On the YouTube Videocast Halitics today, Hal and I discuss the state of the presidential race and agree that Governor Walz was a wise choice for VP. Harris and Walz together are far better than the weird team of Trump and Vance.
Today’s Halitics Youtube videocast with Hal Ginsberg. After three weeks off, we have much to discuss: Kamala, J.D. Vance, Trump, etc. Gaza and Israel, too.
I appear every Monday on Halitics. Live at noon ET, 9:00am PT, but always available on YouTube
As I write this, Joe Biden has just announced he is giving up his quest for re-election and is endorsing Vice President Harris to take his place. There can be no better news.
Kamala is smart, experienced and very capable of doing the job. She would be the best and easiest candidate the Democrats could put up to win in November.
First, she benefits from four years of watching President Biden run the country. Secondly, she would inherit Biden’s strategists and advisors and, significantly, his campaign funds.
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Kamala Harris
More importantly, Kamala Harris could energize the millions of long-suffering, discouraged Democratic voters. She would have the ability to motivate women, minorities and young people to get excited enough to get to the polls and vote in large numbers on November 5.
The enthusiasm coming from a vibrant, new candidate like Harris could easily change the course of this election. And let’s face it, her intelligence, abilities and stability would present a powerful contrast to the insanity, desperation, strong desire to be a dictator, and old age of her rival, Donald Trump.
It is quite possible Kamala Harris could lead the Democrats to an historic sweep of the presidency, House of Representatives, and Senate in November. It won’t be easy, of course, the rabid attack dogs of the GOP will throw every kind of fear, hysteria, tricks and lies at the Vice-President.
Her popularity will need a boost because Fox News and their right-wing allies have been working hard to destroy her ever since Biden became president, knowing full well that if Joe couldn’t do his job for any reason, Kamala Harris would likely be the one to take his place. We know that the Vice-President will be viciously beaten up by the power-hungry cultists behind Trump.
Kamala has a lot going for her. Her experience is laudable, having been elected City Attorney in San Francisco, as well as Attorney General and U.S. Senator from the largest state in the country, California. She was picked to be Joe Biden’s vice-president because she had the credentials, capability, intelligence and sensibility to take over as president after him. Lately, she has been prominent in the promotion of pro-choice legislation and women’s reproductive rights. These very popular causes will help her candidacy, especially with women.
The fact that she is part-Black, part-South Asian, and female would have been impossible to overcome years ago. But most voters, having elected Barack Obama, and seeing success stories from all kinds of Americans of varied backgrounds in recent years, will likely overcome the problem that she doesn’t look like the presidents we have been used to seeing.
It should go without saying that the final months until November will be a time of intense anger, false advertising, and brutal unfair attacks. The Republicans, especially Donald Trump, will not accept the possibility of losing and will fight back with every tool they have available. The Democratic Party, more than ever, will need to aggressively battle the MAGA extremists, stand toe-to-toe against them and stay strong until a winner is officially declared.
If Democratic strategists can effectively expose the hateful, angry comments, and right-wing extremist agenda coming from the Republican Party, as well as Donald Trump’s long history of crimes, racism, sexual assaults, incompetence, lying, immorality and disturbed thinking, then enough people will be able to open their eyes to the contrasting decency and competency of Kamala Harris and other Democrats. If that happens, it’s not out of the question for a stunning sweep of the November elections.
All of this is within reach if Democrats can rally around Vice-President Harris and go all out to help her win the presidency. If they do that, we will finally, astonishingly, be able to see a brighter future for the Democratic party and the American people.
President Biden tested positive for Covid on Wednesday, his third time being diagnosed with the disease. At age 81, Biden is at an age in which he is likely to develop more serious symptoms from the disease, including Long Covid. The disease has the potential to seriously slow down his campaign schedule, at a time when selling himself to voters is crucial, not just to beat Trump and the GOP, but to fortify his chances of holding on to the Democratic nomination for president.
Then later on Wednesday, President said in an interview that he would consider dropping out of the presidential race only if his doctors tell him he had a “medical condition.” Saying this one day after a Covid diagnosis may just have been a coincidence.
I’m only speculating, but if Biden was feeling the pressure of being forced out of his Democratic presidential bid, news of a major health issue affecting his quest for re-election would make for an uncontroversial exit that would let Kamala Harris or another logical candidate step to the front of the line for the Democratic Party presidential election.
Biden and his family might know of a medical condition he has that hasn’t been made public. The Los Angeles Times published an article July 9 by Steve Lopez, reporting on doctors who, (without physically examining him), think Biden might just have a serious medical condition.
Dr. Michael Mahler, a UCLA faculty member, said he noticed suspicious symptoms Biden showed during his disastrous debate with Donald Trump. Mahler noticed “the way he walked onto the stage with a very stiff gait. Normally, the way people walk, they swing their arms, and he didn’t have much arm swing. Then, watching and listening to him, he had … almost no facial expression…. His blink rate was really, really low, and he had very few other movements.” Dr. Mahler also noticed other Parkinson-like symptoms, including muffled speech.
