We have seen the spectacle of Republicans in Congress going along with efforts to overturn the elections, the latest example being the 127 members of the House of Representatives who signed on the lawsuit filed by the Texas attorney general with the US Supreme court that was summarily tossed out. Some Democrats are fed up with this behavior and have decided to fight fire with fire.
[Read more…]
A silly person named Joseph Epstein has apparently written an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal (that is behind their paywall) saying that Jill Biden should not use the ‘Dr.’ when referring to herself because it is unseemly to do so. He seems to think that only those with medical degrees should refer to themselves as ‘Dr.’ To add further insult, he compared her earned 2007 PhD degree in education, which she received after submitting a dissertation on student retention in community colleges, to an honorary degree and apparently even referred to her as ‘kiddo’.
[Read more…]
The US is breaking records each day in the number of positive covid-19 test results, deaths, and hospitalizations. We have also passed another grim milestone of 300,000 deaths.
Our daily update is published. States reported 2.1 million tests, a record 232k cases, and 2,749 deaths. There are 108k people currently hospitalized with COVID-19, also an all-time record. The 7-day average for all four metrics is the highest it has been. pic.twitter.com/7GwbbKYDZn
— The COVID Tracking Project (@COVID19Tracking) December 12, 2020
It is hard to identify which of the around 50 failed lawsuits filed to try and overturn the US presidential elections is the worst. But the one that most reveals the utterly cynical depths to which the Republican Party has sunk is the lawsuit that the Texas attorney general filed with the US Supreme Court that was joined by 18 other Republican state attorneys general and 127 members of the Houser of Representatives. Trump touted it as ‘the big one’, as if all the others were practice runs and that this would succeed where all the others had failed.
We will be INTERVENING in the Texas (plus many other states) case. This is the big one. Our Country needs a victory!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 9, 2020
Given current attitudes, Ruben Bolling wonders how people might react.
Tom the Dancing Bug 1516 news – americans sacrifice
This documentary exposes how the social media algorithms work to keep people hooked to spend vast amounts of time on the sites by identifying their wants and sending them down addictive rabbit holes. It features mostly people from within most of these companies (Facebook, Google, Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, and the like) who became disaffected with the effect these companies and their practices were having on society and saw them as destructive and have now left the companies and are speaking out.
But the filmmakers also added a wrinkle. They have actors portray a family whose members are social media users, focusing on two children who are addicted to it. They show a room in which there is an avatar of the son with three identical people looking at all the data about him and what he is doing and pushing things on him to keep him glued to his phone. In reality of course, there are no people doing this, only algorithms. But there is something much more creepy in the image of actual people who know every thing about us and what buttons to push to get a specific reaction and are monitoring our every waking moment to try and find ways to get us to spend more time on their sites and then selling that engagement to advertisers. Although algorithms may feel less creepy than if humans were doing this, they are far, far more thorough than humans could ever be.
[Read more…]
I thought that the days just dragged before the election but expected that once Trump lost, the elation over the fact that we would soon be spared the sight and sound of him would make the days just zip by. But the days seem to be dragging by even more slowly as Trump stays in the news by continuing to claim that he actually won and was cheated and mounting ridiculous lawsuits. I can’t believe we still have to go through another 41 days of this.
Seth Meyers takes a closer look at the ongoing futility of the legal challenges brought by Trump and his allies.
Before the pandemic, when his show was televised in the studio, Meyers always appeared in suit and tie. When he was broadcasting from home, he switched to casual. Now he has gone back to the studio but is still dressed casually. Is this going to be one of the permanent changes due to the pandemic, that since we’ve seen people in their homes, that relaxed atmosphere is going to be continued?
I am opposed to the death penalty, seeing it as an utterly barbaric practice that no society that considers itself civilized should countenance. In the US, some states allow it, while others do not. The federal government does allow it but it has been very rarely carried out. But Trump and his attorney general Bill Barr seem to have a relish for it, so much so that they are rushing to carry out executions before they leave office, presumably because Joe Biden, who opposes the death penalty, might not carry them out.
[Read more…]
I am sure that all of you have been wondering what televangelist Pat Robertson’s thoughts are on the election now that his hero Trump is on the way out. He says that he knows what can be done to keep Trump in office and that if Trump asks him, he will tell him. It can’t hurt since the Rudy Giuliani-Sidney Powell legal clown circus is not going anywhere.
[Read more…]
Trump is learning what it feels like to be suddenly viewed as a paper tiger. Before the election, almost all Republicans would snap to attention when he said anything and would not dream of criticizing him even when he said and did the most outrageous things. But ever since it became clear that he lost and is on his way out, more and more Republicans, especially at the state and local levels, are feeling freer to defy him, especially when it comes to his demand that they overturn the results of the election.
[Read more…]