QOTD: "Harris Won The Day"

 

Politico tout Adam Wren with the site's "Who Won the Day":

"If Donald Trump loses on Nov. 5, the racist carnival he curated at Madison Square Garden could be remembered as the day that cost him this margin-of-error election.

As Kamala Harris visited a Puerto Rican restaurant in Pennsylvania, talking about her “Puerto Rican Opportunity Economy Task Force,” Trump was at Madison Square Garden, where Tony Hinchcliffe, the host of Kill Tony podcast, called the U.S. territory a “floating island of garbage.” It was a split screen the Harris campaign welcomed. Nearly half a million people of Puerto Rican descent live in battleground Pennsylvania, and lots more elsewhere were certainly absorbing the headlines.

And Harris won the day." (our emphasis)

You don't have to be a person of Puerto Rican descent to be nauseated and furious at the Malignant Loser's fascist rally. Slurs were also leveled at African Americans and Jews during his rally. Americans who don't support the Malignant Loser were threatened as the "enemy from within."  Meanwhile, VP Harris was in Pennsylvania meeting voters, notably Puerto Rican voters, asking for their support and outlining her plans to improve their lives. The contrast couldn't be more stark, the stakes higher.

(photo: Anna Moneymaker / Getty Images)

Today's Tomorrow Cartoon

 

(click to enlarge)

 

In time for Halloween, Tom lists the real horrors of a second Trump term, which would be America's first authentically fascist regime. Turning the military against his domestic "enemies," banning abortion in all cases, deporting millions of immigrants and separating families, and letting Vladimir Putin and our other adversaries have their way with us are just some of what's in the Malignant Loser's plan. Believe him when he spews these unhinged and violent messages at his cult rallies, and vote in what will be a tight election.

The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly

 

The good:

Donald Trump's Republican allies have suffered a string of courtroom setbacks in battleground U.S. presidential election states as Election Day draws closer, losses that could boost voter turnout and speed certification of the eventual winner.

In the past three weeks, Trump's allies have been dealt at least 10 court losses in battleground states that could decide the outcome of the Nov. 5 contest between Republican former President Trump and his Democratic rival, Vice President Kamala Harris.

 

On Friday, they were dealt another loss in Virginia, when a federal judge blocked the state's removal of people it said had not proved their citizenship from its voter rolls.

U.S. District Judge Patricia Tolliver Giles said the removal ran afoul of a federal prohibition on purging large numbers of voters in the 90 days before an election. The state, which is not a swing state this election, said it would appeal.

 

The other decisions include four rulings against Republicans in Georgia, where judges have blocked last-minute changes to election rules championed by Trump's allies, including one that would have required poll workers to hand count ballots, as well as cases seeking to purge voter rolls and block some Americans who are living overseas from voting.

 

The party's recent losses suggest its legal strategy is coming up short in court, which some legal experts said will likely be a net positive for voter turnout. The losses in Georgia, meanwhile, will likely make it easier for officials there to quickly count and certify vote totals, the experts said.

 

"If courts had accepted some of these arguments, it could have had a huge impact on voter disenfranchisement," said Richard Hasen, a law professor at the University of California, Los Angeles... (our emphasis)

Democrats and allied groups have a war chest to enable them to fight back Republican attempts to win in the courts what they can't win at the ballot box. It may make all the difference again this year, as it did in 2020.

The bad:

As we head into the final stretch of the cycle, Donald Trump, who has made his entire candidacy a referendum on immigration, will not discuss his mass deportation plans in detail—not in a recent Univision town hall nor his one debate with Kamala Harris. That’s a tell.

Since those debates, Trump has only leaned deeper into mass deportations, while Harris has aggressively made her case about how she will help Latinos economically, a telling reset to reach Latino voters in the final weeks of the election.

Trump knows that explaining what mass deportations entail would be a disaster for him. Yes, some polls show an alarming rise in support for mass deportations. However, when voters are made aware of how much it costs and the human toll it would take in terms of family separations and the removal of decades-long residents, mass deportation becomes politically toxic.