Dr. Jack Florin, a Fullerton neurologist who’s been practicing medicine for 50 years, told Lopez he has noticed signs of an advancing movement disorder in Biden for several years, and they were accentuated during the debate. Florin thinks Biden has a Parkinson’s variant called progressive supranuclear palsy (PSP).
“When you have PSP, your eye movements are not normal,” Florin said in the article. “You’re looking down and you have difficulty moving your eyes from side to side. People with PSP have what’s called a fixed stare, and it looked like he was just staring, because his eyes were not moving.
“PSP is progressive, incurable and untreatable…. As it gets worse, postural instability is the main problem, and there’s a risk of falls. After a while, patients cannot safely walk.”
Does Joe Biden have Parkinson’s Disease or another serious neurodegenerative or similar disease? I don’t know, but Biden and those close to him might know, and we are likely to find out soon if he does.
If so, it will allow the president an opportunity and a good reason to reluctantly step down. Who can condemn him for suspending his campaign because of a serious medical condition? Biden’s legacy will stay intact and he will give the Democratic Party a better chance to defeat Donald Trump and his frightening Republican cult.
I suspect Joe Biden will very soon reluctantly but bravely sacrifice his candidacy for the good of the country. The sooner the president does so the better. History will be kind to Joe Biden and he deserves that.
By Arlen Grossman/ published at DailyKos.com/ (194 comments as of Wed. 2pm) /July 16, 2024
It would be crazy to say the Democratic Party has given up and is willing to hand over the presidency to Donald Trump and the MAGA Monsters. I don’t really believe that, but damn, Democrats aren’t trying very hard to win November’s election.
Let’s start with the Democrat’s candidate for president, the incumbent Joe Biden. The party mostly agrees Biden has been a good president, and there is plenty of evidence to show that he has. But the 2024 election is about NOW, and is for the FUTURE, i.e. at least the next four years
Naturally, many Democrats are hoping Joe Biden will defeat Donald Trump in the November election. Sorry, but that will be hard to do. The problem is that President Biden looks, talks, moves and acts like an old man. Of course, that is to expected, because at age 81, he is an old man.
Donald Trump is old, too, but he appears to be considerably more energetic, motivated, excited and confident than Biden. It’s sad to say, but Joe Biden doesn’t appear to have what it takes to beat the sociopathic, habitually lying, immoral, and incompetent ex-president.
The polls since last year clearly show Biden is unpopular with most Americans, his age being the biggest reason. His mental and physical abilities are noticeably getting worse. Voters realize there is no way he could excel during his next four years as president. Trump, too, is unpopular in the polling. The majority of Americans are disheartened to see these two mentally declining senior citizens facing off for the second time in four years. Hell, everybody knows they were too old in 2020.
Making it worse, Biden is dug in and unwilling to hand over the reins to a younger, more articulate, inspiring Democrat, one who could motivate voters to march to the polls and overwhelmingly trounce Trump and his anti-democratic, angry, intolerant cult. Unfortunately, Biden appears to be putting his ego ahead of the needs of his country.
Biden may have tipped his hand during an interview with George Stephanopoulos eight days after the debate. As the interview neared its end, Biden was asked: “If you stay in, and Trump is elected, and everything you’re warning about comes to pass, how will you feel in January?”
Biden said: “I’ll feel as long as I gave it my all and I did the good as job {sic} as I know I can do, that’s what this is about.” Right there he pretty much admitted the outcome of the election mattered a lot to his legacy, while failing to mention the importance of the 2024 election to the future of the American people.
And if that wasn’t enough, the typically accommodating Democratic Party felt the need to unilaterally halt their election campaign for a couple days after the assassination attempt against Trump. Meanwhile the Republican Party didn’t halt their vicious smears against Biden and the Democrats during their convention and elsewhere.
Think, too, about the recent horrendous Supreme Court ruling allowing any president carte blanche to legally carry out any of his “official” duties, no matter how questionable. Donald Trump has and will take full advantage of his new presidential freedoms. This prospect scares many people.
It should be noted that these same opportunities are now available to all presidents, including the current one. What are the likely chances that the polite, honorable President Biden will use these new freedoms to his political advantage? If you say none, you are likely right..
Be patriotic, Joe, step aside and allow a younger, vibrant, charismatic Democratic to rescue our country from these unforgiving extremists. Time is running out.
Instead of counting Joe Biden’s brain cells, we need to be counting “vigilantes,” the self-proclaimed vote fraud hunters who, under new state laws, can challenge the vote of their fellow Americans and stop their votes from being counted.
In 2022, 88 self-appointed GOP vote fraud hunters challenged 180,000 voters’ registrations in Georgia.
