Professor Jacobson, in our previous post, analyzed the case thusly:

One important part of the complaint is that it puts in issue Media Matters’ longstanding tactic and business model of targeting advertisers…

This could give X discovery not just of what Media Matters did here, but its other efforts to attack advertisers at other platforms because Media Matters disagreed with their politics.

Keep in mind this case is in Texas. Think about how a Texas jury will feel if X is able to prove its allegations.

Did Media Matters engage in this subterfuge and fraud? Obviously that verdict will work itself out in court, but it would not surprise me in the least, having covered Media Matters for over a decade. Founded originally by the toxic David Brock, with an infusion of cash from George Soros, Media Matters has poisoned our politics as much as anyone else. They are bullies who found a weak spot in the conservative media armor, that advertisers were afraid of controversy, so all Media Matters needed to do is put advertisers in the hot seat and they would flee. //

O’Connor rejected Media Matter’s arguments for dismissal, including that it can’t be liable for business disparagement by reporting truthful statements. O’Connor said X had sufficiently alleged that Media Matters had acted with “actual malice” based on statements criticizing the platform…

The Media Matters report at the center of X’s lawsuit was published online in November. The organization said it found advertisements by IBM, Apple, Oracle and Comcast’s Xfinity placed alongside posts touting Adolf Hitler and the Nazi party.

X sued Media Matters in November in federal court in Fort Worth…The lawsuit alleged the Media Matters report was published “with the intention of harming X and its business.”

stevewhitemd | August 30, 2024 at 11:46 am
If a blue state can force Mr. Kennedy to remain on the ballot despite his desire to exit, can a red state force Mr. Biden to remain on the ballot? //

Leslie Eastman | August 30, 2024 at 11:06 am
What the Harris supporters have just done is treated RFK Jr. voters like idiots. This will backfire. RFK Jr. supports are angry at the Democrat party, and hate it now more than Trump. They will vote for Trump out of spite, whereas they may have stayed home otherwise.

Standing up for unborn babies, no matter the circumstances of their conception, is on par with the pro-life movement’s long-held belief that humans are endowed with natural rights at conception.

Yet, GOP politicians and national pro-lifers alike have let Democrats goad them into a life-centered fight that distracts them from the task at hand. Many of them have taken soft or even sympathetic positions on reproductive technology. Others have become so preoccupied with Trump’s agenda that they’ve failed to gain ground in the battle to protect life on the state level.

Meanwhile, Democrats, with help from their allies in the corporate media, have taken advantage of pro-lifers’ inconsistency on IVF to make messaging and policy gains that benefit their abortion extremism. //

It’s the pro-life movement’s job to set the tone for the fight for life. Yet, a significant number of the movement’s biggest political champions are endorsing a procedure that no doubt kills more life than it creates. That’s a problem that would have been better remedied by prevention than intervention.

Now, committed pro-lifers are fighting an uphill battle against some of their biggest allies to explain to voters duped by Democrats’ deceptive narrative-setting and corporate media’s twisted polls why promoting and subsidizing IVF is wholly incompatible with protecting unborn babies or successfully curbing the industries that profit from the destruction of life.

Shiva Ayyadurai is fighting to get on ballots, but the naturalized U.S. citizen from India fails to meet a key constitutional requirement. //

In the complaint, Ayyadurai argued that the First Amendment guarantees his right to run for president regardless of the Constitution’s pesky qualifications. And he asserted that such a qualification has been “abrogated and implicitly repealed” by the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to the Constitution. //

allowing a foreign-born, naturalized citizen access to the presidential ballot changes the Constitution without the benefit of amendment.

There are a lot of reasons why Kamala Harris does not deserve to be president, but perhaps the most important one is her unwillingness to level with the American people about Joe Biden's health. She could have done it in a way that showed respect to her boss but that still got the point across and didn't make her look like a complete shill and tool.

But she didn't. And my guess is that because in doing so she would have exposed her own complicity in the sham and troublesome cover-up.

Kamala Harris will always put personal ambition and politics ahead of country. If the American people didn't learn anything else about her from the CNN interview, let's hope they learned that much. //

Sargon of Cincinnati Granny Heartful
18 hours ago
A side effect of an anti anxiety medication is that it can result in a loss of focus, and continued returning to a point the speaker wants to make. As this happens the speaker uses key remembered phrases to gain time to regain the intended message. Resulting in long winding sentences that have little success in communicating the speaker’s thought.

