The latest updates:
There are indications that Kamala Harris is getting some decent post-debate bounce. It’s still closer than it would be in a sane world.
J.D. Vance explained Trump’s concept of a plan for health care. Per Jonathan Chait:
Vance explained the Trump plan during an interview with NBC’s Kristen Welker: “He, of course, does have a plan for how to fix American health care, but a lot of it goes down, Kristen, to deregulating insurance markets, so that people can actually choose a plan that makes sense for them.”
Vance is advocating a partial or complete return to the system that existed before Obamacare. In that world, prior to 2014, it was very difficult to find affordable coverage unless you were on Medicare, Medicaid, or got insurance through your employer. There was a market for individual insurance, and it was possible to buy plans if you didn’t get coverage through a government plan or through work. But that market was dominated by “adverse selection” — the only way insurers could make money was to weed out any customers likely to need medical care.
Was Vance asleep from 2008 to 2010 when the details of the Affordable Care Act were being fought over? And back when millions of people couldn’t get health insurance at any price? Unreal.
There have been 33 separate bomb threats made against schools in Springfield, said Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine. Several of them came from “overseas,” from one country in particular, but DeWine would not say which country. No actual bombs were found, but of course they have to be taken seriously nonetheless.
Nativist hysteria is hardly new to the U.S., of course. There was another incident when false rumors about immigrants set off several days of rioting, resulting in about 20 deaths and two churches and a seminary burned. The year was 1844, the city was Philadelphia, and the immigrants were Irish.
It turns out that Trump’s Arlington Cemetery incident is being investigated, but not by the Army.
Law enforcement officials at a Virginia military base are still actively investigating an August incident at Arlington National Cemetery involving what has been described as a confrontation between former President Donald Trump’s campaign and a cemetery worker, even as the Army says it considers the matter closed, according to multiple sources familiar with the matter.
As part of the probe led by the Joint Base Myer-Henderson Hall Police Department, an investigator with the base’s police department has sought in recent days to contact Trump campaign officials about the incident, the sources said.
Investigators are seeking to interview the officials involved in the incident, according to the sources.
Pro Publica reports that Judge Aileen Cannon Failed to Disclose a Right-Wing Junket. And that wasn’t the first time.
Today Republicans in the Senate again blocked a bill that would have protected IVF.
The vote fell largely along party lines, 51 to 44, short of the 60 votes the bill would’ve needed to advance.
“Republicans want people to think they support IVF because they know how unpopular that position is. They want to keep their true agenda hidden from the public,” Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) warned during a press conference on the steps of the Capitol. He was flanked by his Democratic colleagues, who held up large photos of families who have used IVF.
They’re more afraid of the Fetus people than they are of being consistent.
I spent some time today trying to extract something meaningful from the conflicting mash of poll results. The Morning Consult poll had a sample of 11 thousand likely voters. That's a HUGE sample. (I've seen polls this year with a sample size less than 800. IMO, they're junk.) I'm not saying Morning Consult numbers are "true" – the poll could be skewed if they oversampled CA and undersampled TX. But somebody spent big bucks to get a result that large – I think they tried to make it real. What I'll be watching for is the trend with Morning Consult polls. With the same methodology, the trend should be true even if the actual numbers are off a bit.
The swing states are still the ball game. Pennsylvania is pivotal, though North Carolina could almost replace PA in electoral votes. My gut says Georgia will go to Trump but it's the state Trump seems to have rigged most securely. Az and NV seem to be too close to call.
I toy with the theory that Trump picked Vance to made him look mentally stable in comparison. Then I switch to a competition theory. Vance takes the junior MAGAs, and Trump works the veterans. All of this assumes way too much. Ergo is a word neither could come close to defining even on a multiple-choice test. I cringe when either use the words therefore or even the word so. You know the next utterance is going to be pure nonsense.
Nouns get bad too. When Trump says Windmill expect the content you expect to get rid of with a flush toilet. Lately he is off the flush toilet rant, but I could jinx things on that one. Just in case the documents case gets past the bought off Cannon, he may need that for his defense. Mar-a Lago only has high volume, high security, certified, paper disintegrating flush toilets, much better than the ones he was forced to use in the White House. They looked like gaudy bathrooms but really…a state of the art, secure document facility. Woops, I'm not allowed to write about that. I'm sure the redactors will fix that before this goes out.
What's next a bio-weapon? Bibi is a terrorist!
https://www.bbc.com/news/live/cwyl9048gx8t
Oh Lord just don't let my baby grow up to be Secretary of State.
Thomas Friedan must read in NYT.
Opinion | America’s Role in the World Is Hard. It Just Got Much Harder. – The New York Times (nytimes.com)
Keith Wheelock comment: