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babylonsister's JournalParents and students outraged after Texas high school assigns 'hero' essay about Kenosha shooter..
Parents and students outraged after Texas high school assigns ‘hero’ essay about Kenosha shooter Kyle Rittenhouse
By David Matthews
New York Daily News |
Sep 17, 2020 at 2:49 PM
A homework assignment from a Texas high school English class is raising a few eyebrows after students were asked to write about "hero” Kenosha shooter Kyle Rittenhouse.
Rittenhouse, 17, faces charges of first-degree intentional homicide, first-degree reckless homicide, attempted first-degree intentional homicide, possession of a dangerous weapon by a person under 18, and two counts of first-degree reckless endangerment after he shot protesters, killing two and injuring one, who were rallying following the police shooting of Jacob Blake by Kenosha, Wis., police in August.
Students at W.T. White High School in Dallas were given an assignment, dubbed “Hero for the Modern Age,” which called for students to write half-page biographies of Mahatma Gandhi, César Chávez, Malcolm X, George Floyd, Rittenhouse and Joseph D. Rosenbaum, one of Rittenhouse’s alleged victims.
The assignment also misspelled Gandhi and Malcolm X, according to CBS Dallas Fort Worth.
“From the spelling, to the grammar, no women on the list… and then a white supremacist murderer,” Kristian, a relative of one of the students who did not want to provide her last name, said to CBS News 11 while the saying the teacher’s lack of judgment made them unsuitable for teaching children. Several students who received the assignment also complained about it on social media.
more...
https://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/ny-texas-high-school-kyle-rittenhouse-hero-essay-20200917-25cpoaiqmjae3ms56wbca327w4-story.html
Trump Charged Secret Service for Rooms It Could Not Use
Have I mentioned in the past day what a POS he really is? 
https://politicalwire.com/2020/09/17/trump-charged-secret-service-for-rooms-it-could-not-use/
Trump Charged Secret Service for Rooms It Could Not Use
September 17, 2020 at 12:03 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard
No Dems Allowed:Conservative Lawyer Holds Secret Voter Fraud Meetings With State Election Officials
I remember this dim wit's name.
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/voting-fraud-heritage-foundation-von-spakovsky-1060493/
September 15, 2020 3:16PM ET
No Democrats Allowed: A Conservative Lawyer Holds Secret Voter Fraud Meetings With State Election Officials
Heritage Foundation’s Hans von Spakovsky, whose work about voting fraud has been discredited, has been conducting private meetings for Republicans only
By Mike Spies, ProPublica
& Jake Pearson, ProPublica
& Jessica Huseman, ProPublica
This story was originally published by ProPublica.
Starting in early spring, as the coronavirus took hold, a conservative lawyer at the forefront of raising alarms about voting by mail held multiple private briefings exclusively for Republican state election officials, according to previously unreported public records.
The lawyer, the Heritage Foundation’s Hans von Spakovsky, is a leading purveyor of the notion that voter fraud is rampant, claims that have been largely discredited.
snip//
At the Heritage Foundation, von Spakovsky maintains a database of voter fraud cases and, emails show, regularly urges secretaries of state to contribute to it. At the moment, the database encompasses some 1,300 cases, stretching over a period that begins in 1982. As Reuters recently noted, billions of ballots were cast during that time.
Von Spakovksy’s writings on voter fraud carry the veneer of academic research. But when he was questioned about his work in a trial two years ago, he testified that none of it has undergone the stringent vetting process of peer review. The judge in that case dismissed his testimony, saying it was “premised on several misleading and unsupported examples” and included “false assertions.”
Before coming to the Heritage Foundation, von Spakovsky served on both the Federal Election Commission and in the Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division, where he drew scrutiny after approving a voter ID law in Georgia that a federal judge likened to a Jim Crow-style poll tax. In May 2017, Trump appointed von Spakovsky to a voter fraud commission that disbanded less than a year later without producing any evidence of voter fraud.
Leaked FEMA Memo Reveals 17 Percent Jump in U.S. COVID Deaths Last Week
https://www.thedailybeast.com/fema-memo-reveals-17-percent-jump-in-us-covid-deaths-last-week?ref=homeLeaked FEMA Memo Reveals 17 Percent Jump in U.S. COVID Deaths Last Week
WRONG DIRECTION
Jamie Ross, Reporter
Updated Sep. 17, 2020 9:27AM ET /
Published Sep. 17, 2020 6:34AM ET
Obama Memoir Coming After Election
https://politicalwire.com/2020/09/17/obama-memoir-coming-after-election/Obama Memoir Coming After Election
September 17, 2020 at 7:11 am EDT By Taegan Goddard
There is not yet a release date for the second volume.
