Julia!

 

Latest Trends

The billionaire owners at the LA Times and Washington Post have spiked their editorial boards’ endorsements of Harris. This indicates the fear an authoritarian Trump presidency is striking in the media ownership class.

This morning, the opinion polls are trending in Trump’s favor.

538 gives him a 53% chance of winning, while Harris has fallen to 47%. Harris’s lead in the national popular vote is steadily falling and now sits at only 1.4%.

In the swing states, Trump is now ahead in five and Harris only in two. Over the past week, Pennsylvania and Nevada have flipped to Trump.

Arizona Trump (+2.0%)

Georgia Trump (+1.8%)

Michigan Harris (+0.5%)

Nevada Trump (+0.2%)

N. Carolina Trump (+1.5%)

Pennsylvania Trump(+0.3%)

Wisconsin. Harris (+0.3%)

538 says Trump would win in the Electoral College, 275-263. Obviously, this is all within the margin of error and therefore conjecture. But it appears ever more urgent that the Democrats get out their voters and make a last-minute push to overcome what seems at present to be a narrow lead for Trump.

HEADLINES:

• Jeff Bezos killed Washington Post endorsement of Kamala Harris, paper reports (WP)

• The real problem with the Washington Post and L.A. Times endorsement decisions (SFC)

• Marty Baron on Post endorsement choice: ‘This is cowardice’ (The Hill)

• The Guardrails Are Already Crumpling (The Bulwark)

• Elon Musk’s Secret Conversations With Vladimir Putin (WSJ)

• Can the Media Survive? (New York)

• Harris and Beyoncé ignite a Houston rally with a double-barreled argument against Trump (AP)

• ‘This is who Donald Trump is’: Ex-Trump administration officials sign open letter backing John Kelly’s claims (Independent)

• Some of Trump’s most senior former advisers warn he could deploy troops against Americans (WP)

• ‘Big lie’ 2.0: How Trump’s false claims about noncitizens voting lay the groundwork to undermine the election (NBC)

• Republicans cut into Democrats' early voting edge. What it means for the race. (USA Today)

• Why we may not know the winner of the US presidential election on Nov. 5 (Reuters)

• Abortion bans are top of mind for young women in North Carolina as they consider Harris or Trump (AP)

• Trump signals support for Israeli offensives in call with Netanyahu: ‘Do what you have to do’ (WP)

• Israel strikes Iran as payback for missile attack, risking escalation of Mideast wars (AP)

• ‘Instead of aid, we are receiving tanks’: Key hospital in northern Gaza comes under Israeli fire (CNN)

• Is Afghanistan’s Most-Wanted Militant Now Its Best Hope for Change? (NYT)

• Waymo Closes $5.6 Billion Funding Round From Alphabet, Others (Bloomberg)

• Departing OpenAI leader says no company is ready for AGI (Verge)

• Perplexity CEO Proposes Revenue Deals for Publishers After Lawsuit (WSJ)

• Anthropic’s AI can now run and write code (TechCrunch)

• ‘The Onion’ Officially Endorses Joe Biden For President (The Onion)

Forget the Math

 As one who is frequently quoting the polls, today I’m going to illustrate why you can also completely ignore the polls and have just as good as a chance of predicting who’s going to be the next president of the U.S.

Harry Eaten of CNN cites data on the swing states going back as far as 1972 to indicate the average error rate in the polls prior to an election averaged 3.4 percent.

There is no poll anywhere in any of the seven swing states showing either candidate with anywhere near a 3.4 percentage point lead. At last check, 538 has Trump ahead by 1.6 points in Georgia, for example. Given the historical average error rate, that only tells us that there’s an equal chance of a Trump victory of 5 points and a Harris victory by 1.8 points.

So the margin of error “swing” in Georgia and every other battleground state is roughly 6.8 points, based on history. In Pennsylvania, Harris could win by 3 or lose by 3.8 — and so on down the list. You get the point — we don’t really know from the polls what’s going to happen at all.

