FTA:

This May and June, leaders from Washington's policy, political, legal, and national security communities got together to imagine what for many of us remains almost unthinkable: how the United States might change in the wake of a Donald Trump victory in November. The centerpiece of the effort, known as the Democracy Futures Project, was a series of five nonpartisan simulation exercises that envisioned different ways Trump and his administration might dismantle key elements of our democracy.

If there was one core conclusion from the simulations, which brought together nearly 200 experts, it was this: We had better do everything in our power to get out the vote for Kamala Harris and the Democrats in November, because there is currently no effective Plan B on the horizon if Trump returns to the White House.

*decided to do

Maddow points out frightening truth about Trump's lack of concern about votes

Rachel Maddow rounds up instances in which Donald Trump not only assures his supporters that if he is elected they won't have to vote in the future, but also that even for this 2024 election he does not need votes. Maddow posits that the reason Trump doesn't care about votes is that he intends to win by manipulating the administration of the voting tabulation.

More racial segregation. I remember when the left viewed this as a bad thing.
#4 | Posted by BellRinger

This happened organically. The first night after Biden bowed out and Harris tossed her hat into the ring, black women who regularly "meet" on Sunday nights held a zoom call and a whole bunch of black women tuned in. Not to be outdone, black men decided to due a similar zoom call, and white women decided to follow suit. Other groups have followed like the White Dudes for Harris mentioned in this article. FWIW, the other night there was a Women for Harris zoom call that was open to women of all races and not all groups have a racial/ethnic compenent. For example, Dads for Kamala, Disabled Voters for Harris and Crazy Cat Ladies for Harris are among the other "groups" gathering online to raise money, awareness and lists of volunteers.

Black women, white dudes, crazy cat ladies: Identity groups fuel a groundswell for Harris

Within hours after President Biden announced he would not seek reelection and endorsed Harris as his replacement nominee, more than 44,000 Black women and allies from across the country gathered online, raising over $1.5 million, according to organizers. The template for that event, organized by Win With Black Women, was repeated the next day by Win With Black Men, which organizers said brought 45,000 Black men and raised $1.3 million. . . .

On Tuesday, Harris announced she would be headlining a "National Organizing Call" " open to all identities.

"Good. Electrify these fences too."

Kind of a weird thing for one of The Retort's most notorious fence sitters to say, no?

Menstrual survelliance/period police? How ---- weird is that? I never thought I'd live to see the day that such a misogynistic invasion of privacy would be advocated by a man who is running to be a heartbeat away from the presidency. Like I said, he's a creepy, creepy weirdo.

Since Trump is old and Vance could end up being president someday, Vance on the ticket could motivate some voters who might otherwise be complacent about voting to actually get out and vote. His various anti-women stances have earned him a creepy weirdo flag. #Keep Vance Out of Our Pants!

How is it one of the richest men in the world is so angry and bitter and vengeful? I guess it's true what they say: Money can't buy you love or happiness for that matter.

"This is the same BIDEN administration that failed to communicate with and protect Trump. Now they claim they they could have protected society from COVID."

Trump is the guy who could have given Biden Covid during a 2020 debate by refusing to be tested prior to the debate as the rules required, so spare us your faux outrage.

FTA:

Though Cole has been a primary source for how the media understands transition and detransition, potentially due to the significant funding and influence from wealthy benefactors and influential conservative figures, her story is an outlier. In 2022, a study showed that transgender youth remained stable in their gender identity five years after social transition, with only 2.5% returning to identifying as cisgender. A review of over 50 studies by Cornell University determined that detransition rates are likely between 0.7% and 3.8%. Even in the recent Cass Review, only 10 out of 3,000 youth who were either receiving gender-affirming care or on waitlists to do so had detransitioned by the time they reached adult care.

Even among detransitioners, Cole's story is uncommon. According to a 2015 survey, most detransitioners did not choose to do so because they "were not actually trans." Instead, they cited several external factors, such as job loss, reduced income, lack of family support, and a worsening political climate. Importantly, 62% of those who detransitioned eventually chose to retransition.

FTA:

When election night comes in November, it will be up to thousands of local election officials to certify election results in their counties. Among those election officials are scores of Donald Trump supporters who believe his lies and conspiracies about stolen elections " and will be in prime position to act on those beliefs to try to aid his campaign in November.