Jim Carrey will play Joe Biden on 'SNL'
Jim Carrey will play Joe Biden on 'SNL'
By Frank Pallotta, CNN Business
Updated 4:51 PM ET, Wed September 16, 2020
New York (CNN Business)"Saturday Night Live" has found its Joe Biden.
Jim Carrey will play the Democratic nominee and former vice president on this season of "SNL," NBC announced Wednesday.
The variety series will return just in time to mock the 2020 presidential election when it debuts on October 3. The series will premiere with five consecutive episodes leading up to the election on November 3.
Carrey is a surprising choice to play Biden considering that he's not a part of the cast and that former cast member Jason Sudeikis is known for playing Biden.
However, "SNL" has been bringing outside talent to play characters more and more over the last four years. This includes Robert de Niro as Robert Mueller, Brad Pitt as Dr. Anthony Fauci and, of course, Alec Baldwin as President Donald Trump.
"SNL" usually nabs more attention during election years, and incorporating Carrey into the mix with Baldwin's Trump should provide buzzy moments as the show takes on the debates and other news surrounding the election.
The other big piece of news for "SNL" on Wednesday is that the show is set to be back in front of a live audience again.
more...
https://www.cnn.com/2020/09/16/media/jim-carrey-joe-biden-snl/index.html
In 2 minutes flat, CNN's fact checker dismantled nearly ever Trump town hall talking point
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2020/9/16/1977901/-CNN-fact-checker-rattles-off-Trump-s-Town-Hall-lies-in-2-minute-tour-de-forceIn 2 minutes flat, CNN’s fact checker dismantled nearly ever Trump town hall talking point
Walter Einenkel
Daily Kos Staff
Wednesday September 16, 2020 · 3:23 PM EDT
Daniel Dale rattles off preliminary lies told by Donald Trump during Sept. Town Hall in PA.
It's so rough you have to laugh
Since the beginning of his life, Donald Trump has been a liar. He lies big and he lies small. Everything from his strange hair down to his shoes are false or misleading in some way or another. Since the beginning of his administration, Trump’s penchant for lying has increased. The Washington Post put his rate of lying or misleading claims at around 20 per day at the end of 2019. That was before the pandemic, before Trump completely dropped the ball and his racist, cruel, xenophobic, and incompetent administration’s sins came back to claim us all.
Trump’s lying and the need for fact-checking has become one of the few jobs created by the current administration, since the administration is made up of so many scam artists and general hoodwinkery. CNN has reporter Daniel Dale doing the fact-checking for those moments when Trump is allowed to really talk for a while. On Tuesday night, Trump decided his campaign could use the illusion that he was speaking to Americans outside of his white supremacist cultish base, and have him sit down with Pennsylvania voters in a town hall. As you can imagine, Trump lied for most of the hour and a half event. CNN’s Don Lemon had Daniel Dale on to point out some of the inconsistencies in Trump’s assertions.
At this point, we all know that Trump is a mediocre person, born into great power and wealth, buoyed by our rigged systems of inequality, and now failing on a global level. We all know Trump is a liar and that his lies are seemingly so transparent it is mind-numbing to watch millions of people continue to show their support for him. Daniel Dale has a great ability to really speak fast and thus perform the level of bullshit this current white supremacist in chief is shoveling out into the public sphere any chance he gets.
Trump said he fired James Mattis, Mattis resigned. He said that protesters took over 20% of Seattle. It was a six block area, nowhere close to 20%. He took credit again, for sending in the National Guard in Minneapolis, saying that this happened after a week and a half of violence there. It was not even close to a week and a half. It was days and the Democratic governor is the one who activated the Guard. He said he essentially repealed Obamacare by getting rid of the individual mandate. Not even close to true with the Medicaid expansion, pre-existing conditions protections, other stuff remains.
He said the cupboards were empty of ventilators, his administration admits he inherited about 16,000 from Obama. He did his usual false-boast about so-called bans on travel from China and Europe. They were not complete bans. He said stocks are owned by, quote, “everybody.” Just about half of Americans own stocks. He repeated his nonsense about testing causing cases, testing merely reveals and helps fight cases. He said that Biden has agreed to a Bernie Sanders style of socialized health care. He fought Sanders on that issue. He has very much not agreed to a Sanders-style plan. And, Don, this is a preliminary list. i have hours of fact-checking tonight to do because there's even more than this so this was just a firehose of lying, again, from the president.
Dale subsequently debunks the right-wing talking point lie that the boost in shooting crime in New York City (Trump exaggerates the uptick by about 200%) is misleading since even though there have been more violent shooting crimes in NYC this year, the numbers are still way below the numbers in Giuliani’s last year in office as mayor of New York.
Lemon asks Dale if he needs to take a sip of water after that two-minute tour de force.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=7&v=Kxj7U62G1KI&feature=emb_logo
David Corn: A Simple Plan to Deal with COVID-19: Free Flu Shots for All
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2020/09/a-simple-plan-to-deal-with-covid-19-free-flu-shots-for-all/9 hours ago
A Simple Plan to Deal with COVID-19: Free Flu Shots for All
But so far Trump has not called for a comprehensive vaccination campaign.
