BC POLITICS
Saved by @Jacobtldr

THREAD (WOW!)

1) If you want to watch a Coordinated Media Disinformation Campaign play out (just like the Trump-Russia Collision Hoax), there's one playing out right now in real

 2) @TWPundit Exclusively Reported 10/13

"expect to see multiple...stories related to Turkey which will...be tied together by a massive “bombshell” piece in the @nytimes ...near election day in a well-coordinated smear campaign"
Yep, the piece just dropped
https://t.co/ncqK9IrwEv
3) The Turkey Disinformation Campaign is following the exact same playbook as the 2016 Trump-Russia Collision Hoax, and with all the same players
https://t.co/W4qEDSHFAZ
4) In 2016, there were 3 separate stories related to Russia’s connection to @realDonaldTrump that dropped on Oct 31st.

Article #1 from Soros-funded @MotherJones by @DavidCornDC about @carterwpage alleging he was a secret Russian operative. Fake news!

https://t.co/7T9G1p4lzW
5) Article #2 from @FinancialTimes about @SergeiMillian and his connection to Trump Tower projects

https://t.co/OipMuPB8gh
6) Article #3 from @Slate by @franklinfoer about Alfa Bank and how the Trump Campaign was secretly communicating with the Russians through a secret server in Trump Tower ( more fake news)
https://t.co/BgdQEnp1Og
7) @nytimes coordinating w/ the others, + FBI, & FusionGPS, was supposed to tie it all together. Instead published this article stating investigation was dropped because the FBI found no links to Russia.

FBI panicked at the last moment & attempted to bail https://t.co/6tOtP3wPfU
8) I'll get in more debunking the of the
@nytimes articles, but I wanted to note that you can't even get out of the 1st full paragraph without realizing how laughably stupid it is
9) Turkey is a major geopolitical adversary & is currently fighting 3 proxy wars against Iran: Syria, Yemen, & Azerbaijan. Why would they be funneling billions of $$$ to them? It's moronic. So we can establish it's a smear piece, not a serious article https://t.co/UEgLbURJR8
10) The
@nytimes
article was designed to drop on the same day as articles in other publications. For example, this Vox Media-owned
@NYMag
article which references the
@nytimes
article. An obvious sign of coordination. https://t.co/tX2ZSO66qH
11) Go grab the URL of the
@NYMag
article and do a Twitter search and look at the Blue Checkmark Brigade that is pushing the article out in line step
https://t.co/MfMRze2ASE
12) Of course you've got writers for
@Slate
jumping in to help push out the story, too. https://t.co/DVE55mdVBJ
13)
@Slate
by the way, ran their own hit piece on Turkey the day before, helping to lay the groundwork for the disinformation campaign. They're not about to sit this hoax out! https://t.co/9aly1WSUvi
14) Vox reporter and committed Russia Collusion hoaxster
@atrupar
Also got into the game with an attempted "quid pro quo" redirect https://t.co/pH62FUSGuk
15) Because when you when you've been pushing a conspiracy theory this stupid for this long, you're kinda pot committed
https://t.co/c7IGI8zi3K
16) Of course we can't overlook the author of the
@NYMag
article himself,
@jonathanchait https://t.co/p4lIMPCgMT
17)
@jonathanchait
was vital in planting the seeds of the original Trump-Russia Collusion Hoax. Chait wrote one of the earliest FusionGPS-planted stories in Apr 2016 claiming Putin had somehow compromised Trump.
https://t.co/j2yMcv6C30
18) Chait was also the "useful idiot" for FusionGPS who planted the "Trump changed the RNC platform on Ukraine to help Putin" narrative.

These stories were cited in other stories later on and used by the FBI to obtain FISA warrants on the Trump Campaign. https://t.co/AYNbxxIRvK
19) The same pattern has been playing out for a while in 2020, this time in relation to Turkey

@TWPundit first discovered a disinformation campaign was underway to illicitly connect Trump to Turkey when articles like this began dropping earlier this year https://t.co/BKqS9wJzGi
20) The Soros-funded
@OCCRP was the same media outfit cited in the fake Ukraine "whistleblower" complaint used by @AdamSchiff to kick off his Ukraine Impeachment hoax.
The Sep 2020 @OCCRP
article still reports the Ukraine accusations as established fact
https://t.co/vHBTjOckCK
21)
@BuzzFeed
( who infamously released the Steele Dossier) then got in on the act along with
@ICIJorg
... another collection of Soros-funded stooges (there's that name again 🤨) https://t.co/oeKFa6BUWt
22)
@BuzzFeed
gaslit their followers into thinking they'd really found something. But as
@TWPundit
reported, it was just recycled, made up dirt. Fake new.