So instead of just reciting more of what is essentially meaningless math, I’m going to switch gears this morning and turn to instincts and hunches. These are based on several assumptions:

• Most “undecided” voters aren’t paying attention and will choose the party they have in the past. The candidates don’t really matter. These “undecided” guys are going to break 50-50..

• Unfortunately, a certain portion of voters simply will not vote for a woman. But other voters will vote for Harris because she is a woman. These factors would probably cancel each other out, except for the Dobbs decision on abortion. Advantage: Harris.

• First-time voters are probably going to matter a lot and they are inherently difficult to measure since there are no precedents for how they may vote. Most are 18-25 and may not vote the same as their parents. My gut is that this time they will break for Harris.

These assumptions may or may not hit the mark but whichever candidate can stir up the most excitement in the final ten days will probably get more of those first-timers on their side. That, plus a greater surge by women voters motivated by reproductive freedom will give Harris the advantage in the end.

HEADLINES:

• Harris and Trump Deadlocked to the End, Final Times/Siena National Poll Finds (NYT)

• Three Lebanese journalists killed in Israeli strike (BBC)

• South Korea warns it may send Ukraine weapons after North Korea sent troops to Russia (NPR)

• These Places Have Democracy Watchdogs Bracing for Potential Election Discord (NYT)

• The GOP has reportedly recruited a 200,000-strong "army" of pro-Trump poll watchers who will swarm polling sites on Election Day, new reporting shows. And on Monday, Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC debuted a so-called "Election Integrity Community" on X, where misinformation about voter fraud is already running rampant.  (Mother Jones)

• The Group at the Center of Trump’s Planning for a Second Term Is One You Haven’t Heard of (NYT)

• Republican poll watchers in battleground states worry US election experts (Reuters)

• Michigan Arabs and Muslims deeply split over supporting Harris (WP)

• Trump slams John Kelly for calling him a ‘fascist’ after Harris lauds comments (Guardian)

• Why Gender May Be the Defining Issue of the Election — The issue is rarely directly addressed by either Vice President Kamala Harris or Donald Trump. But the 2024 contest is, in ways overt and subtle, a referendum on the role of women in American life. (NYT)

• American creating deepfakes targeting Harris works with Russian intel, documents show (WP)

• Trump says he’d fire Jack Smith quickly if he wins another term in office (CNN)

• Why Fascism Doesn’t Stick to Trump (Slate)

• Trump reportedly met Rupert Murdoch, the former chairman of Fox Corp. and News Corp., to demand the conservative network be even nicer to him. [HuffPost]

• As Election Looms, Disinformation ‘Has Never Been Worse’ (NYT)

• World on track for catastrophic 3 degrees Celsius warming, UN warns (Politico)

• IMF chief warns that world risks falling into slow-growth rut and urges China to enact reforms (AP)

• The blistering rally in gold augurs ill for the power of the dollar (Economist)

• Inflation Has Cooled, but Americans Are Still Seething Over Prices (WSJ)

• Lost for centuries, Silk Road cities are revealed by drone technology (NBC)

• Local news sources are still drying up, but there's growth in digital sites in metro areas (AP)

• The AI Power List 2024  (Business Insider)

• Former OpenAI Researcher Says the Company Broke Copyright Law (NYT)

• Conservative Man Proudly Frightened Of Everything (The Onion)

LYRICS:

“Please don't tell me how the story ends” by Kris Kristofferson

This could be our last goodnight together
We may never pass this way again
Just let me enjoy 'till its over 
Or forever
Please don't tell me how the story ends

See the way our shadows come together
Softer than your fingers on my skin
Someday this may be all 
That we'll remember 
Of each other
Please don't tell me how the story ends

Never's just the echo of forever
Lonesome as the love that might have been
Just let me go on loving and believing 
'Till it's over
Please don't tell me how the story ends

Please don't tell me how the story ends

By a Quark

 Twelve days left. Nate Silver thinks Trump will win. James Carville believes Harris will win. No one can say Americans don’t have a choice, but nobody knows who they are going to choose.

