2024 - A Blank Canvas

[hurricanehink]

Omg the level of detail is fantastic! From small bits such as Eminem introducing VP-nominee Peters, to the electoral histories, the plausible future tragedies like mass shootings and explosions. It‘s been a while since I’ve read such a detailed future TL. Kudos. And I hope you don’t stop at 1/20/2025!

[SaintStan86]

UPDATE: Before I continue with this TL, here's an update on last night's blockbuster primaries...

In Missouri, it turns out Eric Greitens was indeed beyond salvageable, as even Donald Trump's vague "ERIC" endorsement turned into a clear choice for state Attorney General Eric Schmitt, who appears to have made Missouri less of a priority for Democrats now. He will still have to face Trudy Busch Valentine (who is an heiress to the family behind the King of Beers itself, Budweiser), but it's fair to say that Schmitt is certainly a much less offensive Republican on the ballot than "the other Eric". In other words, get ready to see Sen. Schmitt a lot on TV come 2023, forcing the state's other Senator, Sen. Josh Hawley - his predecessor as Attorney General - to compete for TV time. ("My stolen election theory is better than your stolen election theory! Eeeeeeee!") While I have updated some of the posts (particularly the more recent ones where certain individuals are speaking at the conventions, for instance) to reflect this, I have decided to leave others alone and let these updates do the talking. Other than that, my predictions in Missouri appear to have gone as planned, with the two open Republican seats indeed being won by Mark Alford in the western-based 4th District between suburban Kansas City and Columbia and Eric Burlison in the Springfield-based 7th District.

Across the state line in Kansas, voters rejected a referendum (marketed on the pro-life side as "Value Them Both") to give their legislature the power to restrict abortion with more than 60 percent of the vote, while at the same time Republicans renominated Scott Schwab for Secretary of State and nominated Kris Kobach for Attorney General (yes, that Kris Kobach). Of course, we all know that Sen. Jerry Moran will be heavily favored to win a third term over Democratic former Kansas City Mayor Mark Holland, while current Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt is gearing up for a Battle Royale with Gov. Laura Kelly. I feel sorry for anyone who has to do the news in Kansas City (as Alford did before he decided to talk politics), not even knowing which one is Derek Schmidt and which one is Eric Schmitt...except the former is a buzzcut version of Hank Hill (complete with thin-framed glasses) and the latter has lighter hair. The one call that was easy? Rep. Sharice Davids versus Amanda Adkins in the 3rd District outside Kansas City, which will be a barnburner.

Of course we all know Michigan was going to be interesting to watch, but while I would have voted for Kevin Rinke given his business outsider status had I voted there, Tudor Dixon has effectively become a juggernaut (and more so because of the DeVos family than Trump) and is going to give Gretchen Whitmer a much needed reality check, even if the polling numbers initially don't look rosy. And while I initially went with former HUD Secretary John Gibbs over Peter Meijer in the 3rd District, I flipped back to Meijer because of his cash advantage as well as the possibility that his "independent streak" would carry him through in a swing district. Apparently, that didn't work as Gibbs narrowly defeated Meijer on Tuesday. I'm still going with Gibbs given the GOP trendlines and the district not being too out of reach for Republicans, but it's hard to imagine anyone being more ecstatic about this news besides Trump than Hillary Scholten. Not surprisingly, this district is being targeted by the DCCC in this TL as it already is IRL.

While I did get right the GOP candidates running against Elissa Slotkin and Dan Kildee, I also miscalculated the Metro Detroit races on the Democratic side. While my prediction on the 10th District in Macomb County stuck, I missed the mark for the Democrats in the 11th and 13th Districts. I went with Andy Levin over Haley Stevens given Levin's family has a long history in the district (and in Michigan when you count Carl Levin) as well as the fact that southern Oakland County has long been the epicenter of Metro Detroit's Jewish community. However, geography worked to Stevens' advantage, and after decades of service to Metro Detroit, the Levin name will no longer be adorning the halls of Congress, and Stevens will be favored in November; while I do not rule out the possibility of Mark Ambrose scoring a shocking upset given the presence of areas like Troy, Auburn Hills, Waterford Township and Bloomfield Hills, the stronger Democratic numbers in Pontiac, Farmington Hills and Royal Oak will certainly work against the GOP; Ambrose should be lucky the new 11th doesn't include Southfield. And the Detroit-based 13th is also one where I threw a jump ball, but with State Rep. Shri Thanedar as the Democratic nominee here, not only is he headed to Congress, but Detroit will not be represented by a Black member of Congress for the first time in decades, as John James is a Republican whose 10th does not go south of 8 Mile.

In Washington state, the Senate race went as expected with Sen. Patty Murray facing Republican Tiffany Smiley in November, but it appears that Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler has survived in the southwest-based 3rd District in part due to the "top two" primary, and will now face a Democrat in November, auto repair shop owner Marie Perez. That has to be a pretty bitter pill for Joe Kent and his supporters to swallow, and it wouldn't shock me if they attempt to "poo poo" the primary format, which is also going to be expected in Alaska with regards to Kelly Tshibaka in the Senate race where the Democrats are intent on really pushing Lisa Murkowski over the top unless Republicans close ranks completely behind Tshibaka and throw Murkowski to the wolves. I can expect the same bitter pill to be swallowed by Loren Culp in the central-based 4th, where Rep. Dan Newhouse (who like Herrera Beutler voted to impeach Trump) will also face a Democrat in November, Doug White. The 8th in the exurbs outside Seattle will be very closely watched, but it's still not clear who Rep. Kim Schrier will face (which makes for a great choice for ranked-choice voting), so I'm going to hold off on that. The situation in the 3rd and 4th districts might also change, since Washington and its mail-in ballots are notorious for being slow.

Last but not least, let's talk about Arizona. While the vote for the GOP primary for Governor against the Democratic nominee, Secretary of State Katie Hobbs, remains undecided, I wouldn't be shocked if Kari Lake holds on to her lead given that she rose late in the evening whereas Karrin Taylor Robson led early on in most of the state. As of now, Robson is only ahead in Maricopa County and trailing everywhere else, and even there her lead over Lake is tenuous. It also appears the "Trump slate" has won downballot as well, which will make for a very interesting midterm in Arizona given the obvious of what has happened here. But regardless, it's fair to say my projection of a close and contentious GOP primary in Arizona has come true - two years early. While I will be pulling for Blake Masters and hoping for unity in the post-primary phase, Arizona Republicans are making the long dysfunctional Illinois and New Jersey GOP establishments look like well-behaved, well-mannered "sweet little boys" in comparison.

Lastly, on the Arizona congressional frontier - for which a good chunk of competitive seats exist - David Schweikert survived his primary challenge with a plurality in the north Phoenix-based 1st and will now face Democrat Jevin Hodge, while Eli Crane prevailed in the northern-based 2nd District and is likely set to defeat Tom O'Halleran in November. Restaurateur Kelly Cooper currently leads Tanya Wheeless in the south suburban Phoenix-based 4th District, and it looks like he'll be the GOP nominee in November against Greg Stanton (though I'm still sticking with a pickup here). Lastly, Juan Ciscomani cleared the deck in the suburban Tucson-based 6th, but instead of Giffords hero Daniel Hernández Jr. it will be Kirsten Engel instead; it still does not change the fact that the new 6th favors Ciscomani and that's where this race will stay, regardless of how bad the situation may be for the GOP up the ballot.

Tomorrow night - even though it technically already is "tomorrow night" in Texas, Tennessee will go to the polls, and the saga in the 5th District will be solved. I believe Kurt Winstead has the gravitas to win here, but a lot of people say this is Beth Harwell's to lose. Except I digress...I was hoping Manny Sethi would run here after the masterful campaign he ran here in 2020 against the favored Bill Hagerty in the Senate primary, and I thought the way the Tennessee GOP establishment treated Morgan Ortagus, Robby Starbuck and others was absolute horse****. Regardless, best of luck to all running in tomorrow's primary in the Volunteer State...Just remember to give the people of Houston their Oilers history back!

With the general election now well underway (save for a few primary states that have yet to settle their fields), here is the latest Electoral College projection...

To no great surprise, the general election map is deadlocked as the West and East Coasts for the most part belong to Kamala Harris, while the Gulf Coast along with most of the Midwest and Great Plains belong to Ron DeSantis. The polls are relatively close in the Pacific Northwest with Washington and Oregon (both of which have not gone for Republicans since Ronald Reagan's 1984 landslide) appearing to be potentially competitive in exurban areas outside of Seattle and Portland. While Colorado and New Mexico are also leaning towards Harris, who continues to enjoy strong support in Denver and Boulder as well as Albuquerque's Bernalillo County, much of the rest of these states are going strongly for DeSantis. The Democrats' vaunted "blue wall" that Donald Trump penetrated in 2016 is clearly up for grabs, with Minnesota being sought after by both parties and Michigan largely leaning blue because of Sen. Gary Peters as the vice presidential running mate on the Democratic ticket.

Of note is the fact that Iowa and Ohio - traditional battleground states that remain such until Election Day - are leaning towards DeSantis as Harris has largely struggled in rural areas within both states as well as Illinois, which is now only leaning Democratic as DeSantis's strong numbers downstate and increasingly competitive numbers in the Chicago suburbs are putting the Land of Lincoln - which has not been considered a "swing state" since Al Gore's strong performance there in 2000 - in play. Missouri and Indiana both have competitive Senate and gubernatorial races, which has put the Show Me State in potential play for Democrats even though both states stand a strong chance at staying Republican. And while Nebraska is heavily favored to vote for DeSantis, the state's congressional district votes - which are split from the statewide totals - span the vote spectrum with the Omaha-based 2nd District tilting towards DeSantis, the Lincoln-based 1st largely favoring the Republican incumbent, and DeSantis widely expected to win the 3rd District that covers the state's rural remainder.

The South for the most part is favoring DeSantis, with his favorite son status in Florida pushing what otherwise has been the proverbial swing state in recent elections - one that is usually a "tossup" heading into November - into "leans GOP" territory early on. The presence of Nikki Haley on the Republican ticket as DeSantis's running mate has placed the state almost out-of-reach for Democrats save for Harris's enormous support among African Americans here and in many other states, and has also pushed North Carolina into "Leans GOP" territory as well (though the state's White liberals and Black voters also stand to make the state competitive as well).

Six states stand out as "tossup" states for November: Arizona, Georgia, Nevada, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. These 66 electoral votes have emerged as the biggest battlegrounds on the map, with the latter two having been part of Trump's "blue wall" breach from 2016 and the former two having flipped for Biden in 2020 - with both Republican Governors ultimately ending up on Trump's "hit list" in the 2022 midterms, though Georgia's Brian Kemp did easily survive his primary and won reelection over Stacey Abrams. Nevada and New Hampshire have not voted for a Republican presidential candidate since 2004 and 2000, respectively, and both states also have all-Republican congressional delegations that are being targeted by the DCCC, with the former also hosting a competitive Senate race and the latter a popular moderate Republican Governor seeking reelection.

In most national polling, Gov. DeSantis holds a lead over Vice President Harris, with some of the polls showing the lead greater than the margin of error, as fast national polling following the Democratic National Convention showed Harris enjoying a bump in the polls, with some even suggesting a virtual tie or a 1-2 point lead over DeSantis. However, many observers predict the numbers will return to somewhere around 3-5 points with respect to DeSantis's lead over Harris, with Harris likely to lean on the opinions of young voters, suburban women and Hispanics in order to gain the upper hand since the working-class vote - traditionally a source of strength for Democrats - continues to be leaning towards DeSantis as many blue-collar votes continue to show strong disapproval of the Harris's social policy, with some Democrats outperforming the Harris baseline in polling amongst these crucial voters.

The Senate, meanwhile, is shaping up to be a major battleground this year, but the race has become less about whether or not Republicans can maintain their majority and more about whether or not they will reach the proverbial threshold of 60 Senators needed to advance a DeSantis administration agenda in the clear...

With Democrats having lost California in the most bizarre of circumstances and likely to lose West Virginia on Election Night, the situation has become more about how Democrats can avoid a situation where Republicans (should DeSantis win) steamroll their entire agenda through the Congress without needing votes from the minority or risking the possibility of a filibuster. The party has coalesced its efforts around Missouri, Texas, Florida, Indiana and Nebraska (the latter of which is home to a late-breaking opportunity from Omaha City Councilmember Pete Festersen, who has been running a vigorous campaign and is outpolling Harris in Omaha, Lincoln and even in parts of rural Nebraska). Maine, Montana, Wisconsin and Vermont are all tossup states, with the latter in this category solely due to the splintering of the Democratic base vote between supporters of state Attorney General T.J. Donovan (who enjoys strong support from the Democratic establishment) and former Lt. Gov. David Zuckerman, who is running with the endorsement of the Vermont Progressive Party and leads among more progressive Democrats. This has created an opening for another former Lt. Gov. in GOP nominee Brian Dubie, who also hopes to benefit from the reelection bid of popular moderate Gov. Phil Scott.

Ohio, Pennsylvania and Virginia have become tenuous states for the Democrats, with Republicans running aggressively in all three states and bemoaning the "hard left turns" of their previously moderate Democratic incumbents. While Arizona and Michigan, previously considered tossup states, have become a bit more friendly to Democrats, this is largely due to certain circumstances not related directly to their candidacies between Arizona's brutal Republican primary where nominee David Schweikert has struggled to unite his party and Michigan being the home state of Peters. Minnesota, Washington, New Mexico and New Jersey are also leaning Democratic as well with top-tier Republican opponents polling competitively in these otherwise liberal-hued states. Republicans also have emerging races in Delaware (where a member of the du Pont family has emerged as the odds-on favorite for the Senate against Rep. Lisa Blunt Rochester) and New York (where State Sen. Mike Martucci has begun to catch up against Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand in recent polls.

To be continued, with a little help from our friends at the NFL...

[NewYorkExpress]

I imagine that unless McConnell loses the Senate majority, the filibuster would be the first thing to go in a Republican Administration after 2024.

[SaintStan86]

First week of the general election...

September 2, 2024
DeSANTIS RALLIES REPUBLICANS IN OHIO; DEMOCRATS MEET HARRIS IN ST. LOUIS
The general election began in earnest as Ron DeSantis campaigned in Dublin, Ohio on Monday, as the Florida Governor traveled to the important swing state to rally voters in the affluent Columbus suburb at Muirfield Village Golf Club, where he was joined by none other than golf legend Jack Nicklaus (who built and continues to redesign holes on the course which annually hosts the Memorial Tournament, a regular stop on the PGA Tour the weekend after Memorial Day) on the first hole of his tournament-caliber course (with the audience situated in stands normally used for the tournament). During the speech DeSantis stressed the importance of "making sure every vote counts and that your vote is not altered to push a political outcome", empowering volunteers to sign up as "poll watchers" to ensure that voter fraud is "caught and trapped before it spreads like a wildfire". Nicklaus endorsed DeSantis at the event, proclaiming "With Donald Trump, we managed to stem the bleeding that Barack Obama was doing, and for which Joe Biden ripped off the band-aid too soon. Ron DeSantis will not just patch things up, but sew it back like it never even happened" before presenting DeSantis with an old wooden driver engraved with his signature and DeSantis's name.

After remarking to the 'Golden Bear' himself, "You know, I'm going to go out here and give this thing a whirl", DeSantis proceeded to hit a golf ball - in full sportcoat - from the hole to the crowd's amazement, with his young son Mason in tow. After receiving a message from an aide further down the hole, DeSantis remarked "I'm just told I hit it past the halfway mark" as he walked back to the audience and continued "We are just past that, and we're only getting started with these next two months on the horizon...Let's keep our eyes on the prize, for the reward awaits us at the end!" (DeSantis would proceed finish his round of golf the following morning, staying in the clubhouse's sleeping quarters before he headed out to Colorado for a rally in the Denver suburb of Castle Rock the following afternoon).

Meanwhile, Harris addressed a crowd at Chaifetz Arena in St. Louis, the on-campus arena of Saint Louis University's basketball teams, on Monday night as the Vice President began her general election campaign in earnest. "As we embark on this journey together, let me remind you of how far we have come to this point in our campaign for the people. This is the Gateway to the West, and while we don't intend to go straight west, we are halfway to our goal. But when you join me and Senator (Gary) Peters, we are going to create a stronger, more perfect union, and continue the great work that President Biden never seems to get credit for", as she was joined on stage by U.S. Senate candidate Nicole Galloway and several other mostly St. Louis area Democratic candidates, including most notoriously Rep. Cori Bush of Missouri's 1st District, who also made remarks contrasting the two presidential candidates on criminal justice matters: "While Ron DeSantis spends his time trying to kiss the ass of Donald Trump and his robotic fans, we are putting in motion the message of fair, effective justice that breaks the cycle of broken families and broken lives", without elaborating on specifics regarding DeSantis's stances on the issue.

Sen. Gary Peters was in Ohio on Monday, where he hosted a Democratic auction and banquet at a union hall in the Toledo area and urged the audience to "take a strong stand for labor, and a strong stand against Gov. DeSantis and his 'survivalnomics' strategy of starvation wages, 'deathcare' instead of healthcare and making your boss richer and your family poorer", while Republican running mate Nikki Haley was in Tennessee to stump for Sen. Marsha Blackburn at a Young Republican gathering at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville, where Haley called on "Volunteers to roll up their sleeves and become volunteers in our campaign to deliver a strong rebuke to the Democrats and their friends in the media who care little about your future and everything about taking the cream while you're left eating crumbs".

September 4, 2024
FIRST PRESIDENTIAL DEBATE TO BE HELD IN DALLAS; MUIR, CO-PANELISTS TO SERVE AS MODERATORS
On Wednesday, the first presidential debate of the 2024 campaign cycle was announced with the debate scheduled to take place on Thursday, September 19th at McFarlin Memorial Auditorium, located on the campus of Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas. The debate will be moderated by ABC World News Tonight anchor David Muir, with four other panelists, columnist and political reporter Bud Kennedy of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, conservative Dallas-Fort Worth talk radio host Mark Davis (who is also a contributor to The Dallas Morning News), former Dallas Mayor and Pizza Hut CEO Mike Rawlings, and senior Southern Methodist University political professor Cal Jillson. This is the first presidential debate not to be conducted by the disbanded Commission on Presidential Debates, which decided to fold in 2023 as the Republican National Committee persisted in refusing to allow its candidates to participate in their debates, with the Democratic National Committee deciding to follow suit "for the sake of guaranteeing a fair debate with the American people in 2024".

The selection of Dallas as the site for the first debate is symbolic, as the Metroplex is set to be a presidential battleground with Tarrant County having narrowly gone for Joe Biden in 2020, once competitive, Republican-leaning Dallas County having become a reliable Democratic stronghold in Texas, and traditionally Republican Collin and Denton counties coming close to being lost for Donald Trump that year. The debate will be attended by guests from both parties' presidential tickets along with undecided voters from across North Texas; potential attendees must not have participated in the 2024 primaries for the Democratic, Republican or Libertarian primaries - all of which have ballot access in Texas, and cannot have contributed to any of the candidates participating in the debate.

While one of the major criticisms centered around third-party candidates being excluded, the status quo has prevailed for the first debate as the only candidates invited to participate in the first debate are Vice President Kamala Harris and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, with the national aggregate average showing DeSantis at 44.6 percent and Harris at 40.0 percent; 8 percent of the remaining 15.4 percent is split between third parties with Forward's Andrew Yang pulling an average of 4.9 percent. The decision to snub Yang despite promises of a "fairer debate opportunity" for notable third-party contenders, to no great surprise, is met with scorn from the Yang camp who vowed on Wednesday "to seek an alternate opportunity to gain the attention of the American people who deserve a clear contrast to the two-party monopoly that has divided our country". Another candidate, Constitution Party nominee Mike Lindell, also expressed dismay: "The people desire to hear from all of the candidates running for President, and it goes without saying that I won't be watching this debate in two weeks". Representatives for Libertarian nominee Dave Smith and Green Party nominee Norman Solomon have also reached out regarding a potential "alternative debate".

It's Thursday night, September 5th. While the campaigns of Kamala Harris and Ron DeSantis are in full swing, football fans across the country are tuned in to watch the Super Bowl champion Dallas Cowboys, fresh off their sixth Super Bowl title, take on the Arizona Cardinals in a rematch of the 2023 NFC Championship game that sent the Cowboys to Super Bowl LVIII in Las Vegas, where they defeated the AFC Champion Los Angeles Chargers...

From NBC...
MIKE TIRICO: We welcome you to AT&T Stadium in Arlington for the kickoff of the 2024 season as we kickoff NBC's coverage of a new NFL season, where Dak Prescott and the defending Super Bowl champion Dallas Cowboys play host to Kyler Murray and the Arizona Cardinals in a rematch of their epic NFC championship game from last year in Glendale, where the Cowboys came from behind to beat the Cowboys with a fourth-down touchdown as time expired. Mike Tirico here with Cris Collinsworth, we'll go down to Melissa Stark down at the sideline in a moment. But first, how 'bout them Cowboys, Cris? This is truly America's Team again, or is it?
CRIS COLLINSWORTH: Yeah, you can say so. At least we have no more memes about watching Super Bowl highlights on VHS...that's for sure!

It's the end of the first quarter. The Cowboys are up 14-3 on the Cardinals...

MIKE TIRICO: And the Cowboys will corral themselves to the other side of AT&T Stadium, up 14-3 on the Cardinals on two masterful touchdowns by Dak Prescott. We'll be back with the 2nd Quarter from Arlington after these words from your NBC station...

During the commercial break, an ad begins playing, showing a relatively normal teenage girl in a suburban driveway who walks into her home, walking in with her cell phone and what appears to be a Twilight book...

A young boy is looking through his baseball trading card and sports memorabilia collection...

A marching band is participating in a parade on a Main Street somewhere in America, with drill team members and a VFW chapter behind them...

A young Asian boy is showcasing his science project at a science fair...

Young minority folks are serving customers at a fast food restaurant...

A group of volunteers handle a shelter dog outside a house...

An interfaith charity event is happening at a community center...

While the music starts off patriotic, to the tune of "America the Beautiful"...the video suddenly takes an ominous turn as each of the five scenes turns into a split second mélange of shocking images...

Upon the teenage girl entering her bedroom, her mother - donning a cross necklace and a "MAGA" shirt - lashes out at her daughter and yanks the book out of daughter's hand, getting into a brawl with the girl as her father knocks several of her books, magazines and other material goods onto the floor of her room. The hysterical girl struggles to fight back, but her angry father attempts to raise his hand and strike her...

The young boy's father, wearing a "Trump Won" shirt, screams at his kids as he knocks his trading card collection and throws his sports memorabilia to the ground...

A white man, dressed in black and flying a Confederate flag on top of his car, deliberately drives his SUV into the parade and runs over several of the parade participants, including an elderly military vet, and some of the aforementioned dancers and marching band members before running into a young family...

A group of bullies torment the Asian boy and knock over his science project, as one of the bullies (donning an unmarked red cap) knocks off his glasses and another attacks the principal with what appears to be itching powder mixed with water...

An angry middle-aged woman lashes out at the fast-food worker, throwing her food and drink at the minority cashier, shouting "You ******* ******" (words bleeped out for obvious reasons)...

