The Commentariat -- October 23, 2020
Late Morning/Afternoon Update:
Prize for Best String of Words in the Debate Goes to Donald Trump: "I take full responsibility. It’s not my fault...."
Prize for Audacity Goes to Donald Trump: To Kristen Welker: "I am the least racist person in this room."
The Washington Post's live updates of Covid-19 developments Friday are here: "The average number of covid-19 hospitalizations has risen in at least 38 states over the past week — a trend that cannot be explained by more widespread testing — according to data tracked by The Washington Post."
Elahe Izadi & Jeremy Barr of the Washington Post: “During the final presidential debate, President Trump made reference to 'the laptop from hell,' 'AOC plus three' and 'Russia, Russia, Russia.'... The material was very familiar to — and maybe only familiar to — regular viewers of Fox News opinion hosts such as Sean Hannity. 'I feel like he almost was speaking the language of Fox prime time,' Chuck Todd ... said on NBC after the debate. 'If you watch a lot of Fox prime time, you understand what he’s saying. If you don’t, you have no idea.'... 'Some of the punches he threw at Joe Biden I don’t think landed, because unless you were Sean Hannity, you probably had no idea what he was talking about,' CNN host Jake Tapper said.” Mrs. McC: We thought Trump's vocabulary had grown more and more limited, but it turns out he's just dropped a normal English vocabulary & replaced it with right-wing buzzwords & phrases.
Lena Sun & Nick Miroff of the Washington Post: "The Trump administration has been pressuring health experts at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to endorse the use of border hotels to hold migrant children before deporting them, a practice the government halted last month under court order, according to federal health officials. Career CDC officials have declined to sign off on a declaration requested by the Department of Health and Human Services affirming that the use of hotels to detain migrant children is the best way to protect them from the spread of the novel coronavirus, according to one HHS official who has seen the declaration.... The request from HHS is the latest example of the administration’s efforts to use government scientists and physicians to advance the president’s political agenda."
Deb Reichmann & Matthew Lee of the AP: "... Donald Trump announced Friday that Sudan will start to normalize ties with Israel, making it the third Arab state to do so as part of U.S.-brokered deals in the run-up to Election Day. The deal, which would deepen Sudan’s engagement with the West, follows Trump’s conditional agreement this week to remove the North African nation from the list of state sponsors of terrorism if it pays compensation to American victims of terror attacks. It also delivers a foreign policy achievement for Trump just days before the U.S. election and boosts his embattled ally, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Recently, the United States brokered diplomatic pacts between Israel and the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain. Jordan recognized Israel in the 1990s." ~~~
~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: A photo accompanying the story pictures Trump in the Oval surrounded by 11 men & one woman applauding Donald Trump. They appeal to be Cabinet members & aides. They are standing close together, and none is wearing a mask except the woman, who is seated & appears to be pregnant. There is nothing Trump would change about his response to the coronavirus because he has saved millions of lives by cancelling some flights from China. ~~~
~~~ Christopher Ingraham of the Washington Post: A scatter graph produced by "Carnegie Mellon’s CovidCast, an academic project tracking real-time coronavirus statistics, yields a particularly vivid illustration of how mask usage influences the prevalence of covid-19 symptoms in a given area. For all 50 states plus D.C., this chart plots the percentage of state residents who say they wear a mask in public all or most of the time (on the horizontal axis) and the percentage who say they know someone in their community with virus symptoms (on the vertical axis).... [For those of you who passed Statistics 101:] The R-squared of CovidCast’s mask and symptom data is 0.73, meaning that you can predict about 73 percent of the variability in state-level covid-19 symptom prevalence simply by knowing how often people wear their masks." Ingraham points out several factors that could have influenced the results. "Nevertheless, the chart is particularly useful in the context of all the other high-quality evidence showing that masks reduce the transmission of the coronavirus and other respiratory diseases."
Nicole Hong & Jesse Drucker of the New York Times: "Ken Kurson, a close friend of ... Jared Kushner, was taken into federal custody on Friday and charged with cyberstalking in connection with his divorce. Mr. Kurson, who now runs a media company and works in the cryptocurrency industry, helped write a speech for the president’s 2016 campaign. When Mr. Kushner owned The New York Observer, the weekly newspaper, he appointed Mr. Kurson to be its editor in chief in 2013. Mr. Kurson was also a longtime associate of Rudolph W. Giuliani.... Federal prosecutors in Brooklyn accused Mr. Kurson of sending threatening and stalking messages to several people.... The F.B.I. has also gathered evidence that Mr. Kurson engaged in a similar pattern of harassment during his divorce proceedings in 2015, including installing software on someone’s computer to monitor keystrokes, the criminal complaint said. He also used aliases to contact that person’s employer to report false allegations of misconduct, according to the complaint."
