The Frankish Reich

Because you are generally a reasonable person, here's my taxonomy of election claims: A. The Strong Actual Fraud claims. These are the Trump claims. - A.1. Someone hacked/manipulated election machines/software to make them spit out invalid/fraudulent results. - A.2. Someone stuffed the ballot boxes with "votes" from nonexistent (dead, moved away) or invalid (multiple ballots, same person) voters. B. The Weak Improper Influence claims. (Someone or some entity "Improperly Tried to Influence How People Voted"). These are the Hillary 2016 Russian influence claims. - B.1. Foreign actors, perhaps with assistance (collusion) of American actors. Russian state-sponsored persons/entities improperly (and/or illegally) engaged in online propaganda either to suppress Democratic votes, drum up Republican votes, or to discourage people from voting entirely. - B.2. Domestic actors, perhaps with the assistance of U.S. government actors, sought to suppress something or to emphasize something with the intent (or result) of causing people to change whether and how they voted. This is the Hunter's Laptop theory. It is also the Comey Overreaction/More Hillary Emails theory. [EDIT: adding another category] C. The Voter Suppression/Undue Voter Encouragement Claims. These are the Stacy Abrams-type claims, that a state government run by the opposing party took steps to make it unduly difficult to cast a ballot in a way that differentially impacted one party. Polling stations shut down/consolidated into more distant stations in minority/Democratic areas, or polling hours shortened/Sunday voting eliminated, etc. The reverse side of this coin: claims that voting was made too easy in a way that benefits the opposing party or minority groups, like allowing for Sunday voting and transporting groups en masse from church to the ballot box. They are very different kinds of claims. What I'm saying is that Trump's A.1 and A.2 claims have basically zero evidentiary support. And so his supporters (not so much him yet; he's slow to catch on) have begun moving to the weaker B.2 claim. That doesn't mean that there is necessarily nothing there; just that it is more akin to the Hillary B.1 claims than it is to the earlier Trump A.1 and A.2 claims. "Election interference" is a catch-all dealing with all these "engaged in shenanigans to change whether and how actual voters voted." That is quite different from "counted phantom votes" or "changed properly cast votes from one candidate to another." It makes some sense to speak of an election as "stolen" if there is: 1. Solid proof of A.1 and/or A.2 happening, in 2. Sufficient numbers as to plausibly change the result of the election as a whole. Attorney General Barr investigated 2020, and didn't say there was no way A.2 (people ineligible to vote who voted) happening, but he did say there was no evidence that this was in numbers sufficient to change the result. It does not make sense to speak of an election as "stolen" if we are talking about improper influence, since that means that people voted one way rather (or voted when they otherwise wouldn't have, or vice versa) than another based on what they heard or read. That simply doesn't agree with what we typically mean by "stolen" or "rigged." Those terms are properly reserved for the "A" category strong claims, with proof.

Don't Re-X the troll.

Which, of course, she didn't say. No one - not Kamala, not anyone - is saying the revised Florida curriculum "omits" slavery. That is a nonsensical comment. If you are accusing the new curriculum of glossing over the horrors of slavery by suggesting that some slaves learned marketable skills, of course you are saying that slavery is IN the curriculum. I love how people who accuse Democratic critics of mischaracterizing something have no qualms about doing exactly the same thing.

The bolded comment is correct.

Yes, he was. Have I ever said otherwise?

That is scary. TIA? Wishing nothing bad for Mitch (he is at a minimum a bastion of stability, even if many people don't like his particular variety of stability), is this not even more proof that we need to move away from the gerontocracy currently governing America?

But since he seems to be able to get the Florida legislature to do whatever he wants, it stands to reason that he can get them to fix Florida insurance law so that property insurers can stay in that market and still make money. Yet ... he doesn't. Why not? Because he doesn't want to be known as the Governor who raised insurance rates?