Mass deportations would be ugly; they would require local law enforcement to work with federal law enforcement to remove law-abiding residents, many of whom have woven their lives and livelihoods into the fabric of their communities. It would separate mixed-status families, leaving children who have been here their whole lives without their parents. We are still dealing with the aftermath of the last time the Trump administration separated families at our southern border—one of the ugliest moments in the modern history of our country. [snip]

"We have to tell that story and not let Trump define immigration for our country," Valiente Action Fund executive director Maria Rodriguez said. "When we identify the specifics of what Trump is proposing with mass deportations, as was done in the ad Playbook 2025, and tell the story of what he is planning on doing on immigration, it moves voters." ... (our emphasis)

Beyond the human cost, the economic cost of the Malignant Loser's fascistic plan would be catastrophic. But, there was more last night at Madison Square Garden --

The ugly:

Donald Trump’s rally at Madison Square Garden, billed as a triumphant homecoming, turned into a political fiasco on Sunday night as a pro-Trump comedian’s racist diatribe drew furious condemnation, including from prominent Republicans.

The rally, held just more than a week before Election Day, was intended to serve as a platform for Trump to make his closing argument. But the racist slurs and vulgarity of the former president’s opening acts were so striking — and sparked such backlash — that his campaign was left on the defensive and issued a disavowal.

The event began with comedian Tony Hinchcliffe, host of the “Kill Tony” podcast, who opened the rally with a set replete with slurs about Latinos, African Americans and other groups that Trump’s campaign is actively targeting to turn out for the former president.

Latinos “love making babies. There’s no pulling out. They come inside, just like they do to our country,” Hinchcliffe said to laughter inside the arena. He added: “There’s literally a floating island of garbage in the middle of the ocean right now. I think it’s called Puerto Rico.”  [snip]

But his derogatory comments and the slew of offensive remarks offered up by the pillars of Trump’s political movement throughout the hours-long program quickly overshadowed the spectacle of the event that drew thousands of MAGA faithful to the heart of Manhattan and was designed to serve as a capstone to the former president’s two-year attempt at a political comeback.

Trump supporter David Rem called Harris the “anti-Christ.” Businessman Grant Cardone claimed Harris has “pimp handlers.” Radio host Sid Rosenberg called Hillary Clinton, Trump’s 2016 rival and a former secretary of state, a “sick son of a bitch” and cast Democrats more broadly as “Jew-haters and lowlives.”  [snip]

In his own speech, Trump reprised some of his harshest remarks about immigration, with his calls to weed out “the enemy from within.”

Trump, who has demonized migrants, called for the death penalty for “any migrant who kills an American citizen or a law enforcement officer,” and at one point stopped to show a video about Venezuelan migrants and gang activity in New York.

The crowd responded by chanting: “Send them back.”...

The hatred, the racism, the bigotry, the anti-Semitism, the punching down, the dark fascism -- pure, undiluted Trump and his MAGAt cult at the site of a 1939 American Nazi rally, no less.  That's their closing argument.  It's all out in the open for anyone with eyes to see and ears to hear.  They're telling you who they are.  Believe them.  (Aaron Rupar has a mega thread of the rally if you want to get more of the sickening show.  More later in "Tweets/ Xeets Of The Day.")

BONUS:  Tengrain did his own research and found this interesting stat of people of Puerto Rican heritage in key states--

• PA: 467,000
• FL: 1,200,000
• TX: 230,000
• NC: 115,000
• GA: 109,000
• WI: 65,000
• OH: 137,000

Vote!

Across The Universe, Cont. -- Distorted Galaxy

 

(click on image to enlarge)

From NASA/ESA, October 21, 2024: The spiral galaxy appearing in this week’s Hubble Picture of the Week is named IC 3225. It looks remarkably as if it’s been launched from a cannon, speeding through space like a comet with a tail of gas streaming from its disc behind it. The scenes that galaxies appear in from Earth’s point of view are fascinating; many seem to hang calmly in the emptiness of space as if hung from a string, while others star in much more dynamic situations!

Appearances can be deceiving with objects so far from Earth — IC 3225 itself is about 100 million light-years away — but the galaxy’s location suggests some causes for this active scene, because IC 3225 is one of over 1300 members of the Virgo galaxy cluster. The density of galaxies in the Virgo cluster creates a rich field of hot gas between them, the so-called ‘intracluster medium’, while the cluster’s extreme mass has its galaxies careening around its centre in some very fast orbits. Ramming through the thick intracluster medium, especially close to the cluster’s centre, places an enormous ‘ram pressure’ on the moving galaxies that strips gas out of them as they go.