Jason Horowitz & Pope Francis was an hour into a sprawling interview with a Mexican journalist at his Vatican residence in 2019 when he was asked if he had changed since his time as archbishop of Argentina, when he staunchly opposed gay marriage. Francis responded that he had always defended the church’s teaching on marriage, then began to delve into the question of legalizing same-sex relationships when suddenly the video skipped forward. 'One changes in life,' he said. The words that went missing — expressing support for same-sex civil unions — surfaced only this week in a new documentary.... But the clip also became the subject of sudden intrigue over when and where the pope made the remarks, and why they were only now being made public. Two people close to the [Mexican broadcaster Televisa]..., said that the Vatican had required that the interview be filmed with Vatican cameras and that the Vatican be given control over the footage. The Vatican cut out the pope’s remarks on same-sex unions in the edited version provided to Televisa, the two people said.... The Church allowed a documentary filmmaker access to the Vatican archives, including the raw footage of the Televisa interview. The filmmaker put the clip in a new documentary....”
Ted Barrett & Clare Foran of CNN: "Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell did not answer questions about his health Thursday, only saying there were 'no concerns' after reporters asked him about what appeared to be bruises and bandages on his hands in recent days. 'Of course not,' McConnell told reporters in the Capitol when asked if he had any health issues people should know about.... In 2019, McConnell fractured his shoulder after he tripped and fell at his Kentucky home. He also underwent triple heart bypass surgery in 2003. A statement released by his office at the time described the operation as a success." With photos. --s
Sarah Blaskey, et al. of the Miami Herald: "Donald Trump’s team knew they couldn’t win the 2016 election simply by persuading people to vote for Trump.... So the campaign and its allies used big data to target Black communities along Miami-Dade County’s historically disenfranchised Interstate 95 corridor. There, residents became some of the 12.3 million unwitting subjects of a groundbreaking nationwide experiment: A computer algorithm that analyzed huge sums of potential voters’ personal data — things they’d said and done on Facebook, credit card purchases, charities they supported, and even personality traits — decided they could be manipulated into not voting. They probably wouldn’t even know it was happening.... They called it 'deterrence.'... Behind the 2016 deterrence campaign was Cambridge Analytica ... at a time when Stephen Bannon, eventually hired to lead the Trump campaign, was the firm’s vice president[.]" --s
Florida. Mary Ellen Klas of the Miami Herald: "A generation more familiar with TikTok, Instagram and XBox has the potential to make the difference in Florida’s toss-up presidential race between two seventy-somethings. Younger voters this year have been registering and casting ballots in bigger numbers than previous years and, if the presidential race in Florida is as close as polls predict, it will be decided by the margins. There about 1.1 million additional new Florida voters between 18 and 34 in 2020 than there were in 2016.... According to an analysis by Catalist, a progressive polling organization that is monitoring Florida’s voting trends among a slightly broader age group, ages 18 to 39, turnout has increased 44% among those voters compared to 2016." --s
~~~~~~~~~~
Presidential Debate
Alexander Burns & Jonathan Martin of the New York Times: “President Trump and Joseph R. Biden Jr. delivered starkly divergent closing arguments to the country in the final presidential debate on Thursday, offering opposite prognoses for the coronavirus pandemic and airing irreconcilable differences on subjects from rescuing the economy and bolstering the health care system to fighting climate change and reshaping the immigration policy.... Mr. Trump, who badgered Mr. Biden with increasing aggression over the course of the debate, appeared determined to cast his opponent as a career politician who was, as he jabbed toward the end of the debate, 'all talk and no action.' And the president used the event as his most prominent platform yet for airing unsubstantiated or baseless attacks about the finances of Mr. Biden and members of his family. Mr. Trump, however, did little to lay out an affirmative case for his own re-election, or to explain in clear terms what he would hope to do with another four years in the White House. He frequently misrepresented the facts of his own record, and Mr. Biden’s. And on his most important political vulnerability — his mismanagement of the pandemic — Mr. Trump hewed unswervingly to a message that happy days are nearly here again....” Here's the AP's main story by Jonathan Lemire & others.
The Guardian's summary report by Lauren Gambino is here. ~~~
~~~ Guardian opinion writers offer their takeaways here. Jill Filipovic: “If one single thing shone through in Thursday’s debate, it was that Donald Trump has absolutely nothing to say. He has no agenda. He has no plan. He has no ideals or hopes or purpose. All he has is the raw pursuit of power – for his own benefit, no one else’s. Trump failed to put forward even one specific policy he will push in his second term. He offered some vague hand-waving – he (or the US supreme court) will get rid of Obamacare and he’ll replace it with something better, no you haven’t seen his plan..., but he’s working on it, it’s almost done, he swears.... Instead, he was purely reactive. Joe Biden would put forward an idea, and Trump’s response was: 'Well why didn’t you do that when you were in office?' Trump is in office, and while a lot has changed in four years, there’s little he can be proud of.”