Classic #RussiaGate pattern of circular reasoning … plant the story and then cite the story. https://t.co/8EdnnCbSus
23) It wasn't just Soros-funded alphabet soup orgs and rags like @Buzzfeed
@NBCNews did their part to help lay the groundwork for the @nytimes (sadly transparent and predictable) smear piece yesterday. https://t.co/jlIFJBBcvU
24) This article too was transparently absurd because it made reference to possible violations of the "Emoluments Clause" of the US Constitution ... which would fall in the same category as the Logan Act

Even @NBCNews recognized the stupidity of the charge and quickly retracted
25) The 9/27 @nytimes article on Trump's illegally leaked tax return was itself part of the setup. There were numerous accusations related to Turkey in the original article which are again referenced in the article from yesterday. https://t.co/7bsEnoG5hu. Stay tuned for more...

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1) FL absentees, early voting:

*Dems as expected ("souls to the polls Sunday") had a good day and FINALLY take the early walk-in vote lead by 6,100 votes.

Rs total: 1,151,593
Ds total: 1,092,547

Rs +59,046 combined lead. This is very good for this point in the campaign.

2) At this point in 2016, Rs only led by 40,000. I could be mistaken but I think yesterday was the last day polls were open on Sunday, so the final "souls to the polls" Sunday.

3) As of yesterday, four red counties were yet to report. That would likely boost the lead back to 70k

4) I don't think the FL Rs in their wildest dreams expected to lead this late in the campaign.

5) Likewise in NV:
Clark (with its union "encouragement" for members turned out big yesterday and added net 6,000 voters.

However---big however---neither Washoe nor the rurals . . .

(5) contd. . . were open yesterday. My guesstimate is that would slice that number in half.

While this helped, the NV Ds are still looking at a significant--to potentially massive--shortfall from their 2016 numbers coming out of early voting.

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THREAD:
Good afternoon, followers of frivolous election litigation. There's a last-minute entry in the competition for dumbest pre-inauguration lawsuit - a totally loony effort to apparently leave the entire USA without a government.

We'll start with the complaint in a minute.

But first, I want to give you a quick explanation for why I'm going to keep talking about these cases even after the inauguration.

They're part of an ongoing effort - one that's not well-coordinated but is widespread - to discredit our fundamental system of government.

It's a direct descendent, in more ways than one, of birtherism. And here's the thing about birtherism. It might have been a joke to a lot of people, but it was extremely pernicious. It obviously validated the racist "not good enough to be President" crowd. But that wasn't all.

Don't get me wrong, that was bad enough. Validating racism helped put the kind of shitbird who would tweet this from an official government account into power. But it didn't stop


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My piece in the NY Times today: "the Trump administration is denying applications submitted to the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services at a rate 37 percent higher than the Obama administration did in 2016."

Based on this analysis: "Denials for immigration benefits—travel documents, work permits, green cards, worker petitions, etc.—increased 37 percent since FY 2016. On an absolute basis, FY 2018 will see more than about 155,000 more denials than FY 2016." https://t.co/Bl0naOO0sh


"This increase in denials cannot be credited to an overall rise in applications. In fact, the total number of applications so far this year is 2 percent lower than in 2016. It could be that the higher denial rate is also discouraging some people from applying at all.."

Thanks to @gsiskind for his insightful comments. The increase in denials, he said, is “significant enough to make one think that Congress must have passed legislation changing the requirements. But we know they have not.”

My conclusion:
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@Brossentia
Watching the Congress hearing on Gamestop/Robinhood/Reddit. I'll let people know if there's anything super interesting.

Right now, it seems like both Democrats and Republicans are sympathetic with average Americans rather than the companies. It'll be interesting to see what happens.

I kind of like Rep. Patrick McHenry's (R) take. Basically, he says it's dumb that it's easier to buy a lottery ticket than to invest.

Now, Congressional hearings in committees are often more about figuring out problems than attacking each other; I fully expect both Democrats and Republicans to have good insight here.

Rep. Al Green says that fines -have- to outweigh the benefits from breaking the law. I completely agree.
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The Dude
The Dude
@JurisDudence
This is partly what makes it impossible to have a constructive conversation nowadays. The stubborn refusal to accept that opposition to Trumpism and GOP nationalism is about more than simply holding different beliefs about things in and of itself. 👇


It's fine for people to hold different beliefs. But that doesn't mean all beliefs deserve equal treatment or tolerance and it doesn't mean intolerance of some beliefs makes a person intolerant of every belief which they don't share.

So if I said I don't think Trumpism deserves to be tolerated because it's just a fresh 21st century coat of cheap paint on a failed, dangerous 20th century ideology (fascism) that doesn't mean I'm intolerant of all beliefs with which I disagree. You'd think this would be obvious.

Another important facet. People who support fascist movements tend to give what they think are valid reasons for supporting them. That doesn't mean anyone is obliged to tolerate fascism or accept their proffered excuse.


Say you joined a neighborhood group that sets up community gardens and does roadside beautification projects. All good, right? Say one day you're having a meeting and you notice the President and exec board of this group are saying some bizarre things about certain neighbors.
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My new theory: A lot of it is guilt.

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