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Category: Politics

Deny, attack, reverse – Trump has perfected the art of inverted victimhood

Deny, attack, reverse – Trump has perfected the art of inverted victimhood

Early this year (but just as applicable now as then) Sidney Blumenthal wrote: Time after time, with predictable regularity, never missing a beat, Donald Trump proclaims his innocence. He always denies that he has done anything wrong. The charge does not matter. He is blameless. But this is only the beginning of the pattern. Then, he attacks his accusers, or anyone involved in bringing him to account, usually of committing the identical offense of which he stands accused. But it…

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Will Trump Bibles be placed in in every classroom across Oklahoma?

Will Trump Bibles be placed in in every classroom across Oklahoma?

The Oklahoman reports: Superintendent Ryan Walters isn’t just talking about buying Bibles for schools. Bids opened Monday for a contract to supply the state Department of Education with 55,000 Bibles. According to the bid documents, vendors must meet certain specifications: Bibles must be the King James Version; must contain the Old and New Testaments; must include copies of the Pledge of Allegiance, Declaration of Independence, U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights; and must be bound in leather or leather-like…

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In the authoritarians’ new war on ideas, biology might be next

In the authoritarians’ new war on ideas, biology might be next

By C. Brandon Ogbunu In 2021, U.S. Sen.Ted Cruz compared critical race theory — an academic subfield that examines the role of racism in American institutions, laws, and policies — to the Ku Klux Klan, the most notorious homegrown terrorist organization in U.S. history. In doing so, he opened a playbook that resembles one put into practice by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and others: Attack ideas that are unfriendly to a narrow view of the world, and do so by…

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U.S. discusses strikes on Iran oil sites as Israel presses Lebanon offensive

U.S. discusses strikes on Iran oil sites as Israel presses Lebanon offensive

Be wary of the credulous takes about a new Middle East being forged through war. https://t.co/JDNmuAO9TG — Ben Rhodes (@brhodes) October 3, 2024 Reuters reports: The U.S. is discussing strikes on Iran’s oil facilities as retaliation for Tehran’s missile attack on Israel, President Joe Biden said on Thursday, while Israel’s military pressed ahead with its campaign against Iran-backed armed group Hezbollah in Lebanon. As Israel weighs its options after its arch-foe Iran launched its largest ever assault on Tuesday, Biden…

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Why Netanyahu and Putin both want a Trump victory

Why Netanyahu and Putin both want a Trump victory

James Risen writes: The outcomes of the two biggest wars in the world hang in the balance of the American presidential election, even though U.S. troops are not involved in combat in either one. If Donald Trump wins the election, both wars will get much, much worse. Russian President Vladimir Putin and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu both want Trump to win the American presidential election so that they can prolong and intensify their brutal wars without the possibility of…

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Former county clerk gets 9 years in prison for tampering with voting machines

Former county clerk gets 9 years in prison for tampering with voting machines

The New York Times reports: Tina Peters, the former clerk of Mesa County, Colo., was sentenced on Thursday to nine years in prison after being found guilty in August of tampering with voting machines under her control in a failed attempt to prove that they had been used to rig the 2020 election against former President Donald J. Trump. At a hearing in Grand Junction, Colo., Judge Matthew D. Barrett scolded Ms. Peters sternly from the bench, telling her he…

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Trump initially refused to give California wildfire aid because it’s a blue state, former aide says

Trump initially refused to give California wildfire aid because it’s a blue state, former aide says

E&E News reports: In the aftermath of Hurricane Helene, former President Donald Trump has blasted the Biden administration for its handling of the disaster — going so far as to accuse Democratic leaders of ignoring the needs of Republican storm victims. But a review of Trump’s record by POLITICO’s E&E News and interviews with two former Trump White House officials show that the former president was flagrantly partisan at times in response to disasters and on at least three occasions…

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Harris holds a 66-electoral-vote lead over Trump, calculates prominent data scientist

Harris holds a 66-electoral-vote lead over Trump, calculates prominent data scientist