Rev has a full transcript of the debate.
Bill Barrow & Zeke Miller of the AP outline key takeaways. Here's one: “Trump’s difficulty articulating a defense of his handling of the coronavirus remains a drag on his campaign. The opening topic of the debate was entirely predictable — Trump has received variations of the same question in interviews and has rarely delivered a clear answer. Asked to outline his plan for the future, Trump instead asserted his prior handling was without fault and predicted a rosy reversal to the pandemic, which has killed more than 223,000 people in the United States. 'We’re rounding the turn, we’re rounding the corner,' Trump claimed, even as cases spike again across the country. 'It’s going away.' Biden, who has sought to prosecute Trump’s handling of the virus in his closing pitch to voters, came prepared. 'Anyone who’s responsible for that many deaths should not remain as president of the United States of America,' he said. Biden added: 'He says we’re, you know, we’re learning to live with it. People are learning to die with it.'”
Trump Can Behave Himself for up to an Hour When His Political Life Depends upon It. Morgan Chalfant of the Hill: “President Trump adopted a more measured tone at the start of the final presidential debate as he and ... Joe Biden sparred in the first section focused on the coronavirus pandemic. The debate grew more combative and personal as it continued, as Biden brought up Trump’s personal attorney Rudy Giuliani, claiming he was being used as a 'Russian pawn,' and Trump went on to press Biden on his son Hunter Biden’s foreign business dealings. Still, the debate seemed more organized and less contentious than the first one, perhaps due in part to the new rule implemented by the Commission on Presidential Debates that muted candidates’ microphones so that each could have two minutes of uninterrupted time to speak at the beginning of each 15-minute segment.”
New York Times reporters' fact-check is here. The lede: “... President Trump unleashed an unrelenting series of false, misleading and exaggerated statements as he sought to distort former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s record and positions and boost his own re-election hopes. The president once again relied heavily on well-worn talking points that have long been shown to be false. The president appeared determined to reinvent the reality of the last four years — and the history of the pandemic in 2020 — as he faces judgment on his actions in just 12 days. He once again falsely dismissed the Russia investigations as a 'phony witch hunt.' He insisted that aside from Abraham Lincoln, 'nobody has done more for the Black community,' an assertion that people in both parties find laughable. And he tried again to wish away the pandemic, saying 'we are rounding the turn' even as daily cases of the virus this week topped 70,000 in the United States for the first time since July.” ~~~
~~~ Glenn Kessler, et al., of the Washington Post: "President Trump yet again broke the fact-check meter at the second presidential debate, while Democratic nominee Joe Biden made relatively few gaffes. Here’s a roundup of 25 of the most noteworthy claims that initially caught our interest, virtually all of them by Trump."
Mrs. Bea McCrabbie: I'm not sure if anyone noticed, but this debate -- moderated by a woman -- was a debate targeting American women. Rachel Maddow, Joy Reid & Nicolle Wallace did post-debate analysis for MSNBC, and besides pointing out many of Trump's bald-faced lies, his callousness on the coronavirus, Black Lives Matter & children in cages brought them to tears. Trump is getting kudos for not blowing up until the last half-hour of the debate, and for not calling Welker a POS, without accounting for what he was actually saying/lying about his terrible administration & certainly without providing any outline for his plans for a second term. I guess when your one & only plan is More Graft & Corruption, you don't want to let on.
Jeremy Stahl of Slate: “At Thursday’s debate, moderator Kristen Welker asked ... Donald Trump about his since discontinued and unlawful policy of separating children from their parents at the border without any plan to return them as a 'deterrent' for undocumented immigration.... At first, Trump blamed smugglers for bringing children over the border, not admitting that these children had come with their parents and been taken from them on orders from his administration. When the president finally acknowledged the reality, though, he ... [said,] 'They are so well taken care of.... They’re in facilities that were so clean.'... His administration has also argued in court that it need not provide detained children with a 'toothbrush,' 'towels,' 'dry clothing,' 'soap,' or 'sleep.'... He did not mention the at least six children who have died in CBP custody in less than a year.... After further discussion of [President] Obama’s harsh deportation policies — which ... did not include family separation — [Joe] Biden ... [said,] 'You have 525 kids not knowing in God’s name where they’re going to be and lost their parents,' he said. After an evening in which Trump repeatedly interrupted Welker and Biden to try to get the last word in nearly every exchange, this was one subject he was eager to move on from. 'Go ahead,' he said as Welker attempted to change topics.”
