US Presidential Election 2020

[Grizzly]

I Kinda feel like this guy, he says it so well, I don't need to use my own words...

What's the point of voting in a new president every four years if almost everything is controlled by the CIA, big banks and the elite few?

[Wombaticus Rex]

Until then, Rex, I ask you to take into consideration Bernie's entire career. Do you suggest that he was groomed by the powers that be since he was running for the mayor of Burlington? What's the mechanism by which he has been co-opted here?

He wasn't groomed, he didn't have to be. He willingly participated because it was just easier than getting a real job.

I definitely think Bernie genuinely wants better economic outcomes for Americans, just like Elizabeth Warren genuinely wants to become the first female President.

Not a big fan of either of these men, but it's a solid rundown:

[liminalOyster]

I want to split the difference here. Bernie is milquetoast as far as any sort of radicalism and esp. on the MIC. But I'll take it and, to a degree, take it passionately. But Rex's cynicism is still sound, first because he pays more attention to a series of shadow-y realities than anyone else I know and second, he's a Vermonter and there's never been much reason, IMO, to dispute that a number of Bernie's actions in that state betray a less-than-admirable professional history.

That said, do I think Bernie wants to be president? Yes. And do I buy that, fundamentally, he is trying to ensure that the entire history of US progressivism doesn't die with the boomers? Yes.

I can't wait for all the well-researched and largely airtight investigative pieces about Shadow, Pete and the DNC to show up in 2 months to less than a whimper from the MSM. RI's future is emboldened and guaranteed.....

[RocketMan]

I want to split the difference here. Bernie is milquetoast as far as any sort of radicalism and esp. on the MIC. But I'll take it and, to a degree, take it passionately. But Rex's cynicism is still sound, first because he pays more attention to a series of shadow-y realities than anyone else I know and second, he's a Vermonter and there's never been much reason, IMO, to dispute that a number of Bernie's actions in that state betray a less-than-admirable professional history.

That said, do I think Bernie wants to be president? Yes. And do I buy that, fundamentally, he is trying to ensure that the entire history of US progressivism doesn't die with the boomers? Yes.

I can't wait for all the well-researched and largely airtight investigative pieces about Shadow, Pete and the DNC to show up in 2 months to less than a whimper from the MSM. RI's future is emboldened and guaranteed.....

Well, fair enough and I will integrate your cynicism. Will also check out that Hedges/Nader clip.

Do you happen to have some sources regarding Bernie's shady dealings in Vermont?

[Belligerent Savant]

.

A number of us foretold the type of shenanigans unfolding in Iowa - nothing groundbreaking, though perhaps a bit more overt/egregious/early-stage than prior years.

There's no reward, monetary or otherwise, for calling these events out on the internet, at least not as anonymous handles in a relatively obscure forum (yes, i typed the word 'forum'. In 2020. Point galvanized).

There's much dissection and nuance that can be applied here, of course, but how can anyone not share the 'cynicism' espoused by WRex... within this venue, no less?

We're dealing with a highly motivated, highly funded aggregate of power-hungry fevered egos that will leverage all available resources to attain and mantain their grasp, demonstrably.

Is there a way out? The likely reality is the best we can hope for is the least worst option (Bernie... perhaps even Warren to a far lesser degree. None of the other options would offer anything different, in sum, than what we've had here since 2000. I mean, we've had it far longer than that, but it's been incrementally more overt since the fall of the twin towers, the symbolic collapse of more subtle theatrics).

[RocketMan]

.

A number of us foretold the type of shenanigans unfolding in Iowa - nothing groundbreaking, though perhaps a bit more overt/egregious/early-stage than prior years.

There's no reward, monetary or otherwise, for calling these events out on the internet, at least not as anonymous handles in a relatively obscure forum (yes, i typed the word 'forum'. In 2020. Point galvanized).

There's much dissection and nuance that can be applied here, of course, but how can anyone not share the 'cynicism' espoused by WRex... within this venue, no less?

We're dealing with a highly motivated, highly funded aggregate of power-hungry fevered egos that will leverage all available resources to attain and mantain their grasp, demonstrably.

Is there a way out? The likely reality is the best we can hope for is the least worst option (Bernie... perhaps even Warren to a far lesser degree. None of the other options would offer anything different, in sum, than what we've had here since 2000. I mean, we've had it far longer than that, but it's been incrementally more overt since the fall of the twin towers, the symbolic collapse of more subtle theatrics).