A group of young boys walking down the street throw a brick, striking one of the animal shelter volunteers as another attempts to set the shelter dog on fire...

A pale young white male dressed in a trenchcoat shows up at the interfaith event - where a pride flag also happens to be on display - with an AR-15, shooting at the crowd...

Throughout it all, audio quotes from Donald Trump, Tucker Carlson, Josh Hawley, Marjorie Taylor Greene and Charlie Kirk are interspersed throughout the video as the blood-spattered head of the injured veteran, the crumpled glasses and parts of the destroyed science project, the stoic (if angry) pose of the mass shooter at the interfaith event, and the teenage girl - now hysterically crying as evidenced from her face being lit up by an off-screen bonfire of what appears to be her personal possessions - is shown as a menacing sounding, high-pitched young woman's voice shows up...

"This is what Republicans have become. A party that hates successful people. A party that hates our families. A party that hates dreamers and doers. A party that hates our heroes both on the frontlines and in our community. Because of one bigoted racist man and his anti-American, fascist enablers who encourage this hate and love Russia, China, North Korea and Saudi Arabia - all countries who hate our values - more than America. Republicans are Bigots...Republicans are Racists...Republicans are Traitors...Republicans are Bullies...Republicans are Corrupt...Republicans are Trailer Trash. Don't vote for them", as ominous sounding red and black-colored scenes showing a burning flame, a silhouette of Josh Hawley and his raised fist from the January 6, 2021 attack on the Capitol, a Confederate flag and other offensive items are presented in a red-and-black slihouette with a more angry-mouthed silhouette of Trump's face in the background.

The narrator concludes with "Decency for America paid for and is responsible for this advertisement. Because you either have decency or you don't. End of story."

And so, the commercial break is over, returning to the game...

MIKE TIRICO: Well, okay, I guess we'll go to an aerial shot of AT&T Stadium presented by Goodyear and the famous Goodyear blimp flying over Arlington on this beautiful night here in North Texas, and what an amazing shot that is.
CRIS COLLINSWORTH: Man, I tell you, whoever filmed that ad probably spent more money than Dak Prescott is owed this year. And I see Roger Goodell and Jerry Jones on their phones. Chris Christie, too.
MIKE TIRICO: Boy, Goodell looks tense. Maybe he's telling Kliff Kingsbury to get his act together. Especially with the way the Cardinals are playing...

For those who are wondering, Chris Christie is a Cowboys fan (despite obviously hailing from the backyard of the New York Giants) and was invited along with Goodell and Jones to sit in the latter's suite at AT&T Stadium. And while it's not clear what's going on and won't be for some time until at least later in the evening, Goodell is on the phone with 45...

(Inside Jerry Jones' suite at AT&T Stadium, via an NFL Films cameraman...)
ROGER GOODELL (on the phone): Hello, is this Donald?...Yes, you don't need to ask me, that was the most disgusting ad I've seen in my lifetime...
CHRIS CHRISTIE (on the phone): You have to do something. This is not looking good. We don't want to have to bail out the sports memorabilia market.
ROGER GOODELL (on the phone): Yes, please do. Get in touch with your lawyers and mine...this is beyond bottom of the barrel. Go call (RNC Chairwoman) Ronna (McDaniel) now. Let me get the other commissioners on the phone...
COWBOYS SPOKESPERSON: ESPN and channel 8 (WFAA, ABC affiliate in Dallas) just called, they're on the way to the stadium...
JERRY JONES: Bet the Dallas Morning News will be next...
COWBOYS INTERN: Sean Hannity just denounced the ad on his show!
ROGER GOODELL: Sh*t! This is not going away anytime soon...
CHRIS CHRISTIE: Oh it's going to be the top story all over the country tonight...
JERRY JONES (on the phone): Hello, yes ma'am get the ladies from PR on it now. I'm getting a statement ready to share with the press. This ain't cow patties, more like bloody diarrhea...
COWBOYS INTERN: CNN just broke in!
COWBOYS SPOKESPERSON: Oh my, Twitter is on fire...
ROGER GOODELL: Get me a room...it's going to be a long night...

Will this Hail Mary end with a come-from-behind touchdown? Or a pick-six? You decide...

[SaintStan86]

The Dallas Cowboys defeated the Arizona Cardinals 39-10 on a strong performance by Cowboys QB Dak Prescott as Cardinals QB Kyler Murray had no touchdowns and 3 interceptions, with the Cardinals' only touchdown coming on an interception converted into a pick-six touchdown in the 3rd quarter. However, the return of the NFL season has been soured by a controversial ad that was well beyond the control of NFL...and NBC. While there were no doubt outraged football fans (not unlike what happened in Week 3 of the 2017 season in response to then-President Donald Trump's criticism of kneeling NFL players), the response is sudden and quick...

September 6, 2024
NFL CONDEMNS ANTI-GOP AD AIRED DURING KICKOFF GAME AS TRUMP ISSUES BOUNTY LOOKING FOR SOURCE OF AD; NBC TO LAUNCH INTERNAL INVESTIGATION
Within moments of a controversial ad that attacked Republicans as "trailer trash" and depicted scenes of abusive behavior committed by supposed Republicans and supporters of former President Donald Trump, which aired during the National Football League's annual kickoff game on NBC between the Arizona Cardinals and Dallas Cowboys in Arlington, Texas on Thursday night, the NFL swiftly condemned the ad without hesitation as league and team executives, broadcast partners, sponsors and others also joined in the chorus of various stakeholders condemning the ad. Without resistance, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell promptly released a statement:

"What was supposed to be a glorious night, celebrating the return of a wonderful American tradition for another season, was turned upside down by an outside advertisement from a rogue political group that attempted to portray one of the two major political parties in our country as undeserving of American citizenship or participation in public society. The advertisement was a flagrant violation of our advertising standards that not only violates standards prohibiting the broadcast of provocative political content (including vague attacks) during commercial breaks, but also contains content so objectionable that it would not pass muster with the FCC nor network broadcast standards.

The NFL is committed to excellence when it comes to the broadcast presentation of our games and other associated programming that we air both during the season and in the offseason. It also recognizes that our football family comes from all political stripes, from all ethnic and religious backgrounds, and from all corners of the country regardless of the color of their skin, the income in their household, and the neighborhoods they live in. While he did not deem it necessary, it spoke volumes for me to reach out to former President Donald J. Trump midway during this advertisement where I explained to him this was unacceptable, and could not agree more with him when he called the ad "the most degrading, filthy and unacceptable ad I have ever seen in my lifetime". Because it was just that horrible and offensive, and completely ill-fitting of the word "decency" this so-called 'Decency for America' claims to advocate for.

On behalf of the NFL and our 32 franchises and their owners, I also extend my apologies to the Republican National Committee for the ingratiating way in which their party was maligned, as well as to the campaign of Gov. Ron DeSantis, who while I am not explicitly endorsing anyone in this presidential election, has been instrumental in ensuring that our league, and many other professional and amateur sports leagues, got back out into the public eye and to participate and hold events in the face of debilitating challenges that the sports world faced during the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as during the reckoning the country faced in the wake of the murder of George Floyd. Fans are truly what make the NFL special, and if you have felt offended by what you saw on Thursday night, I am truly sorry.

We are eager to work with the proper authorities to investigate the origins of this horrible, distasteful ad that our league nor NBC, our broadcast partner that aired tonight's game to a national audience, expected to see on TV tonight. In closing, we look forward to seeing you tune in this weekend to watch the remainder of our kickoff weekend as we go through Week 1 of the 2024 season together as a sport, and as a country.

- Roger Goodell, NFL Commissioner

Former President Trump, to no great surprise, blasted the ad as a "blatant attack on an entire half of the country and its supporters, using the most LIBELOUS and FALSE stereotypes about Republicans and the 74 million Americans who voted for me in 2020, spoke out BIG when the totally false election results were flipping in Biden's favor, and have kept the faith in electing Republicans to Congress in the midterms (and also getting rid of the horrible Liz Cheney and her minions who falsely attacked me for what happened that day in 2021), and are now working overtime to elect the wonderful Governor of Florida, Ron DeSantis, who is going to Make America Great Again and defend the freedoms that President Biden and his partner-in-crime, Kamala Harris, have routinely stripped away in the name of "a great transformation" that is anything but great. If it weren't for the gracious call Roger Goodell gave me last night, I would have turned off the TV, period. NBC should be ashamed of themselves - as if their patron saint status in the FAKE NEWS MEDIA was already bad enough - for allowing this filth to be broadcast to a national audience that just wanted to watch a football game, and nothing more!" Trump continued to reiterate the statement throughout the day on Truth Social, as did many others on the right, and the following day issued a $10 million bounty to "any American who has information regarding the very sources behind this so-called 'Decency for America' group, which is by the way the most ironic and poorly named outside political group in the history of our great nation!"

Indeed, the reactions on the right, as they were in 2017, vacillated between boycotting the NFL and urging fans to demand that players stand up for the national anthem in Week 1's games on Sunday, though unlike Week 3 in 2017 (which came as Trump made a series of controversial comments that were denounced by the NFL and its teams, followed by kneeling and raised fists from a number of players and subsequent YouTube videos of NFL fans burning jerseys), the reaction on social media was relatively tame in comparison with few if any such reactions in part due to Goodell's swift response to the controversy. The controversy embroiling the NFL dates to the 2016 preseason, when then-San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick chose to sit on the bench during the playing of the national anthem in protest of police brutality against African Americans. After consulting with a U.S. Army Green Beret named Nate Boyer, a former walk-on for the University of Texas football team who became the team's starting long snapper over four seasons, Kaepernick chose to kneel during games until his eventual release from the 49ers after the 2016 season, though the practice's emulation by other NFL players - fueled by the fact that Kaepernick has never taken another snap in the NFL since the 2016 season - caused consternation amongst more conservative NFL fans as well as some more liberal ones defending Kaepernick.

Kaepernick himself was not impressed by the move. Though he similarly was not impressed by the league's all-encompassing goals to "End Racism" in the 2020 seasons and beyond following the racial reckoning stemming from the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis and its subsequent civil unrest nationwide, Kaepernick (as he did in 2016) also took to social media to express his "displeasure" with the notion of voting in an election "where it seems nothing is going to change for the better, and where the promises for real justice are unlikely to be met". This obviously did not sit well with ESPN commentator Stephen A. Smith, long a critic of Kaepernick for his refusal to activate himself in electoral politics. "Once again, Colin Kaepernick wants to play it safe, and once again not activate himself. Who gives a damn anymore?!? You've been out of the league for eight seasons now, and it's the same old dance, the same song, but no real change in the winds. Yes, that was a very stupid ad, I don't care how bad the other side may be, but at least practice what you preach instead of try to be a poor man's Donald Trump wearing Democrat clothes. Cause it ain't 'decency' when you resort to stereotypes you hear on some random Reddit or whatever the hell they use".

Meanwhile, a number of Hollywood celebrities were indeed supportive of the ad, which resulted in extensive coverage on Entertainment Tonight, Inside Edition and other tabloid and entertainment news shows (as well as the usual suspects on cable TV news and talk radio). Commentator Raymond Arroyo (filling in Friday night for titular host Laura Ingraham on The Ingraham Angle on Fox News Channel) dedicating almost the entire show to the fallout from the controversial ad including praiseworthy tweets of the ad from celebrities, (mostly) Democratic activists and candidates and other stakeholders sympathetic to the ad. Players for both the Cowboys and Cardinals were mostly unaware of the ad, but the general reaction was that the ad was "too hot for TV" and "probably written by someone who's been watching too many true crime shows".

Arizona Cardinals defensive end J.J. Watt was particularly unimpressed: "Look, this bothers me all the time whenever it gets political and someone wants to start something", referencing also the first game of the 2020 NFL season when he played for the Houston Texans (and is regarded as that team's most iconic player in its history) and drew controversy when his team went into the tunnel during the pregame ceremony on the road against the Super Bowl LIV champion Kansas City Chiefs. - the first regular season game played since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic and the George Floyd riots. Watt has also been as well known off the field for his charitable and philanthropic efforts, including raising millions for Hurricane Harvey relief during the 2017 season as well as advocating for the Pat Tillman Foundation, named for the former Cardinals player-turned-Army Corporal who was killed in duty with friendly fire while serving his country in Afghanistan, upon his signing with the Cardinals in 2021.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis spent the day talking with executives from the NFL and other major sports leagues and governing bodies (including the NBA, Major League Baseball, the NHL, the PGA Tour, NASCAR, the NCAA, WWE and UFC, as well as overseas sporting bodies including the Premier League, LIV Golf and the International Olympic Committee), as well as team owners and executives including the DeVos family, owners of the NBA's Orlando Magic (which itself drew attention during the NBA's 2020 season in its pandemic-protected bubble at Walt Disney World when one of its players, Jonathan Isaac, refused to kneel with his teammates), Jacksonville Jaguars owner Shahid Khan, and legendary NBA coach/executive Pat Riley, the team president of the Miami Heat. DeSantis himself condemned the ad, calling it "not only a blatant attack on every American who believes in conservative principles and values, but also pushes a gross, inflammatory stereotype that is completely untrue and without merit, while once again unnecessarily injecting politics into sports". Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri also used the controversy to reiterate his push to repeal Major League Baseball's antitrust exemption, but also reached out to Kansas City Chiefs Chairman and CEO Clark Hunt, who joined many team owners and executives in condemning the ad.

Immediately following the game Thursday night, NBC News broke into programming with a Special Report bulletin, where NBC Nightly News anchor Lester Holt (who had already returned to his residence in Manhattan when the ad aired) was whisked back to the network's studios in Rockefeller Center before the game concluded to report on the controversial ad and issued an apology on behalf of the network, reporting that "NBCUniversal, and our parent company Comcast, has condemned the advertisement as inappropriate for broadcast, and this advertisement has been ruled a violation of the broadcast standards both of NBC and the NFL, whose Commissioner Roger Goodell also condemned the ad in a statement issued during tonight's game in Arlington, Texas". NBC, through NBC Sports Group President Pete Bevacqua, NBCUniversal CEO Jeff Shell and Comcast CEO Brian Roberts, also announced in the statement that it plans to conduct an internal investigation into the placement of the two-minute advertisement during one of the commercial breaks, with more details on the investigation to come soon.

The situation did not resolve itself overnight at the network and its 200+ affiliates across the nation, with the online servers of several NBC affiliates crashing at various points during Thursday evening and early Friday morning. The controversy has already drawn comparisons to other NBC broadcast controversies, including the infamous 1968 "Heidi Game" in a which a made-for-TV adaptation of the children's tale Heidi interrupted the epic ending of an AFL game between the New York Jets and Oakland Raiders, as well as the 1992 fallout from Irish musician Sinead O'Connor's performance on Saturday Night Live in which she tore up a picture of Pope John Paul II in protest of child sexual abuse in the Catholic Church. Some have also begun to already draw comparisons to the 2004 scandal involving a CBS News story regarding then-President George W. Bush's service in the Texas Air National Guard, in which Dan Rather came under fire for presenting as "authentic" documents regarding Bush's military service that were later discovered to be forgeries, while others including Elon Musk believed the source of the stereotypes came from "random Twitter users spouting off false nonsense and stereotypes you hear about in The Onion".

September 8, 2024
THIRD PARTY CANDIDATES TO HOST JOIN DEBATE ON TWITCH; UPSTATE NEW YORK TO HOST VICE PRESIDENTIAL DEBATE
After failing to gain access for the first presidential debate upcoming in Dallas, four major third-party candidates agreed on Sunday to take part in a "People's Debate" to be held at the Moscone Center in San Francisco on Saturday, September 28th. The debate will be broadcast on Twitch, an online streaming platform that is best known for its live video game streams, and will feature Forward Party candidate Andrew Yang, Constitution Party candidate Mike Lindell, Libertarian Party candidate Dave Smith and Green Party candidate Norman Solomon. While the committee organizing the debate has also invited the major party nominees in the Democratic Party's Kamala Harris (who herself once served San Francisco as District Attorney) and the Republican Party's Ron DeSantis, the organizers have also acknowledged that the chances of both candidates appearing in the debate are slim, but have nonetheless announced that there will be six podiums with the two major parties situated in the middle - if only as "empty suits" in an attempt to deadpan the "general ignorance of the two-party monopoly towards alternative political movements".

The idea for a political debate on Twitch was first sought by a number of popular Twitch users, who argued that there were "a number of issues and stances that continue to be ignored by the two parties that dominate American politics", and who also lamented the increasing partisan and ideological polarization of the two major parties. While having previously barred even mild adult content in the past, a recent Supreme Court ruling whose majority opinion was written by Neil Gorsuch ruled that mild nudity not intended to shock or harm adult viewers, so long as the user implements age requirements before granting access to particular users and also does not involve children under the age of 18, could not be used by Twitch administrators to ban users from the platform, and therefore ruled any attempts by the platform to ban users for mild nudity a violation of the First Amendment. This reason, as well as the obvious polling deficits of the third party candidates (even though Yang has been hovering around 5 percent in most recent polling), have made the two major party candidates hesitant to participate in the debate. Author and former Rolling Stone contributor Matt Taibbi will serve as the moderator for the debate, which may or may not air on traditional television depending on whether or not networks have the appetite, let alone the time, to carry the debate.

Meanwhile, another official debate was announced on Sunday, this one involving the vice presidential running mates, with Republican running mate Nikki Haley and Democratic running mate Gary Peters set to participate in a debate that will be held on Tuesday, October 1st at Bartels Hall, located on the campus of Cornell University in Ithaca, New York. The debate will be moderated by PBS NewsHour correspondent Amna Nawaz, and will also feature two panelists providing questions, Ben Domenech (publisher of The Federalist) and Katrina vanden Heuvel (publisher and former editor of The Nation). Domenech's questions are expected to come from a conservative perspective, whereas vanden Heuvel's are widely expected to be favor the traditional liberal stylings of her publication, with Nawaz merely serving to provide the topic to be debated with the panelist furnishing the question for the candidate. Two other debates are expected to be scheduled next week for the presidential candidates, likely to be held later in October with a town hall-style debate being one of them.

While the first debate has traditionally emphasized domestic matters and the third more of a foreign policy perspective, Southern Methodist University has indicated that neither group of issues is expected to be favored in its upcoming debate, and that stylistics will be given a greater emphasis versus past debates. Some are floating the possibility of a unique debate format, in which the moderator provides the issue to be discussed and then give one of the candidates the opportunity to provide their stance with the other rebutting with his or her stance on the same issue, for the final debate, though whether or not the format could follow a modified Lincoln-Douglas format designed for a presidential election or a traditional policy debate remains to be seen.

The news about the vice presidential debate was not the only story of note on Sunday, which saw the Sunday morning talk show circuit dominated by discussion over the controversial ad that aired during the NFL game on Thursday night; while the day's NFL games did see some players and teams lock arms during the national anthem, very few if any players actually kneeled, and such players received little or no attention according to statistics provided on Twitter by business analyst and former ESPN analyst Darren Rovell, who also noted that the controversial ad did not affect ratings for the week's games.

In fact, the week's broadcast of Sunday Night Football (between the New England Patriots and Buffalo Bills) saw a ratings increase of 10 percent compared to 2023, while the only reminder - if faint - of Thursday night's broadcast visible during much of Sunday's game coverage centered on the airing of a one-minute 2017 "unity" ad, similar to one first aired during Super Bowl LI and again during the controversial Week 3 of 2017 that followed then-President Donald Trump's criticism of the league's players over the kneeling controversy. The ad, entitled "Inside These Lines 2.0", recycles the same narration used by actor Forest Whitaker in the original 2017 ad while including new imagery from 2024, and aired at least once during all 14 of Sunday's NFL games, with the ad also set to air tomorrow night on ABC and ESPN's season premiere broadcast of Monday Night Football.

New York state itself also saw a number of minor parties issue their endorsements for the 2024 presidential campaign, with the leftist Working Families Party endorsing Vice President Harris, while the New York Conservative Party issued its endorsement to Gov. DeSantis. The Independence Party, which traditionally has endorsed one of the two major political party candidates, issued its endorsement for fellow New Yorker and Forward Party nominee Yang, calling his candidacy "a watershed moment that aims to transform American politics for the better and give Americans that badly needed 'permanent third party' that will force the two longstanding parties to come to their senses and stop their childish bickering".

Next up: The "Trashgate" investigation begins, the last congressional primaries (well, at least not including Louisiana) are held, and one Senator gets heated over residency questions...

[SaintStan86]

UPDATE: Before I continue with this TL, I have some updates to share from last Tuesday's (and Thursday's) primaries that haven't been said already:

• As expected, the Trump slate swept Arizona as Kari Lake won her primary for Governor over Karrin Taylor Robson, as Lake took the lead in Maricopa County and won every county in the state. While some are hoping that the Republican vote unites before November, independents and John McCain Republicans hold the key to victory in the state, and it wouldn't shock me if their bitter pill swallows the GOP (at least in the race for Governor) down the drain. The same is also true for Blake Masters, whose victory is also one for GOP megadonor Peter Thiel; whether or not Masters can overpower Sen. Mark Kelly down the line remains to be seen.
• The House races are set for November in Arizona as well. Nothing has changed from what I described previously, and it's fair to say that while being endorsed by Trump is a good indicator as to whether or not you can win a Republican nomination for certain contests, the same cannot be true if you're a former Phoenix Suns executive - Republican (Tanya Wheeless) or Democrat (Adam Metzendorf). So much for their epic city edition jerseys with that mosaic of Camelback Mountain...
• Upon closer inspection of Washington's congressional results, it's fair to say the fat lady hasn't sung yet in the 3rd District, where Joe Kent now trails Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler by under 300 votes with under five percent of ballots to go, meaning that Heidi St. John may no longer be subjected to the sort of 'hate mail' some conservatives have certainly been giving her in recent days for "splintering" the GOP vote. The winner faces Democrat Marie Perez in November, and it's fair to say their chances will be easier if Kent (as likely projected now) takes second. Elsewhere, Rep. Dan Newhouse will now be one of likely two (not counting Wyoming's Liz Cheney who is pretty much a goner in a few weeks) along with California's David Valadao remaining amongst the ten who voted to impeach Donald Trump over J6, as he secured a top two spot in the 4th District, with the other going to Democrat Doug White. And while I thought Reagan Dunn would have had a shot against Rep. Kim Schrier in the 8th District connecting the eastern Seattle suburbs to Wenatchee (a seat that his mother once held in Congress), and others thought Jesse Jensen's being the previous GOP nominee would help, Matt Larkin had other plans in this tossup district, and it's fair to say that a former George W. Bush aide who ran for Attorney General in 2020 (Larkin) seems more relevant than a King County Councilman who ran for Attorney General in 2012 (Dunn).
• In case you missed it, Tennessee had its unique "First Thursday" primary this week, and (talking about the 5th District in south Nashville and suburbs) while the Tennessee GOP establishment had its way in pushing out Morgan Ortagus (Boo!) and Robby Starbuck (Boo!) in favor of Beth Harwell, I was still mildly disappointed that Manny Sethi didn't pursue this seat, and my gut instinct told me that Kurt Winstead would be the one here, apparently being a Ron DeSantis Republican paid off bigly as Maury County Mayor Andy Ogles (who defied COVID lockdowns and mandates that even the neighboring conservative bastion Williamson County fell prey to) will now rise to Congress. While the Democrats do have a credible opponent in State Sen. Heidi Campbell in their bid to fill the open seat of retiring Democrat Jim Cooper, this seat is effectively gone for the Democrats. Andy Ogles has to be the luckiest man on the face of the Earth. Tennessee will be a very quiet state this year as Gov. Bill Lee is strongly favored for reelection over Democratic ICU physician Jason Martin in November.
• People of course will be wondering "Why are you picking the nutcase who beat Peter Meijer?" in Michigan's 3rd District, but even with the currently rocky situation with the GOP's chances in November (especially on the Senate side of the ledger), I still say that John Gibbs will narrowly defeat Hillary Scholten in the 2022 cycle since the map still remains challenging, as this is a West Michigan district anchored in Grand Rapids that narrowly voted against Donald Trump TWICE, and which is used to electing more moderate Republicans not unlike former President Gerald Ford, who once represented the district before he ascended to the Vice Presidency and then succeeded Richard Nixon in the wake of Watergate. However, to the disappointment of fans of State Rep. Rachel Hood, I'm going to say that Scholten will run again for this seat in 2024 and make the "third time a charm". Get ready for a barrage of ads laser focused on Gibbs's worst statements while Gibbs puts a positive spin on his tenure in Congress + a powerful surrogate in former HUD Secretary Ben Carson (who endorsed Gibbs in IRL in his primary) and for whom Gibbs worked under in the Trump administration. Also, shame on the GOP for canceling a decent liberty-minded conservative in Justin Amash, all because of his disdain for Trump...Never mind the painful, obvious FACT that he was still more conservative than almost all of Congress...
• Lastly, prayers be with the family and staff of Rep. Jackie Walorski of Indiana, who was killed in a tragic car accident on Wednesday along with two of her staffers (including her District Director, a position you've seen a lot of in this TL given that outside of the actual Reps themselves, the District Directors are the eyes and ears of the district and are usually amongst the potential contenders when an incumbent retires, runs for higher office, resigns or dies). Republican officials in her South Bend-based 2nd District will be picking her replacement nominee, and whether or not that Republican (who will be favored to win in November) stays in 2024 will depend on various factors (e.g. "is he a conservative?", "does she support Trump?", "do they fight for the district?", etc.) and is ultimately up to that district to decide. Due to the fluid nature of this vacancy - and the obvious investigation ongoing in this crash, I am not going to further speculate at this point with regards to this district.