Trump Lost This Debate by Less Than He Lost the First Debate. Jennifer Agiesta of CNN: "Joe Biden did a better job in the final debate on Thursday, according to a CNN Instant Poll of debate watchers. Overall, 53% of voters who watched the debate said that Biden won the matchup, while 39% said that ... Donald Trump did. Viewers once again said that Biden's criticisms of Trump were largely fair (73% said they were fair, 26% unfair), and they split over whether Trump's attacks on Biden were fair (50% said yes, 49% no). That's a more positive outcome for Trump. In a CNN Instant Poll after the first presidential debate, just 28% said they thought the President had won the debate, and 67% called his criticism of Biden unfair."
The New York Times' live updates of the debate are here. ** New York Times reporters' live analysis is here. The page has live video of the debate.
Washington Post opinion columnists are liveblogging the debate here. The page has live video of the debate.
The Guardian's live updates of the debate are here.
~~~ Presidential Race, Etc.
Annie Linskey of the Washington Post: “Joe Biden said Thursday he would name a bipartisan commission to propose an overhaul of the Supreme Court and federal judiciary because the current system is 'getting out of whack,' following weeks of pressure to endorse or reject a push by liberals to expand the court. Biden has repeatedly avoided saying directly whether he would accept a court expansion plan promoted by Democrats angry at Republicans’ speedy confirmation process for Amy Coney Barrett, who is expected to be approved by the full Senate within days. Thursday’s comments to CBS’s '60 Minutes' were Biden’s fullest response on the subject.” Mrs. McC Note to Ken W.: Biden has not yet released video of the interview nor tweeted about the interviewer's bias, hatred and rudeness.
Jeremy Barr & Elahe Izadi of the Washington Post: “President Trump followed through on his threat, or promise, to release video of his interview with CBS News journalist Lesley Stahl before it is set to air on '60 Minutes' on Sunday night.... On Thursday morning, after he again teased a release of the video ('the vicious attempted “takeout” interview of me'), a 37-minute clip of the interview appeared on the president’s Facebook page. In posting the interview, Trump and the White House violated an agreement with CBS News that the White House was taping the interview 'for archival purposes only,' said a network source with knowledge of the interview.... 'The White House’s unprecedented decision to disregard their agreement with CBS News and release their footage will not deter “60 Minutes” from providing its full, fair and contextual reporting which presidents have participated in for decades,' the network said.” Mrs. McC: Why, you might think Trump can't be trusted to honor even the simplest, clearest agreement. (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
Look at the bias, hatred and rudeness on behalf of 60 Minutes and CBS. Tonight’s anchor, Kristen Welker, is far worse! -- Donald Trump, Thursday, in a tweet ~~~
~~~ Jill Colvin of the AP: “The footage shows Trump growing increasingly prickly as CBS anchor Lesley Stahl presses him on a host of topics, including his response to the coronavirus pandemic, his slipping support among suburban women, the lack of masks at his rallies, and the 'Obamacare' replacement plan he has long promised but failed to unveil.... And he again preemptively criticized the moderator of Thursday night’s final presidential debate.... As Trump continued to throw unsubstantiated allegations at [Joe] Biden and former President Barack Obama, Stahl tried to explain: 'This is “60 Minutes” and we can’t put on things we can’t verify.'... 'Leslie [Lesley], you’re discrediting yourself,' he said.” (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ Caitlin Oprysko of Politico: “... Donald Trump on Thursday released video footage of the tense interviews he and Vice President Mike Pence had separately with '60 Minutes' correspondent Lesley Stahl, including a particularly combative exchange in which Stahl accuses both men of having 'insulted' her and the news program. In Stahl’s interview with Pence, which took place after Trump cut short his earlier conversation with Stahl and would not film what was supposed to be a joint appearance..., [Stahl said,] 'This was not a rally. This was not just a campaign speech to the public. This was supposed to be an interview, and the same with the president.... And I feel that you both have insulted “60 Minutes” and me by not answering any of our questions and by giving set campaign speeches that we’ve heard both of you give at rallies and not answering our questions.'” ~~~
~~~ AP: “... Donald Trump says 'it will be so good' if the Supreme Court puts an end to the Obama-era health law when the justices hear challenges to the Affordable Care Act next month. Trump made the comment in an interview with CBS’ '60 Minutes' that’s set to air Sunday night. The president posted the full, unedited interview on Facebook on Thursday.... With [Amy] Barrett on the path to confirmation in the coming days, Trump is signaling that he’s confident that court’s expected swing to the right portends the demise of the health law. Trump says in the interview: 'I think it’ll end' and 'I hope that they’ll end it.'” (Also linked yesterday.)