Yep. That's whay it does boil down to.

Hunter S. Thompson said it: on 9/12:

Make no mistake about it: We are At War now ― with somebody ― and we will stay At War with that mysterious Enemy for the rest of our lives. It will be a Religious War, a sort of Christian Jihad, fueled by religious hatred and led by merciless fanatics on both sides. It will be guerilla warfare on a global scale, with no front lines and no identifiable enemy.
...
The numbers out of the Pentagon are baffling, as if Military Censorship has already been imposed on the media. It is ominous. The only news on TV comes from weeping victims and ignorant speculators.

The lid is on. Loose Lips Sink Ships. Don't say anything that might give aid to The Enemy.

[liminalOyster]

RocketMan, the first thing that comes to mind and for which I have no reference at moment, is a famous non-violent sit-in by anti Balkan war protesters who Bernie had arrested. IIRC, there are also some untowards moments of doing same for union workers. I'll see what I can dig up when I get a chance. If it's not clear, I remain a passionate supporter of the man,

[RocketMan]

RocketMan, the first thing that comes to mind and for which I have no reference at moment, is a famous non-violent sit-in by anti Balkan war protesters who Bernie had arrested. IIRC, there are also some untowards moments of doing same for union workers. I'll see what I can dig up when I get a chance. If it's not clear, I remain a passionate supporter of the man,

Yes, well, god forbid we start cults of personalities here... no sir. Gimme all you got.

It's just fucking tough maintaining some semblance of a cheerful disposition, so one tends to grab on to what one can. But I've always known Bernie's brand of "socialism", hell, he's up front about it himself, he dares to mention FDR and socialism in the same sentence. Where's Eugene fucking Debs, at least, or the rest of the deliberately forgotten history of of American COMMUNISM, forget even about socialism. Labour activism. The Howard Zinn shit. Nowhere to be found. New Deal is as left as he'll go.

[JackRiddler]

.

These people who did the Iowa App job are self-made amateurs, but we live in an age of impunity. As the saying goes (CA Fitts), "those who win in a rigged game get stupid."

Check off the boxes:

- days before, sudden accusations from the Buttigieg campaign about Sanders deploying "dark money" (i.e., they mean, Our Revolution!) - obvious projection of what they are doing.

- the group is called Acronym (set up as a charity) and the project is called Shadow, Inc. For fuck's sake.

(Suck the site while you can https://shadowinc.io/about/)

- day before the caucus, the Buttigieg campaign acts with a dubious complaint to kill release of the gold standard Des Moines poll that everyone knows shows Sanders far ahead.

- day before the caucus, accusations by unnamed DNC/insider types that Sanders campaign may plan to "game" the results... by reporting the results!

(My joke at that was, reporting results from Iowa will be censored more strictly than the name of the CIA's whistleblower.)

- And then this "chaos" yesterday.

Here's a profile on Tara McGowan, by the way, who is so breathlessly proud of her dark-money prowess. For feminism!

https://www.ozy.com/news-and-politics/m ... gist/95569

“I knew that we shared two fundamental beliefs:

Yes, yes, tell me what you stand for!

that better content yields better results and that you can’t do the same tactic twice



She believes there are two types of people in politics:

O this is going to be good!

those who are motivated by money and those who are motivated by power.

Uh...

Man, she so very dangerous!

Disruptive!

Upending politics, man!

No one's done opaque dark-money set ups through a holding company disguised as a charity like she does. It's a total reinvention of the form! Wowza!

https://www.ozy.com/news-and-politics/m ... gist/95569

www.ozy.com

Meet the Democrats' Most Dangerous Digital Strategist | OZY

Nick Fouriezos

It’s June 26, the first night of the Democratic debates. But at a watch party at the Brixton bar, in Washington’s trendy U Street neighborhood, none of the Democrats are paying attention to the drama on the screen. Instead, they are circled around Tara McGowan, a weapon of a woman whose innovative tactics make her critically important to the Democratic Party … and the biggest threat to the orthodoxy that has made so many left-leaning digital gurus rich in the post-Obama era.

“This was an excuse to throw an open bar,” the 33-year-old brunette quips, promising to keep her speech short. The event is also a birthday party for Acronym, the digital-focused nonprofit she founded in 2017. “It feels like we have lived a thousand years in those two years,” she admits.

