184 Comments

The MAGA team knows they are going to lose. Just like in 2016 when they expected to lose so they made up stories about busloads of people travelling from New York to vote in other states. At the time I believed they were not educated enough to know the principles of the big lie theory, but with all the symbolism and lies flowing in the last few weeks, I now believe they are following Herr Geobbels playbook.

Expand full comment

I think they expect to lose. I believe they will lose.

It's a turnout election. So far the turnout appears to be huge, but we haven't done elections with this much early voting to know what this means for sure. The orange f#ckwit is urging his maggots to vote early this time, so who knows?

After the disgusting display at MSG I think those not so addled to put dumoty stickers on their pickemup trucks likely will just not vote at all.

What I'm more worried about is the House and the weevil Johnson with his secret.

Expand full comment

Highly unlikely the "little secret" will have any impact on the electoral certification with which it presumably is about. At most, might delay it for a short time, is all. Just another attempt to raise the temperature.

Expand full comment

This is too stupid to believe. By every metric available they are in the lead.

Have you talked with Trump? How in the hell "DO YOU KNOW" they BELIEVE

they are going to lose?

Expand full comment

Yeah, the metrics in your addled brain ahole. It's a margin of error race so far. Oh, did I also say you were a pathetic, laughable little turd?

Expand full comment

Hey hey hey. Gentlemen, stop being Aholes. First, this is a toss up election. It shouldn’t be but it appears so. Trump scum is running on open borders and guess what, he is right. Biden was asleep at the wheel for at least the first 2 or 3 years and allowed or ignored those hundreds of thousands running across hot sands. Kamala Harris must win or this country goes truely down the sheet hole no kidding. Trump wants to see the count get stuck so it can be sent to the House to decide. That is Trump’s secret and this must not be allowed.

Expand full comment

I think more likely they believe they have a clever way to choose the Electors rather than waiting for a House vote. But this particular thread is a bit toxic for me. Bowing out.

Expand full comment

Yes, it's really ugly. MAGA can't respond with anything but bullying and vitriol. So damned sad. Especially thinking about what MAGA means- for real, not as a dead slogan.

Expand full comment

Ah, the literary legend speaks. Might take your own advice. Suggest you avoid making conciliatory noises to a blatant troll in the future. People might get the wrong impression. Or would it be the right impression? And do get another talking point. Has nothing to do with the state of the border for the last two years or Harris's immigration policies except in the addled brains of the party formerly known as Republican and its apologists.

Expand full comment

There is a review of a new book on Opus Dei (OPUS: Dark Money, A Secret Cult and its Mission to Remake Our World by Gareth Gore) over on Open Democracy substack today which suggests that the Opus Dei led Heritage Foundation (its head, Kevin Roberts, is a member) and its followers are already funding a huge movement to challenge the election if Trump loses it.

Expand full comment

when trump loses the election.

Expand full comment

🙏🐈‍⬛💙

Expand full comment

Geez Dale. Are you always an asshole?

Expand full comment

Geez Houston 2024 are you always a pathetic apologist or do you prefer troll?

Expand full comment

GFY, good try. Bye.

Expand full comment

What’s funny is that your most recent message had seven minutes of editing compared to your oriiginal post. One can only imagine.

Let’s just tone it down a little

Expand full comment

How about you mind your own effing business pal. When I want your advice about how and when I respond to a blatant troll, I'll let you know. And what one can only imagine is whether you share his sensibilities. Funny that.

Expand full comment

That's the next problem. The MAGAs are certain they are a lock for next Tuesday.

By every metric "available" that the good Mr. A has been shown, ...it may be true.

The cult >knows< they are going to win.

What comes after, when it doesn't?

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwjggfW79rSJAxVBBTQIHZgeGwIQ78AJegQIEhAB&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DSzdziw4tI9o&usg=AOvVaw3Nb_SUJ6Hjm737QiGURnGR&opi=89978449

Expand full comment

There are many in the MAGA camp who think they are going to win, because creating a false expectation is part of their big lie exercise, just like sowing doubt about the validity of the result with the rhetoric about illegal aliens voting.

Expand full comment

It's not over until she is sworn in. My neighbors and I are planning a giant party Jan7

Expand full comment

Good plan except she won't be sworn in until January 20. Maybe two giant parties? January 6 is Congress accepting the Electoral College votes.