According to the polls, it’s become a game of micro-movements. The numbers seemed to be trending for Trump for a while until Wednesday, when they suddenly inched more in Harris’s direction.

As far as the only places that matter in the presidential race, which are the seven swing states. Harris leads in Michigan, Wisconsin and Nevada. Trump leads in Georgia, Arizona and North Carolina.

Trump also leads in Pennsylvania, which combined with the above would prove determinative, but only by such a tiny margin, 0.3 percentage points, that 538 calls it a tossup.

To give you a sense, that means only about 21,000 people who could swing the whole thing one direction or another, which is utterly ridiculous when it looks like Harris is going to win the national vote by around 3 million votes. As a percentage of the electorate, that is 0.0001336 percent.

The smallest known thing in our universe is a quark. And that’s what separates our democracy from chaos right now.

HEADLINES:

• As Election Looms, Disinformation ‘Has Never Been Worse’ (NYT)

• Nate Silver: ‘My gut says’ Trump will win (The Hill)

• Kamala Harris denounces Trump as ‘fascist’ who wants ‘unchecked power’ (Guardian)

• James Carville: Three Reasons I’m Certain Kamala Harris Will Win (NYT)

• Donald Trump's campaign is behaving remarkably irrationally (MSNBC)

• Fox Host Says Maybe Trump Didn’t Realize Hitler’s Generals Were Nazis (Rolling Stone)

• The U.S. Spies Who Warn About Election Interference (New Yorker)

• Election officials are fighting a tsunami of voting conspiracy theories (AP)

• Vice President Kamala Harris said her team is prepared to counter Trump if he prematurely declares victory in next month's election. Harris also dismissed the possibility that Americans wouldn’t vote for her because she’s a woman. [HuffPost]

• The banality of Elon (Vox)

• U.S. officials say Russia smeared Tim Walz and might stoke post-vote violence (WP)

• Immigrant voters: 'The money in US politics absolutely scares me' (BBC)

• Over 230 Republican candidates have cast doubt on the 2024 election (WP)

• Bill Gates has reportedly donated about $50 million to support Harris' White House bid through a nonprofit group. [HuffPost]

• Russia and Iran may fuel violent post-election protests in the US, intelligence officials warn (AP)

• Giuliani assets will transfer to Georgia election workers he defamed (WP)

• Terrorist Attack Hits Major Defense Facility in Turkey (WSJ)

• US says evidence shows North Korea has troops in Russia, possibly for Ukraine war (Reuters)

• Hizbullah’s sprawling financial empire looks newly vulnerable (Economist)

• Trying to reverse climate change won’t save us, scientists warn (Verge)

• In Havana's still dark corners, a protest erupts (Reuters)

• What the surging gold price says about a dangerous world (Economist)

• Why Los Angeles Is Becoming a Production Graveyard (Hollywood Reporter)

• This Week in AI: The AI agents cometh (TechCrunch)

• Amazon's 'zombie' data centers are a warning for the entire AI industry (Business Insider)

• Dead Bird On Sidewalk Leads Man To Contemplate Own Inevitable Collision With Plate Glass (The Onion)

Trump's Plan

For months now, it has been clear that the margin of victory for whoever wins the election for president will be so narrow that a barrage of lawsuits will ensue. It is also apparent that Trump is laying the groundwork to seize power even if he loses at the ballot box.

Politico has done a brilliant job of documenting how this will occur:

— He will deepen distrust in the election results by making unsupported or hyperbolic claims of widespread voter fraud and mounting longshot lawsuits challenging enough ballots to flip the outcome in key states.

— He will lean on friendly county and state officials to resist certifying election results — a futile errand that would nevertheless fuel a campaign to put pressure on elected Republican legislators in statehouses and Congress.

— He will call on allies in GOP-controlled swing-state legislatures to appoint “alternate” presidential electors.

— He will rely on congressional Republicans to endorse these alternate electors — or at least reject Democratic electors — when they convene to certify the outcome.