** Julian Barnes, et al., of the New York Times: "While senior Trump administration officials said this week that Iran has been actively interfering in the presidential election, many intelligence officials said they remained far more concerned about Russia, which in recent days has hacked into state and local computer networks in breaches that could allow Moscow broader access to American voting infrastructure. The discovery of the hacks came as American intelligence agencies, infiltrating Russian networks themselves, have pieced together details of what they believe are Russia’s plans to interfere in the presidential race in its final days or immediately after the election on Nov. 3. Officials did not make clear what Russia planned to do, but they said its operations would be intended to help President Trump, potentially by exacerbating disputes around the results, especially if the race is too close to call.... Some U.S. intelligence officials view Russia’s intentions as more significant than the announcement Wednesday night by the director of national intelligence, John Ratcliffe, that Iran has been involved in the spreading of faked, threatening emails...." ~~~
~~~ Wherein Trump Loyalist Mr. Rat Points Out Trump Is Trying to Undermine the Election. Greg Sargent of the Washington Post: “The centerpiece of [DNI John] Ratcliffe’s announcement [Wednesday] was that Iran — and Russia, which was mysteriously downplayed — has obtained voter data enabling Iran to send emails to voters that were faked to seem like right-wing efforts to menace them into voting for Trump. Ratcliff[e] noted that this was 'designed to intimidate voters, incite social unrest and damage President Trump.' The idea is that these emails are supposed to associate Trump with right-wing efforts to intimidate voters.... But the other thing Ratcliffe said about Iran is ...: 'Iran is distributing other content to include a video that implies that individuals could cast fraudulent ballots, even from overseas. This video, and any claims about such allegedly fraudulent ballots, are not true.'... Who else has been making such claims about fraudulent ballots? Why, Trump has, of course. And so has ... William P. Barr ... and ... Donald Trump Jr.... The Post viewed the video: 'The video ... shows Trump making disparaging comments about mail-in voting, followed by a logo with the name of the Proud Boys....' So, to be as clear as possible, this video circulated by Iran, which Ratcliffe has denounced for spreading false information about voter fraud, features Trump himself making such claims.” Emphasis added. Thanks to Ken W. for the link. (Also linked yesterday.)
Will Sommer of the Daily Beast: "With less than two weeks before Election Day and Trump lagging in the polls, some of the president’s most prominent allies are going all in on QAnon.... At his NBC town hall last week, Trump refused to disavow QAnon, which the FBI considers a potential source of domestic terrorism. On Sunday, Republican National Committee chair Ronna McDaniel sidestepped a question from ABC host George Stephanopoulos on whether she would denounce QAnon.... And nothing has proven to be more of a nexus for the GOP’s QAnon conspiracy-mongering than Hunter Biden’s supposed laptops.... Rudy Giuliani has recently begun claiming that the laptop contains images of lurid, illegal pictures of underage women.... The unverified claims about Biden’s laptop are a near-identical echo of an earlier conspiracy theory embraced by QAnon and Pizzagate supporters about former Rep. Anthony Weiner's (D-NY) laptop. In that story, Weiner's laptop featured a video of Hillary Clinton and aide Huma Abedin abusing children, in scenes so gruesome that NYPD officers who viewed it eventually killed themselves." ~~~
~~~ Ben Collins & Brandy Zadrozny of NBC News: "Some of the same people who pushed a false conspiracy theory about Hillary Clinton that first emerged in 2016 are now targeting Hunter Biden, Joe Biden's son, with similar falsehoods. Their online posts are garnering astronomical numbers of shares on social media.... There is an important difference, however. The pizzagate-style rumors in 2016 were largely confined to far-right message boards like 4chan and parts of Reddit. But the Hunter Biden iteration of the same conspiracy theory took off last weekend with the help of speculation from conservative TV hosts and members of Congress. Their theorizing can be traced back to a new website [-- Revolver News --] that has been promoted by ... Donald Trump and his surrogates.... The child abuse conspiracy theories about Hunter Biden that emerged from the fringes of the internet began swirling before the New York Post article and can be traced to associates of former White House aide Steve Bannon." ~~~
~~~ ** Will Bunch of the Philadelphia Inquirer: “QAnon believers hunting for child kidnappers should start at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.... QAnon’s core followers believe there’s a Satanic cult among Democratic Party elites and Hollywood that’s protected by a 'deep state' cabal and which engages in rampant pedophilia (at minimum) and maybe rituals where small children are killed by monsters who then drink their blood.... NBC News almost [broke through the pre-election bombast] this week with its explosive report that advocates who’ve been scouring records, the internet, and even the backstreets of Central America have been unable to find the parents of 545 kids, many of them under age 6, who were wrenched away by federal agents during Trump’s crackdown at the southern border.... 'Let’s not mince words,' the Washington Post editorialized Thursday. 'The Trump administration kidnapped children.'... The real child-abusers are bland bureaucrats rendered into cowards by a system, a political machine that defends the narcissistic authoritarianism of its leader that QAnon fantasizes is protecting their white suburban kids even as real brown ones are traumatized.” Firewalled.
Washington Post: "At least 47.1 million have voted nationwide, and there are still 12 days until Election Day, surpassing the total number of early ballots cast in 2016." Includes a map & other graphics so you can check out how voting is going in your state.