Expand full comment

I'm curious what "metric" you think is clear. The professional pollsters don't know. There are record numbers of junk polls this year, commissioned by the likes of the idiot Musk, that get thrown in to try to create a statistically accurate poll that just isn't.

You believe what you like, sweetie.

And go away.

Expand full comment

You must be in the wrong place!

Expand full comment

The good news is that you read at least a part of Dr. Richardson's letter. Sadly you choose to believe outlier metrics and it would be interesting to learn where you're getting this info. Vote for democracy, not dictatorship.

Expand full comment

By all the crybaby rhetoric about voter fraud!😜

Expand full comment
Oct 30·edited Oct 30

Hi James, I have no clue why some people are dumping on you so badly. I hope you stay around to both post and listen within Civil Discourse. Which, now I come to think of it it claims to be a safe spot that combines "civility" with "discourse". I'm reminded a few years back when I joined I said that Kamal's left toe might be longer than her right (or something like that). Damn was everyone mad at me. But they got over it. Probably....

Expand full comment

You poor deluded fool. He's a paid troll. Like supporting disinformation do you? Nothing "civil" about that.

Expand full comment

See. The whiskey is wearing off. You are a lot more affable now.

I enjoy reading many of your posts, Dale. We can all learn from you. But, er, the whole yelling and screaming just turns me off.

Expand full comment

Not booze nimrod. Just anger at trolls and their apologists. Do me a favor in future. Can you manage that? Don't reply to my comments. You've shown your colors. In fact, avoid reading them. And here's another edit for your check list. Save your condescension for your relatives and friends.

Expand full comment

No offense intended

Expand full comment

Yeah, calling someone an asshole is never intended as an offense. Like I said, deluded.

Expand full comment

The paid troll is Heather. She has refused to answer if she is paid by the DNC or a DNC PAC.

We all know the answer. Everyday she puts at DNC talking points.

There is a thing called free speech which leftists hate. They want to control what people say and think. Its time for you to grow a pair and hear an opposing view point.

Expand full comment

Derp. Poor misunderstood troll reading from the troll handbook. Laughable as always.

Expand full comment

You can be counted for the stupidest posts of all time. Go back to the bong. Its home there.

Expand full comment

James, your thought process is sound, and since we're all feeling stressed out due to the election, I sort of understand why your tone is so dismissive and nasty. Take a deep breath....

Expand full comment

I think you'll find his tone is "dismissive and nasty" because he's a troll.

Expand full comment

Underneath trvmps's self-serving lies about voter fraud is a profoundly racist position, that it's fraud unless white men do the deciding.

Expand full comment

Joan, for well over a century now, it has been rich white males doing the fraud, while blaming everyone else, hoping it will work out for them the way it did in the days of enslavement. No one challenged rich white male pronouncement or lynching or imprisonment/re-enslavement, etc. When our military should have intervened to save the lives of Black Americans or our indigenous population, they did nothing or sometimes even helped with the killing and destroying. We have a questionable history that rich white males want to deny as much as possible, making sure that we don't fully comprehend where we have been and where rich white males want to push us back to. We need to stand up more often to call them out on their racism, misogyny, xenophobia, homo/transphobia, classism, and their fear of everyone who is not them. Then we have to stop voting for them. They need to grow up before being given responsibility for any office in this nation.

Expand full comment

Ruth, I've been reading The Nation That Never Was by Kermit Roosevelt III, and based on what he says, I'd say that the white males doing nothing to help Blacks or indigenous people goes back to our founding. That aside, you have expressed the reality of our country very beautifully. Thank you for that.

Expand full comment

Susan, it is so painful to have to acknowledge that there is a segment of our population that wants to essentially enslave everyone else in the society, pretty much the way Hitler did in Nazi Germany. Trump, alas, is their poster child who gets to say all the things they want to say, but they might lose their positions of prominence if they admitted that their hatred of everyone but rich white men like themselves is strong and truly all-inclusive and will continue to fester if the rest of us permit it. We all need to call each other out when we say and do things that are racist, misogynistic, xenophobic, homo/transphobic, classist, etc. Those positions are all within the hearts of a significant number of rich white men. Rupert Murdoch, Elon Musk, and Peter Thiel are just a few examples and they are all immigrants who have been gifted with American citizenship, something they did not earn or even work for. They have bought the rich white male BS and ate it washed down with the Kool-Ade they regularly drink. We need them out of power. Fair tax laws without loopholes, Social Security taxes on all income, better business regulations that are actually fair all around, and limitations to what they can buy and destroy would be a start, after we get them out of politics by ditching Citizens United. We could do this if we had the will.