IC 3225 is not so close to the cluster core right now, but astronomers have deduced that it has undergone this ram pressure stripping in the past. The galaxy looks as though it’s been impacted by this: it is compressed on one side and there has been noticeably more star formation on this leading edge, while the opposite end is stretched out of shape. Being in such a crowded field, a close call with another galaxy could also have tugged on IC 3225 and created this shape. The sight of this distorted galaxy is a reminder of the incredible forces at work on astronomical scales, which can move and reshape even entire galaxies!

[Image Description: A spiral galaxy. Its disc glows visibly from the centre, and has faint dust threaded through it. A spiral arm curves around the left edge of the disc and is noticeably more dense with bright blue spots, where there are hot and new stars, than the rest. Opposite, the disc stretches out into a short tail where it covers a distant background galaxy. Around it, other distant galaxies and some nearby stars are visible.]

Credit:  ESA/Hubble & NASA, M. Sun

Today's Cartoons

 

(click on images to enlarge)

(John Darkow, Columbia Missourian)

(John Deering, Arkansas Democrat-Gazette)

(Randall Enos, caglecartoons.com)

(Steve Breen, Creators.com)

(Phil Hands, Wisconsin State Journal)

 (John Buss, @repeat1968)

(David Rowe, Financial Review, Sydney)

(Bill Day, caglecartoons.com)

(Dennis Goris, @EandPCartoons)

(Clay Jones, claytoonz.com)

(Emanuele Del Rosso, @EandPCartoons)

(Drew Sheneman, The Star-Ledger, Newark, NJ)

(Jason Adam Katzenstein, @j.a.k._)

Quotes Of The Day -- "Take Our Lives Seriously"

 

Former First Lady Michelle Obama, directing her remarks to men at a rally in Kalamazoo, Michigan, yesterday with Vice President Kamala Harris:

“We expect her to be intelligent and articulate, to have a clear set of policies, to never show too much anger, to prove time and time again that she belongs.  But for Trump, we expect nothing at all, no understanding of policy, no ability to put together a coherent argument, no honesty, no decency, no morals.”

____________________

“If we don’t get this election right, your wife, your daughter, your mother, we as women, will become collateral damage to your rage.”

____________________

“I am asking you all, from the core of my being, to take our lives seriously.” 

 

(Photo:  Jacquelyn Martin/ AP)

Coach Pop Dunks On Trump

 

San Antonio Spurs President and Coach Gregg Popovich was asked about the upcoming election yesterday.  His response is one for the ages, worth every minute.  

🎥 Gregg Popovich spoke at length about the American elections between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump. Full answer 👇 pic.twitter.com/VYyKCaw8TT

— Théo Quintard (@TheoQuintard) October 26, 2024

 

"Coach Pop" graduated from the U.S. Air Force Academy in 1970, served five years in the U.S. Air Force, and held several coaching positions before joining the Spurs coaching staff in 1988.  In 2020, he coached the U.S. team to a gold medal at the Tokyo Olympics.

Real men don't vote for Trump.

Sunday Reflection

"The President is merely the most important among a large number of public servants. He should be supported or opposed exactly to the degree which is warranted by his good conduct or bad conduct, his efficiency or inefficiency in rendering loyal, able, and disinterested service to the Nation as a whole. Therefore it is absolutely necessary that there should be full liberty to tell the truth about his acts, and this means that it is exactly necessary to blame him when he does wrong as to praise him when he does right. Any other attitude in an American citizen is both base and servile. To announce that there must be no criticism of the President, or that we are to stand by the President, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public. Nothing but the truth should be spoken about him or any one else. But it is even more important to tell the truth, pleasant or unpleasant, about him than about any one else." -- former President Theodore Roosevelt (10/27/1858 -1/6/1919), in an editorial in the Kansas City Star on May 7, 1918.

These sentiments would seem to be lost on the fascistic, authoritarian MAGA cult that's taken over a major party in America, and most certainly on its sociopathic and criminal leader to whom blind loyalty is the highest virtue.  In a little over a week, we have a duty to all that have gone before and all that will follow us to defeat the imminent fascist menace on our doorstep. 

