A General thread for 2024 Presidential Elections

[p0rtia]

Ooh, sah-nap!

[neonzx]

It's all good. The Harris team thinks Kamala can handle an open mic policy. Looking forward to it.

[Volkonski]

Once Trump hears about this he will demand that the mikes always be on. He won't see that it is a trap intended to expose his craziness.

[zekeb]

The Kamala campaign wants the world to see how out of control DonOld can be. As if we don't already know.

[neonzx]

"I'm Speaking" along with a stern look.
DonOld is going to get scolded by mom.

[Volkonski]

Trump appears to undercut his campaign’s efforts over microphone rules at debate

https://www.cnn.com/2024/08/26/politics ... index.html

But while Trump took aim at what he called the “biased” network Sunday evening – complaining about reporter Jonathan Karl and a panel of “Trump Haters” on his Truth Social platform – he said Monday that he would prefer the mics to stay on.

“We agreed to the same rules, I don’t know, doesn’t matter to me, I’d rather have it probably on, but the agreement was that it would be the same as it was last time,” Trump said when asked by a reporter if he wanted the microphones muted during the debate when the candidate is not speaking.

Trump also again cast doubt on whether he would participate in the debate.

“When I looked at the hostility of that, I said, ‘Why am I doing it? Let’s do it with another network.’ I want to do it,” Trump said

The Harris campaign, for its part, is requesting that ABC and other networks seeking to host a potential October debate keep microphones on, according to a senior campaign official, marking a change from the June debate when the then-Biden campaign wanted microphones muted except when it was a candidate’s turn to speak.

A top Harris spokesman said Monday that the campaign considered the mic issue “resolved” after Trump’s comments.

[RVInit]

It's all good. The Harris team thinks Kamala can handle an open mic policy. Looking forward to it.

Absolutely. Putting in controls just made Trump appear as if he was able to comport himself like a reasonable adult.

[Rolodex]

The plan to goad trump into saying stupid stuff on socmed is working. Make him boast about doing something (despite his campaign's wishes) and consider it done. Harris can hold him to whatever stupid stuff he says. Oops!

Mics on! The question is whether he'll actually show up. I don't know if this ABC one had an audience.

[Slim Cognito]

Get busy running ads accusing trump of being too chicken to debate Harris. Plaster Fox News with them. Get busy Rick Wilson.

[Rolodex]

Not sure exactly where to put this, but if you're on social media at all, you've seen the recent outcry about proposed taxes on unrealized gains. Trumpers were screaming their heads off, although it may have cooled a bit now that the detail that it applies only to people with $100 million+ in assets (although I'm sure plenty of maga haven't seen that part yet, and probably most have little to nothing in investment unless they have a good retirement plan or 401K at work).

Anyway, the whole point of the unrealized gains taxation on super wealthy is to have them pay a "fair share" and increase revenues. I'm no tax expert, but I had questions about how it might work. How to value? what about loss years? what about illiquid assets?

It turns out other people have been thinking about this, too. And not just in the past when when peoples' hair was on fire. This proposal was in Biden's 2022 budget. And it's been bandied about way before that.

This is a link to a thread reader post that compiles a long-ish but easy to understand thread about this topic. Within this post are links to a couple of really interesting articles. One addresses a technique that I knew about the weathy doing - borrowing against assets and using that borrowed money to live. It's "income" on which you pay no taxes because it's just a loan. Meanwhile, the assets you borrow against continue (generally) to increase in value. There's a link to a paper about a proposal to tax that borrowing. Seems like a better idea than taxing unrealized gains.

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1829 ... 94171.html
Download the pdf in this link to read the very understandable proposal/argument defending taxing borrowing against assets: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm ... id=4716197

Good history on threadreader about how long people have been looking at how to collect revenue on unrealized gains...even as early as 1939.

/tax nerdiness

[MN-Skeptic]

I'll believe they'll tax unrealized capital gains when I see them pass the law. Even then I won't believe it. I haven't looked at the proposal, but I can't imagine the headache of determining just who has $100M in applicable assets. I would assume that the taxed assets would then have their basis stepped up to reflect that taxes had been paid on them.

Some folks will still be around who will remember the Tax Act of 1976. Before 1976, if you inherited property, your basis in the property was stepped up, i.e., your cost basis for tax purposes was the value on the date of the decedent's death, not the lower, original price of what they had paid for it years ago. The Tax Act of 1976 changed the rules and said that heirs now had to use the cost basis of the decedent. Can you imagine the nightmare of figuring out what your grandpa had paid for that painting 50 years ago, or that land 75 years ago? The law was delayed, and finally repealed in 1980. Because, of course.