— He will try to ensure Harris is denied 270 votes in the Electoral College, sending the election to the House, where Republicans are likely to have the numbers to choose Trump as the next president.

None of this is far-fetched; it’s all out there in plain sight. If our democracy is to survive, it appears not only will Harris have to win in the Electoral College, our courts will have to again hold the line, as they did in 2020, against the Trumpist onslaught that is certain to follow upon his defeat.

So it’s a double whammy awaiting us. Not only is democracy going to have to win the battle; it will have to win the war.

***

The polls all remain within the margin of error, but Trump has moved ahead in Pennsylvania. If he wins there, and all else stays as is, he would win in the Electoral College, 280-258.

***

And then there’s this from the Washington Post: “Woman Drops Phone, Gets Stuck UpsideDown in Rock Crevice Looking For It.”

HEADLINES: 

• Harris’s Early Career: Prosecutor by Day, Boldface Name by Night (Cal Today)

• The Improbable Coalition That Is Harris’s Best Hope (Atlantic)

• The Very Real Scenario Where Trump Loses and Takes Power Anyway (Politico)

• Trump Vs. Harris 2024 Polls: Harris Leads In 4 Latest Surveys (Forbes)

• Poll shows Harris holds a 46%-43% lead over Trump amid voter gloom (Reuters)

• Democrats brace for a possible crack in the blue wall and signs of North Carolina slipping (NBC)

• Likability isn't enough (Silver Bulletin)

• Inside the Last-Ditch Hunt by Harris and Trump for Undecided Voters (NYT)

• Mideast conflict looms over US presidential race as Harris and Trump battle for an edge (AP)

• Elon Musk targets Michigan with voter misinformation (WP)

• Nerves frayed in Canada and Mexico over US trade relations (BBC)

• New cases of political violence roil US ahead of contentious election (Reuters)

• FBI investigating leak of U.S. intelligence on Israeli strike in Iran (Axios)

• What’s Wrong With Donald Trump? (NYT)

• Ranked choice voting could decide which party controls the US House (AP)

• Global fight against historic inflation surge is nearly over, says IMF (WP)

• Lost City Discovered in Amazon Rainforest (Newsweek)

• Neuroscientist: The No. 1 thing you can do every day for a sharper, healthier brain—it takes ‘just 10 minutes’ (CNBC)

• Humans Are Evolving Right Before Our Eyes on The Tibetan Plateau (ScienceAlert)

• Rupert Murdoch’s news outlets sue Perplexity AI for allegedly engaging in ‘massive freeriding’ (CNN)

• What open-source AI models should your enterprise use? Endor Labs analyzes them all (VentureBeat)

• More than 10,500 actors, musicians, authors protest tech’s AI data grab (WP)

• It Only Tuesday (The Onion)

 

So It Goes

 Le secret des grandes fortunes sans cause apparente est un crime oublié, parce qu’il a été proprement fait. -- Balzac (1834)

Watching Elon Musk trying to buy the election for his buddy Trump causes me to reflect on the varied ways people try to use their wealth to acquire power and influence. History provides cautionary tales. 

Not to get too philosophical about all of this, but Balzac basically got it right 190 years ago. Great fortunes tend to stem from great crimes against society. I would just update his observations to note that great wealth can lead to the commission of new crimes that are just as harmful as those that built the fortune in the first place. What Musk is doing now may prove to be one of those crimes.

In any era, we inevitably see a few titans build great fortunes while the masses of the people struggle to just get by. One way or another, these rich men come to dominate the levers of power in society, often for worse — as Musk aspires to do now by backing an authoritarian for president.

But there can also be great good that comes some wealth — there would not be much philanthropy without the wealthy. Bill Gates is an example of a billionaire actively trying to make the human condition globally more equitable.

Meanwhile, this system of wealth generation and concentration goes on and on, leading to ever greater disparities. So we need to have reporters and social activists who track down and tell us about both the bad actors like Musk and the philanthropists like Gates, as part of the process of keeping them all accountable.