Anti anxiety drugs are not intended for stress reduction before a speaking engagement. Usually they are used for stress inducing events like flying. Or, if a patient is anxious in large crowds. Not intended for interviews. //

It’s a dry heat
15 hours ago
"I have served with President Biden for almost four years now. And I’ll tell ya it’s one of the greatest honors of my career, truly. He cares so deeply about the American people. He is so smart and — and loyal to the American people. And I have spent hours upon hours with him, be it in the Oval Office or the Situation Room. "

But she is not "tethered" to Biden in any way LOL

I've talked now about Discworld's original hardbacks, and their original paperbacks. To briefly recap, both used the same two illustrators for the entire run.

Brazilian Supreme Court justice Alexandre de Moraes ordered Elon Musk's social media platform X, via a legal representative in the country, to suspend the accounts of political enemies (in other words, supporters of Bolsonaro), who the government is investigating. If the X lawyer disobeyed, he would be arrested--and there would be personal consequences for X owner Elon Musk, too:

Mr Moraes had ordered X accounts he has accused of spreading disinformation - many supporters of the former right-wing president Jair Bolsanaro - must be blocked while they are under investigation.

After X owner Musk criticised Mr Moraes, the judge ordered 100,000 reais ($19,774; £15,670) fines a day for any account that X reactivated, and stressed the possible liability of the company's legal representatives in Brazil if this were to happen.

He also put Mr Musk under investigation for charges including the obstruction of justice.

Discworld - Book Covers

I used to prefer kobodl because it's standalone, which means you don't need other proprietary software like Adobe Digial Editions or Kindle for PC (that I can't use on Linux). However, I have since discoverd a way to do this with Calibre and 2 plugins:

Leseratte10/acsm-calibre-plugin - A plugin that can read Adobe Digital Editions files that Kobo web download produces.
noDRM/DeDRM_tools - The popular DRM removal plugin.
Now you can just download the .acm file from your book list on Kobo.com and load it into Calibre desktop!

You don’t get to insist Donald Trump’s private peccadilloes are a criminal matter while being silent about the corrupt relationships of Kamala Harris, the Clintons, and so many others. //

Bill Clinton was a primetime speaker at the DNC last week, campaigning on behalf of a woman who by all reasonable appearances engaged in political corruption on behalf of a dirty politician she was having a transactional sexual affair with. Weird how these same people were not outraged by that.

At the same time, Trump’s sex life, which however disdainful, was never a matter of public corruption. And yet the whole reason they’re running around saying Trump is a Convicted Felon™ is that the Democratic Party engaged in an all-hands-on-deck effort to try and turn Trump’s attempt to keep an entirely private affair with an onscreen prostitute from becoming public knowledge. //

Ultimately, it’s impossible to argue this incident merits more legal scrutiny than what Harris did in San Francisco. //

Now then some people will say, “what about Trump being convicted of sexual assault in New York?” Well, the heavily Democratic New York legislature passed a special law to undo the statute of limitations to make the case possible, and in any event, Trump’s accuser doesn’t even remember what year the assault took place. And while being wary of attacking the credibility of sexual assault accusers might be a good practice, E. Jean Carroll’s various public appearances strongly suggest she had questionable motivations and is a little crazy. //

This is about being honest about the state of American politics. If you want to understand why someone as allegedly immoral as Donald Trump wasn’t immediately kicked off the political stage because of his supposedly outrageous character flaws, you merely have to recognize that the American public rightly understands that the Democrat Party is itself fully in the thrall of figures whose personal dealings and sex lives are in many ways worse than Trump’s peccadilloes.

Eight years later, people are still in total denial about this, and maybe you shouldn’t feign outrage over a talk radio guy being cruder about the truth than your sensitive ears can handle. Especially when you’re silent about Kamala Harris’ past, the Clintons’ continued influence, and your friends and allies cashing checks from Reid Hoffman.

During the 2019 Democrat primary, Harris was asked whether she would commit to a federal ban on fracking.