Now, back to our regularly scheduled program, picking up at one week before the first debate...

September 9, 2024
NBC ANNOUNCES PANEL TO INVESTIGATE NFL ADVERTISING CONTROVERSY
Less than a week after a controversial advertisement that attempted to smear Republicans and supporters of Donald Trump and current GOP nominee Ron DeSantis as "trailer trash" or worse aired during the network's broadcast of the annual NFL kickoff game (an extension of the network's Sunday Night Football package), NBC announced the members of its five-member "blue ribbon" panel for its investigation of the incident as well as the network's traffic department. The members consist of former U.S. Attorney General Bill Barr, who served in the capacity under George H.W. Bush and Donald Trump; Joe Lockhart, a former executive vice president of communications and public affairs for the NFL who once served as White House Press Secretary under President Bill Clinton; Dick Ebersol, a senior NBC Sports adviser and former NBC Sports Chairman; Andy Polansky, retired former CEO of Interpublic Group; and Mignon Clyburn, former FCC commissioner and the daughter of retiring U.S. Rep. Jim Clyburn of South Carolina.

NBC Sports Group Chairman Pete Bevacqua and NBCUniversal CEO Jeff Shell, in announcing the panel for the investigation, compared the laudatory aims of their panel to that of the one which investigated the infamous forgery scandal involving CBS News in 2004, involving purported military records relating to then-President George W. Bush, that were presented on air during a broadcast of 60 Minutes as "authentic". NBC has also hired two former FBI agents to serve as private investigators to collect information from sources, and while not promising to have a report out before the presidential election, it did state that "come the end of December, we may have a final report on this". The investigation comes amid reports that the network's traffic duties (in broadcast terminology, referring to the slotting of advertisements during commercial breaks) were allegedly handled by someone charged with overseeing traffic for MSNBC - NBC's sister cable news network which has a prominent liberal primetime lineup.

Indeed, several of the network's hosts, including Joy Reid and Chris Hayes, largely have brushed off the controversy as "more whining from right-wing provocateurs who refuse to accept that America has become intolerant to bigots" (Hayes) while only tacitly acknowledging that there was a "colossal mistake" with the placement of an ad hominem political attack ad on the main NBC network. An unidentified source with NBC who wished to remain anonymous told Variety, "It goes without saying that the one property within NBCUniversal that must remain neutral in any sense - from a perspective of demographics, genres and especially politics - is NBC itself. Clearly, someone manning the controls at 30 Rock last Thursday didn't get the message". JaguarGator9, a popular YouTube podcaster known for his historical flashbacks of random NFL trivia (including broadcast controversies), recently skewered NBC over the incident and has vowed to "come out swiftly with my take on this as soon as I have enough evidence to make a compelling video".

The incident has also prompted other sports leagues and entertainment entities to more closely keep track of their barter advertising arrangements. For example, Jay Monahan, the Commissioner of the PGA Tour (which recently wrapped up its first calendar-year season after recently having staggered previous seasons across years) has announced that all designated commercial breaks (except for those delegated to local stations and cable headends) must be approved by the Tour in advance, while UFC President Dana White has barred cable headends from broadcasting any political advertising during his competition's signature weekend cards on ESPN. Both Major League Baseball and NASCAR, which are currently in the late stages of their season, also have tightened advertising controls in the run up to their respective World Series and NASCAR Playoffs (the latter of which began last weekend).

Outside of sports, CBS Media Ventures, which syndicates numerous programs to stations including the popular game shows Jeopardy! and Wheel of Fortune and the newsmagazines Inside Edition and Entertainment Tonight (the latter two of which have had extensive coverage on Trashgate over the last few days), along with syndicated reruns of comedies during the weekdays and serials on weekends, has also barred national political advertisements during its barter commercial breaks. This rule, as with the aforementioned sports broadcasts, does not apply to time delegated to local stations and has also been taken up by other syndication distributors. Nonetheless, various station groups, including Nexstar, Sinclair, Scripps, Hearst, Cox and TEGNA, have tightened their political advertisement standards in the wake of the controversy to avoid a repeat of what happened at NBC last Thursday night. NBC itself will be taking an extra step with its late night broadcasts (including the Tonight Show and Saturday Night Live, which have been prone to controversy especially from conservatives), by announcing that no national political advertisements will be allowed during its commercial breaks, and has strongly encouraged its local affiliates as well as its own owned-and-operated stations to strongly vet all political advertisements locally before they air.

September 10, 2024
NEW ENGLAND, DELAWARE VOTERS GO TO THE POLLS FOR CONGRESSIONAL PRIMARIES
On Tuesday, voters in four of the five last remaining states went to the polls to select their congressional and (in half of the states) gubernatorial nominees for the 2024 election, with Delaware, Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Rhode Island rounding out the last remaining batch of primary contests before the November election (Louisiana traditionally holds its nonpartisan primary on Election Day). Given the mostly Democratic leanings of these states, most of the action is localized especially in the two states that do not have gubernatorial contests this year.

In Rhode Island, Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse learned who his Republican challenger will be on Tuesday, as Republican voters selected State Rep. and one-time State House Minority Leader Brian Newberry to be its nominee against Whitehouse. While Whitehouse is a clear favorite for reelection, Newberry is believed to be his strongest challenger since 2006, when Whitehouse defeated incumbent moderate Republican Lincoln Chafee (who later became an independent Governor, then a Democratic presidential candidate and is now a Libertarian). The race to watch in Rhode Island, however, will be in the state's 2nd District where Republican freshman Allan Fung is seeking a second term. In that district, Democrats nominated Lt. Gov. Sabina Matos - the first Dominican-American elected to statewide office in the United States - to take on Fung in the first-ever all-minority congressional race in the state's history. While the race in the 2nd (which covers northwest Providence and the conservative-leaning jurisdictions of Kent and Washington counties) is expected to be a closely watched race, the nearby 1st District (which covers the rest of Providence as well as Bristol and Newport counties, basically the state's entire eastern edge) of Democrat David Cicilline is expected to remain in Democratic hands in November.

Massachusetts saw considerable action on Tuesday as four members of its all-Democratic congressional delegation (nine total) are retiring. The most closely watched of these races in November will be in the 9th District, which includes many of Boston's southeast suburbs including Plymouth, as well as New Bedford and Cape Cod (which is home to the Kennedy family compound at Hyannis Port). In that district, Democrats nominated openly gay State Sen. Julian Cyr (whose district includes the LGBT mecca of Provincetown) to take on Republican businessman and Marine Corps veteran Jesse Brown, who gave retiring Democrat Bill Keating a surprisingly close re-election in 2022. Another potential sleeper race has also emerged in the Worcester-based 2nd District, which stretches from Central Mass to the Pioneer Valley north of Springfield (including the college town of Amherst). In that district, Democrats are hoping to replace retiring Rep. Jim McGovern with Worcester County District Attorney Joseph Early Jr., whose father Joseph Early Sr. once held the same district for nearly two decades from 1975 to 1993, while Republicans are hoping to pick up with State House Minority Whip Kim Ferguson.

Two other open seats also drew attention on the Democratic side Tuesday, but are not expected to be heavily contested by Republicans this year. In the Western Mass-based 1st District (which covers Springfield and the Berkshires) where Rep. and former House Ways and Means Chair Richard Neal is retiring, Berkshire area State Sen. and former UN official Adam Hinds defeated Springfield City Council President Jesse Lederman and liberal State Committee member Nancy Stenberg to win the Democratic nomination, while in the 8th District (which connects Boston's South Shore suburbs including Quincy, as well as Brockton and Dedham, to such areas of Boston as Beacon Hill, Southie and Jamaica Plain), CDC advisor and Massachusetts General Hospital physician Dr. Robbie Goldstein won a crowded primary against former Boston City Council President Matt O'Malley (whose second cousin, Jen O'Malley Dillon, serves as Deputy Chief of Staff to President Biden), State Sen. John Keenan and progressive activist and video game developer Brianna Wu to become the odds-on favorite to succeed retiring Democrat Stephen Lynch, who has long drawn controversy (and primary challengers) for his anti-abortion views. Though these districts have leaned Republican in a number of statewide contests recently, the GOP has struggled to find credible candidates to run in these open seats which both went handily for President Biden.

For all the talk of competitive congressional primaries, the race for Massachusetts's Class 1 U.S. Senate seat is not expected to be a closely watched affair this year, as incumbent Democrat and recent presidential contender Elizabeth Warren is a heavy favorite for reelection over the Republican nominee, former state GOP Chairwoman Kirsten Hughes. Neighboring New Hampshire, however, will also have a competitive gubernatorial election, but this election too favors the incumbent party - in this case, the GOP. Republican Gov. Chris Sununu easily won his party's nod for a fifth term, which he hopes to gain against former Rep. Chris Pappas, who lost reelection to the 1st District in 2022 against now incumbent Rep. Matt Mowers. Mowers will be running for reelection in his Manchester-based 1st District (which includes the Seacoast and Lakes regions) against State Sen. Rebecca Perkins Kwoka, the first openly lesbian member of her chamber, while her colleague Becky Whitley (who represents a district anchored in the state capital of Concord) will take on first-term Rep. Bob Burns in the 2nd District that also extends to Nashua and the North Country.

Giving ode to the odd notion of "last is first", the major action of the night however was in President Biden's home state of Delaware, where Sen. Tom Carper is retiring, Gov. John Carney is term-limited and the state's at-large Congresswoman, Lisa Blunt Rochester, is running to succeed Carper. Standing in Blunt Rochester's way is Ben duPont, an heir to Delaware's prominent Du Pont family whose wife Laura is the sister-in-law of physician and New Jersey U.S. Senate candidate Dr. Mehmet Öz. While initial polls had Blunt Rochester leading early on, duPont has narrowed the gap in polling and outraised Blunt Rochester in the most recent fundraising cycle. This race, combined with increasingly close polling in the First State (which has not voted for a Republican presidential candidate since George H.W. Bush in 1988), has made Delaware an increasing priority for the Ron DeSantis campaign.

Attorney and former Lt. Gov. and state Attorney General Matthew Denn (who succeeded the former President's late son, Beau Biden, in the latter) won the Democratic primary for Governor and will go up against former State Treasurer Ken Simpler (who was the most recent Republican to win statewide office, doing so in 2014 before losing his 2018 reelection bid for State Treasurer). State Senate Majority Leader Bryan Townsend (who finished second to Blunt Rochester in the 2016 Democratic primary for the at-large congressional seat Carney vacated to run for Governor that year) will face off against State Senate Minority Whip Brian Pettyjohn, who has become an outspoken 2nd Amendment advocate after a 2017 incident at an airport in Maryland where he was forced to turn over his handgun to avoid prison time following a dust-up with the TSA, despite possessing a concealed carry license in Delaware.

Next: The candidates remember 9/11, a certain incumbent in one corner of Georgia gets a peachy surprise, and we'll finally get to that little residency issue about Hawley...

[Tekken_Guy]

You really have Fung winning in 2022?

[SaintStan86]

You really have Fung winning in 2022?

If you go back to the beginning of this TL, it will have already happened. Matos is the strongest possible Democrat they can field for this seat (she happens to come from the corner of Providence that falls in the new RI-02), which is why they have her running in this TL.

While a Republican victory this year would set them up well in a scenario where the Republican is well positioned, this does not guarantee they will be reelected. I have already projected John Gibbs narrowly beating Hillary Scholten in MI-03, but his reelection is not guaranteed and very likely the DCCC has already started running ads on his record (and statements) in his district with Scholten running for a third time. In other words, if Scholten doesn't win this year, she probably will in this TL in 2024.

[SaintStan86]

With the congressional primaries now behind them, the general election is now the sole focus in all 50 states (Louisiana's Election Day jungle primary notwithstanding). Here are the targets of the House Hill committees for this cycle:

DCCC: AL-02, AZ-01, AZ-02, AZ-04, AZ-06, CA-09, CA-22, CA-26, CA-27, CA-40, CA-41, CA-45, CA-49, CO-03, CO-07, CO-08, CT-02, CT-05, FL-02, FL-04, FL-15, FL-16, FL-27, FL-28, GA-02, IL-08, IL-12, IL-14, IA-01, IA-02, IA-03, KS-03, KY-05, LA-03, ME-02, MI-01, MI-03, MI-07, MI-10, MN-01, MN-02, MN-08, MO-02, MT-01, NE-02, NV-01, NV-02, NV-03, NV-04, NH-01, NH-02, NJ-07, NM-02, NY-01, NY-02, NY-03, NY-04, NY-11, NY-18, NY-19, NY-22, NC-08, NC-11, NC-13, OH-01, OH-03, OH-05, OH-10, OH-14, OH-15, OK-03, OK-04, OR-04, OR-05, OR-06, PA-01, PA-06, PA-07, PA-08, PA-16, PA-17, RI-02, SC-01, SC-02, TN-05, TX-14, TX-23, TX-27, TX-36, TX-38, UT-02, VA-01, VA-02, VA-05, VA-07, WA-03, WA-05, WA-08, WV-02, WI-01, WI-03, WI-05, WI-08

NRCC: CA-06, CA-13, CA-14, CA-25, CA-47, CT-03, DE-AL, FL-09, GA-07, HI-01, IL-05, IL-13, IN-01, KY-03, ME-01, MD-02, MD-03, MD-06, MA-02, MA-09, MI-08, MI-11, MN-03, MN-05, MS-02, NJ-03, NJ-05, NJ-11, NM-01, NM-03, NY-17, NY-20, NY-25, NC-01, NC-06, PA-04, PA-12, TX-07, TX-15, TX-28, TX-32, TX-34, VA-04, VA-10, WA-01, WA-02

Both Hill committees: IL-06, IL-07, IL-11

Depending on impending circumstances: GA-14 (if a certain vanquished Republican's write-in candidacy is accepted)

As you can see above, the Democrats have been overly ambitious about their intentions in the House with more than twice as large a field of targeted districts (including some that are very unlikely to elect a Democrat, but which have promising or well-funded challengers), sensing that capitalizing on a large battlefield (and younger leaders such as Rep. Hakeem Jeffries leading the Democrats) would give them many opportunities to retake control of the House, even though odds have become increasingly stacked against them with the Republicans continuing to post a narrow lead in generic polling.

And with that, the TL continues on a somber note...

September 11, 2024
AMERICANS REFLECT ON 23RD ANNIVERSARY OF 9/11
Across the country, time stood still as Americans paid their respects to the victims of the September 11, 2001 attacks while killed thousands at New York City's World Trade Center, the Pentagon outside Washington, D.C. and in Shanksville, Pennsylvania where one of the flights intended for the nation's capital ended up crashing into a coalfield southeast of the Pittsburgh area. President Joe Biden, former Presidents Donald Trump, Bill Clinton and George W. Bush (the latter of whom was in Sarasota, Florida during his presidency when the twin towers of the original World Trade Center were attacked) and former First Lady Hillary Clinton (who at the time was a U.S. Senator representing New York) were present at the National September 11 Memorial in Lower Manhattan, situated where the "Twin Towers" of the original WTC once stood. Following moments of silence taken early in the morning, Bush spoke before the crowd that included families of many of the victims and first responders, remarking "It may have been 23 years - the exact amount of time that it would take for an average American to get from conception to college, but these 23 years have been a very long, painful road for the bereaved of those whose loved ones came down here on a Tuesday morning and never came home."

President Biden also took to the podium, where he spoke of the challenges facing the country in the wake of the attacks. "To this day, there are hundreds of Americans who survived to see another day, but still grapple with the effects of the cancer diagnoses, the pollution from the rubble, the wounds that will never heal - from this disaster", Biden spoke in regards to the health and environmental challenges relating to Ground Zero. Hillary Clinton spoke poignantly of the victims, "Behind the faces that disappeared on that horrible day here at the World Trade Center, there were family men and best friends, there were aspiring graduates and accomplished executives, there were American heroes and international dignitaries, who perished into the skies that day" as many other families also spoke of the losses they endured and the perseverance they undertook in the years following the terrorist attack.

Former President Donald Trump made his first appearance since his presidency at the memorial and also made remarks, calling the sacrifice of the hundreds of first responders who perished at Ground Zero "one that goes beyond service to the people of New York City and our country" and also stating that "Osama is where he belongs - at the very bottom of the ocean in a faraway land, never to be found again, because that's what you get when you give your friends the money to bin Laden to kill us because we choose to live free...if it weren't for that money, those losers and thugs would never have come here to hurt us, and we wouldn't have been forced into endless wars, trillions of debt, and wasted money that otherwise could have helped our police officers and firefighters struggling to live, just to find the bastard". Predictably, while the reaction at 9/11 was understandably muted to avoid a disruptive scene, the social media reaction was intense as Trump critics hit back at the former President for his politically incorrect comments regarding the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks and the terrorists who carried out the attack.

Biden later traveled south (predictably, along the Acela) to the Pentagon and Arlington National Cemetery, where he laid wreaths for the victims of the Pentagon attack and issued a statement to victims' families: "America will never forget the sacrifice your loved ones made and the footprints they leave behind in those stone-framed walls, and their memory shall spring eternal through the passage of time". He later traveled in the afternoon to Shanksville, Pennsylvania, 75 miles southeast of Pittsburgh, where he laid wreaths and gave remarks at the Flight 93 National Memorial, where a United Airlines flight bound for San Francisco crashed short of the terrorists' intended target in Washington, and was joined alongside Gov. Doug Mastriano and former Homeland Security Secretary and then-Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Ridge. "Imagine how much more tragic it could have been had this plane not landed in this coalfield. Our hearts break for the families who lost loved ones here, but the sacrifice of (Flight 93 passenger) Todd Beamer and others is why September 11th was not any more worse than it was and why we shall continue to roll to this day". (Fun fact: The "roll" reference refers to a famed quote Beamer made ("Let's roll!") in the passengers' attempt to gain back control of the Flight 93 cockpit.)

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis was in Jacksonville, Florida on Wednesday, where he was joined by various 9/11 survivors, bereaved families and military with ties to Florida or who have since moved to his state on the same waterfront setting where he launched his presidential campaign last year. "More than ever, Floridians will never forget the sacrifices that these people and their loved ones experienced on that September day. 23 years may breeze by for some, but for others it's a long and painful journey in their lives, which is why we must never forget the lessons we learned and how it brought us together as Americans". Former Gov. Jeb Bush also attended the ceremony, and also thanked DeSantis for his role in "helping to prosecute hundreds of suspected terrorists who took part in al-Qaeda's dirty, dirty deeds that must be rooted out at any cost, and without fail, because our freedoms shall never be taken for granted", while also thanking the 9/11 crowd for "their courage and perseverance in the face of so many struggles that continue to this day".

Vice President Kamala Harris, meanwhile, was at Los Angeles International Airport (where American Airlines Flights 11 & 77 and United Airlines Flight 175 were all destined, with AA 11 and UA 175 hitting the Twin Towers and AA 77 the Pentagon) earlier in the day to pay her respects, before flying to San Francisco International Airport to pay tribute to the United Airlines Flight 93 victims whose plane crashed in the aforementioned coalfield in Pennsylvania. "Today marks 23 years since time stood still here on the West Coast. Where many expected to see loved ones, business partners and tourists - they instead came to see and hear that America changed forever", Harris remarked at LAX.

One member of Congress who stirred controversy was Rep. Ilhan Omar, who stirred controversy on social media and in conservative circles for her remarks at a 9/11 memorial in Minneapolis: "The people here in Minneapolis who lost loved ones that day will never forget the memories of those they lost. But it wasn't just a day of loss of life. It was also a day where for millions of American Muslims, life forever changed as their businesses, their families and their mosques became targets of hate in this country, propelled by those who took what was supposed to be a mission to go after the terrorists who committed the heinous act, and turned it into a crusade against humanity". Several 9/11 victims' families condemned Omar's comments on social media, while Fox News host Sean Hannity lambasted Omar in also referring to Omar's own controversial comments about 9/11 from 2019: "Remember when she said 'Some people did something?' Obviously, Ilhan Omar never learned that lesson."

September 13, 2024
GREENE FACES ANOTHER "BLAST FROM PAST" AS FORMER FOE RETURNS AS WRITE-IN CANDIDATE
Despite winning her Republican primary last May, former Republican-turned-Constitution Party incumbent Marjorie Taylor Greene's decision to switch to the latter party made her vulnerable to a potential write-in challenger. And on Friday, that candidate, Jennifer Strahan, officially launched her candidacy for the 14th District where she stressed "the need for a servant-leader who will advance our conservative values without compromise" as well as an emphasis on "results as opposed to rhetoric". Strahan challenged Greene in the 2022 Republican primary, earning endorsements from the legacy conservative publication National Review as well as the Republican Jewish Coalition (which took offense to MTG's participation at a meeting of the white nationalist America First Political Action Conference in the run up to the primary), but ultimately finished with just over 15 percent of the vote.