Indeed, Acronym has taken hardly any time in breaking the strategy-firm ecosystem in the nation’s capital. By the end of 2018, it had raised and managed more than $18 million, registered 60,000 voters, run 105 targeted ad campaigns in 15 states, helped elect 63 progressive candidates and won 61 percent of the races it invested in. Its staff has grown from five to 38 and it has quickly become one of the go-to digital organizing forces for everyone from Planned Parenthood and Emily’s List to Everytown for Gun Safety and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. And her organization’s weekly newsletter, For What It’s Worth, is becoming a must-read thanks to its smart (and illustration-heavy) look at how the 2020 campaigns are spending money online.

People don’t understand why I am creating a model that I can’t get very rich off of.

While most digital experts specialize in one tactic, the coordinated campaigns built by McGowan bring all the moving parts — from door-knocking and social media campaigns to digital videos and television ads — under one umbrella. “She has very good instincts, metrics and buying strategies,” says Kelly Ward, executive director of the National Democratic Redistricting Committee, which worked with McGowan to help power the big Democratic gains in Virginia in 2017. While the Democratic presidential candidates duke it out in the primaries, McGowan is focusing Acronym’s efforts on registering voters in Florida, Georgia, Texas and Arizona and also investing in state legislative seats in Virginia, Minnesota, North Carolina, Ohio, Wisconsin and beyond. And once the primaries end, hers will be one of the major forces shaping the Democrats’ general-election fight against Donald Trump.

tara obama

While the numbers are impressive, what could upend Washington politics entirely is the structure of her organization. Unlike most digital strategists, her operation is what the IRS classifies as a 501(c)(4) nonprofit — meaning a majority of its funds must be used to promote “social welfare.” And yet, Acronym has a web of for-profit companies beneath it: a campaign consulting firm (Lockwood Strategy), a political tech company with a peer-to-peer texting product (Shadow) and a media company investing in local left-leaning outlets (FWIW Media). In the works is an apparel arm (Rogue Swag) that would be the first major liberal answer to conservative companies that skirt campaign finance laws by selling politically branded clothing over Facebook and elsewhere — spreading political messaging without having to report the spending.

It means the nonprofit Acronym is able to raise money, invest in for-profit companies to advance progressive aims and then return any profits back into its mission. “People don’t understand why I am creating a model that I can’t get very rich off of. Because I don’t own the companies; the (c)(4) does,” she says. And that’s a huge threat to political consultants’ bank accounts.

Since the 1980s, says journalist Sasha Issenberg, author of The Victory Lab: The Secret Science of Winning Campaigns, political firms have specialized in selling specific services: phone calls, direct mail, polls, etc. Today, that can mean separate firms for online videos, TV ads and even paid Facebook outreach vs. organic Facebook outreach. So consultants push for more spending in their individual silos, as opposed to McGowan’s strategy to fold everything under one umbrella — making winning her chief incentive. While McGowan isn’t the first to home in on the problem, she has “probably acted on it with more alacrity than anyone else on the left,” Issenberg says.

McGowan has always had a rebellious streak. An A student with an attitude, she was kicked out of two private high schools while moving around the Northeast for her dad’s corporate job (her transgressions included writing pro-choice essays in religion class and throwing a party at her parents’ house as a sophomore).

Wow! Those examples are so extraordinarily attitudinal and rebellious!

I do wonder a) who her corporate-job father was and b) where she went to college. The latter is left off her Linkedin etc. profiles, that I know of.

She was home sick on Tuesday, September 11, 2001, when she and her mom watched the Today show in horror, as planes crashed into the Twin Towers, where her uncle and aunt worked (her aunt didn’t survive). That traumatic experience partly inspired her to go into journalism — her first documentary focused on an Arabic school in Brooklyn that faced Islamophobic attacks — and she went on to work in the famously sexist environment at CBS News’ 60 Minutes.



Tired of the misogyny and disillusioned about her ability to make change through journalism, she was inspired to jump into politics by covering Barack Obama in 2008, leading to jobs in Congress and on the 2012 Obama campaign. “I knew that we shared two fundamental beliefs: that better content yields better results and that you can’t do the same tactic twice,” says kindred soul and punk-rock political strategist Arun Chaudhary, who pushed Obama digital director Teddy Goff to hire McGowan. She spent time at NextGen America, the Tom Steyer–led climate group, and was the first digital director for super PAC Priorities USA Action in 2016.