Fortune reports: Data scientist Thomas Miller has crafted a model for forecasting the 2024 presidential election that, he says, is far more reliable than the polling that’s constantly cited in the media as the best guide to the outcome on Nov. 5. Instead, the Northwestern University professor deploys a framework based on the betting odds set by folks wagering their dollars not on the candidate they intend to vote for, but the one they expect to win. This writer began…

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Regional war feared as Biden backs Israel’s threat to retaliate after Iranian missile attack

Regional war feared as Biden backs Israel’s threat to retaliate after Iranian missile attack

  Israel has announced it is sending more troops into southern Lebanon as the Middle East moves closer to a full-scale regional war. On Tuesday, Iran fired at least 180 ballistic missiles at Israel that Iran says targeted Israeli military and security sites, a response that comes after a series of escalating Israeli attacks in recent months against Hezbollah, Hamas and Iranian leaders. The United States aided Israel in intercepting many of the Iranian missiles on Tuesday, and President Joe…

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‘Make them riot’ — Trump election case judge unseals special counsel motion on immunity

‘Make them riot’ — Trump election case judge unseals special counsel motion on immunity

CNBC reports: A federal judge on Wednesday unsealed a redacted motion by Special Counsel Jack Smith detailing evidence against former President Donald Trump in his criminal election interference case in Washington, D.C. The 165-page document was filed by Smith as part of his argument that Trump can still be prosecuted for efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss despite a Supreme Court ruling in July that he has presumptive presidential immunity for official acts. Judge Tanya Chutkan unsealed the filing…

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Melania Trump passionately defends abortion rights in upcoming memoir

Melania Trump passionately defends abortion rights in upcoming memoir

The Guardian reports: Melania Trump made an extraordinary declaration in an eagerly awaited memoir to be published a month from election day: she is a passionate supporter of a woman’s right to control her own body – including the right to abortion. “It is imperative to guarantee that women have autonomy in deciding their preference of having children, based on their own convictions, free from any intervention or pressure from the government,” the Republican nominee’s wife writes, amid a campaign…

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Multiple women claiming romantic relationships with RFK Jr. threaten his standing in Trump orbit

Multiple women claiming romantic relationships with RFK Jr. threaten his standing in Trump orbit

Mediaite reports: At least three women are claiming to have had romantic relationships with Robert F. Kennedy Jr. in just the last year, as he pursued a long-shot bid for the presidency, Mediaite has learned. People close to Kennedy now fear the revelation of those alleged relationships could jeopardize his standing in Donald Trump’s orbit, particularly as the former president and 2024 Republican nominee fights to win over suburban women. Two sources with direct knowledge of the three women’s accounts…

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Musk funded right-wing political non-profit years before he endorsed Trump, sources say

Musk funded right-wing political non-profit years before he endorsed Trump, sources say

Reuters reports: Elon Musk secretly funded a conservative political group in recent years, according to four people familiar with his donations, illustrating quiet financial support for right-wing causes even before the billionaire entrepreneur in July endorsed former President Donald Trump’s bid for re-election. Two of the people familiar with the donations told Reuters that Musk’s contributions to the organization, Building America’s Future, had started by 2022. One of those people and a third source said the donations amounted to millions…

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Israel vows to retaliate after Iran launches unprecedented missile attack

Israel vows to retaliate after Iran launches unprecedented missile attack

Julian Borger writes: The sight of missiles descending on Tel Aviv on Tuesday night was the clearest sign imaginable that the regional conflict so widely feared over the past year may finally have ignited. This is the second Iranian aerial attack on Israel in less than six months, but last time there was several days’ notice; the much slower drones and cruise missiles arrived first, and the principal target was a military base in the underpopulated Negev desert. This time,…

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White House backed Israeli attacks on Hezbollah despite opposition from Pentagon, State and intelligence community

White House backed Israeli attacks on Hezbollah despite opposition from Pentagon, State and intelligence community

Politico reports: Senior White House figures privately told Israel that the U.S. would support its decision to ramp up military pressure against Hezbollah — even as the Biden administration publicly urged the Israeli government in recent weeks to curtail its strikes, according to American and Israeli officials. Presidential adviser Amos Hochstein and Brett McGurk, the White House coordinator for the Middle East, told top Israeli officials in recent weeks that the U.S. agreed with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s broad…

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