Greene dismissed the Strahan write-in candidacy as "nothing more than a 'blast from past' (sic) candidacy propped up by the same elites that want to decide what's best for northwest Georgians, as opposed to the people", and pointed to her "relentless advocacy for America First policies" as proof of her conservative voting record that "goes beyond partisan labels". Greene also predicted that Strahan's last name will be "hard to spell" for the average voter, providing several variations of her opponent's last name (e.g. Strayhan, Strayhorn, Strahand, etc.) as examples. However, Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger noted in an interview to Atlanta Fox affiliate WAGA that all write-in entries will be looked at forensically when the votes are tabulated, and that even misspelled names will count "so long as the candidate they are referring to is clear".

In addition to Greene and Strahan, Democrats will be fielding Rome City Commissioner Wendy Davis (not to be confused with the 2014 Texas gubernatorial candidate and former Texas State Sen.), who unsuccessfully sought the Democratic nomination in 2022 in the 14th District and has raised over half a million dollars since Greene switched parties, having only raised less than half that amount at the time that Greene won the GOP nomination last May. The write-in candidacy by Strahan, combined with Davis's fundraising haul, has prompted the DCCC to target GA-14, if only for the general election in November to potentially force a runoff in December, as the district voted for Donald Trump by a 4-1 margin in 2020 despite producing a notable amount of undervotes during the January 2021 Senate runoffs that elected Sens. Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock (the latter of whom has since been defeated by Herschel Walker).

September 14, 2024
HAWLEY ADDRESSES RESIDENCY CONTROVERSY: "IT'S A FAMILY THING"
During a contentious debate on Saturday, Sen. Josh Hawley addressed the lingering residency issue dogging his reelection campaign during a debate with his Democratic challenger, former State Auditor Nicole Galloway. The debate, which aired on stations owned by Nexstar Media Group covering the state of Missouri (including most notably Fox affiliates KTVI in St. Louis and WDAF in Kansas City) and was simulcast nationally on NewsNation, featured the usual sparring matches over such issues as abortion (Hawley is staunchly pro-life "without question", while Galloway vowed a "reintroduction of the Equal Rights Amendment to protect a woman's right to choose"), social spending (Galloway supports restoring full funding for Medicare and Social Security as well as the related aspects of President Biden's "Build Back Better" plan, whereas Hawley has called for an "end to diversions from Social Security that drive up costs") and election integrity (Hawley defended his advocacy for questioning the 2020 results, to which Galloway referred to Hawley as a "sore loser who refuses to accept reality"). Co-moderated by one anchor from KTVI and another from WDAF along with a statewide reporter based in Jefferson City, the two-hour debate aired in lieu of Fox network repeats in the aforementioned major Missouri markets and other network repeats on stations in Springfield and Joplin.

The main controversy from the debate, however, came when the topic of Hawley's residency controversy, an issue dating back to before the 2022 elections when it was revealed that Hawley moved his family to Fairfax County, Virginia around 2020, but before the completion of a large residence the Senator built in the Springfield suburb of Ozark recently, though Hawley continued to maintain a Virginia homestead after the midterms. When pressed for explanation, Hawley cited "It's a family thing" and pointed to such circumstances as the pandemic (which disrupted children's activities including schooling across the country) behind his reasoning for moving his family to Virginia if only on a temporary basis. He also stated that if reelected, he plans to sell his Virginia residence and "purchase a condo somewhere in the area as my DC residency", and stated that he and his wife "will raise our kids in Missouri, the only home state they've ever known, and will go to school with fellow Missourians".

Hawley's statement did not settle the controversy down, as the DSCC took aim at the Senator's "slow walking" of his housing arrangements: "While Josh Hawley continues to play a ping-pong game over whether or not he wants to raise his family in Missouri or in DC, Nicole Galloway is committed to fighting for all Missourians and will raise her family in Columbia like she always has". Current polling has the race vacillating between the usual slight lead Hawley has maintained and a near-virtual tie depending on the source of the poll, with the latter usually being the case from Galloway's internal polling which favors Democrats. Missouri is one of the more closely watched Republican-held seats of the 2024 cycle, as the Democrats' strategy has largely shifted from regaining the majority in this cycle to avoiding a filibuster-proof 60-seat Republican majority; some Democrats have already begun to focus on the 2026 cycle, when several marginal Class 2 Senate seats are up for contention.

While these stories are ongoing, the presidential candidates have been criss-crossing the country. Ron DeSantis made campaign stops during the week in Indiana with Sen. Mike Braun, in Colorado Springs where he spoke to cadets at the U.S. Air Force Academy's Cadet Chapel about "the importance of service beyond self" and spoke of how his experiences as a Navy JAG can relate to those in the Air Force, and tended to minor business back home in Florida relating to business tax and licensing issues. Kamala Harris, meanwhile, was in Minnesota stumping for U.S. Senate nominee Peggy Flanagan and congressional candidates there, in addition to also taking part in a food drive for victims of Hurricane Gordon (which caused significant flooding in the northeastern part of that state) with Rep. Don Davis of that state's 1st District.

Next: Trashgate makes its way to 60 Minutes, and the rest of the debate schedule is released, as the first presidential debate is held...

[Roll Roons]

Is wbrocks running the DCCC or something? What Democrat said they should target seats in rural Alabama, Kentucky, Louisiana, Oklahoma and West Virginia?

[SaintStan86]

September 15, 2024
60 MINUTES REVEALS SOURCE OF CONTROVERSIAL ANTI-GOP AD
During Sunday night's broadcast of the CBS newsmagazine 60 Minutes, correspondent Scott Pelley probed the NFL kickoff game advertising controversy in a segment titled "Decency or Deception?" by starting off with a question "What is Decency for America? Is it a group aiming to foster a calmer political discourse in the face of much partisan and ideological division? Or is it just another outside group looking to influence the presidential election in deceptive ways? You may not have heard of the group, but you may remember the ad that aired over a week ago during the first game of the NFL season, featuring various stereotypes critics of former President Donald Trump, current Republican nominee Ron DeSantis, and the GOP in general have floated around." The report then continued by re-airing most, if not all, of the controversial advertisement Decency for America aired, and then followed up with interviews from various figures in the Trump administration, as well as from critics of the former President and a general manager with an NBC affiliate whose station's website was shutdown for nearly half a day following the ad's broadcast.

The turning point for the segment came midway through when it revealed the source of Decency for America PAC based on records obtained from the Federal Election Commission. The hybrid super PAC has no website nor a telephone number other than that of the treasurer and his email address, but one prominent fundraiser behind the group appears to be a man from Florida named "F Geo Wilson" out of Tallahassee, Florida - which is later revealed to be none other than Rick Wilson, a former Republican strategist who later became a prominent 'godfather' within the Never Trump movement as a co-founder of The Lincoln Project.

Another source that turned up during the segment was John Weaver, who was a key recipient of consulting expenses to the PAC including "language services" and "incentives to act" for actors who volunteered to take part in the commercial. Weaver was also involved with the Lincoln Project until allegations of sexual harassment involving young men - including a non-sexual relationship with a teenage boy - led to his ouster from the Lincoln Project shortly after the 2020 elections. Two NFL executives who wished to remain anonymous were also mentioned in the segment, with one crediting NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell for his prompt response to get in touch with former President Donald Trump as well as the Republican National Committee, "If it weren't for Goodell's quick actions towards Trump, the outcome would have been a lot worse".

Earlier in the day during CBS's broadcast of The NFL Today, studio host James Brown spent nearly 15 minutes discussing the matter, with analyst and former New York Giants quarterback Phil Simms crediting Goodell's swift response for "saving ourselves from what would have been a much more politically charged outcome". The Sunday morning talk show circuit also remained abuzz over the matter, with numerous Republicans continuing to single out NBC for even airing the ad. "You just want to enjoy a football game, and to have some dark money from a supposedly pious group go towards an attack like that against the GOP during a commercial break is insidious", said Sen. Lindsey Graham who also called on advertisers to cut off any and all ties to "whomever did business with Decency for America" on NBC's Meet the Press, whose moderator Chuck Todd earlier in the day defended the quick response of his network's executives and supported calls for a "thorough and probing investigation that reveals why this situation happened". Todd also added earlier in the broadcast that the staff and management responsible for overseeing traffic and master control during the NFL kickoff game "have been placed on temporary leave pending the outcome of the network's investigation".

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, upon hearing news of the 60 Minutes report during a campaign event in Michigan, called out his fellow Floridian Wilson as "a craven opportunist who specializes in creating a false sense of love and kindness packaged into a stereotypical broadstroke of every American who does not support socialism, does not support cultural marxism, and does not support assaults on their families and businesses, as these mean and hostile bullies along the lines of Voldemort", referencing the villain in the Harry Potter books and movies. Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel also was unimpressed: "If this were an ad attacking the Democrats, it would have been swept under the rug by the media already"; upon hearing news of Wilson's involvement, McDaniel has called for an emergency meeting soon to address the matter, with some national committee members floating the possibility of barring Wilson from Republican presidential campaigns.

Many Democrats were also critical of the ad, including some who originally praised the ad such as former Democratic National Committee Chair Donna Brazile, who lambasted the ad for "driving a wedge between the voters Democrats need to hold on to the White House" and became even more critical upon hearing news of the minds behind Decency for America. "Now that we know we have a bunch of vulgar Republican pretenders who were behind this crude attack, whose behavior many Republicans I know of course don't engage in, there ought to be some accountability for this", Brazile stated in a later social media post Sunday night. Fellow Democratic strategist James Carville also chimed in, saying "If you think this is going to help Democrats in 2024, maybe you should trying a beach house in New Mexico...the lunch pail crowd ain't going to be drawn to vote for Democrats with this doo-doo". Liberal commentator Bill Maher, speaking on his HBO series Real Time with Bill Maher the previous Friday, called the ad "more desperate than an attempt to sell Mike Lindell halloween masks on clearance at Spirit Halloween stores".

However, while the Democratic National Committee has also condemned the ad, with Chairman Jaime Harrison calling out Decency for America for its involvement of "disgruntled Republicans who simply can't get Republican consulting gigs" and especially the involvement of John Weaver (who Harrison took the extra step of calling a "sexual predator and pedophile" during an interview on CNN's State of the Union with moderator Dana Bash, one name that surprisingly has yet to respond to the controversy is the Democratic nominee herself, Vice President Kamala Harris. While the Harris campaign has disregarded the ad, the candidate herself has avoided questions on the matter, preferring instead to focus on domestic efforts within the Biden administration as well as the recovery efforts from Hurricane Gordon she took part in earlier in the week.

September 16, 2024
TWO REMAINING DEBATES ANNOUNCED FOR OCTOBER
On Monday, two more debates were announced for the presidential candidates, with eligibility for third party candidates to be determined based on a "five to ten percent threshold" or "potential to serve as spoiler". This eligibility threshold change is perhaps in response to criticism from third party candidates, most notably the Forward Party's Andrew Yang, that the debate criteria remains stacked against candidates from outside of the two major parties. A spokesperson for the Yang campaign called the development "a positive move towards a more inclusive and diverse debate where the two erstwhile established parties will be forced to actually compete for votes instead of making themselves accountable only to their donors". While Yang and other third party candidates are moving full steam ahead with their September 28th "People's Debate" on Twitch, the campaign has nonetheless expressed gratitude over the news and has vowed to "step up" their advertising campaign to "grow our Forward movement into something bigger".

The first of these two debates announced, to be held on Wednesday, October 9th, will be a town hall-style debate to be held at Grand Valley State University in Allendale, Michigan - 12 miles west of Grand Rapids, where attendees (all of them undecided voters) will provide questions to three panelists (all with ties to Michigan) - Mackinac Center for Public Policy Senior Editor Tim Cavanaugh, Progress Michigan Board of Directors Chairman Patrick Schuh, and Libertarian former U.S. Rep. Justin Amash, who represented Grand Rapids in Congress from 2011 to 2021 - who will then pick an audience member to answer the question. The moderator for this debate will be Fox News Sunday host Shannon Bream, who will announce the topic before assigning a panelist to select a corresponding question for the audience to ask. Given the ideological leanings of the former two's respective organizations as well as the libertarian-leaning congressional record of the latter, most of Cavanaugh's selected questions are likely to be more conservative in nature, while Schuh's are likely to be more liberal and Amash's will likely carry an independent streak.

The second of these debates announced, which will be held on Thursday, October 24th at the University of Nevada in Reno, Nevada, will be moderated by CBS News's Chief Washington Correspondent Major Garrett and follow a Lincoln-Douglas debate style modified for television; both candidates are expected to make their initial case based on topics announced by Garrett and selected by University of Nevada professors and consultants from both liberal and conservative think tanks, using a shortened timeframe for each topic both to allow for a more diverse set of issues and to stay within the parameters of a 90 minute presidential debate, which may expand to an additional 30 minutes depending on whether or not a third candidate is able to qualify for the debate. In fact, both debates have prepared for the possibility of additional airtime besides the prescribed last two hours of the primetime schedule on their respective nights, should a third-party candidate qualify for one of the debates.

The informal process of the debate scheduling is in large part a side effect of the disbandment of the Commission on Presidential Debates, following the 2022 decision of the Republican National Committee to bar its candidates from participating in their debates and the subsequent decision of the Democratic National Committee to also forego the previous debate format in hopes of having a "fair debate" with their opponents. While NBC News has floated the possibility of hosting individual presidential forums with each of the major presidential candidates - as all the networks have already done with the candidates in between primaries and campaign events, including a recently announced "Forward Presidential Town Hall" by CNN slated to air on Tuesday featuring Yang - if only out of obligation for their network having been implicated in the Decency for America advertising controversy, these are not considered official presidential debates nor substitutes for them in the way that NBC did in 2020 after a scheduled presidential debate in Miami was canceled over Trump's objection to a virtual format after his diagnosis with COVID-19 shelved original plans for an in-person debate, as well as controversy surrounding the moderator for the ill-fated debate, C-SPAN host Steve Scully.

September 18, 2024
BIGGS OFFICIALLY CONCEDES TO SCHWEIKERT; ARIZONA REPUBLICANS CALL FOR UNITY
On Wednesday, hours before the first presidential debate was scheduled to take place, Rep. Andy Biggs officially ended his campaign for the U.S. Senate after having exhausted all resources to alter the results of the Republican primary from last August's contentious primary against fellow Reps. Paul Gosar and David Schweikert (the latter of whom finished first by a margin of less than 0.04 percent over Biggs in the final results of an automatic recount ordered by Arizona Secretary of State Mark Finchem). In a statement released to the media, Biggs thanked his supporters and "the people of Arizona for affording me the opportunity to represent their conservative values in Washington" and congratulated Schweikert on "a hard-fought campaign" while offering his support to the now-GOP nominee.

In response to Biggs' concession, Schweikert thanked Biggs for "his friendship and servant's heart in working to represent the conservative values that have made Arizona a beacon of freedom for generations" and also urged Republicans to unite and work to "elect conservatives up and down the ballot this fall to stave off the Harris-Sinema machine", referring to Vice President Kamala Harris and incumbent Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, who has generally led by a narrow margin in most polling while the Republicans were sorting out the vote tallies in their contentious primary. Gosar also called on Arizona Republicans to "work to elect patriots who stand for our freedoms this November", having finished third in the August primary with little chance of overtaking Biggs for second, let alone Schweikert in the final results, but stopped short of endorsing his rival. "You know, we fought hard throughout this campaign jockeying for position, but I'm not going to go public with lending my endorsement - at least not yet", Gosar told a reporter with The Arizona Republic.

The Arizona Republican Party also released a statement on Wednesday, urging Republicans to unite behind DeSantis, Schweikert and "our strong and united Republican ticket whose stand for freedom stands in sharp contrast to the anti-business, anti-family Marxism that Democrats have promoted throughout this election", also adding that Sinema is "far from a so-called 'maverick'" and "a sellout to the Washington elite who seek to bring their values to Arizona, not the other way around". A spokesperson for Sinema, to no great surprise, touted the Senator's "bipartisan voting record which has delivered results for Arizonans" and reputation as a "consensus builder who always gets results for her constituents", also predicting that Schweikert's campaign is merely a "recycled series of failed Republican policies that favor corporations and the wealthy, including his campaign contributors, at the expense of everyday Arizonans who see the difference between a proven fighter and a partisan demagogue".

It's a warm Thursday night in Dallas, where Kamala Harris and Ron DeSantis are debating at Southern Methodist University. How it went is coming up next...

[2016]

President Biden & Vice President Harris are two Cowards by not responding to this devastating unhinged Ad.

[SaintStan86]

UPDATE: Before I continue with this TL, I would like to first provide some updates from last night's primaries, as well as a now projected result in Washington state from last week...

• It's official, the number of Republicans who voted to impeach Donald Trump in response to J6 is now down to two (not counting a certain Wyoming Congresswoman whose defeat is certain next week). With Joe Kent now officially having overtaken Jaime Herrera Beutler in the southwest-based 3rd District, and set to face Democrat Marie Perez in November, the defeated incumbent's fellow Evergreen State Rep. Dan Newhouse and David Valadao of California are likely going to be the only impeacheés remaining in the next Congress should both men win (more perilous in the latter since his district favored Joe Biden by a double-digit margin and he has a strong Dem challenger). In this TL, Kent is running for reelection, but the overtly ambitious DCCC will be targeting him.
• In Wisconsin, the matchup between Sen. Ron Johnson and LG Mandela Barnes is now set in stone, and in this TL as well as likely IRL Johnson will have prevailed. The race for Governor, however, will now be a battle between Gov. Tony Evers and Republican businessman Tim Michels instead of former LG Rebecca Kleefisch, thanks in no small part to Trump's endorsement of Michels who won practically everywhere except in Milwaukee and two of the three WOW counties, Green Bay, Madison and Wausau. The one area I do have a question mark about though going forward is on the Republican ledger for LG as State Sen. Roger Roth prevailed in his primary, as I had Roth pegged for the 8th District in this TL where its current Rep. Mike Gallagher is favored for reelection; in this TL Gallagher has already won the GOP primary for Senate to go up against incumbent Sen. Tammy Baldwin. I'm still going with a narrow win for Michels on my expectation that the GOP will unite in Wisconsin (as Kleefisch has implored her supporters to do) as well as what appeared to be a favorably GOP primary electorate compared to 2018 (when more Democrats turned out in comparison), but replacing Gallagher in the 8th will seem like a big step down for Roth (even though his uncle Toby Roth represented the district in Congress for nearly two decades in the heart of the Reagan and Bush 41 eras), so I've instead decided to substitute Roth with a colleague of his from the Green Bay suburbs, State Sen. André Jacque, who drew headlines when he got a case of COVID-19 so bad he was even on a ventilator at one point and lived to tell the tale.
• Next door in Minnesota, DFL Gov. Tim Walz will be facing physician and former State Sen. Dr. Scott Jensen in November. While I do have Walz narrowly pegged to defeat Jensen, the Republican should not be counted out and there is a great chance he could pull off the upset here. Of note to watch will be Jensen's running mate, former NFL Pro Bowler and Minnesota Vikings legend Matt Birk, whose political future will be one to watch going forward. I'm still going with Michele Tafoya in the U.S. Senate race in this TL, but I'm sure there are many who think I should substitute her with the St. Paul-born, Harvard-educated Birk. However, I'm sticking to my guns here and staying with Tafoya in this TL - it's already been done anyway! Also congrats to Rep.-elect Brad Finstad in the southern-based 1st District who won a special election last night for the seat vacated by the death of Rep. Jim Hagedorn, and will now be favored for a full term in November against former Hormel Foods CEO Jeff Ettinger in a rematch this year. The big surprise for me, however, was in the Minneapolis-based 5th District of Rep. Ilhan Omar, where I was expecting a strong primary challenge but not as close as it turned out against former Minneapolis City Council member Don Samuels in the DFL primary. While I certainly don't expect the 72-year-old Samuels to run again in 2024, the fact that Omar barely won by around two percent certainly has to be very humbling for the far-left firebrand.
• In Connecticut, not much has changed as I still predict Sen. Richard Blumenthal will be reelected and I still predict that Republicans Mike France and George Logan will defeat incumbent Reps. Joe Courtney and Jahana Hayes in the respective 2nd and 5th Districts. The sacrificial lamb that Blumenthal will take on will be Republican National Committeewoman Leora Levy, whose grandparents escaped Lithuania and was born in Cuba before eventually fleeing Castro, making her experiences as a Cuban-American Jewish Republican compelling. While her victory over former State House Minority Leader Themis Klarides has to be considered an upset, though Klarides admitting to not voting for Trump in 2020 certainly did not help her case, whichever Republican was going to face Blumenthal was going to be in for an uphill fight considering Connecticut's status as a so-called "blue state" as well as Republicans having lower-hanging fruit (or dare I say, peaches) elsewhere in the nation.
• Last but not least, my apologies to the Becca Balint fan club, for my assumption about Molly Gray being the LG being a boon to her chances for Vermont's only congressional seat on the Dem side did in fact not age well. Balint's side worked hard indeed, and earned their victory in the Democratic primary there last night. I wish I could make Liam Madden competitive for the GOP regardless of who his potential opponent could have been, but this is not your grandfather's reliably Republican Vermont anymore. Balint is heavily favored here, and in this TL she will be running for reelection to her seat, T.J. Donovan will have overcome residency issues to win his Democratic primary for Senate, David Zuckerman (who stands a chance to get his old job back as LG in November) will be gunning for retiring Sen. Bernie Sanders' progressive supporters, and another former LG, Republican Brian Dubie will still have his shot at winning in a three-way race. And of course, Gov. Phil Scott and Sen. Peter Welch will still be around in this TL.

With these results in mind, I have made minor changes to reflect the results of last night where necessary.

Next post, finally we get to the first debate and its most explosive moment...

[SaintStan86]

Source: Wikimedia Commons Author: Michael Barera

Source: SMU Author: Unknown

McFarlin Memorial Auditorium on the campus of Southern Methodist University in University Park, Texas (north of downtown Dallas), site of the first 2024 presidential debate on September 19, 2024.

(The debate begins...)
JASON WHITELY: Good evening everyone, and welcome to McFarlin Memorial Auditorium here on the campus of Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas. I'm Jason Whitely from WFAA-TV here in Dallas, and host of the show Inside Texas Politics which airs on stations in several Texas markets. It is my privilege to introduce y'all to Dallas and to open the first presidential debate of the 2024 election between our two qualifying candidates who will participate in a face-to-face debate like you've never seen before.

Our panelists tonight all have ties to North Texas, which stands to be a very crucial region in this election between Dallas County's emergence as a Democratic stronghold, Tarrant County swinging to Joe Biden and the same almost happening in Collin and Denton counties to the north, and a wide open sea of red surrounding the Metroplex. In other words, whoever wins North Texas effectively wins this election. And these panelists are here in the saddle tonight: starting with Mark Davis, columnist for The Dallas Morning News and host of The Mark Davis Show on KSKY 660 AM The Answer here in Dallas; Bud Kennedy, columnist and habitual foodie for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram whose knowledge of Texas, treaties, T-Bones and tacos is quite impressive; former Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings, who is a former CEO of Pizza Hut that knows how to "out pizza" his competition; and last but not least, political science professor and commentator here at Southern Methodist University, Cal Jillson.