 

"Trump" Visits "The Joe Rogan Experience"

 

"Donald Trump" (satirist J-L Cauvin) makes an appearance on The Seth Jeff Steve... Joe Rogan Experience podcast, to weave his demented nonsense in an "insecure male space" for men "whose fathers have failed them miserably."  Funny and on the mark!

Today's Cartoons

 

(click on images to enlarge)

(Ann Telnaes, Washington Post)

(R.J. Matson, CQ/ Roll Call)

(Dave Whamond, caglecartoons.com)

 (Michael de Adder, @deAdder)

(Jesse Duquette, @jrduquette)

(Dave Whamond, caglecartoons.com)

(Chris Britt, Creators.com)

(Pat Bagley, The Salt Lake Tribune)

(Steve Brodner, @stevebrodner)

(Ed Wexler, caglecartoons.com)

(David Horsey, The Seattle Times)

(Mike Luckovich, Atlanta Journal-Constitution)

(Andy Marlette, Creators.com)

(Phil Hands, Wisconsin State Journal)

(Mort Gerberg, @mortgerberg)

Tweets Of The Day

 

"Anticipatory obedience" to Trump at the darkening Washington Post --

If billionaires and newspapers are refusing to endorse against Trump *before* he's even in power, imagine how they'll act when he can direct the federal govt against them.

Imagine how the press will act after FOUR years of this.

How will voters get accurate information in 2028?

— Ian Bassin 🇺🇸 (@ianbassin) October 25, 2024

It’s not that newspaper endorsements change hearts, and minds (though sometimes they do) it’s that it’s very scary to see billionaire oligarchs obeying in advance.

— Molly Jong-Fast (@MollyJongFast) October 26, 2024

 

There are many great journalists at the Washington Post. They remain great journalists performing an invaluable service this morning. But the Post will never be the same nor will it be seen the same way so long as its current owner remains in place. Great damage has been done.

— David Rothkopf (@djrothkopf) October 26, 2024

 

The paper I've loved working at for 47 years is dying in darkness.

— david maraniss (@maranissdavid) October 25, 2024

Houston rally for Kamala Harris draws 30,000, Beyonce and Willy Nelson -- 

Beyonce for Kamala. Full video. Let’s GO!!!!!! pic.twitter.com/l7H5wivxvb

— Adam Parkhomenko (@AdamParkhomenko) October 26, 2024

"Day of Love" illustrates the Malignant Loser's dark madness ... -- 

Donald Trump calls January 6 a "day of love." By "love" he just means he would love for it to happen all over again. pic.twitter.com/c1IBw8uCiv

— The Lincoln Project (@ProjectLincoln) October 26, 2024

 .... as does this sick fable of his --

Trump: The transgender operations where they are allowed to take your child when he goes to school and turn him into a male… pic.twitter.com/s6G23QhH7U

— Acyn (@Acyn) October 26, 2024

His cult waits three hours to watch him slowly amble across the stage -- 

Trump arrives for his rally 3 hours late. Creepy scene. pic.twitter.com/Ph3qZl3h51

— Ron Filipkowski (@RonFilipkowski) October 26, 2024

Stop! You had me at "picalillis peashoots"  -- 

pic.twitter.com/5hIISXnhhA

— Poorly Translated Shirts (@translatedtees) October 26, 2024

 

"Dipshit" Musk's Sketchy Immigration Past

 

South African fascist Trump fanboy Elon "Dipshit" Musk has been on a mission to clamp down on illegal immigrants, using his increasingly racist social media voice to push conspiracy theories, becoming one of the leading purveyors of lies on immigration. But Musk is nothing if not a hypocrite. The tough guy on immigration's path to citizenship in 2002 is being scrutinized for possible illegality:

"Multi-hyphenate billionaire Elon Musk has become a staunch opponent of illegal immigrants, using his considerable following on X — the social network he owns, previously called Twitter — to spread outright racist conspiracy theories and plenty of other disinformation about the topic.

But there's an uncomfortable truth that stands out, as CNN reported last month: as his own younger brother once claimed, Musk may have once been an illegal immigrant himself.

During an April 2013 conference in California, Kimbal Musk recalled how his and his brother's startup scored a $3 million investment from venture capitalists.

"When they did fund us, they realized that we were illegal immigrants," Kimbal Musk said at the time.

