Odds and Ends — 27 August 2024

@preparedwombat 77

4 months ago

oddsandends

Cryptocurrency, Investing, Money, Economy, Business, and Debt:

Rumble boss ‘departed’ from Europe after Telegram CEO arrest

Tokenized Treasury Funds Pass $2B Market Cap Amid BlackRock’s Explosive Growth

Coronavirus News, Analysis, and Opinion:

Long Covid Knocked a Million Americans Off Their Career Paths

Politics:

Trump suggests he might skip ABC debate with Harris

No Evidence That Maduro Won

One of Venezuela’s top election officials, in a declaration sure to jolt the crisis-weary nation, said in an interview that he had no proof that Venezuela’s authoritarian president won last month’s election.
Since the July 28 vote, governments around the world have expressed skepticism, and even outright disbelief, over President Nicolás Maduro’s claim to victory. But the statement by Juan Carlos Delpino — a member of the government body that announced Mr. Maduro’s win — represents the first major criticism from inside the electoral system.

https://twitter.com/officejjsmart/status/1827759717378134420
https://twitter.com/YaroslavAzhnyuk/status/1827534635171029099

Democrats Have Finally Found Trump’s Achilles’ Heel

Harris’s campaign so far has been a work of genius on several levels, but maybe the most ingenious stroke of all has been the decision to mock Trump—to present him not only as someone to fear but also to ridicule. Harris perfectly encapsulated this two-pronged attack in these memorable lines from her acceptance speech: ‘In many ways, Donald Trump is an unserious man. But the consequences—but the consequences of putting Donald Trump back in the White House are extremely serious.… Just imagine Donald Trump with no guardrails.’
But the emphasis has been on ridicule (Tim Walz’s “weird” comment, Maryland Governor Wes Moore’s jab at Trump’s bone spurs, Barack Obama’s hilarious hand gesture when he was talking about Trump’s obsession with crowd size). It’s great on three levels. The first is that it must drive Trump nuts, and when he goes nuts, he says especially nutty things. Second, it’s arguably more persuasive to swing voters than calling Trump a fascist. Trump is a fascist, make no mistake. But he’s also ridiculous. Mocking him over his Hannibal Lecter obsession will stick in apolitical people’s minds far more strongly than warning about his plans to wreck the Justice Department, and in its way, it’s just as disqualifying.

https://twitter.com/adelpreore/status/1827712351040348294

Trump Holds Event at Border Wall Obama Built

Donald Trump came here on Thursday to heap praise on the structure standing to his right — ‘the Rolls-Royce of walls,’ he called it — and lament the unused segments lying to his left. Joining him there, Border Patrol union leader Paul Perez called the standing fence ‘Trump wall’ and the idle parts ‘Kamala wall,’ after his Democratic opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris.
Those labels were inaccurate. This section of 20-foot steel slats was actually built during former president Barack Obama’s administration. Trump added the unfinished extension up the hillside, an engineering challenge that cost at least $35 million a mile. The unused panels of 30-foot beams were procured during the Trump administration and never erected.

Trump Suddenly Looks Very Afraid of Being Sued by Taylor Swift

Donald Trump now wants nothing to do with the A.I. images he shared just a few days ago.

https://twitter.com/Gerashchenko_en/status/1827684124988944650

Leadership in the 21st Century, or Why America Needed Coach Tim

https://twitter.com/KellyScaletta/status/1827687894238310793

H.R. McMaster Rips Trump White House

In his blistering, insightful account of his time in the Trump White House, McMaster describes meetings in the Oval Office as ‘exercises in competitive sycophancy’ during which Trump’s advisers would flatter the president by saying stuff like, ‘Your instincts are always right’ or, ‘No one has ever been treated so badly by the press.’
Meanwhile, Trump would say ‘outlandish’ things like, ‘Why don’t we just bomb the drugs?’ in Mexico or, ‘Why don’t we take out the whole North Korean Army during one of their parades?’

https://twitter.com/YourAnonNews/status/1828027827951689986

Pro-Trump "Undecided" Panelist Says CNN Knew He Supported Trump