Expand full comment

I agree with you very much. The other day I ended up in a discussion about Citizens United, where it was pointed out to me that the part we don't like was only part of it. It also apparently reiterated our individual sovereignty. So we only need to get rid of the part that gives corporations unlimited power.

Expand full comment

Susan, an additional part that disturbs me about Citizens United is that corporations are declared to be persons. That is ridiculous because it is not possible to actually hold them responsible as we do actual persons. If they commit a crime as a corporation, one can't put the whole thing in jail or do anything to the whole thing, and we know there is always a chunk of corruption going on in many corporations. Money is not speech. It is appalling that a single set of mostly white men on a court or more than one court can take away our rights so easily, then make pronouncements that are just stupid and have them stick unless a constitutional amendment is passed, something that is pretty much impossible as we know since the ERA has been waiting to be certified for more than 3 years. John Roberts has proven to be a sneaky tyrant who manipulates supposedly intelligent people into buying BS and shoving it on the American people: Citizens United, gutting the Voting Rights Act, nearly gutting the Affordable Care Act, bringing down Affirmative action in favor of keeping rich white men like him and 3 other rich white man and a rich white wannabee in charge of everything, overturning Roe v. Wade, giving Donald Trump a pure ignoramus dictator wannabee immunity. It is no accident those rulings were made when Roberts was Chief Justice. He brought his racism, misogyny, and classism with him into office which is why he was nominated in the first place. Bush may not have understood what he was getting, but I doubt that. He knew who worked hardest to get him improperly selected in the 2000 election. So, where does that leave u s? I honestly don't know because no one seems to be willing to make the SC reforms that would be necessary to make our court fair and just.

Expand full comment

You're right about corporate personhood. Thom Hartmann first got me thinking about that 15 years ago when I started listening to his radio show. The first attempt that succeeded was Santa Clara County v Union Pacific, in 1868 or so I believe. A clerk put a preamble to a decision that first indicated corporations are people, my friends.

They finally succeeded with John Roberts.

Anyone who thinks he presides over a legitimate Court is delusional.

Evil is afoot.

Expand full comment

Ruth, this politics gamesmanship is only about power and money. They on the right really don’t have morals or ethics. Even when they speak of small government, it’s about reducing regulations so the corporate side and claim greater profits. It’s only and all about profits. That’s the way the ball is bouncing these days.

Expand full comment

Ruth, I agree with you about corporations not being people, and money not being speech. I was given to understand that Citizens United was about more than those two things. John Roberts is scary, because he tries to appear so normal, but clearly is as underhanded as they come. I am not sure I would understand the opinion were I to try to read it, but I'm getting to where I'm actually thinking about doing that. I don't know what the background is of the person who was explaining it to me, but it sounds like he has legal knowledge, something I don't have, beyond what I learn here.

Expand full comment

Ruth, I just read a summary of the Citizens United decision, and I have to conclude that the information I received about it affirming our sovereignty is a very minor part of the decision. It really is about corporations and their rights, and the idea that we cannot limit their "speech". It was definitely worth going and looking at the decision, to come up with a more accurate view of it - i.e. the view I've actually had all along. My apologies for any confusion I brought to the discussion.

Expand full comment

Then get rid of it and call me in the morning, lol.

Expand full comment

Okay, Doctor Bill…

Expand full comment

Yes, wise one. You property much cover it all.

Expand full comment

Amen 🙏

I would qualify this by adding that all of us who do not freeze up around age four, usually for some trite slight from a parent saying no, into adult spoiled narcissistic toddler mentality, need to remove these whining, malicious and cruel infants from all positions of power in all walks of life.

Expand full comment

The entire Trump campaign, from its beginnings, is based on racism.

Expand full comment
founding

And sexism

Expand full comment

The entire Republican Party is racist. R stands for Racist.

Expand full comment
founding

Joyce, thank you so much! I'm turning the TV on now for this fantastic demonstration of freedom and democracy. I cannot wait to see the Madam President!!! This is the way it should be! THE BLUE WAVE IS HERE💙💙💙🌊🌊🌊🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸

Expand full comment

Looking at those political buttons, I had an “I Like Ike” for years; I cherished it. Didn’t really like Ike (too boring), I liked Adlai—he was funny, smart, self-deprecating.