“There’s no question I’m in favor of banning fracking,” Harris said. “So yes.” //

“In 2020 I made very clear where I stand. We are in 2024, and I have not changed that position, nor will I going forward. I kept my word, and I will keep my word,” Harris said. “My values have not changed. I believe it is very important that we take seriously what we must do to guard against what is a clear crisis in terms of the climate. And to do that, we can do what we have accomplished thus far.” //

“Well, let’s be clear. My values have not changed. I believe it is very important that we take seriously what we must do to guard against what is a clear crisis in terms of the climate. And to do that, we can do what we have accomplished thus far,” Harris said.

DANA BASH: You said you supported banning fracking. Did it change?

KAMALA HARRIS: In 2020, I made clear where I stand. We are in 2024. I kept my word.

DANA BASH: Why did you change your position?

KAMALA HARRIS: Let's be clear. My values have not changed.

What we’ve already done –creating over 300,000 new clean energy jobs – that tells me from my experience as Vice President, we can do it without banning fracking.

And therein lies the tell: "My values have not changed." Harris repeated that line TWICE during the interview. What it shows is that she will spout whatever is necessary to pacify the Pennsylvanian and American voters, and after she is securely installed as president, she'll adhere to those values she's been committed to for decades, and that's to double down on the climate change agenda. //

Paul Hoffer
10 minutes ago
Her positions have changed 180 degrees since she ran in 2020 but Kamala Harris’ values have not changed between 2020 and 2024. What does that mean exactly? What are those values she talks anout? Obviously, the only values on display here is that she will lie and say anthing necessary to get elected. Deception and prevarication are her values.

Greg Price
@greg_price11
·
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🚨BREAKING: Never before seen footage of Pelosi on January 6 filmed by her daughter shows her admitting that its her fault that the Capitol wasn't secure.

“We're calling the National Guard now? They should have been here to start out."

"We have totally failed. We need to take… Show more

9:21 PM · Aug 27, 2024 //

“I just feel sick about what he did to the Capitol and the country today,” Pelosi said as she slumped, visibly exhausted, in the back of her SUV in the pre-dawn hours of Jan. 7. “He’s got to pay a price for that.” //

In the aftermath, Pelosi and her cronies discussed who should be fired for the security failure—Capitol Police officials, Capitol Police Chief Steven Sund, anybody but themselves. But then she honed in on her real target:

“Typical Trump,” [former House Majority Leader Steny] Hoyer piped in [commenting on Trump’s statement about the protests].

After a beat, Pelosi said: “Insurrection. That’s a crime, and he’s guilty of it.” //

Greg Price
@greg_price11
·
Follow
Replying to @greg_price11
Once again President Trump was right: The biggest reason J6 happened was because Nancy Pelosi turned down the Capitol Police's request for the National Guard and then lied about it.
0:22 / 2:03
9:43 PM · Aug 27, 2024

I'm still seeing this as a very opaque operation where, as was the popular saying on night convoy operations in the Army, "I don't know where we are but we're making good time." //

Seveer of the 95th rifles @Seveerity
·
The russians released helicopter guncam footage of them taking out a convoy with guided missiles.

Their own convoy.
Embedded video
1:17 PM · Aug 14, 2024

“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience. They may be more likely to go to Heaven yet at the same time likelier to make a Hell of earth. This very kindness stings with intolerable insult. To be "cured" against one's will and cured of states which we may not regard as disease is to be put on a level of those who have not yet reached the age of reason or those who never will; to be classed with infants, imbeciles, and domestic animals.” - C.S. Lewis

I've always had a morbid fascination with the cruelty of leftism because it always comes with what they see as a moral justification. The left can denounce everything someone does as a heinous social sin of the worst kind, worthy of social isolation and exclusion, and then, in the same breath, do or say the exact same thing.

As I've said for years, the unofficial motto of the left is, and always will be, "it's okay when we do it." //

These intimidation tactics are disgusting, considering this isn't just affecting Vance but his wife and three children of two, four, and six years of age. To be sure, if this was happening in the opposite direction and these were Republicans doing this outside the personal home of a politician with young children, you'd never heard the end of it from activists, the media, and social media denizens. //

She quotes Luke Conway, a Grove City College psychology professor who studies authoritarian tendencies in populations. While he discovered both the left and the right have these tendencies, the left is largely blind to their own:

“When conservatives agree with those items, they subsequently admit (accurately) that they are authoritarian,” Conway wrote. “When liberals agree with those items, they actually are more likely to say they are not authoritarian.” The more authoritarian they are, the less they believe they are authoritarian, he notes. //

how often do you see leftists on social media, or in the media, or activist groups, completely and totally memory hole the real suffering and brutality put upon others that don't align with their way of thinking.