Our moderator for tonight is someone you may remember from TV, but for me it's quite personal since the station I work for here in Dallas is an ABC affiliate, and from that network, I present to you our moderator and anchor of the most-watched evening newscast in America, World News Tonight, David Muir. Good luck to the candidates and all of y'all here tonight.

DAVID MUIR: Thank you very much, Jason Whitely. It is my honor to preside over this first debate of the presidential election, which stands to have the highest participation of any election in American history as America stands at a crossroads preparing to go through another election together. While there are some very vigorous third-party challengers who potentially could qualify for this debate, in the end, regrettably only two candidates qualified, and it is our hope that that changes with future debates. Before we begin tonight's debate, let's go over the format.

The debate will be centered on 12 questions - three for every panelist - that will primarily focus on domestic issues including the economy, fiscal policy, social spending, criminal justice, cultural issues and statesmanship, each totaling 6 minutes with one candidate given 90 seconds to answer the question and their opponent given 90 seconds of their own to respond, with the remaining three minutes dedicated to open discussion.

The topics have been selected by and assigned by the panelists who along with the candidates agreed to the format, and the questions have been designed to be fair and nonpartisan. Both candidates will also have four minutes for an opening and closing statement. While these questions are indeed those of the panelists, these questions are those of the American people, and reflect the issues that matter to the voters

It is an exciting debate we are looking forward to having right now, and it is my privilege to introduce you to the candidates: Democratic Party nominee for President of the United States, Vice President Kamala Harris, and Republican Party nominee for President of the United States, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.

(Harris and DeSantis enter, shaking hands and sharing banter before retiring to their podiums)

DAVID MUIR: Candidates, thank you for joining us on a very special Thursday night here in Dallas, and welcome to the debate. Based on the coin toss that you both participated in beforehand, Gov. DeSantis won that coin toss and has deferred to Vice President Harris, who has elected to give out the second closing segment; therefore, Gov. DeSantis will answer first to the first question, which will be given by Mr. Jillson.

As expected, the debate centered on many of the same issues that the candidates went through individually in their respective primary debates. As expected, DeSantis defended his handling of the COVID-19 pandemic and spoke of Florida's "Golden Age", while lambasting Harris for "taking the greatest economy our country has ever seen, and sunk it with job-killing policies that have hurt families and benefited donors" and "replacing reading, writing, math and science with critical race theory and woke math".

Harris, by contrast, took direct aim at DeSantis's handling of COVID (which she claimed "favors unaccompanied young children at the expense of our seniors"), and vowed to "defend Social Security from unnecessary cuts that harm our seniors" while defending President Biden's economic record ("No one has presided over a more robust economic recovery with such grace, and as your President, I will continue that foresight even if the numbers right now aren't exactly rosy"). However, Bud Kennedy's third question of the night proved to be a real humdinger...

DAVID MUIR: Now, for our next question, let's go back to Bud Kennedy.

BUD KENNEDY: Gov. DeSantis, as you and practically everyone in this room saw since this is Dallas after all - home of America's Team - may have seen two weeks ago, almost two hours ago at this time, there was a very controversial and widely condemned ad that portrayed Republicans as 'mean spirited bullies who disregard their children's innocence and trust, disrespect folks who aren't exactly the stereotypical white Christian male, and have no compunction over how to act in public' - a stereotype many attribute to former President Trump and his supporters, and which some say explains why traditionally red Tarrant County went for President Biden. What is your response to the ad?

DAVID MUIR: 90 seconds.

RON DESANTIS: Thank you, Bud. As I have stated before, I have condemned the ad as absolutely false and also very divisive. That is not who we are as Republicans. Better yet, that is not who we are as Americans. It is so divisive the editorial boards of many newspapers, including the two big mainstream ones here in the Metroplex, and even The New York Times, condemned the ad without reservation.

That even President Biden also called the ad 'a distraction from the real issues facing Americans' explains where the dark money group funding this totally inaccurate ad went wrong. I am familiar with the work of Rick Wilson, being we're from the same state and he lives near the Governor's Mansion, and if you ask anyone around Tallahassee or who works in politics, you will find him to be an agitator, a burned out establishment Republican who struck out with every candidate he's worked with, and is simply mad because his team didn't win the primary against Rick Scott, against Marco Rubio, and against myself and Donald Trump.

He is all hat and no cattle, and ignores the FACT that the 'successful people' he talks about as being so anti-Republican are in reality favoring our campaign, because they see the difference between what Donald Trump and Joe Biden built, and the better choice is clearly not the one who boasted of 'better'.

The Republican Party condemns hate speech, does not condone hate groups, and considers anyone who supports white nationalism to be in flagrant violation of our party principles and party rules. It's in our platform, and it's why the GOP was founded to begin with...read all about it.

DAVID MUIR: (cutting in) Time just expired. Vice President Harris, your response.

KAMALA HARRIS: The ad calling Republicans as something worse than subhuman was indeed a very divisive ad, and certainly is not fit for broadcast. But Governor, that is exactly what your party has become. That is what you are. You say you're not racist but the truth is your supporters are exactly acting like that.

Expecting your kids to bow to your religious demands, being cruel to a fast food worker when you don't have it your way, even attacking our extracurriculars, our sports teams, even our military, because you don't like their opinions - which by the way are protected by our Constitution that you so claim to stand for, that is exactly what your supporters are doing.

Yet President Trump, when Charlottesville happened, did he condemn white supremacists? No, he gave them carte blanche to intimidate polite society and bully our institutions - something no other President has done in history. That is not a successful person, that is a small-minded, negative and hateful person whose values are not American nor even Christian.

In other words, if your child is playing football, in the cool crowd, able to have prom and homecoming - all normal rites of passage every American should be reaching - suddenly he's a "spoiled brat", but if they suck up to their parents, are constantly told "shut up and dribble" without any ability to think for or defend himself, suddenly he's 'a good little boy'.

That is not what America is, that is NOT what America should be, and it is up to you to denounce this trash because we're not going back to the dark days of Donald Trump no matter how many times your supporters yearn for it... (as David Muir tries to break in to remind Harris her time is up)

DAVID MUIR: Kamala, enough, your time is up, let Gov. DeSantis speak. Please...

Asides from this heated segment (in which the two went back and forth with DeSantis bringing up Megan Rapinoe and Taylor Swift and Harris bringing up Joe Rogan), the remainder of the debate proceeded as usual, with the closing segments being more toned down in comparison.

(Editor's note: For those who already noticed, I swapped out the moderators to include Cal Jillson instead of David Gergen since Jillson is local and quite well-known in Texas, and Bud Kennedy from the Fort Worth Star-Telegram instead of Gromer Jeffers Jr. from The Dallas Morning News, since the DaMN already has a columnist in the panel in Mark Davis, and WFAA-TV (the station Jason Whitely works for IRL and hosts Inside Texas Politics on the weekends) has a news-share agreement of sorts with the Star-Telegram; The Dallas Morning News has a news-share agreement with KXAS-TV, which is ironic because WFAA was co-owned with Belo for years with the DaMN (whose offices are across the street from WFAA's) and KXAS-TV was originally WBAP-TV - the TV station originally owned by Amon Carter's Star-Telegram that is now an NBC owned-and-operated station that also serves as a "graphics hub" for other NBC O&Os.)

September 19, 2024
DeSANTIS, HARRIS SPAR IN FIRST PRESIDENTIAL DEBATE IN DALLAS
On Thursday night, both Vice President Kamala Harris and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis held their first presidential debate at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, which is set to serve as a major battleground in November with whomever carries the surrounding Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex likely to carry Texas - and perhaps the election as well. Moderated by ABC World News Tonight anchor David Muir, the debate featured four panelists with ties to North Texas who primarily zeroed in on domestic issues including the economy, healthcare and education, along with social issues such as abortion and criminal justice reform. However, one particular question ruled the night in terms of political uproar - and intensity.

In response to a question from panelist and Fort Worth Star-Telegram columnist Bud Kennedy, who asked DeSantis of his opinion regarding the controversial September 5th ad during the kickoff game of the NFL season that branded Republicans as "trailer trash", DeSantis rebuked the ad as well as the broadstroking stereotype of his fellow Republicans with such vitriolic language, and also took direct aim at former GOP strategist Rick Wilson (a key contributor to the hybrid super PAC who funded the controversial ad, Decency for America PAC), calling his fellow Floridian "an agitator, a burned out establishment Republican who struck out with every candidate he's worked with, and is simply mad because his team didn't win the primary against Rick Scott, against Marco Rubio, and against myself and Donald Trump", and also recognizing the party's historic founding principle to end slavery in the pre-Civil War days while proclaiming "The Republican Party condemns hate speech, does not condone hate groups, and considers anyone who supports white nationalism to be in flagrant violation of our party principles and party rules."

Harris's response, after nearly two weeks of silence despite the ad being condemned from many other fellow Democrats as well as third party candidates Andrew Yang and Norman Solomon (who also called the Vice President a 'fake progressive', citing her prosecutorial record in San Francisco with regards to the state's "three strikes" law), finally came in her response to DeSantis: "The ad calling Republicans as something worse than subhuman was indeed a very divisive ad, and certainly is not fit for broadcast. But Governor, that is exactly what your party has become. That is what you are. You say you're not racist but the truth is your supporters are exactly acting like that." While Harris attempted to allude to Trump's reluctance to directly denounce white supremacists, particularly after the 2017 "Unite the Right" rally in Charlottesville, Virginia which culminated in a deadly car attack by a white supremacist who plowed into a crowd, her repeated back and forth with DeSantis proved to be so divisive that Muir had to intervene multiple times before Muir finally had enough and cut off her mic: "OK, Madam Vice President, that's it. No more. Next question please..." (to which Muir generated strong applause).

Other than that, the debate proceeded with the usual domestic battles not unlike what both candidates went through in the primary stage. Throughout the debate, Harris defended the Biden administration's response to COVID-19 and spoke of her administration's "unprecedented success in rebuilding our nation's economy", and lambasted DeSantis for "putting the elderly and the vulnerable in danger" with regards to his state's laissez-faire approach to COVID. DeSantis, meanwhile, took direct aim at Harris's handling of crime both in her days as San Francisco District Attorney and California Attorney General as well as in her vice presidency: "Unlike Kamala Harris, we are actually going to go after the crooks and the criminals instead of handing them undeserved 'get out of jail' free cards to kill our police officers and steal catalytic converters". DeSantis also blasted Harris and her superior in the White House for turning the FBI into a "Petri dish for criminalizing political opponents", and called the FBI's raid of former President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago residence "a grave assault on our First Amendment and our posterity as Americans".

The issue of entitlements including Social Security, as well as the Affordable Care Act, also came up, with Harris defending the 'successes' of former President Barack Obama's signature health care legislation - which Harris coincidentally never voted for, and vowed to take the "next step forward" with "Medicare for All". DeSantis, meanwhile called "Medicare for All" "dangerous for our government and for patients who wish to keep their doctor without some government busybody butting in", and also called a proposal from the Harris campaign to include Medicare coverage for adult diapers "ludicrous and unnecessary". When asked by panelist and SMU political professor Cal Jillson about how to save Social Security for future generations while also reducing its overall impact on the federal deficit, DeSantis called for an option for wealthier Americans to parlay up to 80 percent of their Social Security earnings into "private accounts that are indexed to the inflation rate and appreciate over time through the stock market" - which Harris lambasted as "another outsource to corporate elites at the expense of the average American", and called for a blanket end to all diversions from the Social Security trust towards appropriations not directly linked to Social Security, for which DeSantis struggled to name one example immediately.

When asked by panelist and former Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings about the need for a federal assault weapons ban, which failed several times in the Biden administration and subsequent administrations since the original version expired in 2004, Harris cited incidents in Uvalde, El Paso and outside San Antonio (among other areas of Texas) as prime examples "that underscore the need to take dangerous and unnecessary weapons of war off our streets", with DeSantis calling "any attempt to take away our guns, including popular rifles like the AR-15" "extremely vague" and "unnecessary", pointing to the need for increased mental health resources with a direct focus on troubled youth and those with mental illnesses; Harris, as expected, dodged the question and called out DeSantis for attempting to "stigmatize those with mental health issues". Border security was another point of contention, with DeSantis vowing to "finish the work that Donald Trump started down at the Texas border" and Harris lambasting her rival for sending his state's National Guard to Texas "at the expense of Florida taxpayers".

One issue that certainly drew attention was energy policy - a popular issue in a state known prominently for its energy industry across a wide variety of sources. When asked by Dallas Morning News columnist and local radio host Mark Davis about meeting the country's future energy needs, DeSantis called for a renewed focus on natural gas and nuclear power, including fast-tracking projects in Texas to meet critical energy demands necessary after a number of summers where the state's in-house electric grid was put to the brink, as well as a renewed focus on "removing barriers to American energy production in our shale fields". DeSantis also drew attention to carbon capture technology and emphasizing market-based solutions to climate change - for which DeSantis has been surprisingly outspoken during his time as Florida Governor. Harris, by contrast, vowed to stay the course on pushing for a "Green New Deal", calling it "the right move for our country with good-paying jobs and benefits that pay themselves in the long run".

Following the debate, Gov. DeSantis returned to the campaign trail in Texas, at rallies in San Antonio and McAllen before heading to Omaha, Nebraska where he is also expected to stump for Sen. Deb Fischer in her suddenly competitive reelection bid. Harris, meanwhile embarked on her next stop on the campaign trail to Oklahoma City, followed by fundraisers in Kansas City and Peoria, Illinois (the latter alongside former First Lady Michelle Obama at a local park), before flying back to D.C. to cast votes on important legislation regarding veterans' and first responders' benefits including for those who performed rescue and recovery services at Ground Zero following the 9/11 attacks in 2001. Most fast national polls showed Harris to be the winner of the debate given DeSantis's struggles to defend his COVID response, though DeSantis supporters declared victory on their end as the Florida Governor denounced Harris for "saying the quiet part out loud" in regards to her comments on the aforementioned anti-GOP attack ad in his closing statement.

Muir, however had the last laugh; after being delayed in his flight back to Syracuse due to severe weather, the World News Tonight anchor (who already had also decided to take the day off on Friday due to his being in Dallas on Thursday) retired to his house in the Finger Lakes region (a four-hour drive northwest of New York City), posing with a glass of Texas-made scotch on the rocks and some hardcover books in front of a framed American flag in a viral Twitter post where Muir commented "The layover was greater than expected, but nothing finer to start a well-deserved weekend than a nice glass of Texas scotch and some good reads up here in the Finger Lakes!"

[SaintStan86]

It's Friday night, the night before the official beginning of Fall, and Laura Ingraham has chosen not to forego this Friday night on her Fox News show, The Ingraham Angle...

Laura Ingraham, host of The Ingraham Angle on Fox News Channel
Source: Wikimedia Commons
Author: Gage Skidmore

LAURA INGRAHAM: Hello everyone, I'm Laura Ingraham. This is The Ingraham Angle from a very busy, and very out-of-touch, Washington tonight. We'll get to the latest from last night's presidential debate plus Congressman Dan Crenshaw joins us to discuss the latest ad disaster from Julián Castro in their campaign to succeed Ted Cruz in the U.S. Senate and Raymond Arroyo is here with us to share the latest Friday Follies...

(camera pans to the right)

LAURA INGRAHAM: But first...Saying The Quiet Part Out Loud. That's the focus of tonight's Angle.

(graphic displaying "The Angle" is shown)

LAURA INGRAHAM: For over two weeks now, you have seen the fallout from the sleazy and infamous ad that failed Republican strategist and establishment carnival barker Rick Wilson put out during the NFL kickoff game. You know, the one that portrayed Republicans as abusive wife and child beaters, who somehow think being an honor student or a star athlete or a brain surgeon is something to be frowned upon, who - falsely - don't care about veterans, and who even lash out at fast food workers - many of them teenagers by the way, simply because Donald Trump taught them to hate.

(clips from the "Republicans Are Trailer Trash" ad shown)

LAURA INGRAHAM: It was an ad condemned by Republicans across the board, condemned immediately by the NFL and, shockingly, NBC. Many Democrats also condemned it, including even President Biden of all persons, and Bill Maher even skewered the ad on his HBO show. Yet for some dumb reason, the so-called Decency for America, aka The Lincoln Project 2.0, is now boasting of how the ad is somehow swaying suburban voters - particularly women - into the arms of Kamala Harris and the Democratic Party who promise to never say mean things about your kids and their peers and activities and promise to weaponize the FBI to arrest parents who don't adopt the correct behavior. And the media is gushing about it...

(clips from various media sources are shown)

LAURA INGRAHAM: And apparently, so is this woman...

(clips from Kamala Harris during last night's presidential debate are shown)

LAURA INGRAHAM: God, we really have to give credit to David Muir for intervening when needed. Because honestly, those takes were downright awful. And even David Muir himself had the last laugh (showing snippet of David Muir's Twitter post with a glass of scotch in his house)...taking some small batch scotch back home from Texas to his $4 million palace up in Upstate New York.

But seriously, at the end of the day, what more could one want after being treated like a rag doll by the Vice President? Because that's exactly who Kamala Harris is. A radical liberal who wants to fundamentally transform the country and push - and cackle - her way to power. She is beholden to wealthy donors who throw away their money towards candidates who are out of touch with the average American.

Candidates whose children most American little leaguers and ballet troupes will never see in their classrooms. Candidates who you won't see sponsoring our Little Leagues and our Rotary clubs. Candidates you don't regularly see in the grocery store aisles or the fitting rooms of most major clothing stores.

In other words, the same people backing Kamala Harris are the same folks who like to rub their snobbery in other people's noses. Never mind that the blue haired people who really make up their base are never going to watch sporting events unlike the Middle America types they hate, who recoiled when Colin Kaepernick took a knee and a random Olympian no one knows except enthusiasts of one obscure sport turned her back on Old Glory. Thankfully, that person finished next to dead last in Tokyo. Never mind that the queen of woke pandering, Megan Rapinoe, has been outed as a bully by many of her teammates.

Never mind that the radical leftists who benefit from the donors' choices usually aren't the ones with the high-skilled jobs in the professions and the trades that we need more of coming out of our colleges, instead of yet another batch of underwater basket weaving degree holders whose ignorant and ill-informed parents pressured them into because they fretted about "too much math" - what idiots!, instead of the "risky" business, engineering, computer and medicine degrees that pay great salaries out of college. And then you wonder why China is beating America in many areas where it counts...

(clips of Chinese government propaganda are shown)

And never mind that our American youth are so lost that the kinds that used to regularly go to the gym instead of wasting away playing video games, that are involved in sports and extracurriculars in high school and eventually join a fraternity or sorority in college, that are involved in Sunday schools and youth camps when they're not in school...they're being frowned upon now because of poorly misguided media stiffs who in their high school days were bullied and now want to rub it in the noses of the "mean" jocks. Yes, there are some poorly misguided social conservatives who suck up to Jen Hatmaker and John Pavlovitz who do this to their kids thinking they're doing so out of love, but it's important to consider the sources.

The next time some so-called Bible believing Christian tells you how bad fraternities and sororities are, never mind their enormous contributions to charities and other philanthropy like breast cancer research and supporting children with autism, consider that they're giving cover to Rolling Stone who trashed a fraternity at the University of Virginia with a totally false rape allegation by the now-disgraced Sabrina Erdely.

The next time someone tells you it's a bad thing for your kid to pursue a career that affords you to buy a spiffy Vineyard Vines Shep Shirt full-price instead of perpetually shopping off the clearance racks because your family focuses too much on pinching pennies like we've done for too long instead of pressuring their incompetent, spend-happy government to do so, consider that these naysayers are the same folks who fawn over Beijing Biden and trashed Donald Trump for bringing back American jobs and increasing American wages.

And the next time some alleged do-good Karen wants you to believe that the sort of "athletic nerds" that Republicans have traditionally championed are "spoiled brats", that's not really what a Republican would say. Most Republican parents aspire to raise such successful offspring. Who you're really giving cover to are the same Hollywood celebrities who fantasize about the popular kids being such "drunken snobs" or "overtly prim and proper types", when the reality is their fantasies are mostly made up lies rooted in "I wish I could be them". And the sad part about it? These lies were being bought up by precocious preteens who grew out of it once they got to high school and their misinformed parents who were taught - wrongly - to believe that the sugarcoated entertainment offerings they provided were "family friendly".

These naysayers are more like a bunch of bitter, jealous cowards who wish they could be some caricature of the cool crowd, and not in a good, Revenge of the Nerds kind of way. Just ask Zac Efron and Jennette McCurdy, who spoke of how their child acting careers got sidetracked between the way Efron's female High School Musical classmates got sexualized by Disney and the cold shoulder McCurdy got when Nickelodeon favored Ariana Grande - who went on to woke infamy licking donuts while saying "I hate America", whereas McCurdy was discarded by the network and struggled with depression and a childhood stolen by her controlling mother.

(clips of celebrity interviews by Zac Efron and Jennette McCurdy are shown)

Fortunately, the tide is turning. In states controlled by Republicans, allegedly spoiled "athletic nerds" are thriving in Florida and Texas, and blossoming again in Michigan and Virginia thanks to leaders who care like Tudor Dixon and Glenn Youngkin. But even in states like Illinois and New Jersey, voters there are waking up to the horror show that Democrats created, with Ron DeSantis polling competitively in Illinois (where J.B. Pritzker is now underwater) and Dr. Öz with a narrow lead in New Jersey over Bob Menendez. And even in New York, State Sen. Mike Martucci, who will join us later in this show, is now holding Kirsten Gillibrand to single digits. And that was before Ron DeSantis responded to Kamala this way...

(clips from last night's closing statement by Gov. Ron DeSantis is shown)

The suburban voters who recoiled from Republicans because of Donald Trump's "mean tweets" swung harder back to the GOP than any other group in 2022, and the working-class voters that now make up the Republican base are even more unimpressed by the Democrats - they're favoring Gov. DeSantis by huge double digits. Hispanics and Asians are also tired of their family values and their academic prowess being trashed by woke liberals as well, and it has only made their support for Republicans more profound regardless of how many times Democrats want you to believe Republicans are nothing but a bunch of white supremacists.

The old Republican guard of open borders, misguided parenting, overtures to China? It's not there anymore, and voters have awakened to the truth. Which has to be pretty distressing for Rick Wilson and the remaining supporters of his at what used to be the Lincoln Project. After all, the so-called Forward Party ticket is drawing in much more support from elitist Beltway Democrats and Silk Stocking voters than any other group, the neocons have been rightfully reduced to a rump party that neither party respects, and Kamala Harris's act is starting to fade with millions of Americans. So the next time someone tells you that that totally false ad is what Republicans are, just remember who's behind the smears.

(clips of Rick Wilson and Joe Scarborough on MSNBC and reports of John Weaver's sexual misconduct allegations are shown)

Because the truth is, unlike Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton who had enough decency - real decency - to keep their comments about people who "cling to guns and religion" and who are a "basket of deplorables" to Democrat donor class types, Kamala Harris chose to say the quiet part out loud, as Ron DeSantis put it best, to an undecided debate audience in Dallas, to a shocked panel of newspaper columnists at both of North Texas's big-name newspapers, a former Dallas Mayor, an esteemed political science professor named Cal Jillson, and even David Muir. That is why we should all be grateful to Gov. DeSantis for calling out Kamala Harris for saying the quiet part out loud. And that's the Angle.

