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Cake day: May 10th, 2022

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  • J.D. Vance Admits He’s Telling Racist Lies for Attention – [archived version]

    “Nobody is disputing that the town of Springfield, Ohio, needs help. But, you’re not just a bystander,” [CNN’s Dana] Bash said. “You’re the senator from Ohio, so instead of saying things that are wrong, and actually causing the hospitals, the schools, the government buildings to be evacuated because of bomb threats, because of the cats and dogs thing, why not actually be constructive, in helping to better integrate them into the community? Because there are a lot of employers there who say that the Haitians workers are helping fill jobs that they need desperately filled.”

    Rather than take any ownership of his role in spreading false claims and incendiary rhetoric, Vance recoiled, saying that any suggestion that he’d been responsible for inciting the bomb threats in Springfield was “disgusting.” The Ohio senator scolded Bash for sounding like a “Democratic propagandist” as she called him out on his reckless lying.



  • I’m not a lawyer, but one reason could be that there’s not (yet?) a clear criminal case that would convince a judge. It’s not clear whether a crime is committed, maybe?

    For example, Mr. McCabe says, ““I don’t know that I would characterize it as [an] active, recruited, knowing asset in the way that people in the intelligence community think of that term” (and similar comments), but ‘don’t know’ could mean there’s nit enough for prosecution? This is not China or Russia, where people are sentenced to.prison in closed-door trials and often not even their lawyers know what exactly their clients are accused of. Maybe we could call it another ‘weakness’ of democracy (which non-democratic state actors try to exploit)?

    But I say ‘could’ and conclude I don’t know either.




































  • Elon Musk and other tech executives are funding a social media ad blitz to support the presidential campaign of Donald Trump

    If a voter in Michigan performs a search on Google, a somewhat shocking ad might pop up.

    The ad shows a young man lying in bed late at night when someone else texts him, “Hey you need to vote,” and then sends the man a video of the attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump. The man can hear the gunshots and people screaming in the background.

    As Trump is rushed off stage with blood pouring down his face, the man watching the video types in response, “This is out of control. How do I start?”

    The ad then displays a website for a group called America PAC.

    The website says it will help the viewer register to vote. But once a user clicks “Register to Vote,” the experience he or she will have can be very different, depending on where they live.

    If a user lives in a state that is not considered competitive in the presidential election, like California or Wyoming for example, they’ll be prompted to enter their email addresses and ZIP code and then directed quickly to a voter registration page for their state, or back to the original sign-up section.

    But for users who enter a ZIP code that indicates they live in a battleground state, like Pennsylvania or Georgia, the process is very different.

    Rather than be directed to their state’s voter registration page, they instead are directed to a highly detailed personal information form, prompted to enter their address, cellphone number and age.

    If they agree to submit all that, the system still does not steer them to a voter registration page. Instead, it shows them a “thank you” page.

    So that person who wanted help registering to vote? In the end, they got no help at all registering. But they did hand over priceless personal data to a political operation.

    […]