HEADLINES:

• Elon Musk’s daily $1 million giveaway to registered voters could be illegal, experts say (CNN)

• U.S. Agencies Fund, and Fight With, Elon Musk. A Trump Presidency Could Give Him Power Over Them. (NYT)

• What Musk Really Wants (Atlantic)

• Liz Cheney helps Harris seek moderate votes as they paint Trump as a dangerous choice (AP) 

• Five family members shot to death in home outside Seattle (Guardian)

• McDonald’s workers roast Trump over ‘insulting cosplay’ stunt at restaurant that failed health inspection (Independent)

• Trump proposals could drain Social Security in 6 years, budget group says (WP)

• For Trump, a Lifetime of Scandals Heads Toward a Moment of Judgment (NYT)

• Trump losing economic edge over Harris, poll suggests, as candidates blitz swing states (Guardian)

• Trump Vs. Harris 2024 Polls: Harris Leads In 4 Latest Surveys (Forbes)

• Has Trump gained ground? The latest 2024 polling, explained. (Vox)

• Harris and Trump locked in dead heat in seven-state poll, with some voters still deciding (WP)

• New Harris vs. Trump poll says this candidate has electoral votes needed to win (NJ.com)

• Trump boasted about his "cognitive" skills right as those skills seemed to have abandoned him multiple times during a town hall event, critics pointed out. [HuffPost]

• For many voters, Trump’s sneering dismissiveness of Harris’s intellect recks of racism and sexism. (WP)

• I Can’t Buy a House. I Can’t Shop. I’m Too Worried About the Election. (NYT)

• Why the west should be paying more attention to the gold price rise (Financial Times)

• Israel, Hamas battle to define final images of Yahya Sinwar (WP)

• Israeli strikes target Hezbollah-linked financial association in Lebanon (BBC)

• Hackers steal information from 31 million Internet Archive users (NPR)

• Trump Ratchets Up Threats on the Media (NYT)

• Honeywell partners with Google to integrate data with generative AI (Reuters)

• Trump Throws Garbage Can Through McDonald’s Window Before Looting $2,000 In Big Macs (The Onion)

The Frog

Recently, an uninvited guest showed up in my life; one that won’t be leaving. I should have seen it coming because there were plenty of clues but the words, when they were spoken, still came as a shock. 

“You’ve got Parkinson’s Disease.“

About five years ago, I was told that the most likely explanation for some of my symptoms at that time was “Parkinsonism,” which sounded to me like an impression of a disease, not a real one. I thought it might never grow up.

After all, we live in a world of “isms,” like Marxism, Fascism, Cubism, most of which never move in to take over our lives, although one of those may be looming next Inauguration Day. 

But in my case PD dropped the “ism” and emerged from the shadows.

There’s not much to be done about this. I’m to continue taking a drug I’m already on — the romantic-sounding Carbidopa Levodopa — and try to exercise. The good news is the disease typically proceeds slowly, I’m told, crippling its victims gradually, like a frog in boiling water, with me being the frog.

As I drove away from my doctors office, starting to process this news, I heard an old Kris Kristofferson tune runningthrough my brain:

We may never pass this way again
Just let me enjoy 'till its over 
Or forever
Please don't tell me how the story ends

HEADLINES:

• 24 reasons that Trump could win (Silver Bulletin)

• Judges punishing Jan. 6 rioters say they fear another burst of political violence (AP)

• Trump thrusts McDonald’s into the political arena in final days of campaign (CNN)

• US election: Legal experts question Elon Musk’s planned cash giveaways (Al Jazeera)

• A Pennsylvania road trip finds voters full of doubt, anger and unease (WP)

• Trump makes vulgar comments about Arnold Palmer at Pennsylvania rally (CBS)

• Trump Responds to Climate Question by Rambling Incoherently About Golf Course (Rolling Stone)

• The Fight Over Ballots Has Already Begun in Wisconsin (NYT)

• US-backed Israeli violence reshapes old Gulf enmities (SCMP)

• The World’s $100 Trillion Fiscal Timebomb Keeps Ticking (Bloomberg)