September 23, 2024
DeSANTIS LEAD OVER HARRIS CUT IN HALF AS VICE PRESIDENT TOUTS NUMBERS WITH SUBURBAN WOMEN
While Vice President Kamala Harris continues to face backlash over her comments regarding the controversial anti-Republican ad broadcast during a primetime NFL game earlier this month, her campaign has been showcasing new polls showing the presidential race tightening, with Harris taking leads in Michigan, Nevada, New Hampshire, Georgia, Pennsylvania and Virginia, and trailing her Republican rival, Gov. Ron DeSantis, within the margin of error in Texas, Arizona, North Carolina, Ohio and even the Governor's home state of Florida. Key takeaways included Harris's favorable polling numbers from her debate with DeSantis last Thursday, particularly regarding prolonged teacher shortages as well as healthcare, as well as a nine-point lead with suburban women on average in most polling. A Harris spokesperson spun it this way: "Voters are waking up to the illusion of Gov. Ron DeSantis's unpopular and divisive record in Florida, and are now saying that they are better off with the steady leadership and economic stability that President Joe Biden has restored to America".

Meanwhile, a spokesperson for the DeSantis campaign responded by pointing out that "Voters can be swayed very easily by what they want to hear from mainstream media and other sources that want you to believe that everything is all rosy out there. The truth is that polling is not an accurate reflection of what the American people care about, as evidenced by how wrong they have gotten it the last several years before and after the Donald Trump years." The DeSantis campaign also stated that they have spoken from numerous 'on the fence' voters who "believe they are being misled by the Democrats' allies in the mainstream media", and pointed to unreleased internal polling that shows DeSantis "still leading by at least six points or more". "Once Americans hear the real story about DeSantis's successful record in Florida, voter opinion starts to shift in DeSantis's favor", the spokesperson added.

The campaigns are already in full swing with their rallies in various states between Harris's appearances in Nevada and Utah over the weekend and DeSantis making overtures to voters in Minnesota and Iowa as well as northern Virginia, where he also stumped for State Sen. Jill Vogel who is running for the U.S. Senate against Sen. Tim Kaine. Newspaper endorsements have also rolled in with The New York Times endorsing Harris along with the Chicago Sun-Times and her once hometown paper, the San Francisco Chronicle. Meanwhile, DeSantis has earned endorsements from The Washington Times as well as the Las Vegas Review-Journal, both of whom have editorial slants that have long favored Republicans with the latter primarily led by the controlling Adelson family who is prominent in Republican fundraising circles. The publication National Review has endorsed DeSantis, calling the Florida Governor "the closest thing to Ronald Reagan we have seen in a long, long time" and warning that "a Harris presidency will mark the end of America as we know it".

September 24, 2024
VOICE BEHIND CONTROVERSIAL NFL KICKOFF AD REVEALS HERSELF; BACKLASH ERUPTS FROM FANS
After weeks of much speculation as to who the nasally voice behind the controversial "Republicans Are Trailer Trash" ad is, an article in Vogue magazine finally revealed the true source: Grammy award-winning musician Taylor Swift. In an interview with the magazine, Swift came out as the voice behind the ad during a candid conversation that also touched on such matters as reproductive rights, the increasingly digitized manner in which musicians earn their livings, and Swift's struggles in her youth to find love before her eventual long-term romance with English actor Joe Alwyn. The lingering issues surrounding her ongoing legal dispute with record executive Scooter Braun, who held the rights to her masters to her original six albums - in turn forcing Swift to re-record those albums after failing to gain back control of them, was also discussed.

In explaining why she took up the offer knowing it could cause potentially serious damage to her reputation in the eyes of her fans, Swift cited "the time to play nice and simply entertain people has come and gone". In further explaining her motives to lend her voice behind the ad, Swift pointed to examples of "aspiring teenagers whose dreams and passions have been cut short by hateful parents who refuse to accept their children for who they are unconditionally", some of whom eventually committed suicide or turned to drug addictions. She also compared "controlling parents" to "those who would rather raise their kids in Saudi Arabia or China than America" and singled out former President Donald Trump as "the catalyst of all the things that have caused so much hurt to so many young people who just want to fit in with their peers and not be forced to live their lives in unhappy, toxic relationships". Summarizing her comments, Swift showed no regrets: "It was the right thing to do, and I seriously hope Americans look in their hearts and ask if being mean to their kids is worth it".

The comments, unsurprisingly, drew blowback from a large contingent of her fans who responded by destroying her CDs and deleting her songs from their iTunes downloads and Spotify playlists. One lawyer in Nashville even announced on Twitter he was launching a series of ads during late-night television targeting interested parties seeking class-action compensation from Apple for full refunds of their discarded iTunes downloads. Country music stations in the United States still playing her music were especially "Swift" in dumping her songs, with one country station in Denver, KYGO-FM (which itself drew controversy when one of its DJs allegedly groped Swift under her skirt at her Denver concert), even hosting a "Swift Slam" for fans to destroy her albums and CDs at Sloan's Lake Park in northwest Denver on a pyre in the middle of Sloan's Lake; this event was interrupted midway through the bonfire, though, when Denver Parks and Recreation and Colorado Department of Public Health & Environment regulators broke it up citing potential damage to the ecosystem in the lake.

September 27, 2024
HURRICANE LESLIE SLAMS INTO FLORIDA, SOUTH ATLANTIC COASTS; MAJOR FLOODING REPORTED FROM VERO BEACH TO VIRGINIA BEACH
From Thursday to Friday evening, a fast moving Category 4 hurricane gripped much of the southern Atlantic Seaboard as Hurricane Leslie made final landfall south of Myrtle Beach, but not without causing a trail of considerable tidal flooding that could be seen as far south as Vero Beach, in Florida. In Orlando, many neighborhoods were flooded as Gov. Ron DeSantis took time out of his presidential campaign to fly back to Tallahassee to oversee the impact of the hurricane on his state. Warning Floridians to do "everything they can to ride out this storm", DeSantis vowed "We are one Florida together, and we are going to provide all the resources necessary to get Florida back on track when Leslie passes". The storm has proven to be a very wet one, drenching much of Central Florida and the First Coast region including Jacksonville with record rainfalls and reports of tornadoes in some coastal communities, as well as a flash flood emergency in Savannah that extended to Charleston and Hilton Head Island, in South Carolina.

The storm's worst impact, however, was in North Carolina and in the Myrtle Beach area, where several piers were wiped out and some beachfront houses were collapsed into the Atlantic Ocean. Much of downtown Wilmington was decimated by storm surge and wind damage that also flattened many coastal communities from the Grand Strand to Cape Hatteras, with flooding also being reported in Norfolk, Virginia and around Richmond. So far, 15 people have been killed and dozens injured, with hundreds of thousands of customers left in the dark without power across several states. Leslie's impact has also disrupted the college football schedule for the week, with many teams choosing to either reschedule their game to earlier or later times depending on the impact to the surrounding area and others choosing to reschedule to another week or cancel the game altogether. The NFL's Jacksonville Jaguars are not impacted for the week, as the team is playing on the road in Chicago this week against the Chicago Bears at Soldier Field.

President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris expressed their thoughts and prayers for the affected residents along the hurricane's path, with Biden vowing "swift action to deliver resources promptly to the affected communities to get them back on track", with Harris also expressing her sympathies to the eastern North Carolina region that already had been battered and continues to recover from Hurricane Gordon (though in some parts of the previous hurricane's most affected region, the damage and flooding from Leslie is not as serious in comparison as most of the damage has been situated along more coastal regions, most notably in the vicinity of Greenville and New Bern). DeSantis has also issued disaster declarations for several affected counties in Florida from the Treasure Coast to Jacksonville, and has already begun to secure federal resources in anticipation of a federal disaster declaration from Biden. North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper, as well as both of his state's gubernatorial candidates (Democratic state Attorney General Josh Stein and Republican Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson) have also seen their leadership skills tested throughout the disasters, with a potential role in the Harris administration for Cooper possibly on the horizon.

Next Up: Andrew Yang finally gets his debate, but will it lead to the real thing?

[2016]

I don't feel good about DeSantis chances! Hopefully the polling snaps back into the Republican favour.

[Illiniwek]

Respectfully, I do not imagine a large contingent of her fans would so completely disown her to the extent of breaking CDs and deleting downloads, "Swift slam" and filing class action lawsuits. Her move away from traditional country has been 10+ years in the making. Her largest demographic of fans are women 40 and younger. She's been an outspoken liberal activist for some years now. I just don't see any "Taylor Swift fans" reacting that negatively.

Now, would country stations pull her music from their lineups? Absolutely.

[SaintStan86]

Respectfully, I do not imagine a large contingent of her fans would so completely disown her to the extent of breaking CDs and deleting downloads, "Swift slam" and filing class action lawsuits. Her move away from traditional country has been 10+ years in the making. Her largest demographic of fans are women 40 and younger. She's been an outspoken liberal activist for some years now. I just don't see any "Taylor Swift fans" reacting that negatively.

Now, would country stations pull her music from their lineups? Absolutely.

You are certainly correct in that regards, especially with those who recall her more "country" days before she literally decided to "Shake It Off" and go full-blown pop (though it's fair to say that her early music was definitely pop country - as opposed to more traditional country (e.g. George Strait, Alan Jackson, Willie Nelson, Patsy Cline, etc.). All said, TS was never a traditional country artist in that sense - which is reserved more for the names I have already mentioned as well as most acts you'd find on "classic country" stations like 97.1 FM where I am in Houston.

And yes, I do see a sort of backlash from fans that are either more conservative, more focused on ACTUAL country music (and this group never cared for her music anyways), or simply outgrew the sort of trend-driven "twangy pop" she promoted in her music, and Fox News will be amplifying it as well as Entertainment Tonight and TMZ. Not unlike what happened to the Dixie Chicks (whose quip about George W. Bush was effectively their country music - and mainstream American music - swan song), TS's words regarding "controlling parents" and "the time to play nice...has come and gone" will have similar backlash and also have given the DeSantis campaign a field day, with some in his camp as well as on Fox News and Newsmax even calling TS a "patron saint of groomers". I'm not going to even entertain her past love life, where she constantly changed out boyfriends more than a baby goes through diapers in a day, even to the point where she wrote songs about her ex-boyfriends and other past flames.

Finally, the references to Denver (and yes, that particular station was the one with the creepy DJ who got fired) and environmental regulators breaking up a station-sponsored pyre in a municipal park are also certain to make this cannon fodder for an upcoming South Park episode, as it's usually around this time Trey & Matt put out new episodes on one of the few remaining redeeming qualities of Comedy Central these days. Imagine Cartman going on and on about TS, harassing Wendy and Bebe in Mr. Garrison's classroom, and ending up getting a scolding from Mr. Mackey ("No one cares what you think of Taylor Swift, m'kay")...

[SaintStan86]

UPDATE: It appears now that Jeffrey Toobin is indeed leaving CNN quite early - and on his own terms! Will be interesting to see what his book regarding the Oklahoma City bombing will be about and how to which extent it inflames the militia contigent - which ever since Waco has been extremely suspicious about the FBI and perhaps the entire national security element of DC. Accordingly, my entry in this TL about his being fired from CNN for making racially charged comments regarding Candace Owens after she called Sen. Ben Sasse a "racist" has been struck out, and replaced with an alternate take in which he stirs similar controversy on New York City's main PBS station, WNET.

As September segues into October, two debates not involving the two major party presidential candidates take center stage...

September 28, 2024
THIRD PARTY CANDIDATES PARTICIPATE IN TWITCH DEBATE IN SAN FRANCISCO
On Saturday night, four third-party candidates seeking to become President of the United States debated each other in a debate seen exclusively on Twitch with the intent of gaining enough support to hopefully gain a spot in at least one of the next two presidential debates. The debate, which took place at the Moscone Center in San Francisco in front of a live audience, was hosted by a trio of popular Twitch political streamers with questions evenly split between those asked by the audience and others asked from Twitch users across the country. As expected (and already announced beforehand), the debate stage featured two empty podiums in the middle that featured cutouts of Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris (for whom the hosts referred to her as having "left her heart in San Francisco and moved to Hollywood") and Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (whom the hosts called "Donald Trump on decaf and 40% less fat than regular Donald Trump", even showcasing a box of reduced fat Oreos to emphasize their argument).

The debate focused on many of the same topics discussed in the primary debates earlier in the year, and as expected the candidates variegated between the issues. Andrew Yang, running under the banner of his Forward Party, spoke of the need for more "human capitalism" in economic policy and announced efforts to "reduce the unemployment and healthcare disparities between autistic and neurotypical Americans to a bare minimum". Yang also called for a federal "ranked choice voting" initiative with incentives to convince states to follow suit. He also called for term limits for members of Congress, vowed to repeal the Apportionment Act of 1911 (which capped the size of the House of Representatives to 435 members and which Yang called unconstitutional), and floated "Democracy Dollars" for ordinary Americans to directly contribute to the candidates of their choice. Yang also expressed support for uniform background checks and concealed carry reciprocity for guns, vowed to push forth a Balanced Budget Amendment including incentives for states to secure ratification of the amendment, and announced a detailed proposal for a "universal basic income" for unemployed Americans.

In addition, the debate also created an opportunity for MyPillow founder and CEO Mike Lindell, candidate for the Constitution Party, to highlight his candidacy. In explaining his platform, Lindell vowed to go "further than Ron DeSantis ever will in securing American jobs for American workers", vowed to end all tariffs with foreign nations unless they "actually don't contribute to our trade deficit", called for a constitutional amendment to "guarantee equal rights for the unborn" and vowed to end all foreign entanglements overseas "without any reservation". Lindell also used the platform to push forth his election integrity platform plank, and called for the immediate arrest of "any elected official who contributed to the 2020 election that was stolen from Donald Trump", but caused a stir when he suggested that "I have consulted with (Brexit movement leader) Nigel Farage regarding the matter and he agrees with me that those who are responsible for the handling of the last election should be prosecuted to the fullest extent"; this stance drew boos from the audience in San Francisco, while Nigel Farage himself later responded by pointing out that he never consulted with Lindell on the matter (and in fact has expressed support for Ron DeSantis for President).

While Yang and Lindell are already household names, the debate also gave an opportunity for two lesser known candidates whose parties are considered are more established in comparison. Libertarian Party nominee and comedian Dave Smith called for "more robust protections for free speech on social media" and called for federal legislation to codify the legalization of recreational marijuana nationwide, and also introduced the audience to podcaster Joe Rogan, who earlier in the week announced his endorsement of Smith on his podcast. "As your next President - the first Libertarian President of these United States - we are going to bring maximum economic freedom and individual liberty to America, and put an end to the hysterical war games that both corporate, establishment parties have created", Smith declared. He also criticized Lindell for "continuing to beat a cold dead horse over four years ago" (referring to the 2020 presidential election) and Yang for "enticing Americans with eye candy disguised as cash" (referring to Yang's aforementioned "universal basic income" idea) when he should be more focused on giving Americans more "arm candy", potentially referring to increase the rate of married couples without giving away clues regarding his stances on abortion and traditional marriage (which already are liberal stances for Smith anyway).

Green Party nominee Norman Solomon, the only candidate on stage who lives in California (and, counting Harris and DeSantis, the only one currently residing in the San Francisco Bay Area), vowed a "relentless progressive agenda" emphasizing a "Green New Deal without strings attached", called for a dismantling of the Electoral College, and vowed to make community college "free to every American who wants a two-year degree". He also echoed Smith's call for decriminalizing marijuana nationally and called out Harris for "cowardly rejecting the grassroots of the Democratic Party who demand a progressive renaissance for America and not this endless drivel of 'this half of the country is abusive to their kids' when Democrats have unaddressed family violence issues of their own that often get swept under the rug" (apparently referencing the controversial anti-Republican attack ad from earlier this month). Solomon also called for the establishment of a Department of Peace and called for an end to all federal funding of local and county police departments, instead leaving that duty up to the individual states.

The debate was the most viewed stream in the history of Twitch, with over 4.1 million users online to view the debate live - constituting nearly half of the active users on the platform, including about 700,000 who joined within the last week primarily to watch the debate. In addition, the debate was also replayed on YouTube as well as other streaming platforms, with clips from the debate also featured on network evening newscasts and Sunday morning talk shows the following day. Yang's campaign spokesperson reported that over $5 million was raised just off the debate last night, with hopes of a polling bounce that could potentially lead to an invitation to the second debate outside Grand Rapids, Michigan next month.

A spokesperson for the Harris campaign, meanwhile, was much less charitable of the participants, and vowed that "voters will come home to Kamala Harris once they recognize the importance of electing a proven leader who will fight for the people and strive to make our communities better, versus electing a random third-party candidate who has nothing credible to stand on". The DeSantis campaign also responded, pointing out that issues like election integrity, the national debt and "defending our shared American values" "are issues that DeSantis takes to heart and will push forth in his first 100 days in office", and dismissed Lindell as "a snake oil salesman more interested in selling pillows than solutions for America".

DeSantis also has reportedly obtained former Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal (who like Yang is Asian-American, albeit of Indian and not Taiwanese descent) to serve as a decoy for Yang in debate prep in preparation of the latter's potential invite to the next debate, joining Sen. Joni Ernst of Iowa, a former colleague of Harris's on the Senate Judiciary Committee who has served as a decoy for Harris in DeSantis's debate prep. The Harris campaign, meanwhile, has obtained Harris's fellow Californian and Rep. Ted Lieu to serve as a decoy for Yang in the Vice President's own debate prep; Rhode Island U.S. Rep. David Cicilline, who served alongside DeSantis on the House Judiciary Committee including during the first two years of the Trump administration, already serves as a stand-in for DeSantis during Harris's debate prep.

It's Tuesday, October 1st, and after a vigorous weekend of barnstorming for both campaigns across the country, the vice presidential running mates make their travail to Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y. for their first face-to-face meeting since both became running mates of their respective presidential nominees...

Source: Wikimedia Commons Author: Dantes De MonteCristo

Source: Wikimedia Commons Author: Kenneth C. Zirkel

The campus of Cornell University in Ithaca, New York and Bartels Hall, home of various Cornell University athletics programs (including the school's basketball teams) and site of the October 1, 2024 vice presidential debate.

October 1, 2024
PETERS, HALEY GO FACE-TO-FACE IN VICE PRESIDENTIAL DEBATE AT CORNELL
On Tuesday night, vice presidential hopefuls Gary Peters and Nikki Haley met face to face for the first time since being plucked by their respective parties to serve as respective running mates for Vice President Kamala Harris and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, with the debate taking center stage at Bartels Hall, located on the campus of Cornell University (whose basketball teams play in the complex) in Ithaca, New York. Moderated by PBS NewsHour correspondent Amna Nawaz, the 90-minute debate covered the gamut of issues, with a primary focus on matters likely to be taken up in the next Congress as the Vice President also serves as President of the Senate, whose duties among others include serving as a tiebreaker vote in deadlocked votes. It also served as an opportunity for Haley to highlight her record as Governor of South Carolina in addition to her work as Ambassador to the United Nations, but most especially for Sen. Peters who, until his selection by Harris to serve as her running mate, was largely unknown outside of his home state of Michigan where he serves as the state's junior Senator (and soon to be Senior Senator with the retirement of fellow Democrat Debbie Stabenow).

One area where the two diverged certainly was on the economy, with a focus on labor unions and the automotive industry. Haley defended her economic record as Governor, touting job growth from such companies as BMW and Volvo - both major European automakers who committed to expanding or moving operations to her state as Governor, and boasted of "over 100,000 jobs created in South Carolina during my tenure as Governor". She also boasted of further job growth under her successor, Gov. Henry McMaster, "for which I served as the cornerstone of the prosperity that all South Carolinians share in". Peters, meanwhile, touted his record of "saving Detroit from economic disaster after the collapse of the auto industry during the Great Recession", not only by providing loan guarantees and debt forgiveness to GM and Chrysler, but also incentivizing all automakers - including Ford and Toyota - to adopt new technologies in auto manufacturing and work towards reducing their overall emissions. Peters also took aim at Haley's assertion that automakers would benefit by moving their operations to Haley's right-to-work South Carolina, pointing to the state's poor educational scores compared to other states. "Without fully funded, quality education, all that economic growth Nikki Haley talks about in South Carolina is just talk", Peters quipped.

Another topic of discussion came regarding cultural matters. Haley spoke of the "right to life for the unborn" and also vowed to take aim at China: "I will work with the Senate and the House to levy higher tariffs on the Chinese Communist government that has undermined American jobs and American workers, and put an end to the assault that the CCP has committed on our country and our values". Peters, meanwhile, expressed strong support for "a woman's right to choose" as well as for "allowing terminally ill patients to end their own life in dignity", noting his 2008 congressional victory against a GOP incumbent in a historically Republican congressional district where he also defeated famed euthanasia advocate Dr. Jack Kevorkian (who ran as an independent in that race). He also took aim at Haley's "rank silence" over racially-motivated violence against her fellow Asian Americans that rose during the COVID-19 pandemic, prompting her to respond "I have never been silent when it comes to violence against racial minorities", and also alluding to her role in removing the Confederate flag from the grounds of South Carolina's state capitol in Columbia, following a 2015 mass shooting committed at a church in Charleston, in which a White supremacist gunned down members of the mostly Black congregation.

One topic that drew considerable attention during the debate was the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement in Israel, which Haley has been a fierce critic of and for which she signed the first statewide legislation to block such efforts in the United States. When asked by panelist and The Nation publisher Katrina vanden Heuvel about whether or not her stance will be sufficient to woo over traditionally Democratic Jewish voters, Haley responded "The gross bias that the UN showed against our friend and ally, Israel, was truly bewildering", as she took aim at Peters for waffling on the issue, arguing that "a vote against BDS is a vote for Hamas".

Peters, whose constituencies during his time in Congress included much of the population base for Metro Detroit's Jewish community in southern Oakland County as well as the historically Polish but now majority-Muslim city of Hamtramck, spoke of the 'delicate balance' of "representing an ethnically and religiously diverse constituency in Metro Detroit", denouncing religious discrimination against either Muslims or Jews (as well as diverse groups of Christians as well as ethnic Dutch and Finnish communities), but also alluding that "not everything that Israel has committed, particularly from Zionist radicals, is 'kosher'", calling it "inconsistent for me to condemn the Palestinian state outright when the Israeli Zionists occupying the West Bank aren't any better with their peacekeeping efforts". Haley lambasted Peters in response: "As Vice President, Ron DeSantis and I will be unwavering supporters for the people of Israel, and will stand tall against efforts to diminish our relationship with the only democracy - and our only true ally - in the Middle East".