New Jersey. Matt Friedman of Politico: “A federal judge on Thursday tossed the Trump campaign’s lawsuit against New Jersey’s primarily mail-in election, ruling that most of its arguments were speculative and that the campaign failed to show how it‘s being harmed. The lawsuit, filed in August by the Trump campaign as well as the Republican State Committee and Republican National Committee, was basically moot anyway. The plaintiffs did not seek an injunction to keep New Jersey from changing the way it was conducting its election. County clerks began mailing out ballots weeks ago and about 2 million have been cast so far. 'Plaintiffs have alleged nothing more than the possibility of future injury to their members,' U.S. District Court Judge Michael Shipp wrote in his ruling.”
Pennsylvania. Danny Hakim & Nick Corasaniti of the New York Times: “The Trump campaign has been videotaping Philadelphia voters while they deposit their ballots in drop boxes, leading Pennsylvania’s attorney general to warn this week that the campaign’s actions fall outside of permitted poll watching practices and could amount to illegal voter intimidation. The campaign made a formal complaint to city officials on Oct. 16, saying a campaign representative had surveilled voters depositing two or three ballots at drop boxes, instead of only their own. The campaign called the conduct 'blatant violations of the Pennsylvania election code,' according to a letter from a lawyer representing the Trump campaign that was reviewed by The New York Times. The campaign included photos of three voters who it claimed were dropping off multiple ballots.... But city officials rejected the assertion that the voters who had been photographed had necessarily done something improper.... Earlier this month, a Trump campaign official told The Times that the campaign would be videotaping drop boxes but was only interested in people who were dumping large numbers of ballots — not in those bringing an extra ballot or two. That assertion appears to have been false.”
Outer Space. Ruby Mellen of the Washington Post: "American [astronaut] Kate Rubins said she plans to cast her vote from the International Space Station in the upcoming presidential election. Some 250 miles below, many voters are struggling to do the same.... Since 1997, U.S. astronauts have been able to cast their votes from space, after John Blaha raised the issue with NASA ahead of the 1996 presidential election, during which he would be aboard the Russian Space Station Mir." Mrs. McC: The Trump campaign will probably challenge Rubins' ballot.
Senate Races. Alyssa Fowers of the Washington Post: "Hundred of thousands of donors rushed to back Democratic Senate campaigns after Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s death, many spreading their donations across several candidates. Seven times as many people gave to Democratic candidates in competitive races the day after Ginsburg’s death than the day before, according to an analysis of data from the Federal Election Commission. Donations were often small, averaging $17.82 during the rush, compared with $55.08 two days before. The most common donation on the day after Ginsburg’s death was $1.92, suggesting that donors made a single contribution via the Democratic fundraising platform ActBlue to split between candidates. Donors may have hoped that spreading the wealth across multiple candidates, rather than focusing on a single race, would help Democrats take control of the Senate, giving them the power to confirm or vote down future Supreme Court justices."
The Trumpidemic, Ctd.
The New York Times' live updates of Covid-19 developments Friday are here: “More than 75,000 cases of the coronavirus were announced in the United States on Thursday, the second-highest daily total nationwide since the pandemic began. Eight states set single-day case records, and 13 states have added more cases in the past week than in any other seven-day stretch. The bleak numbers came as President Trump declared at the final presidential debate on Thursday that, despite evidence, the virus was 'going away,' while his challenger, Joseph R. Biden Jr., warned of a 'dark winter' ahead that required aggressive federal action.” ~~~
~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: NBC News puts the number of 78,000+ cases yesterday & the highest national daily total ever.
Giulia Nieto del Rio & of the New York Times: "A hospital in Idaho is 99 percent full and warning that it may have to transfer coronavirus patients to hospitals in Seattle and Portland, Ore. Medical centers in Kansas City, Mo., turned away ambulances on a recent day because they had no room for more patients. And in West Allis, just outside Milwaukee, an emergency field hospital erected on the grounds of the Wisconsin State Fair admitted its first virus patient this week. More than 41,000 people are currently hospitalized with the coronavirus in the United States, a 40 percent rise in the past month, and cooler weather that pushes more people indoors is threatening to expand the outbreak still more. At least 14 states saw more people hospitalized for the virus on a day in the past week than on any other day in the pandemic, according to the Covid Tracking Project. Seven more states are nearing their peaks."