But what I recall most (1956, I was six) was that the worst insult the Republicans could come up with, was “Egghead”—oh, how times have changed!

Expand full comment

I'm currently serving jury duty in NY on a very serious case. I was flabbergasted today during one of our breaks to hear how many of my fellow jurors believe there is "widespread voter fraud". A couple of these folks are quite highly educated. I tried to reason with them for a bit and then decided it wasn't helping anyone. I left pretty discouraged.

Expand full comment

Unfortunately, that is what I have run up against, too.

Expand full comment

Yup. It's astonishing. My take is that "we" have an opportunity to always gently remind our peers about some of the obvious, indisputable nonsense. I tell colleagues that I don't care if they vote Trump or Harris, but can they at least admit that x/y/z is palpably false and then try to get them to wonder why someone would have told them its true.

Expand full comment
founding

What is their documentation?

Expand full comment

I didn't ask that, but I should have. One woman told about seeing video of Trump ballots being ripped up. Others talked about all the "dead people voting with absentee ballots", and all the "illegals" voting. I reminded them about deep fake videos, said the vast majority of people in the country illegally would not risk voting, and made a plug for using Ground News to easily check which stories are reputable.

Expand full comment

I came to the USA in the 1990s on a green card. I wouldn't have dared to vote, not only because it isn't right, but I could have been criminally charged and prosecuted for doing so. Green Card holders have little chance at citizenship if they commit a crime. I got voting information at my citizenship ceremony in 2010.

I have had hospice patients that were undocumented immigrants. When reading in their chart that they had shown up to an ER with stage IV cancer I was horrified. They would rather not be detected by any system even when they felt severely unwell. There is absolutely no way an undocumented immigrant would draw attention to themselves by attempting to vote illegally.

Expand full comment

Thanks for your words of wisdom and clarity. I am thoroughly sick of Republican lying! It is simply disgusting! Today, I heard a supposed Evangelical minister tell his "people" to be sure to vote for Trump because Kamala Harris was not Christian and so could not be trusted to blah blah blah. Republicans have pumped out enormous numbers of ads on TV, internet, and billboards that are just plain bald-faced lies. I am a big proponent of "freedom of speech," but there is a point at which massive lies are not really "free speech," just free to people with power and money. There needs to be a "truth in advertising" act that will require proof for the claims made in all kinds of ads, particularly the ones where specific actions, data, and positions are involved. Lying that Kamala Harris released "13,000 murderous immigrants" is a lie, one that could cause Trump's crazies to do violence to immigrants they have been led to believe are murderers, rapists, etc. That kind of speech is not "free" speech, there is a high cost for it. How do we as a people put some kind of brake on this outrageous lying, blaming, and threatening? It's time we get out to vote for Harris-Walz and put the lying, cheating, convicted criminal Trump out to pasture along with the rest of the lying, cheating sycophantic crew.

Expand full comment

Kamala Harris has more Christianity in her little finger than djt has in his whole body and the bodies of all his supporters. It is nauseating to know that a minister, who is supposed to help his flock get to the truth, would say something that awful and untrue.

Expand full comment

Susan, you are so right. It seems a significant number of Christians have decided lying is really not a sin and neither is cheating, hating one's neighbors, coveting power and money, doing physical harm to people they don't agree with and step by step breaking every one of the "ten commandments" or maybe, "ten suggestions that one does not have to follow unless one is an enemy of mine." Unfortunately, those folks who are buying Trump and Kump's BS are making life difficult for Christians who are trying to live our faith. Shameful!

Expand full comment

“Violence to immigrants…” except for those that are white.

Expand full comment

Annie, that is exactly what Trump and his Hitleresque crew are calling for! Outrageous!

Expand full comment

His shtick is old. We know. And there are some really smart, dedicated lawyers out there working to see to it the vote is defended in the courts, and voter suppression laws are challenged and defeated.

Along with huge voting numbers, we'll be able to rise above it. VOTE NOW, and bring your friends!

Expand full comment

READER ENGAGEMENT

1. Uncle Sam needs you! https://www.mobilize.us/ (And me.) Make a blue tsunami!

2. Please repeatedly post "not suckers or losers" comments in social media. According to Facebook, there are 4 million veterans and active duty members on Facebook, as well as 12.5 million family members and 242 million friends with veterans or active duty members. Military sites, veterans; organizations, historical sites. Vote vets has already flipped many 2016 and 2020 Trump voters.