When asked by panelist Ben Domenech, the publisher of The Federalist, Peters was also asked about his stance on the national debt, now soaring over $32 trillion despite efforts by President Biden to reduce the deficit. "As a member of both houses of Congress, I have led efforts to bring tough fiscal discipline to our federal budget, and it is regrettable that our efforts to save the economy, guarantee quality, affordable healthcare for millions of Americans and secure thousands - if not millions - of good-paying, shovel-ready jobs, left us with a huge hole in the federal budget", Peters remarked while criticizing Haley for being silent on former President Trump's tax cuts which he called "a major catalyst behind our poor fiscal health that haven't paid for themselves". Haley responded to Peters: "There have been numerous efforts by conservatives to rein in the deficit, but Democrats and weak Republicans like Lisa Murkowski ruined them in the name of 'party unity'", arguing that she will fight to make sure conservative grassroots priorities and not "DC swamp politics" influence the Senate's body of work. Haley continued: "I shook up the old boys' club in Columbia, I shook up the Geneva elite at the U.N, and as Vice President I will shake up the Congress and force our expected robust Republican majority to actually deliver what the people want".

The debate ended with the clear consensus that Republicans are likely to maintain control, if not expand their reach at least slightly, in the U.S. Senate come January 2025. Peters stressed the importance of voting for Kamala Harris to "ensure that more of the same successful, broad-based and bipartisan leadership Americans saw under President Biden continues", while Haley spoke of "great things Americans will be looking forward to when Gov. Ron DeSantis and I are chosen by you, the American people, and I hope not only to earn your trust, but work hard for you - because this country belongs to you". While there has been much discussion about an additional presidential debate between the next two scheduled presidential debates - a town-hall style debate on October 9th and a modified Lincoln-Douglas debate on the 24th, nothing has come to fruition yet beyond the two upcoming debates.

The news also comes as Forward Party candidate Andrew Yang (whose running mate, former GOP U.S. Rep. Adam Kinzinger, hosted a virtual town hall during the vice presidential debate that attracted millions of viewers on the Forward Party's YouTube channel) has polled an average of seven percent in the latest national polling, with DeSantis and Harris nearly tied at around 41 percent with five percent undecided following Harris's comparatively strong performance over DeSantis in the first debate, in which DeSantis took "body blows" from Harris over their handling of the COVID-19 pandemic as well as perceptions that Republicans are "mean bullies", a fact highlighted in the controversial "Republicans Are Trailer Trash" ad from last month that shocked viewers but according to Harris's camp "saw momentum towards our campaign from crucial suburban swing voters who yearn to live their lives and let their kids be kids instead of watching their backs to please 'intolerant cultural fascists'".

Indeed, a key surrogate of Peters' campaign, State Sen. and potential 2026 gubernatorial candidate Mallory McMorrow (who herself won a Republican-leaning suburban district in the 2018 "blue wave" midterms on such similar "appeals to decency"), defended aspects of the ad while condemning the overall tone of it. "Of course many Republicans don't act this way, but when you see Democrats showing up for their kids and their activities and Republicans whining about them because of whatever culture war Tucker Carlson or other ignorant keyboard warriors want to start, tell me who the real Christians are? Certainly not the trash whining about Disney and the NFL", said McMorrow at a campaign event in Ohio; McMorrow gained attention during the 2022 midterms in which she called out a GOP colleague of hers who labeled her a 'groomer' - a term used to describe traffickers of child sexual abuse - during an impassioned speech to her fellow lawmakers in Lansing. However, the DeSantis campaign responded to rumors of a "tightening presidential race", pointing out that focus groups between soft Republicans and undecided independent voters conducted in suburban swing areas have been "very positive" with "encouraging polling numbers to be released soon".

Next post: The 30-day forecast for the Presidency and the Senate, plus a very special birthday is celebrated, and the candidates go to town - and with a third candidate in tow?...

[Kahane's Grave Is A Gender-Neutral Bathroom]

I don't feel good about DeSantis chances! Hopefully the polling snaps back into the Republican favour.

Are you seriously thinking this TL doesn't favor Republicans enough?

[SaintStan86]

Editor's note: With Fox News announcing that Shannon Bream is the new host of Fox News Sunday, I have accordingly changed the moderator for the town hall debate from Bret Baier to her. Also, I have changed the date of the third debate to the next Thursday, October 24th, to give enough of a gap between the next two debates to afford the presidential candidates an opportunity to campaign more freely and even do some forums in between.

The vice presidential debate wasn't the only story of note on the 1st of October. Many miles away from upstate New York, a big birthday is being celebrated...

October 1, 2024
JIMMY CARTER ENDORSES HARRIS AT GEORGIA HOME, CELEBRATES 100TH BIRTHDAY IN ATLANTA
While her vice presidential running mate Gary Peters was in upstate New York preparing for his debate against Republican running mate Nikki Haley, Vice President Kamala Harris joined dozens of other dignitaries in celebrating the 100th birthday of former President Jimmy Carter at the Carter Center in Atlanta on Tuesday. The former Democratic Georgia Governor-turned-President, first elected in a contentious 1976 election contest but later defeated by Ronald Reagan in the 1980 presidential election, was thoroughly honored by such figures as fellow former Presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton, U.S. Sen. Jon Ossoff, former Sens. Sam Nunn and Raphael Warnock and numerous other, mostly Democratic, dignitaries who spoke not only of Carter's "statesmanship" and "divine record as President" (which for obvious reasons has been downplayed by historians), but also of Carter's "stellar humanitarian record" (which has been highly lauded across the political spectrum).

The celebration of events began Tuesday morning two hours south of Atlanta in the small southwest Georgia town of Plains, situated midway between Columbus and Albany. There, Carter was joined by State House Minority Leader James Beverly (who is also the Democratic nominee for the state's 2nd District) and Harris who earned the former President's endorsement during a breakfast of Carter's favorite cheese grits with eggs, country ham and vegetables. "As an humble servant who proudly served as President of the United States during an enormous period of transformation - one where the rights of women, minorities and children made unprecedented progress, I humbly endorse Vice President Harris to become our first Madam President", Carter declared during a live announcement via satellite from his humble house in Plains. The breakfast party then joined many of the other dignitaries who heard from a sermon spoken by Carter at the pulpit of nearby Maranatha Baptist Church, also in Plains, where an invitation-only audience also received a bag of peanuts - a nod to Carter's trade as a peanut farmer before entering politics as a Georgia State Senator in 1963.

When asked during the later gathering in Atlanta about his secret to living, Carter alluded to his marriage of 78 years to his wife, Rosalynn Carter. "She has been my right-hand lady this whole time, and I have been honored to have her join me through all the trials and tribulations this country has endured," as he once again shared scripture from the Bible with his audience in Atlanta. Former Sen. Warnock, himself a preacher who serves as the senior pastor of Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta (where Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. once served as a co-pastor), gave a powerful sermon where he described Carter's impact as going "above and beyond the duties expected of a faithful servant to Jesus" and "whose impact will continue to be felt for generations until the end of the Earth when our Kingdom comes". Various Democratic politicians and some Republicans as well also paid tribute to Carter throughout the day, as did Habitat for Humanity, which the Carters have been extensively involved in over the years.

October 3, 2024
"FORWARD MOTION": YANG GETS INVITE TO TOWN HALL DEBATE IN MICHIGAN
On Thursday, the committee organizing the upcoming town hall debate at Michigan's Grand Valley State University announced that Forward Party candidate Andrew Yang has qualified to participate in next Wednesday's presidential debate against Vice President Kamala Harris and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis. With Yang's campaign polling an average of six percent and pulling voters from both parties at near equilibrium, the organizers at Grand Valley State University felt that the former Democratic presidential hopeful and New York City mayoral candidate "qualified enough" to take part in the debate. "The Andrew Yang campaign represents a new breed of presidential candidate - one that focuses on the solutions that voters crave instead of merely pandering to ideologues on the fringes of the political spectrum, and this proved to be compelling enough for us to invite him to take part", the committee announced Thursday.

Yang released a statement regarding the committee's decision, calling Thursday "a great day for democracy and those who wish to find new solutions to the issues facing America". "I am looking forward to debating with Kamala Harris and Ron DeSantis, forcing them to respond to the tough questions Americans are asking in an open forum versus the partisan 'safe spaces' that they are used to competing in," remarked the former 2020 Democratic presidential candidate who also was a leading candidate for the Democratic nomination for New York City Mayor in 2021, before the party eventually coalesced around eventual winner Eric Adams in a bid to stave off a far-left candidate endorsed by U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and her progressive ideologues; Yang eventually left the Democratic Party in 2021 to found Forward. Former Republican U.S. Rep. Adam Kinzinger, who is now Yang's running mate, called the decision a "giant leap for our country" and reminded the press that "viewers will be in for a good treat next week when our candidacy speaks to a national audience".

The news did not faze either of the major presidential nominees. A spokesperson for the Harris campaign compared Yang's candidacy to "that of an aggressor who wished to co-opt Republican and fringe talking points into a Democratic field with the intent of denying President Biden the nomination, and we remain confident that Kamala Harris is the only choice for America going forward". The DeSantis campaign also addressed the news: "While the two left-wing candidates on the stage next week in Michigan will seek to divide their voters, Ron DeSantis's support amongst Republicans is virtually unified, and we are certain that he will be our 47th President in just over 30 days".

In addition to the inclusion of Yang, the debate committee also announced that a second moderator has been added to join Fox News anchor and Fox News Sunday host Shannon Bream. NBC News anchor José Díaz-Balart, the Saturday anchor for NBC Nightly News who also serves as breaking news anchor for its Spanish-language corporate cousin Telemundo, will join Bream as co-moderator and will be credited as an anchor for the latter property, making Díaz-Balart - whose brother is Miami-based U.S. Rep. Mario Díaz-Balart - the first anchor for a Spanish-language network to serve as a moderator for an American presidential debate. The debate will also now begin sometime around 8:30pm ET (as opposed to the traditional start time of 9:15pm ET), with coverage extending across all three primetime hours, in order to accommodate Yang with the equal amount of airtime afforded to Harris and DeSantis.

It is now Sunday, October 6th - 30 days before Americans find out who their next President is, and here is where the country stands...

With 30 days to go before America elects a new President, the impact of the controversial ad run by disgruntled Republican strategist Rick Wilson's front group Decency for America, combined with DeSantis's relatively subpar performance in the first debate, has somewhat moved the needle in Harris's favor. For instance, Arizona and Nevada - seen as tossup states on the last map - now tilts towards Harris with some of the influence coming from California transplants to both states seen as sympathetic to Harris. Also moving in the Democrats' direction are North Carolina and Ohio (which now tilt towards the Republicans instead of leaning towards them), Colorado and New Mexico (which now favor Harris instead of just leaning) and Texas (which has long been targeted by Democrats). Virginia, Michigan, New Hampshire and Maine also now lean towards Harris, while Nebraska's 2nd District (based in Omaha) is now a tossup.

As expected, Democrats boasted of the map: "With 30 days to go before the election, Kamala Harris is now in stronger position to become our first Madam President, and Americans have signaled that they have no interest in going back to the old Trump-DeSantis agenda of fear, hysteria and division". Republicans, on the other hand, called the map "short sighted" and pointed out that "many voters are already tiring of the arguments by the left and their allies in the mainstream media who continue to cover up the reality of the Biden-Harris agenda's impact on families". "Americans want a President who will stand for their values without government interference, and Ron DeSantis is the only candidate who is committed to doing just that". The DeSantis campaign also noted that many of the most recent state polls were conducted before the Twitch third party presidential debate, and Forward Party candidate Andrew Yang's subsequent rise in polling and advertising exposure (which has drawn more voters from the Harris camp than from DeSantis's, even though 3 to 4 percent of Republicans have indicated a preference for Yang - mostly from supporters of his running mate, Adam Kinzinger, a former GOP Congressman who was also a prominent critic of former President Donald Trump).

Meanwhile, in the Senate where Democrats are hoping to clamp down their potential losses since a Democratic takeover is now virtually impossible...

Arizona remains virtually the same, as Republicans have now started to coalesce around nominee David Schweikert, even though the race still remains Sen. Kyrsten Sinema's to lose. Republicans have also maintained competitive races in Michigan and Washington, with a poll for U.S. Rep. Matt Larkin's reelection campaign also showing GOP Senate nominee Cathy McMorris Rodgers with a five-point lead in Larkin's suburban Seattle 8th District. Democrats remain favored in Delaware and New York, where strong Republican challengers as well as encouraging polling in the latter from the Independence Party nominee (who refused to endorse the staunchly liberal Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand but found GOP nominee and State Sen. Mike Martucci to be "too conservative for New York") has effectively kept the former from putting away the race.

Florida has become competitive on the map, with Democratic nominee Stephanie Murphy's campaign now pulling from virtually all Harris voters as well as a few DeSantis voters. Nevada, Ohio and Pennsylvania have also trended towards the Democrats, who are now running a barrage of ads attacking their Republican opponents as "insufficient fighters for the middle class", while Sen. Tim Kaine continues to remain in a battle with GOP State Sen. Jill Vogel (who is boasting of a new Trafalgar Group poll where she leads Kaine by two points). However, Montana and Wisconsin remain tossups with Republican Rep. Mike Gallagher proving to be a charismatic nominee for the GOP against Sen. Tammy Baldwin in the latter, while Maine has also moved in the Democrats' direction with the latest polls showing Rep. Chellie Pingree with leads of four and five percent over Republican State Sen. Rick Bennett. Vermont remains a virtual tossup as polls from both internal and unbiased sources have variegated between the Democratic, Republican and Vermont Progressive Party candidates.

Republicans continue to face competitive races in Texas, Missouri, Indiana and Nebraska (with one nonpartisan poll even showing Democratic nominee Pete Festersen only trailing Sen. Deb Fischer by four points), though in all of these states their advantages remain the same. They also continue to run competitively against Democratic Senators in New Mexico, Minnesota and New Jersey. And while Republicans are already guaranteed to pick up California after their shut out of Democrats in the traditionally liberal state, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy has opened up a 3-2 lead in most polling, though former Ambassador Ric Grenell has chipped away at McCarthy's lead with his Trump endorsement and strong stances on border security and the budget helping him win over conservatives.

The candidates have made it to Michigan in preparation to face off against one another in the second, traditionally town hall-style debate. While much of the night has centered on how Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis will perform in tonight's debate and come out better than his first debate, how Vice President Kamala Harris can maintain the momentum gained from her last debate, and whether or not Andrew Yang is truly ready for primetime, CNN (appropriate for a network co-owned by Warner Bros. Discovery with such channels as Food Network, TLC and Discovery - as well as TBS and HBO) decided to bring on a cult favorite, trademark red sweater and all, from a town hall debate many years ago...

Source: Wikimedia Commons
Author: Gage Skidmore
Ken Bone, power plant operator from Illinois and famed questioner from the 2016 presidential debate.

(From CNN)
ANDERSON COOPER: Joining us here in Michigan on our all-star panel is Ken Bone, who you may remember from his appearance at the 2016 second presidential debate in St. Louis, where he simply asked a question about energy and became a viral sensation. Ken, thank you for joining us.
KEN BONE: Well, thank you for having me join your panel tonight. I think we're going to have a lot of good things to hear from all the candidates. I'm eager of course, to hear, where they stand on energy issues, since I do man a power plant. I'm sure they have good things to say, not going to say who I prefer even after this debate, but it's going to be fun to watch.

An all-Michigan panel, a history-making duo of moderators and a threesome of candidates take turns debating each other. Stay tuned to hear how it turned out...

[2016]

Looking at this Presidential Map I think this will all boil down to Pennsylvania. I think Harris takes Wisconsin & that 2nd District in Nebraska, DeSantis will take Georgia making it 268-251 and PA decides it.

[President of the great nation of 🏳️‍⚧️]

Carter lives to 100

Based... So... fvcking... zased...

DeFat's inevitable victory is almost worth it now.

[SaintStan86]

UPDATE: Nothing new here, but just reminding everyone of the obvious that is going to be happening on Tuesday in the smallest state in the Union...What she does in this TL in 2024 will be no shock to anyone.

Source: Wikimedia Commons Author: Gpwitteveen

Source: Wikimedia Commons Author: Demhem

The campus of Grand Valley State University in Allendale, Michigan, as well as the GVSU Fieldhouse, home to the university's athletic programs and site of the second presidential debate held on October 9, 2024.

October 9, 2024
CANDIDATES SPAR IN THREE-WAY TOWN HALL BATTLE FOR VOTES IN MICHIGAN
Undecided voters in Michigan were given plenty to hear about from three of the leading presidential candidates on Wednesday as the candidates took part in the second presidential debate, following the traditional town hall format of previous debate cycles. The big difference between this debate and the previous one, however, comes in the form of Andrew Yang, the nominee for his Forward movement who has polled competitively enough in recent polling to become a factor in the presidential race, joining Vice President Kamala Harris and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis on the stage at Grand Valley State University near Grand Rapids, Michigan - with DeSantis proclaiming in his opening statement "it is an honor to be here tonight in Michigan, in the very part of America that Gerald Ford called home for generations", referring to the former President who represented Grand Rapids in Congress prior to his ascendence to the Vice Presidency under Richard Nixon in 1973.

"Americans are ready for a New Way Forward", proclaimed Yang in his introductory speech to the audience, which focused on six policy points (the economy, the federal budget, social spending, foreign policy, cultural issues, and leadership) with three questions each for a total of 18, with each candidate giving two-minute responses and four minutes each for opening and closing statements. Yang, as expected, called for "an American economic revolution" centered on human-centered capitalism that "puts humans ahead of profits", and called for an economic strategy prioritizing median income and labor participation growth as opposed to being reliant on GDP and unemployment figures. As expected, DeSantis responded by pointing out that "Americans are more interested in leaders who get results instead of throwing up weird formulas cooked up in an ivory tower", while Harris referred to her former Democratic rival as "someone who relies too much on going by the book instead of actually getting to the root cause of why our economy isn't working for the people".

Another topic that came about referred to the federal budget, for which panelist and former Congressman Justin Amash relayed a question from an audience member about what the candidates' strategy to rein in the $32 trillion national debt entails. Harris pointed to President Biden's record of "working to cut our deficit to levels not seen since the Clinton administration", which DeSantis refuted by pointing to "record spending from both chambers and both parties", with DeSantis vowing to rein in the federal government: "We're not going to reduce the deficit on the backs of private citizens who continue to feel left behind by an ever-expansive federal government that continues to kick the can down the road". Yang called for an end to all corporate tax incentives at the federal level, "leaving no stone untouched in doing so". DeSantis hit back at Yang by pointing to the latter's "universal basic income" proposal, which he called "highly irresponsible": "It's time we start rewarding people who want to work and not constantly rewarding those who sit on their couch watching Netflix".

Amash also took direct aim at warrantless wiretapping in referring to another question relating to the matter which was asked by an audience member to DeSantis. DeSantis defended his experience working as a JAG at Guantanamo Bay during the War on Terror, while also condemning the need to "constant surveil everything that ordinary Americans do" as a violation of the Fourth Amendment, also pointing to the FBI's August 2022 raid of former President Donald Trump's Mar-A-Lago estate in his state. Harris and Yang also criticized the PATRIOT Act as DeSantis did himself, with Harris vowing to "let the legislation expire without any hearings". Yang also variegated between his two brand-name rivals, siding with DeSantis on "not dragging America into endless foreign wars" while agreeing with Harris on the need to "sponsor peacekeeping bounties to reclaim American civilians unnecessary jailed overseas for crimes that 'do not exist in America'". Yang and Harris also agreed on a robust DREAM Act for all Dreamers who "desire to become American citizens", while DeSantis defended former President Trump's wall at the Mexican border (but not without also endorsing a stripped-down DREAM Act favoring those who "only know our country and nowhere else and have made a significant contribution to our society" as opposed to the more lenient standards favored by Harris and Yang).

However, the debate reached its apogee in terms of social media exposure when an audience member, via a question relayed from panelist and conservative writer Tim Cavanaugh (who is Senior Editor for the Mackinac Center for Public Policy), brought up the issue of whether or not to revisit such court decisions as those dealing with homosexual and interracial marriages as well as affirmative action. DeSantis declared landmark Supreme Court decisions legalizing gay marriage as well as interracial marriages "settled", and went further by arguing that "as President, anyone who opposes hiring someone because they are in a homosexual or interracial relationship has no business being involved in the work of my administration, and the Supreme Court has already shown no intent to revisit Obergefell". Harris responded by stating that "the Supreme Court's decision is never final, and that reforms are necessary to ensure that our courts reflect the will of the people and not the whims of a few elites who wish to dictate their values on ordinary Americans", without going into specifics. Yang decried the rank "cultural warfare" both of his rivals have "thrived" on, while also advocating for an expansion of the Supreme Court to reflect "the increased population of our country", singling out the San Francisco-based 9th Circuit (which extends across several states in the West) as "too unwieldy to effectively serve most in its region".

As expected, liberals went into tweetstorms on Twitter calling for term limits on the high court, with some even calling for conservative associate justice Clarence Thomas, who made remarks suggesting a revisiting of Obergefell, to be expelled from the courts, citing the involvement of his wife in the January 6, 2021 attack on the U.S Capitol. While there were some conservatives who expressed exasperation over DeSantis's "olive branch" to LGBTQ+ voters (with some vowing to back Constitution Party candidate Mike Lindell), most of the conservative social media response centered on both Harris's comments and Yang's "indifference" on the matter. Both conservatives and liberals also generally agreed on the unwieldy size of the Ninth Circuit, with many suggesting the circuit be shrunk to California and in some cases restricted to Northern California (e.g. San Francisco, Sacramento, Fresno, etc.). (Editor's note: The current Ninth Circuit covers the states of Alaska, Arizona, California, Hawaii, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Oregon and Washington as well as Guam and Northern Mariana Islands, covering approximately one-fifth of the U.S. population.)

The debate also turned on the issue of leadership, particularly with Donald Trump and Joe Biden leaving a huge vacuum for the three candidates to fill. When asked by panelist Patrick Schuh, who serves as Chairman of the Board of Directors for Progress Michigan, about whether or not he is a "kindler, gentler Trump", DeSantis remarked Trump as "an effective and hard-hitting leader whose focus on results instead of repeated, stale rhetoric gave us one of the greatest economies America has ever seen", but dismissed the notion that he is merely a copycat of Trump. "When I was first elected to serve in Congress from Florida, Donald Trump was just a celebrity businessman, and having the backing of Gov. and now Sen. Rick Scott or even Jeb Bush was considered a more prized endorsement, but it was conservatives who believed in my message that got me here," DeSantis remarked. He also noted that Trump was not the favored choice of conservatives in the 2016 primary, and simply grew into the role by "fully embracing our conservative message instead of caving to milquetoast moderates like past Republican leaders have done...Even Ronald Reagan raised taxes, and did so 11 times to balance the budget because Democrats wouldn't work with conservatives to cut spending".

Harris responded to DeSantis by remarking that "My background growing up in Oakland, as a member of a mixed family, getting in the ground floor when I needed to, then boldly challenging and defeating the person who discovered you but later became lost, and parlaying that into a successful career as Attorney General of the largest state in the Union, as a Senator and now Vice President. Safe to say I've challenged the establishment and have done well. You should expect no different as your President." In summary, Harris also asserted that she has more experience than her rivals - an assertion DeSantis challenged with his military and congressional experience (as well as his college baseball career) and Yang with his work both as a corporate litigator and as an entrepreneur and nonprofit leader through his Venture for America. Yang also responded by stating that "Unlike my rivals, who wish to act like battering rams clamoring for partisan donor drug money, my supporters are for humanity first, and as your President the American people will truly have found their voice".