His brother interjected, claiming that 'it was a gray area' without elaborating. Last time we checked, that doesn't sound like a clearcut case of legal immigration." (our emphasis)

Of course nothing is expected to result from this disclosure, but it's a sign of the depravity of this arrogant South African sociopath that he wants to pull up the ladder for others that he and his brother climbed into the United States years ago.

 

"The Guardrails Are Already Collapsing" (UPDATED)

 

We're still not over this, and probably never will be.  Betrayals cut deep.

Jonathan Last concludes his essay on Washington Post's Jeff Bezos' decision to not endorse Kamala Harris, Bezos joining the oligarch coalition of cowards who believe their wealth and position are threatened if they don't show Trump obedience:

... These guys can hear the music. They’ve seen the sides being chosen: Elon Musk and Peter Theil assembling with Trump’s gangster government in waiting. They see Mark Zuckerberg praising Trump as a “badass.” And now they see Bezos getting in line, too.

What’s remarkable is that Trump didn’t have to arrest Bezos to secure his compliance. Trump didn’t even have to win the election. Just the fact that he has an even-money chance to become president was threat enough.

Or maybe that’s not remarkable. One of Timothy Snyder’s rules for resisting authoritarians is that “most of the power of authoritarianism is freely given.” People surrender preemptively much more often than you might expect.

Two weeks ago, Ian Bassin and Maximillian Potter wrote what might be the most prophetic essay of the year. They warned about “anticipatory obedience” in the media.

Seventeen days later, Bezos made his demonstration.

In case you needed reminding: The “guardrails” aren’t guardrails. They’re people.

And they’re already collapsing. Before a single state has been called.

Reaction from Post writers and former luminaries here and here.

As we said yesterday, if ever there was a time to cancel a subscription, this is it.

And if ever there was a time to vote, this is it. 

BONUS:  The Philadelphia Inquirer won't be cowed!  Neither will The New Yorker --

 

Proud to work for the @NewYorker which unlike the @WashingtonPost knows who to endorse: Kamala Harris for President https://t.co/u2tauRkkIW

— Jane Mayer (@JaneMayerNYer) October 25, 2024

BONUS II:  Justin Peters has a good read on this. 

BONUS III:  WaPo columnists' statement here.

UPDATE:  Former WaPo editor-at-large Kagan makes an expolosive claim --

The Washington Post’s outgoing editor-at-large and longtime columnist has made explosive claims that its owner Jeff Bezos struck a deal with Donald Trump in order to kill the newspaper’s endorsement of Kamala Harris.

Robert Kagan, who resigned from his position on Friday after more than two decades at the publication, told the Daily Beast that Trump’s meeting with executives of Bezos’ Blue Origin space company the same day that the Amazon founder had killed a plan to support Harris was proof of the backroom deal.

“Trump waited to make sure that Bezos did what he said he was going to do, and then met with the Blue Origin people,” he said on Saturday. “Which tells us that there was an actual deal made, meaning that Bezos communicated, or through his people, communicated directly with Trump, and they set up this quid pro quo.”  [snip]

According to Kagan, “all the facts” lead in the direction of Bezos attempting to transform the Post into something akin to The Wall Street Journal, a center right “anti-anti-Trump editorial slant,” with Lewis by his side.

“Some journalists will stick around for that. Some will leave. If they leave, they can be replaced,” he said.

(Cartoon:  Clay Bennett, Chattanooga Times Free Press;  more later in Today's Cartoons)

The United Nations Building Complex

 

Architect Michael Wyetzner takes us on a tour of the United Nations building complex in Manhattan:  the site itself, the many architects involved in the design, and the style and features of the Secretariat and General Assembly buildings. 

Today's Cartoons

 

(click on images to enlarge)

(Bill Day, caglecartoons.com)

(Rob Rogers, Tinyview.com)

(Mike Luckovich, Atlanta Journal-Constitution)

(Chris Britt, Creators.com)

(Bruce Plante, caglecartoons.com)

(John Deering, Arkansas Democrat-Gazette)

(Clay Bennett, Chattanooga Times Free Press)

(Dave Whamond, caglecartoons.com)

(Tim Campbell, Counterpoint)

(Drew Sheneman, The Star-Ledger, Newark, NJ)

(Matt Davies, Newsday)

(Asher Perlman, @asherperlman)