 2024
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. (snip-more on the page, but this is the news.)
The News Out of TX from Janet
Got a Republican State Legislature? Watch out carefully for this…
This is an opinion piece that contains news, and cites. Also, all Republicans are not Magas, but they’re still Republicans. This is important.
Snippet (it’s not a long piece, and it’s full of info.)
Let’s be clear about what Kansas Republican legislative leaders are doing with their planned overhaul of budgeting: They are launching a personal and political power grab against Gov. Laura Kelly.
They have never accepted or respected her mandate. Despite Kelly winning a second term and having two years left to go, they have continually attempted to usurp the executive branch’s authority. They have tried a constitutional amendment and prohibiting her ability to negotiate Medicaid contracts. Now they’re going after her yearly state budget proposal.
Usually, the Legislature begins its yearly budget process with a proposal from the governor. Her office submits it when lawmakers arrive for the annual session, in January. Now an interim committee wants to start the process earlier, as soon as October of the previous year.
In this new process, the governor’s budget would be a suggestion, not a starting point.
And never mind that it’s a direct attack on Kelly. House Speaker Dan Hawkins, R-Wichita, assured the audience that these changes had nothing to do with the governor.
“This process has nothing to do with the governor,” he said at the meeting earlier this month, according to Kansas Reflector reporter Tim Carpenter. “If you’re going to focus on the governor, probably not the wisest thing to do, because this process has happened over time with many, many different governors.”
He was contradicted by Senate President Ty Masterson, R-Andover, who let the proverbial cat out of the figurative bag.
“You’ll have a Republican governor, for example, or somebody you trust, and you trust the administration to build the budgets, and then you kind of rubber stamp stuff,” Masterson said. “And, then, you switch, and you have (the) opposition party and then there’s all that same power.”
Oh. So it’s like that, then.
(snip-More; also a vid of the sausage becoming sausage)
Kansas women rally adjacent to J.D. Vance fundraiser, with vulnerable plea for reproductive rights
By: Grace Hills – August 24, 2024 8:28 am
First some content warning; the article has a warning that it references rape. The article is below, but I’ll leave some space here; the first mention is in the first sentence beneath their warning. The article will be beneath the Xs; I can’t get formatting to leave space. Also, Sen. Marshall lies like a Trump.
Amber Dickinson speaks on reproductive rights at the “Kansas Women for Harris” rally Aug. 22, 2024, in Leawood. (Grace Hills/Kansas Reflector)
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Trigger warning: This story references rape.
LEAWOOD — Amber Dickinson took a personal and vulnerable stand for reproductive freedom as she talked publicly for the first time about being raped.
Before her speech Thursday in Leawood at a rally of “Kansas Women for Kamala Harris,” only a handful of people knew she is a survivor. Through tears, she explained that she was worried she would stand in front of strangers and cry, when she was supposed to be strong.
“But whose definition of strong are we obligated to adhere to? It is time that women create their own definition of strength,” Dickinson said. “Because strength is not sexually abusing women like Donald Trump. Strength is not belittling women like J.D. Vance.”
Dickinson, a political science professor at Washburn University who has written opinion columns for Kansas Reflector, joined speakers who highlighted the ways Harris’ and former President Donald Trump’s policies affect Kansans. The rally was a counter-protest to Vance’s nearby fundraiser, where Republicans claimed he raised $1.5 million.
Dickinson spoke on reproductive rights, highlighting experiences of women in Oklahoma, a neighboring state with a total abortion ban. She spoke of a fetus found in an Oklahoma college residence hall bathroom. She said this is what the future looks like “if you allow wicked men like J.D. Vance and Donald Trump get what they want from us.”
After Dickinson spoke on reproductive rights, other women spoke on gun safety and funding in public schools.
Kristen Blackton, a former middle school teacher and part of Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, said she witnessed the rise of mass shootings in schools, resulting in her students asking her: “Can you protect us?”
“In our state, in Kansas, the rate of gun deaths has increased 48% from 2013 to 2022 and gun violence also disproportionately affects communities of color, with Black people in Kansas being over two times more likely to die by guns than white people in Kansas,” Blackton said. “This is not normal.”
She talked about legislation introduced by Rep. Linda Featherston, D-Overland Park, that would make safe storage of firearms a requirement. Blackton and other Moms from the group pushed for the bill, which failed to advance.
“Do you know why? We currently have a Republican supermajority in Topeka,” Blackton said. “This means that Republican lawmakers often act like they have no need to listen to their constituents and work across the aisle to improve the lives of Kansans.”
Rep. Mari-Lynn Poskin, D-Leawood, spoke about Moms for Liberty, a group that is known for challenging books in public schools.
Poskin praised Ruby Bridges, the first Black child to attend formerly a whites-only school after Brown v. Board, as a Civil Rights icon. Poskin said she donated copies of “Ruby Bridges’ Walk to School,” a children’s book written by Bridges, to local elementary schools.
“Moms for Liberty attempted to ban this sweet book from the second and third grade curriculums in the state of Tennessee,” Poskin said. “And if you don’t think it’s coming here, you’re wrong.”
Ten miles away from the Democratic women rally, at Indian Hills Country Club in Mission Hills, Republican vice presidential nominee J.D. Vance dined with donors who paid $5,000 to $50,000 to attend. Former U.S Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, Kansas U.S. Sen. Roger Marshall and Oklahoma U.S. Senator Markwayne Mullin also were part of the fundraiser.