Blake Montgomery of the Daily Beast: “A new report from Columbia University on COVID-19 deaths estimates that hundreds of thousands of Americans died because the United States’ response to the pandemic was an 'abject failure,' particularly the actions of ... Donald Trump. With an adequate response, the United States could have avoided tens of thousands of deaths and an incalculable amount of suffering, the researchers said. Dr. Irwin Redlener, the lead author on the study and the founding director of the National Center for Disaster Preparedness, laid the blame at the feet of the White House in an interview with The Daily Beast: 'We believe that this was a monumental, lethal screwup by an administration that didn’t want to deal with reality.' In the report, titled '130,000–210,000 Avoidable COVID-19 Deaths — and Counting — in the U.S.', researchers at Columbia’s NCDP studied 'the staggering and disproportionate nature of COVID-19 fatalities in the United States.' The researchers compared the coronavirus response of the U.S. to that of six other countries— South Korea, Japan, Australia, Germany, Canada, and France — and found that the American government’s response to the pandemic rated unfavorably against them all.” The report is here.
Maggie Fox of CNN: "The US Food and Drug Administration approved remdesivir for the treatment of coronavirus infection, the drug's maker, Gilead Sciences, said Thursday. The drug, sold under the brand name Veklury, has been used under emergency use authorization. It is the first drug to be approved for treating Covid-19.... 'Veklury should only be administered in a hospital or in a healthcare setting capable of providing acute care comparable to inpatient hospital care,' [the company said in a statement.] Earlier this month, a World Health Organization-sponsored global study found remdesivir did not help patients survive or even recover faster, but a US study found the infused drug shortened recovery time for some patients by about a third."
Christopher Rugaber of the AP: "The number of laid-off Americans seeking unemployment benefits fell last week to 787,000, a sign that job losses may have eased slightly but are still running at historically high levels. Last week’s figure was down from 842,000 the previous week, the Labor Department said Thursday. The government also revised down the number of people who sought aid in the two weeks before that. The revised total for the week that ended Oct. 3 was 767,000, the fewest since the viral pandemic erupted in March, though still more than three times the levels that preceded the pandemic. Economists welcomed the declines as evidence that the job market is still recovering from the pandemic recession. But some cautioned that the improvement could prove short-lived." (Also linked yesterday.)
Donald Trump Doesn't Know How to Pick a Password. Adam Gabbatt of the Guardian: “Donald Trump’s Twitter account was allegedly hacked last week, after a Dutch researcher correctly guessed the president’s password: 'maga2020!', Dutch media reported. Victor Gevers, a security expert, had access to Trump’s direct messages, could post tweets in his name and change his profile, De Volkskrant newspaper reported. Gevers – who previously managed to log into Trump’s account in 2016 – apparently gained access by guessing Trump’s password. He tried 'maga2020!' on his fifth attempt and it worked.... Twitter, however, denied the report. However, Gevers told De Volkskrant the ease with which he accessed Trump’s account suggested the president was not using basic security measures like two-step verification.” Gevers said he warned the White House, CIA, FBI & Twitter of the easy hack. “A day later, Gevers noticed that two-step verification had been activated on Trump’s account.... Two days later, the Secret Service got in touch. According to De Volkskrant, they thanked him for bringing the security problem to their attention. [In 2016,] Trump’s password was 'yourefired.'” (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ Mrs. McCrabbie: Obviously, in choosing a password, you pick something you can remember but that would be so meaningless to others that couldn't just guess it. As for whether or the not the story is true, it's hard to say. When I change computers or locations, I get e-mail notifications from a few companies, like Google. I'm not sure if Twitter has sent me such notifications.
Eric Lipton of the New York Times: “President Trump signed an executive order this week that could substantially expand his ability to hire and fire tens of thousands of federal workers during a second term, potentially allowing him to weed out what he sees as a 'deep state' bureaucracy working to undermine him. The executive order, issued late Wednesday and described by one prominent federal union leader as 'the most profound undermining of the Civil Service in our lifetimes,' would allow federal agencies to go through their employee rosters and reclassify certain workers in a way that would strip them of job protections that now cover most federal employees.... Mr. Trump’s new executive order would create a new class of federal worker, known as 'Schedule F' employees, that would be made up of career staff members who are involved in 'confidential, policy-determining, policy-making, or policy-advocating' work. This would most likely include the thousands of federal employees who write the regulations that translate federal laws into formal rules, as well as economists, scientists, lawyers and manager....”
Mike Schneider of the AP: "For the second time in two months, a panel of federal judges on Thursday blocked ... Donald Trump’s effort to exclude people in the U.S. illegally from being counted during the process of divvying up congressional seats by state. The decision from a panel of three district judges in California went further than last month’s ruling by a panel of three federal judges in New York by saying that Trump’s order in July not only was unlawful but also violated the constitution. The New York judges ignored the question of the order’s constitutionality and just said it was unlawful.... The Trump administration has appealed the New York decision to the Supreme Court, and the nation’s high court agreed to hear the case next month. Other challenges to Trump’s order are pending in Maryland, Massachusetts and the District of Columbia." (Also linked yesterday.)