When reached, many of her competitors declined to comment. Privately, Washington consultants gripe that her nonprofit umbrella model is duplicitous because she could still be paying herself exorbitant amounts through the private companies beneath it. “It’s not a surprise that others on the left are uncomfortable about the disruption,” says Eric Wilson, a Republican political strategist who blogs about digital tactics at LearnTestOptimize.com. An Acronym spokesman declined to reveal McGowan’s salary but confirmed she does not own any equity in the for-profit companies.

McGowan has also advocated for building in-house digital teams at her previous stops, another blow to consultants that could foster distrust. “As Tara has demonstrated at Priorities USA — much to my dismay — you get the better results and more efficiency bringing your buying in-house,” Wilson says. “She’s also exposing many of the less effective advertising tactics on the left.” Chaudhary agrees: “We have to evolve or die. … [She] is asking the right questions and forcing the Democratic Industrial Complex to change.”

McGowan is well aware of her detractors. She believes there are two types of people in politics: those who are motivated by money and those who are motivated by power. She wants power, which means winning elections to enact the policies she believes in. “Too often, in any industry, a drive for profit can lead to greed. And I think that can blur the lines of the real objective here,” she says. “This could be an election that changes entirely how campaigns are run. It could be a catalyst.”

.

Read more: Playing catch-up with conservatives — can startup energy help Democrats?

Nick Fouriezos, OZY Author

[Grizzly]

^^^
Jesus Crisp! These fucks play with our lives, as if they have some grandiose line to GOD, that we do not... Someone posted so called comedian Bill Maher or however you spell it, and instead of laughing I was so fucking aware of how demented these fucks really are... It does not bode well, for anyone that has a shred of integrity and decency left in them. mUST gO TO the DARk side! Fuck you Cheney and everything that came after, because of you fucking murderers!

https://mobile.twitter.com/JackPosobiec/status/1224731240793767936?s=20
Watch how Buttigieg ‘randomly’ wins this coin toss

Just in...
Putin Prepares To Release Iowa Caucus Results
https://www.moonofalabama.org/

[thrulookingglass]

I'm a little stunned. CNN is saying Buttigieg is at 26.9% in Iowa. Bernie is close behind. Know your audience. Its Iowa...not Cambridge, MA. He has a folksy charm so long as the 'normals' don't learn he's gay. He's a bit more centrist than Bernie. I don't see any grand conspiracy in this, well, no more than normal. Lets face it anyhow, if you care about America, its pretty much anyone but Trump for president in 2020. And the bastards going to get acquitted in all likely hood. Untutored people are easier to rule over.

[stickdog99]

[Grizzly]

^^^
Putin's boy! I kid, I kid...

SOTU: Democrats deliver official response to President Trump's why the fuck their worse than the thugs...annual address. And yet again cheated Bernie out of another shot in Iowa. Fuck both parties.

[JackRiddler]

.

Once is happenstance, twice is coincidence, three times is enemy action. Don't let anyone harangue you into apologizing for smelling the stink.

Imagine this in an "adversary" country, like Iran or Russia or Venezuela:

- A candidate who is called a socialist (Sanders) is heavily favored to win a regional election that will involve no more than a couple hundred thousand voters at most.

- In the two weeks leading up to the election, the country's corporate media and traditional political establishment unleash a steady, near-unanimous stream of smears, warnings, lies and attacks on the socialist.

- Just before the election, opponents of the socialist warn that his side plans to influence the outcome unfairly, by reporting the results correctly. (One can't make this stuff up.)

- A poll long considered the "gold standard" for predicting this election is scheduled for publication on the day before the election. Publication is abruptly canceled, due to a single complaint from someone claiming to be a supporter of another candidate.

- This other candidate, the ex-mayor of a small town (Buttigieg), is a trained intelligence operative, officially, and appears to have much deeper and continuing involvements with espionage agencies and military-tech contractors.

- The counting system for the election was very recently replaced by a phone app that has never been tested. (Reports about this already stirred up suspicions prior to the election. Why was it considered necessary to replace the prior counting method with an app at all?)

- This app was developed recently in a short time by a company founded and controlled by a supporter of the ex-mayor (Tara McGowan). Her husband is listed as a strategic advisor to the ex-mayor's campaign.