They successfully removed thousands of voters from the rolls in that state. The group behind the attack on US citizens, True the Vote, glorying in their success in Georgia, has rolled out the vote challenge operation to several swing states and––Are you ready for this numbers?––they signed up 44,000 volunteer vigilante vote challengers so far this year.
We’ve gone from 88 vigilantes in one state to 44,000 challengers in dozens of states. That number, 44,000, should ring a bell. It happens to be Biden’s margin of victory in 2020. Therefore, if each vigilante can wipe even one voter off the rolls in a swing state, there goes the election.
And some of those vigilantes challenge thousands of voters in a single county.
I’m non-partisan: I don’t tell folks how to vote. But it’s a cold fact that every single vigilante vote challenger so far is Republican–including top GOP officials.
In 2022, we exposed the mass attack on a staggering 180,000 voters in Georgia organized by True the Vote, based in Texas, and their comrades in the Republican Party.
Working with our allies NAACP, Rainbow/PUSH, New Georgia Project and Black Voters Matter, we were able to block most of the challenges, yet thousands of voters still lost their right to a ballot.
As key voting rights attorney, Mark Elias, has warned,
“If the virus of mass voter challenges is an epidemic threatening to sweep across the nation and undermine our democracy, then Georgia is patient zero. We have already seen the virus of voter challenges spread. New Republican election vigilante groups are cropping up around the country to lodge mass challenges against unsuspecting voters.”
While True the Vote has already signed up 44,000 vote challengers, they are not alone. Trump’s lawyer, Cleta Mitchell, is using a system called “EagleAI” that has already challenged 10,000 voters in Florida. Now, they are preparing to attack in swing states. Look out Pennsylvania: vigilantes have already challenged 16,000 in Pittsburg.
And there are other groups joining the vigilante vote challenger game. In Arizona, where Biden squeaked by Trump by only 10,457 votes, the vigilantes call themselves the Pigpen Project mounting challenges on top of those challenged by True the Votes’ MAGA-nauts.
All the groups are using the same bogus methods of targeting voters as True the Vote––which has not found a single illegal voter despite the hundreds of thousands challenged.
Vigilantes in Arizona are flying drones over ballot drop boxes, and in some cases, showing up at the ballot boxes with weapons.
Teresa Mabry of the Arizona Democracy Resource Center, told me,
“They had drones going over people, policing people. [Election] employees were afraid to go into their offices, we sent out teams out to make sure they would be OK.
“So when you’re showing up at a polling location and militarized our military looking uniforms, nice goggles and with weapons, or just posting out in front of these boxes, you were trying to intimidate folks who have experienced a history and a legacy of violence.”
And back in swing state Georgia, the GOP legislature passed a new law, SB189, that will make it much harder for county clerks to reject the challenges.
Gerald Griggs, President of the Georgia NAACP told me,
“So I fully expect 2024 to be the wild, wild West when it comes to election challenges. So if there were 180,000 challenged before, I’m looking at more maybe 300,000 or 400,000 [in Georgia alone]. They want to make it easier to challenge and harder to vote.
“So they will have unlimited voter challenges both before and after the election, unlike in 2022, when there was a cut off period for the actual, voter challenges. So vigilantes are going to be out in mass. “
If no one challenges the challengers, Biden is toast in Georgia. Same for Arizona, Nevada, Wisconsin and Texas.
This is the true danger to democracy in 2024. Our job this year is to make sure that the voters, not vigilantes, pick our President.
In 2020, the Palast team’s film, Vigilante: Georgia’s Vote Suppression Hitman was a crucial tool for voting rights groups to overturn the vigilante challenges. Still, thousands of those challenges went through, including the successful removal of African-American soldiers assigned outside Georgia. But an American soldier, whatever color, should not lose their vote because they are instructed by the Commander-in-Chief to deploy away from home.
While we stopped many of those challenges, and successfully re-registered thousands with our voting rights partners, the laws and court rulings have blessed the vigilante vote hunts for 2024.
Because True the Vote’s vigilante challenges have gone national, so must our investigation and film. Therefore, on September 6, we will launch, Vigilantes Inc.: America’s New Vote Suppression Hitmen.
Narrated by Rosario Dawson and produced by Martin Sheen, Maria Florio (Oscar, best documentary) and George DiCaprio.
Democrats are divided as to who should take on the dangerous dictator wannabe Donald Trump. I make my case for Kamala with Hal Ginsberg on Halitics as we continue our weekly analysis of the latest political news on Hal’s YouTube videocast.
Letter to the Editor/Monterey County Herald: Congratulations to Britain’s Labour Party for their resounding victory over the long-ruling Conservative Party. My question is, why can’t we have a Labor Party here? The Democratic Party once filled that role, but both parties now rely on billionaires and corporations to finance their campaigns. The Republican Party is hopeless, but ideally the Democratic Party might wake up and realize working people, the middle and lower classes, and labor unions should be their true constituents.
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