In the swing states of Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, and Pennsylvania, Rolling Stone and American Doom identified at least 70 pro-Trump election conspiracists currently working as county election officials who have questioned the validity of elections or delayed or refused to certify results. At least 22 of these county election officials have refused or delayed certification in recent years.

Certification of election results is what legal experts consider a "ministerial task," and one required by state and local law. But as Trump's lies about the 2020 election have taken hold, Republicans nationwide have decided that certification provides them an opportunity to hear fraud allegations " and refuse to officially count their local votes. Republicans have refused to certify election results at least 25 times since Trump lost the 2020 election to President Joe Biden.

"I think we are going to see mass refusals to certify the election" in November, says Democratic election lawyer Marc Elias. "Everything we are seeing about this election is that the other side is more organized, more ruthless, and more prepared."

Same question I have had all along: what did the bullet hit that caused it to fragment before a piece of it struck Trump?

FTA:

The Republican approach to Vice President Kamala Harris is terrible, no good, absolutely awful and all over the place. Compared to Harris' upbeat, future-oriented campaign backed by the banging chorus of America's greatest pop star, Donald Trump looks like a late-stage Elvis stuck in a doom loop.

While Speaker of the House Mike Johnson has urged his caucus to focus on policy and not personality, Trump and his allies will obviously ignore this good political advice over the next 100 days. This will damage his campaign--and the country--but it's the only way Trump and his followers know how to run. Racism and sexism are very powerful forces in American politics and have often worked to great effect. Trump and his allies obviously know this, so they have trotted out their greatest hits of tropes that amplify the two, hoping to further hype up the MAGA base.

Ron Filipkowski
@RonFilipkowski
I know we're treating him like a normal candidate, yada yada, but can someone ask him this which should've been asked in the debate:

Do you agree that you are ineligible to run again in 2028 if you win this time and must leave the presidency in Jan 2029?

Just see what he says.

FTA:

Harris has a profound opportunity to present herself as a change agent while embracing Joe Biden's legacy. To do that, she must do a better job than the president in explaining how their administration has been rebalancing power in favor of the little guy. It's a populist revolution that most people have never heard of.

One reason most voters and much of the media are oblivious to this story is that Biden has always viewed himself, and been viewed by others, as an institutionalist who values regular order and working across the aisle. Yet when Biden first sat behind the Resolute Desk in 2021, he made appointments and policy changes that challenged principles that elites in both parties have used for 40 years to entrench their power and privilege.

These principles have gone under different banners in different decades. In the 1990s, policy wonks often referred to them as "the Washington Consensus." Today, the mindset is called "neoliberalism," a core belief that market capitalism is a self-stabilizing system and that if left undisturbed by government regulation, it will spread broad prosperity and freedom across the globe.

Video at link:

Q. "Do you believe if Donald Trump were elected next year, that he would try to stay in office beyond a second term? That he would never leave office?"

Liz Cheney: "There's no question ... Absolutely. He's already done it once."
(April 2023)

It sure looks like Trump wore that big white bandage for days not to protect his poor injured ear but to cover up the fact that it wasn't very injured at all.

I remember at least one poster on the Retort telling us Trump was going to need plastic surgery to repair his badly injured ear. Guess not.

In the real world,Trump is not God's chosen one. His comments about Harris are projection. He's the one who is a bum and real garbage.

It's hard to believe that some people, way too many people, believe that this is the man God saved so that he could save the USA.

'Wow': CNN anchor taken aback after Trump calls Kamala Harris 'real garbage'

Sidner played a clip of Trump speaking with "Fox & Friends" on Thursday morning in which he said of Harris that "I'd love to be nice but I'm dealing against real garbage."

"Wow," Sidner said in response.

You can just see/hear how much he relishes saying this:

Trump: "Kamala Harris was a bum three weeks ago. She was a bum."

Clown, this one's for you:

Folks already getting ideas for Halloween:

I didn't even know Spirit Halloween sold these @uNoClimbGorilla, looks like a lot of fun, should be popular this year

Sumbitted without comment:

#119 Thanks, Redial. Yeah, there was nothing like a tree branch in Crooks' line of sight, so it's hard to understand why the FBI is considering a bullet fragment as a possibility.