David Corn
There is an amazingly simple and clever step that the US federal government could take to counter a possible COVID-19 surge this fall and winter: a national crash program for flu shots. So far, the Trump administration has not embarked on such a program.
snip//
“Offering a free flu shot to everyone is a no-brainer,” Bhadelia says. Yet she notes that “a lot of national health care is not national,” so there are plenty of cracks in the system. Low-income people without insurance, she adds, are often not aware of immunization programs that will provide a flu vaccination with no charge. And there are people in all income brackets who don’t see the need to get a shot.
As the nation heads into flu season with the deadly coronavirus pandemic still untamed, a comprehensive flu shot campaign that makes the vaccination available to all and that mounts wide-ranging and creative efforts to promote and distribute flu shots (door-to-door flu shot teams?) would be a straightforward way to address this double-threat and bolster a health care system still coping with COVID-19. It also could be something of a test run for what happens should a coronavirus vaccination be developed.
“We are all anticipating a stressful winter coming up,” Shaffner says. An extensive flu shot blitz could mitigate that: “It couldn’t be simpler. Just roll up your sleeves.” Funding for such a program would certainly be crucial. But this is largely a question of national leadership, Schaffner contends. Imagine if Trump said everyone should get a flu shot. “That would be very important,” Schaffner remarks. “That could have a huge effect. It’s the best thing that we can do.”
But as Trump has refused to embraced the basic steps necessary to contain the pandemic, he has also not yet demonstrated an interest in such an elementary and effective public health project. Could that be because of his antivax past? Whatever the cause, he is letting an opportunity slip by. As the COVID-19 death count approaches 200,000, Trump—and the nation—is running out of time to implement a damn easy way to assist an embattled health care system and to reduce suffering and death.
Eric Boehlert: The press is desperate for a horse race
The press is desperate for a horse race
Thumbs on the scale
Eric Boehlert
This newsletter is only possible because of the support of readers like you who are backing a new kind of independent journalism. If you’re enjoying PRESS RUN, please consider subscribing for $6 a month. Thanks!
On Sunday, The New York Times released fresh polling data from four swing states. The results were so good for Democrat Joe Biden that his campaign may have allowed itself a cautious smile or two — Biden had huge lead in Minnesota, and was ahead in Wisconsin, Nevada, and New Hampshire. Accompanying the polling article, the Times published a political snapshot from each of those four states. But the snapshots read much differently than the polling results, as the Times seemed to lean hard into the idea that Biden was slumping.
snip//
This year’s not-so-dirty secret: The campaign press desperately wants to tell an exciting election season story. Journalists like to create storylines, tension, compelling characters, and relay wild plot twists. More excitement means a larger audience —the press wants a horse race because it’s way more entertaining. And for most campaigns over the last 25 years, the media have been blessed with lots of nail-biting and historic battles. Not so much in 2020, where the contest has remained locked in a stubborn holding pattern, and shows no signs of budging soon.
The problem with that scenario is it produces relatively boring content. How often can news outlets report, "Biden Maintains Comfortable Lead"? The temptation for the press is to put their thumbs on the scale for Trump in the hopes of marketing a closer race.
It's an outgrowth of Both Sides journalism, which suggests if the Trump campaign is lagging, which it clearly is, that means Biden's run must be facing big obstacles, too. Which, of course, makes no sense since a two-person campaign is, by definition, a zero sum event. Both campaigns can't be struggling at the same time.
"Why Biden could still lose the suburbs to Trump," Politico announced last week, leaning hard on provoking Democratic anxieties with a click-bait headline. It's true that Biden "could" lose the suburbs, but it's also much more likely he'll win them.
more...
https://pressrun.media/p/the-medias-desperate-attempt-to-create
Trump shares fake video of Biden playing 'F--- the police'
What a goon.
Trump shares fake video of Biden playing 'F--- the police'
By John Bowden - 09/16/20 09:01 AM EDT
President Trump shared a fake video Wednesday morning that made it seem Democratic nominee Joe Biden (D) was playing the NWA song "F--- the Police."
It's the latest example of Trump retweeting a fake, doctored or manipulated image or message from his Twitter account.
It comes as the president is leaning into a law-and-order message on the campaign trail, and as he trails Biden in national and swing-state polls.
The fake video was tweeted by a pro-Trump parody account "The United Spot." Trump added the words "What is this all about?" over the video in which Biden is depicted as playing the NWA song from 1988 at a Hispanic Heritage Month event.
Twitter flagged the video as "manipulated media."
more...
https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/516633-trump-re-shares-manipulated-video-of-biden-playing-f-the-police
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