Mike Brown, chairman for the Kansas Republican Party, called the dinner a “huge success” in the party’s weekly newsletter Friday. Brown said more than 300 people attended, and raised $1.5 million.
On Tuesday, Marshall told KWCH, a radio station in Wichita, that he has heard from Kansans whose top concerns are inflation, border security, and government overregulation.
The Road to Splitsville AND THE AWARD FOR OUTSTANDING ACHIEVEMENT IN TRASHING ICONIC BUILDINGS GOES TO…
Written in Wonkette style. Must be read! It’s not long. It’s jaw-droppingly appalling. Not the article, the subject of it.
by Rebecca Schoenkopf Read on Substack
How do we know we’re on the Road to Splitsville (and possibly headed to a political and legal separation of the red states and the blue), and not on some other thoroughfare, like the Highway to Hell or the Boulevard of Broken Dreams? We know, because such a Split would be absurd and grotesque. But the red states are Republican states, and the Republican Party is the Donald Trump Party, and the fans of Donald Trump love the absurd and eat the grotesque with a fucking spoon.
Speaking of which: what are you doing on September 5?
If you’ve got some time, and $2,500 (per individual) to spare, you could join Christ-knows-how-many dipshits, ghouls, imbeciles, and traitors at—we kid you not—the “J6 Awards Gala,” to be held at Donald Trump’s golf club-cum-Ex Sematary in Bedminster, N.J. Go alone, with your significant other, or rope together eleven of your chums and snag a table for 12. Yes, 12 x $2,500 = $30,000 but, because this a Donald Trump-related production, the actual cost of a table for 12 is a cool $50,000. But think of th—
What? You have a question? (snip-a bit more, well worth the click. You can read if you’re not a subscriber.)
Transgender Adults Being Cut From Care After Florida Court Ruling by Erin Reed
by Erin Reed
After a court ruling from the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals allowed an anti-trans law in Florida targeting youth and adults go back into effect, many providers were forced to end care. Read on Substack
*With thanks to Janet.*
Several transgender youth and adults are being told their care will be terminated following a ruling from the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals by a majority-Trump appointed panel. The court ruled that a 2023 law, which restricts transgender care at any age, can go back into effect after being permanently blocked in June 2024.
The ruling, released late Monday, stated that transgender people are not a “quasi-suspect class,” meaning they do not receive the same level of equal protection under the Constitution as other categories such as race, ethnicity, religion, or sex. This decision implies that laws discriminating against transgender people are likely to be considered valid and constitutional by the 11th Circuit Court.
One such law, SB254, was passed in 2023. The law banned gender-affirming care for transgender youth but went further than similar legislation passed in several Republican-led states that year by also restricting care for transgender adults. The bill mandated that care for transgender adults could only be provided by physicians and required that patients receive forms outlining the “risks” of gender transition. Many proposed versions of these forms are filled with disinformation about transgender care.
The physician requirement has proven especially burdensome for transgender adults, as the majority of their care is provided by nurse practitioners. This is because the number of transgender adults far exceeds the capacity of physicians who offer gender-affirming care. Planned Parenthood, the largest hormone therapy provider in the United States, explains, “Most gender-affirming hormone care is provided at PPSP by advanced practice providers (physician assistants, certified nurse midwives, and nurse practitioners) in our health centers or over telemedicine.”
Now, with the law fully in effect, transgender adults who previously had access to care are being notified that their care will no longer be provided.
One anonymous patient shared an email from their provider, QueerMed, which stated, “Unfortunately, Florida has reinstated the ban on care for minors and the restrictions for adults… We can no longer see any patient of any age who is located in Florida.”
See that email here:
Spektrum, a major provider in Florida, was also forced to terminate care and cancel new patient appointments. However, during the period when the law was blocked, the organization reportedly took steps to ensure patients were well-supplied with medication in case the law went back into effect:
“During this little freedom period as I call it … we made good use of that time to make sure all of our patients were well supplied with medication. Although I had hoped that it wouldn’t have been necessary, at least now we can say, I’m glad we did all the things that we did,” said Joseph Knoll, a nurse practitioner at the clinic, as reported by the Associated Press.
Healthcare bans are currently a contentious issue in courts across the United States, with some courts blocking bans on transgender healthcare coverage or provision. A major point of contention is whether discrimination against transgender people qualifies as sex discrimination, which would subject these laws to higher scrutiny regarding their constitutionality.
The Supreme Court is poised to rule on such questions later this year in a case stemming from Tennessee’s trans care ban. If the Supreme Court were to rule that transgender people are not entitled to equal protection under the law, many forms of discrimination against transgender youth and adults could be deemed fully legal.
For trans people in Florida, many cannot afford to wait for such a decision, and many have already fled the state. For those unable to leave, disruptions to their care will likely have significant impacts on their mental and physical health.
“We are deeply disappointed by this decision and the panel’s disregard for the district court’s careful findings and adherence to the Eleventh Circuit’s recent precedent. Allowing these discriminatory restrictions to go back into effect will deny transgender adults and adolescents lifesaving care, and prevent Florida parents from making medical decisions that are right for their children. As the district court found based on voluminous evidence, the record shows that these extraordinary restrictions were based on disapproval of transgender people and serve no purpose other than to harm transgender Floridians. The plaintiffs in this case are considering their options and will take every step possible to protect their right to equal treatment under Florida’s laws, which these restrictions egregiously violate. We will continue fighting for transgender Floridians and their families, and for everyone’s right to make healthcare decisions without government interference,” said the organizations representing the plaintiffs in the case.