I think taxing unrealized capital gains will end up just being a proposal, not an actuality.

[Suranis]

Because one of the things that helped Biden first time around was the ability to tell the fucker to shut the hell up. If Biden had been free to tell Turnip that he was a fucking liar, the headlines would have been filled with less "disasterous debate performance" the next day. The Press is going to be looking for anything at all to cast Harris as the loser, so might as well unshackle the rules and let her go nuts. Turnip will be Turnip so giving him ample oppritunity to dig his own grave can only help her.

[keith]

"I'm Speaking" along with a stern look.
DonOld is going to get scolded by mom.

Turnip never had a mom give him that Mom look. If the nanny ever gave him that look she'd probably only ever do it once so she wouldn't have to bear the screaming and caterwauling that she would have been blasted with.

[Rolodex]

"I'm Speaking" along with a stern look.
DonOld is going to get scolded by mom.

Turnip never had a mom give him that Mom look. If the nanny ever gave him that look she'd probably only ever do it once so she wouldn't have to bear the screaming and caterwauling that she would have been blasted with.

lil donnie would probably have hit her. There are reports he struck a teacher when he was in grammar school. I think that's part of why they sent him to military school.

[Dave from down under]

The GOP is unhappy that the Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court has Ruled against disenfranchising voters over incorrect dates on mail in ballots

https://www.reuters.com/world/us/pennsy ... 024-08-31/

[RTH10260]

GOP network props up liberal third-party candidates in key states, hoping to siphon off Harris votes

By Brian Slodysko and Dan Merica
Sept. 2, 2024 2:35 PM PT

WASHINGTON — Italo Medelius was leading a volunteer drive to put Cornel West on North Carolina’s presidential ballot in the spring when he received an unexpected call from a man named Paul who said he wanted to help.

Though Medelius, co-chairman of West’s Justice for All Party, welcomed the assistance, the offer would complicate his life, provoking threats and drawing him into a state election board investigation of the motivations, backgrounds and suspect tactics of his new allies.

Across the country, a network of Republican political operatives, attorneys and their allies is trying to shape November’s election in ways that favor former President Trump. Their goal is to prop up third-party candidates such as West who offer liberal voters an alternative that could siphon away support from Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic nominee.

It’s not clear who is paying for the effort, but it could be impactful in states decided by minuscule margins in 2020.

It’s money West’s campaign does not have, and he has encouraged the effort. Last month, the academic told the Associated Press that “American politics is highly gangster-like activity” and he “just wanted to get on that ballot.”

Trump has called West “one of my favorite candidates.” Another is Green Party candidate Jill Stein. The former president favors both for the same reason: “I like her very much. You know why? She takes 100% from them. He takes 100%.”

Democrats are exploring ways to lift Randall Terry, an antiabortion presidential candidate for the Constitution Party, believing he could draw voters from Trump.

But the GOP effort appears to be more far-reaching. And after years of Trump accusing Democrats of “rigging” elections, it is his allies who are now mounting a sprawling and at times deceptive campaign to tilt the vote in his favor.



https://www.latimes.com/world-nation/st ... rris-votes

[sad-cafe]

"I'm Speaking" along with a stern look.
DonOld is going to get scolded by mom.

Turnip never had a mom give him that Mom look. If the nanny ever gave him that look she'd probably only ever do it once so she wouldn't have to bear the screaming and caterwauling that she would have been blasted with.

lil donnie would probably have hit her. There are reports he struck a teacher when he was in grammar school. I think that's part of why they sent him to military school.

he is a narcissist psychopath

[RTH10260]

Christian group recruits ‘Trojan horse’ election skeptics as US poll workers
Lion of Judah enrolls poll workers in Trump-aligned swing state tour, which experts say could be ‘hazard to democracy’

Alice Herman
Wed 4 Sep 2024 13.00 CEST

A Christian political operative has teamed up with charismatic preachers to enroll election skeptics as poll workers across the country, using a Donald Trump-aligned swing state tour to enlist support in the effort.

Joshua Standifer, who leads the group called Lion of Judah, describes the effort as a “Trojan horse” strategy to get Christians in “key positions of influence in government like Election Workers”, which will help them identify alleged voter fraud and serve as “the first step on the path to victory this Fall”, according to his website.

Standifer has been on the road with a traveling pro-Trump tent revival featuring self-styled prophets and Christian nationalist preachers that has made stops in key swing states including Michigan, Georgia, Arizona and Wisconsin.

He describes himself as a former Republican opposition researcher who struck out on his own after receiving a message from God to involve Christians in politics.

“[God] said, ‘start a group called the Lion of Judah. Start a 501c4, get out there, and help my body come together as one,’” Standifer told a crowd at the Courage Tour in Wisconsin earlier this month. According to Tennessee business records, Lion of Judah was incorporated there in 2021 as a non-profit organization.