• Hurricane Oscar heads to Cuba, could lead to 'humanitarian crisis'(USA Today)

• Colombian scientists develop supplement to protect bees from pesticides (Reuters)

• Remote-control robots could help humanity explore the moon and Mars (Space)

• Chatbot hack shows why you shouldn’t trust AI with your personal data (BGR)

• How robots are transforming physical therapy (WP)

• Dumbass Apple Picker Goes For Overripe McIntosh Red When Pink Lady Cleary Best Option Given The Topography, Time Of Harvest (The Onion)

LYRICS:

“Just Like Tom Tomb’s Blues” by Bob Dylan

When you're lost in the rain in Juarez, and it's Easter time too
And your gravity fails, negativity don't pull you through
Don't put on any airs when you're down on Rue Morgue Avenue
They got some hungry women there, and they'll really make a mess outta you

If you see Saint Annie, please tell her thanks a lot
I cannot move, my fingers they are all in a knot
I don't have the strength to get up and take another shot
And my best friend, the doctor, won't even tell me what it is I've got

Sweet Melinda, the peasants call her the goddess of gloom
She speaks good English, invites you up into her room
And you're so kind and careful not to go to her too soon
And she takes your voice and leaves you howling at the moon

Up on Housing Project Hill, it's either fortune or fame
You must pick one or the other, neither of them are what they claim
If you're lookin' to get silly, you better go back to from where you came
Because the cops don't need you, and man, they expect the same

All the authorities, they just stand around and boast
How they blackmailed the sergeant-at-arms into leaving his post
And picking up Angel, who just arrived from the coast
Who looked so fine at first, but left looking just like a ghost

I started out on Burgundy, but soon hit the harder stuff
Everybody said they're right behind me when the game got rough
But the joke was on me, there was nobody even to call my bluff
I'm going back to New York City, I do believe I've had enough

Hear Neil Young’s version.

If Hope Prevails

 “Sometimes people will open the door for you and leave it open. Sometimes they won’t. And then you need to kick that fucking door down.” — Kamala Harris

This weekend, I humbly submit links to three of my recent attempts to capture sides of Kamala Harris.

The Knife

Mattering

A Happy Woman or an Unhappy Man?

I also strongly recommend the New Yorker profile listed below and quoted above.

HEADLINES:

• The Ascent - Can Kamala Harris defy her doubters—and end the Trump era? (The New Yorker)

• Israeli strike in north Gaza kills 87, Hamas-run ministry says (BBC)

• A drone targets the Israeli prime minister’s house (AP)

• After Sinwar's death, Israel aims to lock in strategic gains before US election (Reuters)

• Leaked documents show US intelligence on Israel’s plans to attack Iran, sources say (CNN)

• Seeking a historic win, Harris faces a familiar foe: Sexism (WP)

• New evidence unsealed of how Trump's Jan. 6, 2021 rally was funded (USA Today)

• Inside the Republican National Committee’s Poll-Watching Army (New Yorker)

• Elon Musk Is Offering Pennsylvania Voters $100 to Sign His Pro-Trump Petition (Mother Jones)

• Exclusive: Trump ground game in key states flagged as potentially fake (Guardian)

• The True Dangers of Trump’s Economic Plans (Foreign Affairs)

• China launches survey to understand ‘fear of having children’ (NBC)

• Peer inside the underwater volcanic caves where life thrives (CNN)

• Cuba's power grid collapses again. Why does this keep happening? (NPR)

• Are the Amazon’s Trees Worth More Alive than Dead? A New Industry Thinks So (WSJ)

• Most common US pesticide may affect brain development similarly to nicotine (Guardian)

• Bumblebee queens choose to hibernate in pesticide-contaminated soil, scientists discover (Phys.org)

• “Hello, I’m Don Barlett and I Liked Your Story.” (MoJo)

• Invisible text that AI chatbots understand and humans can’t? Yep, it’s a thing. (ArsTechnica)

• Nation Demands Tax Dollars Only Be Wasted On Stuff That's Awesome (The Onion)