CapitalistImperialistPig

Arun quotes from a Newsweek story on the Republican opposition research book on Bernie Sanders. It's not good. Really not good. From Kurt Eichenwald's Newsweek story: On Friday, I almost assaulted a fan of my work. I was in the Philadelphia International Airport, and a man who recognized me from one of my appearances on a television news show approached. He thanked me for the investigative reporting I had done about Donald Trump before the election, expressed his outrage that the Republican nominee had won and then told me quite gruffly, “Get back to work.” Something about his arrogance struck me, so I asked, “Who did you vote for?” He replied, “Well, Stein, but—” I interrupted him and said, “You’re lucky it’s illegal for me to punch you in the face.” Then, after telling him to have sex with himself—but with a much cruder term—I turned and walked away. ... I have seen the opposition book assembled by Republicans for Sanders, and it was brutal. The Republicans would ha...

Like many others, I've been pondering the question of why nearly 1/2 of Americans voted for (and elected) a vulgar, dishonest, and dangerously unstable person for President. Obviously there is an economic component, a nostalgia for the good old union factory jobs that meant good benefits and a middle class lifestyle. The race divide was actually less severe than in the Obama elections - more Blacks and Hispanics voted for Trump than Romney. I think that there was a big cultural component. These voters saw their culture under siege and voted against all those threats to it: Mexicans, Gays, Blacks, Muslims and, perhaps especially, the media figures propagating all the multi-cultural and related notions. I call it the anti-Jon Stewart vote. It could just as well be called the anti-Miley Cyrus vote. Stewart and his Alumni relentlessly mocked Trump, Fox News, and the other totems of the right and these cultural conservatives wanted revenge. Miley and others like her live their liv...

The latest ABC/Washington Post tracking poll has very bad news for Hillary. In the past week, Trump has obliterated her once commanding lead and taken over a narrow lead himself. Details here. The first fully post-FBI shocker ABC/WaPo poll is out and it is a shocker: in a poll that saw Hillary lead by a dominating 13 points as recently as one week ago, moments ago ABC/WaPo/Langer Research announced that Trump has not only taken the lead from Hillary, but this is the first time he has done so since May. As a reminder, this is the same poll that as we reported over the weekend, effectively confirmed to "poll tampering" which saw Hillary's lead collapse from 12 points to just 2 several days ago. While vote preferences have held essentially steady, Hillary is now a slim point behind Donald Trump, a first since May, in the latest ABC News/Washington Post tracking poll. Forty-six percent of likely voters support Trump in the latest results, with 45 percent for Clinton. T...

Trump has repeatedly praised Putin and backed Russian positions in Ukraine, the Middle East, and the Baltics, but is there evidence of long term ties between him and Russian intelligence? Josh Marshall reports allegations of a long time US intelligence operative: According to David Corn, who is an experienced national security and intelligence reporter, a retired spy from a western country who now works for an American security contractor has provided the FBI with evidence suggesting that "the Russian government has for years tried to co-opt and assist Trump." Corn further reports that this retired spy found "troubling information indicating connections between Trump and the Russian government. According to his sources, he says, 'there was an established exchange of information between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin of mutual benefit.'" The retired spy, who remains anonymous, says he's provided his evidence to the FBI and they have requested addi...

Is there anything odd or suspicious about a secret communication channel between a long time Trump internet server and the the Russian Alfa Bank? Franklin Foer in Slate: The researchers had initially stumbled in their diagnosis because of the odd configuration of Trump’s server. “I’ve never seen a server set up like that,” says Christopher Davis, who runs the cybersecurity firm HYAS InfoSec Inc. and won a FBI Director Award for Excellence for his work tracking down the authors of one of the world’s nastiest botnet attacks. “It looked weird, and it didn’t pass the sniff test.” The server was first registered to Trump’s business in 2009 and was set up to run consumer marketing campaigns. It had a history of sending mass emails on behalf of Trump-branded properties and products. Researchers were ultimately convinced that the server indeed belonged to Trump. (Click here to see the server’s registration record.) But now this capacious server handled a strangely small load of traffic, suc...

538 has upgraded Trump's chances to about one in four. This is based on his surge in several key battleground states: Ohio, Florida, Nevada, North Carolina, and Iowa. Meanwhile, the PPIG, or Pig Paranoia Index Generator has reached Defcon Crimson *. It, in turn, is based on several polls, current media hysterias, and, especially the ACI, a proprietary index based on the comments on my blog. Others: Green, Yellow, Orange , and, reserved for situations where the Earth has already been vaporized, Ultraviolet .

In the comment thread, WB writes: ... in his latest piece he basically writes that he and we know nothing and will not get to know the truth, just as I told you above. This after pretending in his previous two pieces that he actually knows something. I don't agree with his second sentence, and I quote from all three pieces: Kevin Drum Number One: In other words, nobody has even looked at these emails yet. The FBI has to get a court order first. So: are these emails that have already been turned over? Maybe. Are they routine emails about schedules and so forth? Maybe. Nobody, including the FBI, has the slightest idea. Kevin Drum Number Two: We have a bunch of emails from Huma Abedin to other people. The FBI has not read them yet and has no idea what they're about. Kevin also quotes an LA Times story which attributes to an unidentified official: Investigators came across the emails while investigating whether Weiner violated federal law when exchanging sexually ...

A nice essay in the NYT: On Nov. 8 I will be going to the polls and voting, without hesitation or disinclination, for Hillary Clinton. But what a treacherous and unforgivable act this will be for my father, who will no doubt be supporting the only presidential candidate he believes has any chance of saving the United States from almost certain ruin: Alyson Kennedy. You have probably never heard of Alyson Kennedy until now, and neither have you heard of her running mate, Osborne Hart, unless you happen to be a member of the Socialist Workers Party, as my father has been for the past 50 years, or you happen to have passed in recent months a folding table on a city street and been handed campaign literature explaining that “the only way forward is to organize independent working-class struggles that point toward overturning the dictatorship of capital.” This is the exact sentiment, word for word, that my family subscribed to when I was growing up, a sentiment that can be traced all the...

Michael Moore: Yes, on November 8, you Joe Blow, Steve Blow, Bob Blow, Billy Blow, all the Blows get to go and blow up the whole goddamn system because it's your right. Trump's election is going to be the biggest fuck ever recorded in human history and it will feel good. I think he's got that right. The same analysis probably applies to the verdict in the Bundy Brother's case and the Brexit vote. If they get their wish, I don't think they are going to enjoy the morning after -- I mean the next four years.

Various liberal pundits have been declaring the election over for a few weeks, but Nate Silver and 538 see Trump's chances creeping up over the last ten days or so (current estimate, 21%) with most of this due to his improving poll numbers, mostly at the expense of Gary Johnson.

I voted today, and the turnout was heavy despite it being a couple of weeks before the general voting. There was a line, though it moved pretty quickly. Apparently about 12,000 people have already voted in the County - a bit more than 1/4 of the final tally in 2012. To my paranoid eye, the crowd today looked a bit Trumpish - old and white. The elderly lady in the voting stall near me apparently couldn't read the ballot, so a helper was reading the candidates to her. She was indignant that she couldn't vote a straight Republican ticket, but had to go through and have each one's party affiliation read to her. Of course I was voting at a time of day when most people with jobs are at work. Now I would like to go somewhere with no TV or internet and hide out for a couple of weeks.