Expand full comment

I have neighbors who are Veterans. They are phone banking and canvassing in WI and MI. One of them walks with a limp from his active duty service. Thank you for what you are doing. Here's an article I found interesting from a few days ago. Veterans phone banking in Saginaw, MI referring to "45" as the devil!

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/oct/26/michigan-veterans-harris-phone-bank?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

Expand full comment

Check out the Joe Rogan Youtube and sites. Not suckers or losers.

Expand full comment

It is increasingly hard to ignore the effect of the Electoral College as it is now constructed, with the fact of faithful and faithless electors - a scenario not justified in the Constitution, especially since in two elections this century, it has essentially told millions of Democrats that they might as well have stayed home.

For the rest, one can only hold one’s breath for another week. The trenches are dug, the artillery is roaring overhead, no-man’s land is wired and mined. Millions upon millions of us are hunkered down in our respective front lines waiting for the whistle that will initiate the greatest test of this most extraordinary and crucial experiment in human government so far.

At this moment, as I so often do, I think of Lincoln. “As a nation of free men we shall live through all time, or die by suicide". One of our two major political parties is opting for a slow kind of suicide, the other is taking him at his greatest command “It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated to the great work remaining before us.... that government of the people, by the people, and for the people shall not perish from the earth."

Expand full comment

The Electoral College is so deeply intertwined within everything since the launch of this nation. There was no such thing as a faithless elector, for example. The electors were whoever the State said, and voters be damned. Maybe 5% of the entire country drove the conclusion?

I've now I've bored many of you here with analogies to the European Union, but would Italy have joined the EU if they had no voice compared to France and Germany?

I think the "problem" is that Americans are taught that we live in a Democracy. Maybe we should, but that is a different fight.

Expand full comment

The best situation would likely be to make the presidential election a national one instead of leaving it in the hands of thee states.

Expand full comment

Who’s ready? Hope all ya’ll settled in with popcorn and a glass of wine, ready for Kamala’s big moment. She’s reclaiming the space, standing up for our Country right at the scene of the crime.

First down. Goal to go. Let’s git ‘er done.

And at the risk of offending some of you, Go Big Blue! Sweep.

Expand full comment

I’ve just learned from my son, who works for Wisconsin Dems, that the Governor of Nevada, plans to activate the National Guard on Election Day. Guy Lombardo is a Republican and former law enforcement official who was the 17th Sheriff of Clark County (the Las Vegas - Henderson area).Thanks to the 45th President and that horrifying rally at MSG on October 27, this is what is necessary in the most important election of our lifetime. Thank you so much for being there for all of us. We’re so grateful. Here is the link:

https://www.reviewjournal.com/news/politics-and-government/nevada/nevada-governor-to-activate-national-guard-for-election-day-3197845/?utm_campaign=widget&utm_medium=archive&utm_source=archive&utm_term=Nevada%20governor%20to%20activate%20National%20Guard%20for%20Election%20Day

Expand full comment

I'd prefer discrete [very discrete] police manning the drop boxes between now and then.

I've no clue what it means to have armed soldiers on Election Day. Could they at least help drive old people to the polls and give them sandwiches and water?

Expand full comment

Now that’s making sense !!!!

Expand full comment

Early voting in NV to Nov. 1. Friday.

Expand full comment

Have some fun creating "good trouble" this week!! There's still time to phone bank, placing painted "voting for Kamala & Tim" rocks on benches at a local shopping center, putting post-it notes with Kamala stickers on trash cans & post-it notes in restaurant bathrooms... just a few ideas of "good trouble"!

Expand full comment

Hi Joyce. I think you should send one chicken photo with each discourse. They make me smile

And my world is a better place. Thanks!

Expand full comment

Come what may, Kamala has run an absolutely sterling campaign-sprint. In the yet-to-be-written Handbook of Future Elections, this one has been a spectacular seminar. How To Do It.

I have to admit, (again) I have underestimated her talent for this kind of election-thing, but to be fair, she has grown into the job and is not the same candidate we saw 4 years ago.

In June of 1968, in Portland, Oregon, I shook Robert Kennedy's hand and wished him good luck in California. I haven't felt like that since, not until this week.

Godspeed Ms. Harris, and to us all.

Expand full comment

"President Kamala Harris." It has a nice rinlkg

Expand full comment

Love it a lot !!!

Expand full comment