Thursday, October 31, 2024
Trump wants to compare now to four years ago. Here’s what it looks like
https://www.reuters.com/world/us/does-trump-really-want-compare-now-four-years-ago-2024-10-30/
After adjusting for inflation the economy overall is 11.5% larger now than it was at the end of 2019, when output under Trump reached its peak. Growth rates were comparable: From the third quarter of 2023 to the third quarter of this year, inflation-adjusted output rose 2.66%; in the comparable pre-COVID quarters, comparing the third quarter of 2019 to the third quarter of 2018, the economy expanded 2.8%.
Trump sparks concern with claims of fraud in Pennsylvania
https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/4962489-trump-casts-doubt-election-results-pennsylvania/
“They’ve already started cheating in Lancaster. They’ve cheated. We caught them with 2,600 votes. No, we caught them cold,” Trump said.
Officials in Lancaster County announced last week they were reviewing roughly 2,500 voter registration forms due to potential fraud. But there were no fraudulent ballots involved and no indication that the registration forms are a sign of wider fraud, according to The Philadelphia Inquirer.
RFK Jr. claims Trump pledged to give him ‘control’ of HHS, USDA
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said Monday that former President Donald Trump has promised him “control” of HHS and the Department of Agriculture, according to a video obtained by POLITICO.
Speaking at a virtual event, the former presidential candidate said “the key that President Trump has promised me is control of the public health agencies, which are HHS and its sub-agencies, CDC, FDA, NIH, and a few others … and then also the USDA.”
Puerto Rican Artist Nicky Jam Withdraws Trump Endorsement
https://www.thedailybeast.com/puerto-rican-artist-nicky-jam-u-turns-on-donald-trump-support/
On Wednesday, however, Jam announced he no longer supported Trump in an Instagram video.
“Never in my life did I think that a month later a comedian would come to criticize my country and speak badly about my country,” he told his 43 million followers on the app. “And therefore, I withdraw any support for Donald Trump and step aside from any political situation. Puerto Rico deserves respect.”
Wednesday, October 30, 2024
That photo of people wearing ‘Nebraska Walz’s for Trump’ shirts? They’re distant cousins
https://apnews.com/article/walz-family-nebraska-trump-elelction-2f2e29586b0e9ebe094ff2cf546e1ae4
A sister of Democratic vice presidential nominee Tim Walz says she doesn’t recognize the people wearing “Nebraska Walz’s for Trump” T-shirts in a photo that is making the rounds on social media. It turns out they are distant cousins.
Dershowitz says he could ‘enthusiastically’ vote for Biden over Trump
“I’m a strong supporter of Joe Biden. I like Joe Biden. I’ve liked him for a long time, and I could enthusiastically support Joe Biden,” Dershowitz said during a radio interview with Dan Abrams on his Sirius XM radio show.
“Over Donald Trump?” Abrams asked.
“Over Donald Trump, yeah,” Dershowitz replied.
Trump Rage-Posts Through Night After Harris’ Massive D.C. Rally
Trump has a tendency to lash out on Truth Social when he’s upset, and although he claims nobody draws crowds like he does, the size of Harris’ rallies has been a sore spot throughout the campaign. A Harvard analysis found that Harris rallies draw, on average, twice as many attendees as Trump’s. The D.C. Metropolitan Police Department expected about 20,000 people to show up to Harris’s D.C. rally—roughly the same number that packed Madison Square Garden for Trump on Sunday. In fact, the vice president’s event ballooned to more than 52,000 people, causing overflow on the Washington Mall, before ultimately reach 75,000, a campaign official said.
RFK Jr. and Aaron Rodgers: How con artists exploit male insecurity for political gain
https://www.salon.com/2024/03/15/rfk-jr-and-aaron-rodgers-how-con-artists-exploit-male-insecurity/
But the sad truth is that just because Rodgers and Kennedy are villains doesn't make their victims innocent. Like most con artists, these two manipulate not the good intentions of their marks, but their ugliest instincts. Certainly, there's no shame in having feelings of insecurity, which most people feel at times. But young men are being told to combat that feeling with narcissism, laziness, and entitlement. To play the victim of poorly defined "elites" — a word that Kennedy loves to use — while worshipping actual elites like Kennedy or Rodgers. And to align themselves with these elites, whose main gripe is that their privileged existence doesn't stop others from criticizing the terrible and false things they say.
In this, these two resemble Donald Trump, who still gets the lion's share of male voters who are largely mad that other people aren't kissing their asses hard enough. The Kennedy crowd does seem to veer younger, suggesting part of it is they don't want to be associated with the embarrassing fanny pack Boomer crowds that fill up Trump rallies. They also swoon at Kennedy's rhetoric about how he "defies the left-right division." That sort of empty rhetoric flatters the egos of people who want to feel like rebels without actually doing the hard work of resisting real injustice — especially if doing so means confronting your own prejudices.
Arnold Schwarzenegger Says He Is Voting for Harris and Walz
https://www.newsweek.com/election-2024-live-updates-kamala-harris-donald-trump-10-30-24-1977137
I guess he is not a real man
Former Republican governor of California Arnold Schwarzenegger announced in a lengthy X post that he will vote for Kamala Harris and Tim Walz this Election Day. The Terminator actor admitted that he does not "like either party right now" and said that Trump's comments about America being "like a garbage can for the world" are "so unpatriotic, it makes me furious." He added that he "will always be an American before I am a Republican," and that this is the reason why he will be voting for Harris and Walz. Schwarzenegger has openly criticized Trump in recent years. Following the January 6, 2021 rebellion, Schwarzenegger said that Trump would be recognized as the worst President in U.S. history.
Trump declares himself ‘father of IVF’ at town hall with all-female audience
https://edition.cnn.com/2024/10/16/politics/ivf-donald-trump-abortion/index.html
Donald Trump on Tuesday declared himself the “father of IVF,” a fertility treatment that has come under threat following the Supreme Court’s 2022 decision to overturn Roe v. Wade.
It’s unclear what precisely the former president meant when he made the comment at a Fox News town hall in battleground Georgia that was billed as focusing on women’s issues and had an all-female audience. But he has repeatedly returned to the issue – talking up his support for IVF – on the campaign trail, where he has given a long series of confusing or contradictory answers about his stance on abortion.
How Trump’s toxic masculinity threatens men’s health
Trump has only leaned in to his hypermasculine anti-science agenda by promoting his “Make America Healthy Again” slogan with anti-vax conspiracy theorist Robert F. Kennedy Jr., an archetype for toxic masculinity in his own right, who has reportedly been promised a role in Trump’s administration if Trump wins the election and has promoted the idea of banning U.S. agencies from studying infectious diseases.