The debate generally received positive ratings from viewers, with fast national polling appearing to favor the "new guy" Yang over DeSantis and Harris. Amongst the two major party candidates only, DeSantis appeared to have a stronger debate performance than his rival compared to last time, with some criticizing Harris for being "too fuzzy" in her responses on many of the questions. While most respondents agreed with Yang on his approach to the economy and reforms like ranked-choice voting (which DeSantis also credited with "giving Virginia a great Governor in Glenn Youngkin" but otherwise disagreed with Yang's approach and Harris also expressed support for) and independent redistricting commissions (which Harris supported but was poo-pooed by DeSantis), DeSantis gained more support on the national debt, taxes, crime, foreign policy, leadership and his views on "climate realism" with regards to the environment where he advocated for carbon capture technology and "free market solutions to our climate matters", and Harris generally received higher marks on LGBTQ+ rights, healthcare and racial equity.

October 12, 2024
DEMOCRATS RUN AD BARRAGE IN FLORIDA SLAMMING DeSANTIS, SCOTT
With its Sunbelt climate, prosperous economy and demographically, ethnically and (yes) politically diverse population, Florida has effective become "THE swing state" in American politics. Which makes it no surprise why Democrats have been running a barrage of ads in recent weeks slamming their Republican rivals as "the dark force sinking Florida into purgatory" according to one ad released by the Florida Democratic Party amongst many targeting (among others) Gov. Ron DeSantis and Sen. Rick Scott (who is up for reelection to the Senate against former Rep. Stephanie Murphy. The ads have been running across all of Florida's major markets including Miami, Orlando, Tampa and Jacksonville, airing on everything from primetime programs and weekend sports including NFL and college football games to even during that most sacred of all advertising cows: Fox News Channel.

Among the ads being run by Democrats include one calling DeSantis "Judge Doom", using his military experience as a JAG (short for Judge Advocate General) to rip the Governor over his handling of the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as another showing pictures of Spring Break vacationers during the beginning of the pandemic in 2020 - when virtually every aspect of American life went into lockdown: "While everything from March Madness to movie theaters shut down, drunken, spoiled teens flocked to Florida beaches and turned them into incubators for death". Another ad targeted DeSantis for his handling of the "Don't Say Gay" controversy in Florida ("Disney is a Florida institution, but Ron DeSantis treats it like it's a landfill") while a third, this one from Murphy's Senate campaign, tried to imply that the Governor (and Sen. Scott) work "behind closed doors" in reference to an election reform bill he signed where only Fox News was allowed to attend: "While Ron DeSantis and Rick Scott close their doors to the public, Stephanie Murphy is opening her doors to all Floridians".

DeSantis and Scott are far from the only Democratic targets in these ads. In Miami, both Spanish and English language ads have been targeting two of the area's GOP Reps., Carlos Giménez and Maria Elvira Salazar. Salazar's opponent, former State Rep. Nick Duran, blasted the incumbent as "one more keen to turn the lights out instead of light up the Miami skies", while Giménez's opponent, former Rep. Debbie Mucarsel-Powell, took direct aim at Giménez for "picking and choosing which immigrants to serve while our families wait for word on whether they can reunite or not" as well as for his support of Wyoming Republican Harriet Hageman in her 2022 defeat of then-Rep. Liz Cheney: "While Liz Cheney put country over party, Carlos Giménez was bankrolling her opponent" (Giménez attended a fundraiser in support of Hageman during that primary).

Not all of the ads directly referred to Donald Trump nor his allies in Congress, including DeSantis and Scott. In Sarasota, former State Rep. Andrew Learned hit his Republican opponent, wealthy auto dealer and financier-turned-House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Vern Buchanan, as "too rich to relate to the average Floridian" and "more interested in cutting taxes for his golf and boat buddies than bringing relief to his district". And in Tallahassee, Democrat Rick Minor reminded Rep. Neal Dunn, who spent his first three terms winning easy elections, that "the time to sit back and relax without a care in the world for his neighbors may be going through is over". Various other Florida GOP Reps., including Brian Mast, Cory Mills and Aaron Bean, also received the "hypocrite" label for opposing Hurricane Gordon relief funds in North Carolina while voting for Hurricane Leslie relief in their state.

October 13, 2024
LIZ CHENEY ENDORSES YANG FOR PRESIDENT: "THIS IS ABOUT PEOPLE BEFORE POLITICS"
In a move that surprised virtually no one on the right (and possibly some on the left), former Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney announced her endorsement of Forward nominee Andrew Yang during Sunday's edition of State of the Union on CNN, where she serves as a contributor. "Between the hard-left, tax-and-spend policies that Kamala Harris has advocated for in the Senate both as a Senator and as Vice President, and the hard-right, isolationist policies that Ron DeSantis has championed, there is only one viable candidate for President that is worth voting for. Andrew Yang and I don't agree on everything, but he stands for country above party without reproach, and that is why I am endorsing him for President." The former Congresswoman, who lost her reelection in 2022 to current Rep. Harriet Hageman in the wake of her vote to impeach then-President Donald Trump (who endorsed Hageman in her primary) on charges of inciting insurrection during the January 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol, and who also lost her post as Republican Conference Chair months after the attack, has been a contributor to the network since leaving Congress, and has often used her newfound bully pulpit to criticize her former Republican colleagues as "unfit to serve and inchoate in their vision for defending America and our Constitution".

The Yang campaign made note of Cheney's endorsement on social media: "As a stateswoman who was fearless in putting everything on the line - her career, her family, her reputation - to defend the Constitution when it needed defending the most, Liz Cheney is a woman of great candor, one who recognizes that the issues facing the country cannot be solved through blind partisan purity tests". Yang's running mate, former U.S. Rep. Adam Kinzinger, who served with Cheney on the select January 6th Committee as the only two Republicans on the committee (a slate backed by House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy that included neither Cheney nor Kinzinger was blocked by then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi), called the Cheney endorsement "a game changer for the presidential race" and "proof that our groundbreaking campaign to move America forward is gaining steam".

The DeSantis and Harris campaigns were far less charitable to the news. "It comes as no great surprise that Liz Cheney's celebrity is anything but credible, and her endorsement of failed Democrat-turned-third party dogcatcher Andrew Yang is further proof of her irrelevance", noted a DeSantis campaign spox who also declared that "the Republican Party, more than ever, is the party of America First - prosperity at home, peace abroad, and liberty and justice for all. A platform that triggers Liz Cheney and the small fraction of a percent of the country that follows her". Harris's campaign spox also chimed in: "The Andrew Yang endorsement by Liz Cheney is proof that Yang is far from the 'fresh' and 'above politics' candidate he claims to be and is more about taking the country backward as opposed to 'forward'".

Next: Some other current events, maybe an October surprise or two, and a few forums before the final debate...

[SaintStan86]

With less than 30 days to go, here are some updates from around the water cooler...

• The FDA issues a warning to users of Tylenol in the wake of a viral TikTok challenge in which users of the pain reliever, primarily young adults, have been experimenting with mixing at least half a dozen Tylenol pills with alcohol in the "Tylenol Challenge", with some of the demonstrations even being posted on YouTube. 14 deaths and over 300 hospitalizations have been attributed to the challenge with many of the more prominent symptoms including liver damage, seizures, vomiting, headaches and urinary tract infections. Despite pressure from the FDA and from concerned parents, Johnson & Johnson has stated that government regulation is not necessary beyond what already exists, and argues that putting its products behind the pharmacy counter - a move pushed by some parents but strongly opposed by both the company and retailers selling Tylenol - would do more harm than good.
• Mudslides and flooding have resulted in over 2,000 deaths in Honduras and Nicaragua from Hurricane Nadine, which also caused considerable damage that wiped out entire villages in both countries. A group of Christian missionaries from Texas on a trip to drill water wells in Nicaragua was also feared missing for days until rescue crews found them two weeks later, some of them dehydrated but mostly hungry and exhausted, in a hillside forest near a village decimated by the flooding they escaped from. Miraculously, the entire missionary crew of 20 mostly young volunteers survived without serious injury or illness. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, Sens. Ted Cruz and John Cornyn and President Biden all commended the missionaries for their bravery and sacrifice in surviving what Abbott called "an epic Cast Away story".
• Former U.S. Rep. Madison Cawthorn was arrested in North Carolina on charges of lewdness, public intoxication and property damage after he was caught recklessly driving a golf cart naked on the grounds of the Omni Grove Park Inn golf resort in Asheville, where a conservative political conference was taking place. According to resort patrons and Asheville police, Cawthorn was reportedly inebriated and harassing women on the course, even mocking some of them to tears. Surveillance video and police body cams showed Cawthorn screaming "f**k the police" at officers and resort patrons who called Asheville police, who then chased Cawthorn down four holes of the course, resulting in thousands of dollars in damage to the greens as well as a destroyed golf cart that Cawthorn crashed into a bunker while also attempting to bite a police officer in his arm. Cawthorn later apologized on social media for his actions and announced he was entering an alcohol treatment program.
• Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announces that he will not stand for reelection to his riding in Montreal when the next federal election in Canada takes place in 2025. In an announcement, Trudeau thanked the Canadian people for "entrusting me to serve with high honors as your Prime Minister" with his family by his side and vowed to "stay the course in finishing the promises I made to all of Canada when I became Prime Minister" (in 2015). President Biden and other dignitaries honored Trudeau within moments of his announcement, while Trudeau's opposition leader, Candice Bergen, called the announcement "a watershed moment that the Canadian people - and most especially our truckers - have finally been waiting for", declaring that "in 2025, Canada will be a deep shade of Tory Blue from Atlantic to Pacific to the truest North".
• Idaho becomes the first state in the Union to be projected to gain an additional congressional district in the (way-too-early) 2030 reapportionment sweepstakes. The state continues to experience rapid growth in the Boise area and all across the state as well from various kinds of transplants, including West Coast residents seeking lower taxes and a higher quality of life, retirees looking to retire in a distraction-free environment, Hispanic immigrants looking to work in the state's farming communities including many growing Idaho potatoes, entrepreneurs seeking a robust business climate in which their businesses can thrive, Mormon families seeking a more wholesome environment in which to raise their families, and various groups of mostly right-wing and anarchist populations (including militia groups) seeking a refuge from more populous states. Idaho's gain comes at the expense of Rhode Island, which barely kept its second congressional seat but is now likely set to lose it in 2030. The increasingly unwieldy size of many congressional districts has furthered discussion on the viability of maintaining the size of Congress in its current state - with increasing numbers of politicians across the spectrum (including most notably Forward presidential candidate Andrew Yang) calling for the legislatively-imposed cap of 435 representatives to be stricken.
• In the sports world, Collin Morikawa is the 2024 FedEx Cup Champion on the PGA Tour, Germany's Alexander Zverev is the leading player on the ATP tennis circuit, Megan Rapinoe has officially retired from the U.S. women's soccer team, the Toronto Maple Leafs start their NHL season as Stanley Cup Champions for the first time since 1967, and the Phoenix Suns receive their championship rings from their first NBA Finals win in franchise history.

And now, here comes the October surprise (or two)...

October 15, 2024
REPORT: AMERICA SET TO GO INTO DEFAULT UNLESS DEFICIT IS REDUCED; SOCIAL SECURITY AT BREAKING POINT WHILE MILITARY "BLOATED WITH PORK"
A report released Tuesday by a group of independent economists indicated that the United States is set to face an unprecedented default sometime in the next five years unless action is taken to reduce the federal budget deficit, which currently stands at over $32 trillion. "The inability of lawmakers to agree on a 'grand bargain' to cut the amount of spending and/or raise taxes in exchange for a budget surplus, combined with a virtual disdain for bipartisan negotiation and an unwillingness to tackle budget strains from increased entitlement spending out of 'fear of being defeated at the next election', has put the United States on a shaky financial foundation with a complete lack of courage to do the right thing to avoid a sudden shock to the nation's economy", the report finds. The report also singled out both current President Joe Biden and former Presidents Donald Trump, Barack Obama and George W. Bush for "squandering their responsibilities to the nation in favor of pleasing imaginary partisan aims out of 'fear of an angry electorate that has grown accustomed to taking checks from the government'", while "doing nothing to also confront their large trade deficit with multiple countries, including China, due to a prolonged 'decline in manufacturing'".

In addition to indictments of the state of the country's entitlement spending and manufacturing indexes, the report also lambasted the U.S. government for a defense spending regimen that largely "favors the whims and fantasies of third-party defense contractors who are more interested in appeasing profit-hungry shareholders than serving American interests both at home and abroad". "Over 60 percent of the Pentagon spending is not necessarily directed towards the manufacture of weaponry and paying military soldiers and personnel, and in fact a large portion of the defense budget is 'bloated with pork' including excessive weapons and unnecessary programs that have nothing to do with military preparedness nor even basic creature comforts such as entertainment from the Armed Forces Network", the report continues. The report also indicted the U.S. government for "taking up many basic functions that are best reserved to state and local governments or private enterprise" and called for "a dramatic reshaping of the federal government to meet its basic responsibilities instead of being driven by cable news soundbites".

The report undoubtedly drew a strong response from both major presidential candidates. Ron DeSantis campaign spokesperson Christina Pushaw called the report "more damning evidence that Washington is completely broken and unable to meet the basic needs of both our country and our military" and called the consequences "unsurprising for a White House that has no military experience between President Biden and Vice President Harris", while Kamala Harris spokesperson Kirsten Allen called the news regarding the potential default "more fear mongering from outside sources that are largely sympathetic to conservatives", arguing that "People have long misunderstood the actions of Kamala Harris, and that misunderstanding sometimes comes with the rank sexism that she and other women have faed when attempting to transform our country into a more equitable union", also adding that "President Biden would have budget surpluses if more Americans would just simply pay their 'fair share' of taxes". The response from Harris critics, undoubtedly a conservative bastion, was fierce with talk radio host Dan Bongino lambasting the Vice President as "someone who is keen to quarantine themselves from reality while Americans are forced to make hard decisions between food and housing that are highly unconscionable".

The report sent stock prices between the Dow Jones Industrial Average, NASDAQ and the S&P 500 plunging by more than 2000 points, with all major indices experiencing steep declines; some Dow 30 components even saw losses by as much as 15 percent in late trading. Gov. DeSantis, who was in Florida meeting with legislative leaders preparing for a "potential transition" in the coming weeks, outlined a proposal in a primetime address on cable television (including most notably Fox News) that called for a "thorough review of the entire federal budget" including incentives to states both to "pass a Balanced Budget Amendment and ratify it in the Constitution" and to incentivize states to take up some government functions at least temporarily "in order to create a series of budget surpluses to reduce the deficit". DeSantis also took aim at both Democrats and "jellyfish Republicans" whom DeSantis described as "either unwilling to fight for their party's principles or who, even worse, squander them for political gain".

October 18, 2024
REPORT: MILITARY ILL-PREPARED TO DEAL WITH THREATS FROM CHINA, IRAN; REPUBLICANS BLAST "WOKE" MILITARY LEADERSHIP
Just days after a damning report stating that America risked potential default without making drastic changes to federal budget practices, another independent report on Friday took direct aim at the preparedness of the U.S. military to face a potential World War against China and/or Russia, with some scenarios possibly involving nuclear weapons. In the report, 40 percent of those tasked with "dealing with nuclear threats" were deemed "undereducated in the fields of math and science", while another 30 percent "lacked the basic physical capacity needed to carry such arms". Another 25 percent deemed more suitable for less physically demanding capacities in the military, such as air traffic control and clerical duties, also were deemed "mentally unprepared for the rigors of military operations".

The report took direct aim at the U.S. military as well as educational bodies as a whole across the country, with both K-12 and higher education entities being singled out for "producing an American youth that is not only trailing our international counterparts in terms of writing and math competencies, but also is ill-suited for both the skill sets demanded by corporations, manufacturers and trades as well as the demands expected of our military and law enforcement". Various economic, trade, labor and other groups ranging from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Association of Manufacturers and the AFL-CIO to the Fraternal Order of Police and various military advocacy groups called the news unsurprising, with the American Farm Bureau Federation also warning of "prolonged struggles with American agriculture potentially threatening the nation's food supply".

The news also proved to be a field day for conservative talk radio and Fox News commentators like Sean Hannity, who on his primetime program in the latter form slammed the "Harris-Biden administration" as "grossly unprepared to deal with the struggles that many Americans continue to face, between a mediocre economy where the stock market and wages are not in perfect harmony, where our deficit continues to run amok with high levels of social spending even with labor participation at an all-time high, and where our precious defense dollars threatening our deficit are being spent less on preparing to deal with a nuclear China intent on obliterating Hong Kong and more on trivial matters like 'proper pronouns' and 'sensitivity training', which by the way doesn't matter to Putin or Xi nor radical Islamic terrorists".

The issues with the federal budget were front and center during a set of presidential forums hosted by ABC News on Wednesday and Thursday, with the former featuring Republican Ron DeSantis calling the Biden administration "the most mediocre presidency in our lifetime" during a forum in Indianapolis hosted by ABC News Chief Washington Correspondent Jonathan Karl, while the latter featured his Democratic rival, Vice President Kamala Harris defending the Biden administration's response to the budget "that will pay for itself in the long run" during a forum in Pittsburgh hosted by Good Morning America co-anchor Robin Roberts. (Both Roberts' GMA co-anchor and This Week co-host George Stephanopoulos and World News Tonight anchor David Muir were precluded from moderating either forum, due to the former's ties to the Clinton administration and the latter having moderated the first presidential debate last month.)

October 20, 2024
HARRIS SHAKES UP CAMPAIGN STAFF IN PREPARATION FOR "HOMESTRETCH TO VICTORY"
With just over two weeks to go before the presidential election, the campaign of Vice President Kamala Harris announced an 11th-hour shakeup of her staff in order to "optimize our campaign operations in preparation to get voters to the polls all across the country". The campaign announced that the reorganization is "necessary" in order to "ensure that our message gets into the right hands and that every vote is accounted for", arguing that an "effective" and "disciplined" campaign is "what it takes to win the White House". The campaign also denied that the decision was made in response to Harris's own developing polling struggles in recent weeks as the impact from Harris's critique of her Republican rival Ron DeSantis and his supporters began to wane in the midst of the rise of Forward nominee Andrew Yang's third-party candidacy.

Indeed, the Florida Governor has begun to pull away in most presidential polling, with the RealClearPolitics average showing DeSantis with 44 percent and Harris with 38 percent, while Yang continues to maintain an average of about 7 percent with only six percent of voters undecided. One prognosticator noted that "DeSantis continues to hang onto virtually all of Donald Trump's 2020 supporters, and among those who aren't backing DeSantis, almost all of them are going to (Constitution Party nominee) Mike Lindell, with few if any going to Kamala Harris". The report also noted that while Yang is "drawing from supporters of both parties, Yang's support base has become more lopsided in the Democrats' favor, which is bad news for the Democrats", also taking note that Green Party candidate Norman Solomon, who received the support of former NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick last week (prompting ESPN commentator Stephen A. Smith to remark "Finally, Colin Kaepernick grew the hell up and made his choice clear"), has also amassed an average of 2 percent in most polls; Kaepernick cited Harris's "selling out of the Black vote that put her in office to gain acceptance from the corporate plantation".

The news also comes as newspaper endorsements have continued to roll in, with two papers who have not endorsed Republicans since at least 2012 making their choices clear. On Sunday, The Dallas Morning News (which endorsed Hillary Clinton in 2016 after a long stretch of continuously endorsing Republicans dating back to World War II and chose not to endorse in 2020 before the COVID-19 pandemic broke out) endorsed DeSantis with his handling of Florida's economy being a major reason: "If Texas deserved to lose its number one status in terms of which economy is the strongest in the nation, it had to be the Florida of Ron DeSantis", also remarking that "While DeSantis has as much of the rank ideological hardline that Donald Trump had in his presidency, he comes across as far more statesmanly than his ill-mannered contemporary" and effectively branding Harris's campaign a downgrade from Hillary Clinton's "Whereas Hillary Clinton would have pretty much governed not unlike her moderate, business-friendly husband, a Harris presidency would make Barack Obama's fiscally tone-deaf and partisan liberal paradise look mild in comparison".

Another traditionally center-right paper, the Chicago Tribune (which itself last endorsed a Republican in 2004 and itself endorsed favorite son Obama twice while opposing Trump both times), also made its endorsement clear on Sunday, endorsing DeSantis despite reservations about some of the Governor's economic stances, particularly concerning his relations with the Walt Disney Company as well as his support of "continued tariffs against China". However, the paper called DeSantis "perhaps the closest thing to our very own Abraham Lincoln and Ronald Reagan we have seen in a long time", while also calling Harris's campaign largely "a far cry from the hope and change Barack Obama brought to America, which in turn made us as proud to be Chicagoans as ever during his presidency"; while also praising Forward candidate Andrew Yang's selection of former Illinois U.S. Rep. Adam Kinzinger as "a smart and savvy move that highlights the dire need for more choices in our presidential elections", the newspaper called Yang's universal basic income proposal "a surefire way to sink our country financially at the worst possible time". Indeed, the Tribune concluded "DeSantis is for the most part a mild-mannered version of Donald Trump, but his policies are miles ahead of the vague promises of Harris, whose overtures to hard-left ideologues that even Barack Obama would be embarrassed by give us great pause, and the scaling platitudes of Yang's campaign explain why a 'catch-all, big tent' political party will always struggle to gain victory in a country whose voters appreciate clear stances on the issues. DeSantis is endorsed".

Not every newspaper endorsement directly favored DeSantis. In its aforementioned endorsement of the Vice President last month, The New York Times argued that a vote for Harris would "bring about a new Enlightenment era to America", and remarked that "while Ron DeSantis is a far more decent Republican standard bearer than Trump, the same toxic policies that Trump pushed in office exist". Harris also won the endorsement of The Washington Post, who warned that a DeSantis administration "would bring democracy back to the brink of where it was under Donald Trump". The Los Angeles Times endorsed fellow Californian Harris on Sunday, calling Harris's candidacy "a chance to make history and bring the California Dream to the national stage, once and for all", but not without expected criticism from conservatives who have long been critical of the Times and its alleged liberal bias. USA Today, which made its first explicit endorsement of a candidate in 2020 when it endorsed then-candidate Joe Biden, endorsed Yang, calling his Forward movement "our greatest opportunity to bring fundamental change to American politics and end the partisan gridlock that has held America hostage for too long"; DeSantis mocked the endorsement during a campaign stop in Cincinnati on Sunday, remarking "Who in this audience still reads USA Today?" to a mixture of mostly jeers and laughs.

Other newspaper endorsements have included The Boston Globe, Hartford Courant and The Seattle Times for Harris and the San Diego Union-Tribune, The Arizona Republic and The Columbus Dispatch (all traditionally right-leaning papers that endorsed Hillary Clinton in 2016) for DeSantis. Both of Detroit's two major newspapers also made their endorsements clear, with the larger and more liberal Detroit Free Press endorsing Harris and the more conservative Detroit News backing DeSantis - their first GOP pick since 2012 (it endorsed Libertarian nominee Gary Johnson in 2016 and abstained from endorsing in 2020).

Next: Where the race stands with two weeks to go, and the candidates have one last debate...