The group’s website, which prominently features Trump and his false claim that the 2020 election was rife with fraud, promises to “release the ROAR of Christian Voters across America” by getting them directly involved with the electoral process. The Lion of Judah’s election worker training program, which the Guardian has reviewed, features a series of modules titled “Fight The Fraud: How To Become An Election Worker In 4 Easy Steps!”

Standifer’s project has so far largely flown under the radar.

Matthew Taylor, a researcher with the Institute for Islamic, Christian, and Jewish Studies, described the effort in a post on X as a “urgent & unrecognized hazard to our democracy this fall” and said he worried it had the potential to sow chaos during the election. “All it takes is one or two of those people coming forward and saying, ‘Hey, I found election fraud’ and presenting dubious evidence to throw an amazing amount of sand in the gears of the vote counting process,” he told the Guardian.

Standifer vehemently rejected the idea that the organization poses a threat to the electoral process and said he founded the group to empower Christians to participate in politics – not to sow doubts in elections.



https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/art ... ll-workers

[RTH10260]

Analysis - images of stats in article

Kamala Harris now leads in US polls but state-level data puts race on knife-edge
Analysis of 2024 polling and previous elections involving Donald Trump suggests race is still too close to call

Ashley Kirk
Wed 4 Sep 2024 12.00 CEST

National polls for the US presidential race have been upended ever since Kamala Harris took over from Joe Biden to run against Donald Trump.

While Biden was trailing the Republican former president nationally and in many crucial swing states, Harris has gained about three points in national polls since becoming the nominee.

The Guardian’s poll tracker assesses polls over a rolling 10-day period. It now has Harris leading nationally by about two points.

But when comparing this performance with previous elections, data from RealClearPolitics reveals Harris’s lead over Trump is weaker than those of his previous opponents. As of 30 August in their respective campaigns, Hillary Clinton led Trump by five points in 2016 and Biden was ahead of him by 6.3 points in 2020.

But national polling is only part of the picture. Clinton lost the 2016 election despite winning more votes than Trump, because of the electoral system by which the president is elected.

Several swing states have shifted to Harris and are on a knife-edge

The US presidential election is decided by races in individual states that have a set number of electoral college votes. This means the race is decided by a handful of swing states such as Pennsylvania, Arizona and Georgia.

Looking at data from RealClearPolitics, Harris has managed to at least close the gap on, if not overtake, Trump in the swing states. This is especially evident in Georgia and Arizona, where Harris has gained more than four points since Biden dropped out of the race.

Pollsters claimed Harris’s consolidation of the Democratic base, especially with voters of colour and young people who drifted from the party in Biden’s final months as the presumptive Democratic nominee, had brought these states back into play.



https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/art ... nald-trump

[RTH10260]

FWIW

[poplove]

Former President Trump & JD Vance's Boeing 737-800 Enters Prohibited Airspace In Washington DC

https://simpleflying.com/trump-jd-vance ... ington-dc/

[neonzx]

Well darn. They have surface-to-air missiles but did not use them.

[Dave from down under]

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-09-10/ ... /104104898

In Georgia, Democrats fear a Republican-controlled board could try to 'rig' the 2024 US election

[RTH10260]

Trump Aides Evacuated Offices After Prank Sparked Bugging Fears
The police were called after suspicious devices were found at a Florida campaign office. It was quickly determined that the devices were likely part of a prank.

By Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan
Sept. 3, 2024

Watergate this was not.

Last week, the Trump campaign and Republican National Committee offices in West Palm Beach, Fla., were abuzz with talk of listening devices and espionage, possibly by a foreign government. The police were called and the offices were closed for a forensic search.

The reality was more Charlie Chaplin than John le Carré.

A plastic prank device that can be purchased on Amazon for $13.97 was the cause of the problem.

A police report from the West Palm Beach police department, obtained by The New York Times, detailed the incident. Devices were found on Thursday after people heard beeping under a staff member’s desk at the Trump campaign offices. When Trump officials searched, they found additional devices, for a total of three.

“FOUND POTENTIAL LISTENING DEVICES // HEARD BEEPING BY DESKS // INTERNAL SECURITY ALSO FOUND DEVICE,” the police report reads. The person making the report, according to the document, “THINKS THEY HAVE FOUND LISTENING DEVICES ‘BUGS; IN THE OFFICE.’”


https://www.nytimes.com/2024/09/03/us/p ... vices.html

[MN-Skeptic]

Here's a gift link to the New York Times article - Trump Aides Evacuated Offices After Prank Sparked Bugging Fears