Those killed by illegal migrants. Trump's assassination attempt. The beating of Rand Paul by his neighbor. Antifa's attacks and assaults. The destruction and death connected to the Black Lives Matter riots. The utilization of government departments to attack citizens that reject leftist agendas.

All of these things are wholly pushed into the shadows or, when brought up, justified through some flimsy means or subjected to ridiculous and often untrue "whataboutism."

This can only be done if they truly see their opponents as not deserving of human treatment because they see them, you, as less than human. //

Rufus McGee
9 hours ago edited
Honestly, I actually think it isn't even that complicated. Of the seven deadly sins, many would argue Pride is the worst and the source for the other six.

Leftists teach that to be special has less to do with the kind of person you are than the kind of person you say you are. Combine that with a tendency many humans have in which they enjoy being cruel and you have a system that rewards cruelty in the name of right-think.

In other words, leftists give in to the worst parts of human nature simply because they enjoy it.

“Just an FYI – Kamala Harris’s campaign reached out. They’d like to pay us about $1,000 for access to the email list,” Alcorn wrote in a December 30 email to Hunter and Hallie Biden, Beau’s widow.

The money would go to the [Beau Biden] campaign, then be transferred to the foundation,” explained Alcorn, who ran the Beau Biden Foundation for the Protection of Children from January 2016 to June 2021, according to his LinkedIn profile.

Now, here's the onion:

Three former members of the Federal Election Commission (FEC) told The Post that donor list swaps are common and legal among campaigns, as long as each pays fair market rate.

But funneling the Harris payment to the foundation in exchange for the donor list — after the Biden family made clear months earlier that Beau’s campaign funds would be donated to the foundation — would have been a different matter.

“Charitable organizations are not supposed to be involved in transactions with partisan campaign committees,” said Michael Toner, who served as FEC chairman in 2006 and as a commissioner between 2002 and 2007.

The first layer to peel off here is the status of the Beau Biden "campaign." The money paid — and sure, a grand isn't all that much in the grand scheme of things, but the amount doesn't matter, the law does — the money appears to have been funneled through the campaign and into the Beau Biden Foundation, a 501(c)(3) corporation. Non-profits of this kind are not supposed to be involved in partisan politics, and according to Mr. Christenson, the Beau Biden Foundation, on a Form 990 filing, had denied “...engag(ing) in direct or indirect political campaign activities on behalf of or in opposition to candidates for public office.”

The second layer here is that the Beau Biden Foundation later offered Kamala Harris a seat on their board of directors. That's an unpaid position, but one that carries some influence, and could also run afoul of election finance law.

What's less believable is that this harrowing story of a working-class woman having to pay her way through college by salting fries was only worth mentioning when she began to run for president.

For decades, Harris never mentioned it, not on the campaign trail nor in two books. It’s absent from a job application and résumé she submitted a year after she graduated from college. Third-party biographers did not write about it. Not until Harris ran for president in 2019 and spoke to a labor rally in Las Vegas did she mention the job, telling the crowd that she "was a student when I was working in a McDonald’s."

It would seem odd for Harris to never mention this detail about her life story until she was in her mid-50s. She wrote multiple books, and none of them included her working at McDonald's. The multiple biographers who profiled her apparently never knew about it either. Only when it became politically convenient did Harris start making the claim.

Then there's her post-college resume, which never mentions any job at McDonald's. In the same document, she mentioned fairly irrelevant details about her travel to Africa and India. //

BurbankBob 3 hours ago

The McFib is back!

Avatar
Rainy Day Patriot BurbankBob 2 hours ago

Would you like lies, I mean fries, with that?

Boeing has has a long string of aviation disasters to its credit which many attribute to Boeing's embrace of DEI to the detriment of engineering excellence.

NASA is also pushing DEI inside its engineering operations. In fact, "diversity statements" determine if programs sink or swim: see Biden-Harris admin requires 'corrupt' DEI 'ideological litmus test' on NASA innovation funding, scientists say | Fox News.

What might make up a "white supremacy culture?" //

Hmm, it seems to me that a heaping doses of "perfectionism," "either/or thinking," "objectivity," "quantity over quality," and "sense of urgency" are all things that would have helped Boeing avoid this fiasco. Perhaps a little "worship of the written word" could have come in handy when building a freakin computer clock or choosing non-flammable components. Or some solid "power hoarding," instead of "group groping" when making decisions.

The irony of alleged "white supremacy culture" containing so many of the elements that would have prevented this fiasco is just too much to bear.

Speaker Johnson had to intervene to get Trump into Arlington National Cemetery for the anniversary of the withdrawal from Afghanistan with Gold Star families. //

The Gold Star families, who lost their children during the Biden administration’s withdrawal from Afghanistan, invited Trump to Arlington National Cemetery. He laid a wreath there for the 13 servicemembers who were killed serving their country in Afghanistan. However, a Gold Star family told the Caller that Arlington National Cemetery was trying to make it difficult for the former President to appear for the ceremony to honor their children, something the families requested.

Arlington National Cemetery told Gold Star families that they could only be there for a specific time that did not work for everyone’s schedule and were also told the president could not join them at their children’s gravesites, the family told the Caller. //

Republican California Rep. Darrell Issa has called on Biden to meet with these Gold Star families on multiple occasions, his office told the Caller. He was present for the ceremonies on Monday and had been in contact with Arlington National Cemetery leading up to the anniversary, his office said.

“This administration absolutely interfered with the tributes to the 13 fallen. In its war on Trump, it made the Gold Star families collateral damage,” Issa told the Caller. //

“Arlington Cemetery officials claimed the families didn’t want any media, photography, or videography at Section 60, contradicting what the families had actually requested. The families were fine with the media, designated by the Trump team, but Arlington kept pushing back, obstructing the process,” the source continued. “This would have not happened without Speaker Johnson.”

Hoover told the Caller in an emotional phone call that he and other Gold Star family members were the ones who called Trump and asked for him to show up. He also criticized the Biden administration for not contacting them for the past three years.

It seems as though Trump derangement syndrome (TDS) knows no bounds. From things that can be classified as silly, like former First Lady Melania Trump never appearing on the cover of magazines like Vogue, to the extremely serious, like an assassination attempt. Closer to the serious end of the scale lands the folks at Arlington National Cemetery and their recent treatment of the 13 Gold Star families of service members killed in the Afghanistan withdrawal at Abbey Gate and the ceremony marking the third anniversary of that incident, with former President Donald Trump attending that ceremony.

Real Defender🇺🇸 @real_defender
·
Liberals trending #WeRespectVets, when both Kamala Harris and Joe Biden didn’t bother to show up at Arlington National Cemetery is hypocrisy at its finest.

One man showed up at the request of the families, his name was Donald Trump.
11:44 AM · Aug 29, 2024

Per a Daily Caller exclusive report, Speaker of the House Mike Johnson (R-LA) ultimately ended up intervening so that Trump, who had been invited to attend the ceremony and laid a wreath for the service members, could get into Arlington National Cemetery. This part of the never-ending disrespect these families have received at the hands of the Biden-Harris federal government begins with the Cemetery informing the families that there was a specific time that the ceremony could be held, but that time was not convenient for all family members. They were also informed that Trump would not be able to join them at their loved ones's gravesites.

Darin Hoover and Kelly Barnett are the parents of SSGT Taylor Hoover. Hoover and Barnett contacted Rep. Michael McCaul (R-TX), Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, who, in turn, contacted Speaker Johnson. Johnson made a phone call, and what do you know, the situation changed. In addition to Johnson and McCaul, Reps. Brian Mast (R-FL) and Darrell Issa (R-CA) also stepped in to help the families to make sure the ceremony went off without a hitch.

But this is not the only roadblock that Arlington National Cemetery put up, a place whose very existence is to pay respect to those who have served. The Cemetery claimed that the families had stated they did not want any media, photography, or videography at the gravesites. That, however, was not the case. The families had stated that media designated by Trump's team was acceptable. However, Arlington kept interfering in the process.