- The founder-controller of the app company is known and even celebrated as a "disruptor" (in the good sense of this term). This is because she set up a charity that owns a suite of for-profit contractors to political campaigns, allowing her to channel political money around in opaque fashion. This is considered innovative and bold, because she supposedly supports leftist and feminist causes.

- The ex-mayor's campaign is a client of the app company and has paid at least 40,000 dollars to it for political services rendered. While not a high-sounding sum, this further establishes a connection between the ex-mayor's campaign and the app company.

- The founders and executives of the app company and the "charitable" organization that owns it were all employed by the earlier campaign of a former opponent (Clinton) of the socialist.

- This earlier campaign was exposed for engaging in dirty tricks against this socialist. This former opponent has recently been vocal in joining the chorus of ruling-class condemnation of the socialist.

- On the evening after the election process is concluded, official reporting of the results is suspended after less than 2 percent of all precincts are counted. At this point the socialist is leading, as almost everyone expects, and as reports from the election meetings suggest heavy and enthusiastic support for the socialist.

- Apparently the new counting app has failed and caused a delay in reporting. The state party leaders announce they are conducting a long "quality check."

- At midnight, with no further results reported, the ex-mayor declares himself victorious.

- Late on the next day, reporting on the count resumes. Now the ex-mayor is ahead of the socialist by a close margin. The corporate media report copiously on the ex-mayor's performance as a big win.

- Reporting of the count is still incomplete. The news cycle switches to other, unrelated, big stories. It may be a long time before we hear anything more about the results.

The above listing does not prove election fraud. It does, however, look like what election fraud has looked like in the past.

Similar circumstances, when they occur in foreign nations considered "adversarial" to the US, have sufficed to justify accusations against these countries.

Crucially, a number of self-evident conflicts of interest are present. The state party should have never bought an app to count the votes from a company owned and operated by supporters of one of the candidates, or a company that is run by people who worked in the past for campaigns that were hostile to another candidate. And again, why is it even considered necessary to replace the prior means of counting the vote?

Note that in this case, because this election is only the first in a long series of primaries and caucuses, the delay may have more of an impact than a fraudulent count. Initially false results can affect what happens in subsequent primaries. If the final results are correct, but are announced weeks or months later, and if the delay was an intentional stratagem, then fraud has still been committed.

There is no reason for anyone to apologize for voicing their suspicions. In fact, these voices should be encouraged and taken seriously.

Dismissals and sneers are unwarranted and obnoxious. Do not let people bully you.
We have every right to expect full transparency regarding the party officials who bought the app, the app makers, the ownership of the companies involved, the ex-mayor, his campaign and relevant advisors and associates.

Demands are warranted to treat and investigate these circumstances as suspicious, and to do everything possible to safeguard against fraud attempts in the elections yet to come.

...

Doug Henwood: "After a long pause in counting the guy connected to military intelligence comes from behind—the guy who claimed victory before any votes were counted. But we’re too sophisticated for conspiracy theories."

Remember, a break in the vote counting IS the evidence on which the US, its OAS satellite and Canada declared the Bolivian election invalid and backed a military coup d'etat against the elected president. (On no evidence at all, they declared the Venezuelan election invalid.)

I really don't care if you think it's a stupid plot - who's ever going to be punished? Georgia fixed the gubernatorial election last year. Who paid a price, besides the voters and the losing candidate? New York State admitted that hundreds of thousands of voters were illegally purged before the 2016 primary. What price was paid? What corrective action taken? What comprehensive investigation launched? What reforms put into place?

Liza Featherstone: "I respect all of you nuanced people and I realize there are a lot of possibilities. But if there is no elite conspiracy to stop Sanders this would be practically the first time in history that US elites failed to respond to a socialist threat by doing something shady and conspiratorial."

[mentalgongfu2]

I'm a little stunned. CNN is saying Buttigieg is at 26.9% in Iowa. Bernie is close behind. Know your audience. Its Iowa...not Cambridge, MA. He has a folksy charm so long as the 'normals' don't learn he's gay. He's a bit more centrist than Bernie. I don't see any grand conspiracy in this, well, no more than normal. Lets face it anyhow, if you care about America, its pretty much anyone but Trump for president in 2020. And the bastards going to get acquitted in all likely hood. Untutored people are easier to rule over.

Even us fly-over country bumpkins are aware Mayor Pete is openly gay. And I find it hard to believe he outpaced Biden, let alone Bernie. My social circles are limited, granted, but there was a pretty clear swing in my non-scientific observations.