Julian Borger of the Guardian: "US immigration officers allegedly tortured Cameroonian asylum seekers to force them to sign their own deportation orders, in what lawyers and activists describe as a brutal scramble to fly African migrants out of the country in the run-up to the elections. Many of the Cameroonian migrants in a Mississippi detention centre refused to sign, fearing death at the hands of Cameroonian government forces responsible for widespread civilian killings, and because they had asylum hearings pending. According to multiple accounts, detainees were threatened, choked, beaten, pepper-sprayed and threatened with more violence to make them sign.... Lawyers and human rights advocates said there had been a significant acceleration of deportations in recent weeks, a trend they see as linked to the looming elections and the possibility that Ice could soon be under new management." --s (Also linked yesterday.)
Jordain Carney of the Hill: "Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee voted on Thursday to advance Judge Amy Coney Barrett’s Supreme Court nomination after Democrats boycotted the vote. The panel voted 12-0 to send Barrett’s nomination to the full Senate, paving the way for President Trump’s nominee to be confirmed to the Supreme Court early next week. Every Republican on the panel supported her nomination and no Democratic senator voted. Every GOP senator was present for the vote, meeting the committee's rule that 12 members of the panel must be present to report a nomination to the full Senate. But the committee also requires two members of the minority party to be present in order to conduct business. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), however, made it clear that he would move forward regardless of the committee's rules. 'As you know, our Democratic colleagues informed the committee last night that they will not participate in the hearing. That was their choice. It will be my choice to vote the nominee out of committee. We're not going to allow them to take over the committee,' Graham said on Thursday." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ Nicholas Fandos of the New York Times: "The Senate Judiciary Committee voted on Thursday to advance President Trump’s nomination of Judge Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court, with majority Republicans skirting the panel’s rules to recommend her confirmation as Democrats boycotted the session in protest." This is an update of a story linked yesterday. (Also linked yesterday.)
Adam Serwer of the Atlantic: Because "the Supreme Court is helping Republicans rig elections, adding more justices to the bench might be the only way to stop them." Thanks to Anonymous for the link. Anonymous says (yesterday's Comments) that Serwer's essay should be required reading for Joe Biden. But John Roberts should read it, too, because Serwer gets to the rancid meat of Roberts' judicial philosophy: "The chief justice may claim that only deliberate discrimination counts as racism, but in practice he rules even overt racism acceptable if sufficiently competent attorneys clean it up first. And Roberts is the most sympathetic conservative justice when it comes to voting rights." The essay is firewalled, but it's worth using up one of your few freebies.
Jacob Bogage of the Washington Post: "Goldman Sachs, one of Wall Street’s oldest and most prestigious banks, will pay $2.9 billion in penalties and fees to settle federal charges over its involvement in a Malaysian bribery scheme, the Justice Department announced Thursday. Prosecutors in the Eastern District of New York charged the bank with conspiracy to violate the anti-bribery provisions of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, which forbids companies or individuals from paying foreign governments to retain business. The settlement includes the largest monetary penalty ever assessed under corporate criminal bribery law. The Justice Department alleged that Goldman Sachs ignored signs of fraud among some of its senior bankers in a scheme that ultimately led to a Malaysian government-backed economic development corporation being defrauded out of $2.7 billion. About $1.6 billion of the $2.7 billion was used to pay officials in Malaysia and the United Arab Emirates to secure work issuing and selling bonds in international markets."
Pilar Melendez & Seamus Hughes of the Daily Beast: “A 19-year-old who was busted with a car full of guns and explosives ... debated killing Joe Biden online, traveling to a Wendy’s mere miles from the former vice president’s home and penning a checklist that ended in 'execute,' federal authorities allege in court documents. Alexander Hillel Treisman, originally from Seattle, was indicted by a federal grand jury in September on a child pornography charge after authorities stumbled upon his abandoned van at a Third Bank in Kannapolis, North Carolina. Inside, officers with the Kannapolis Police Department found a trove of weapons, including an AR-15 style rifle behind the driver’s seat, a canister of Tannerite, an explosive material, and more than $500,000.... 'Should I kill joe biden?' Treisman allegedly wrote on April 15, 2020, alongside an image posted on iFunny, according to a search-warrant application. The application also details how the 19-year-old went to Wilmington, Delaware — Biden’s hometown — on at least one occasion and discussed his need to 'save' Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders.”
Way Beyond the Beltway
Russia, Etc. Jonathan Watts of the Guardian: "For the first time since records began, the main nursery of Arctic sea ice in Siberia has yet to start freezing in late October. The delayed annual freeze in the Laptev Sea has been caused by freakishly protracted warmth in northern Russia and the intrusion of Atlantic waters, say climate scientists who warn of possible knock-on effects across the polar region.... The downward trend is likely to continue until the Arctic has its first ice-free summer, said Meier. The data and models suggest this will occur between 2030 and 2050." --s (Also linked yesterday.)
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