Well, the timeline would have to be earlier, but it could be something like this: some new and more damaging dirt on Biden comes out by next Spring, or even just before the convention. Biden withdraws for the good of the country. Kamala is sidelined for some ass-covering reason (I always thought Supreme Court nominee if someone conveniently resigns or even dies, but maybe something else). Boring standard-issue Democrat runs in Biden's stead, in time to get on all state ballots. Not Newsome - California is too divisive. Some Amy Klobuchar type. Obviously the Dem power brokers would prefer a different candidate, but not just any (Kamala) different candidate. But the problem is Biden actually seems to want four more years, and Kamala as the understudy makes things difficult. So I wouldn't rule it out. And yes, I want it to happen.

There you go. Why would this be absurd? The fivethirtyeight reliable poll average pre-election had Biden winning nationally by ... almost exactly the margin that he did win by. Every stupid Trump theory has been shot down, one by one: - Venezuelan Election Machines hacked! The subject of a record-breaking defamation settlement when discovery showed absolutely zero evidence of this. - Georgia election officials brought in fake ballots in suitcases! The subject of Giuliani's recent concession that this was not true. - Arizona flooded with fake votes, including by dead voters! The subject of an audit by a Republican-paid firm, showing that no such thing happened and in fact the Biden vote was just a tick higher than reported in official results. And still: they believe. It's a religion. Blessed are those who have not seen and still believe in Trump's bs.

I will hazard a guess that the percentage of school age children in America who are actually underfed statistically rounds to zero. Yet the "going to bed hungry" or "unable to learn because they are hungry" memes persist. And in general, the poorer the kids are, the higher the rate of obesity. Walmart cheapo white bread: $1.32. Walmart peanut butter: 64 ounces (that's a lot!), 6 bucks. Walmart jelly: 2 bucks, 18 ounces. But what about vegetables you ask? Yeah, a lot less vegetables for the school compost bin.

But property insurers are leaving Florida. Why? They may not be willing to deal with the risk imposed by hurricanes and other weather events. OK. I get it. But the typical response of an insurer to a high risk environment is to charge higher premiums. So are Florida insurance regulators not allowing that to happen? If so, aren't they meddling in the free market? If not, what is the reason?

Or maybe, just maybe ... they don't want to impeach Biden, at least not until he's officially renominated, lest it gives the Democratic power brokers and opportunity to push him out, and an opportunity for a younger candidate (not Kamala) to be his anointed successor. A big "be careful what you wish for."

So ... plea deal is dead for the moment at least. Good. Reminiscent of the judge who refused to allow withdrawal of Mike Flynn's guilty plea. Both are appropriate exercises's of a federal court judge's authority to ensure that agreements are in the interest of justice.

They are not "ignoring" the story.

How childish can people be? Of course vaccines have side effects. We would still have polio and smallpox outbreaks if right-wing pundits had an internet in the 1950s and 60s.

The Man Who Knew Too Much About Sous Vide.

As for the mainstream media ignoring Hunter (and isn't working at home great): just flipped on MSNBC. "Breaking News: New Details From Hunter Biden Hearing."

Chefgate!

As I've always said to my family: "there's a reason that beautiful purebred dog is in a shelter."

So bring it on! I guess an impeachment that has zero possibility of actually achieving the result is now officially a Great Idea. You owe Nancy an apology.

I didn't say that. The suggestion was that there was some wave of horrific events. The study says there were elevated lab values consistent with mild and transient cardiac effects.

The article notes that the player now known only as "Quinn" identifies as non-binary. In other words, does not identify as a woman, nor is there any indication that Quinn is transitioning to being a woman as that language is now understood. So yes ... I don't get this at all. It is a women's team, Quinn is not a woman as understood by traditionalist AND as understood by Quinnself.

I'll just note the conclusion of the study: Conclusion: mRNA-1273 myocardial injury was more common than previously thought, being mild and transient, and more frequent in women versus men.

Ol' Tarheel pays an awful lot of attention to people he "ignores," doesn't he? So just a coincidence that a term favored by (maybe even invented by? I haven't looked) QAnon is the title of a movie that argues that the things QAnon said were true. Got it.

And yet she kept her House in order and delivered articles of impeachment not once, but twice. Which her critics say was definitely the Worst Idea Ever in History since Trump had zero chance of actually being removed from office, but one that definitely should be repeated by McCarthy's House under precisely the same circumstances.