Google News

I've used Google News as the home page on my laptop for many years. But, I've frequently noticed how the aggregated stories often contain headlines from Fox that are not the most important fact about a current story, but basically a smear against Democrats.

For example, I'm looking at Google News now and the top group of stories are about the G20 summit. The top, most bolded headline of the group is from Fox and it says, "Biden appears to use prepared list of reporters after G20 summit in Rome". 2 of the remaining 4 headlines that appear in this topic are also from Fox. They say, "Biden arrives at COP26 climate summit with a US energy crisis he created" and "Biden apologizes for being late to G20 press conference: 'We were playing with elevators'"

The average person who scans these headlines to get a sense of current events is being continuously bombarded with purposely crafted negative propaganda. I'm not sure if Fox games Google to get their headlines so prominently placed, or if Google is complicit, but it's frustrating to see Biden's poll numbers fall, nearly entirely over bullshit. The problem is that Fox doesn't just influence their zombie followers, who choose to watch Fox, they get their headlines prominently placed on major supposedly nonpartisan news aggregation sites and subliminally influence people.

Biden just pulled into the lead in Wisconsin at 4:45 am!!

Milwaukee absentee ballots just reported

If we take the Senate/Presidency, shouldn't DC/Puerto Rico statehood should be top of the agenda?

The Republicans shamelessly stall judicial nominations when there's a Democratic president to stack the courts in their favor. Some people propose expanding the Supreme Court to compensate, but if the Republicans regain control of the Senate/Presidency, they will just retaliate and expand the court further.

I think that a more effective option might be to grant DC/Puerto Rico statehood if Democrats control the government. It wouldn't change the problem with the courts, but it would add 4 Democratic Senate seats that would help prevent future judicial manipulation and it's a legitimate issue. They're US citizens without representation.

Those 4 Senate seats would make it much harder for the Republicans to gain a majority and it would be difficult for them to retaliate. There aren't US territories full of uneducated white people that they could fabricate into new red states.

Wouldn't this be a good thing to try to get done in the 1st two years if we take back the Senate and the Presidency?

The major way Trump benefits from the RBG replacement fight

The leading story is now a contentious, high stakes, high publicity issue that has nothing to do with COVID.

Anything that distracts any swing state Republican leaning people who are frustrated with his incompetence and mendacity is probably a plus for him.

Hopefully, the naked Supreme Court power grab will be an additional PR negative for him and there will be 4 R Senators who care enough about their own political futures and place in history to stop it.

RIP Ruth Bader Ginsberg

A truly top tier role model. An exemplary woman, an exemplary human with a truly meaningful and important lifetime of work.

There are nothing but the ultimate positives to say about her, but damn I wish she could have lasted 3 more months. Mitch McConnell won't even blink at the hypocrisy of holding hearings on a replacement. One year was too close to an election for Merrick Garland, but 5 weeks before or even after a lost election will be just fine.

Bill Maher on the blue wall of silence...

Bill Maher on Tara Reade

Stimulus checks delayed because Trump orders Treasury Dept. to print his name on them

From the Department of Utterly Predictable Headlines. No President's signature has EVER appeared on an IRS payout check before.

https://nypost.com/2020/04/14/trump-has-signature-printed-on-coronavirus-stimulus-checks/

Bill Maher - Worst Responder

Could Sherrod Brown or another non-primary candidate become the nominee in a brokered convention?

Nate Silver is currently ranking "no winner" as the most likely outcome of the primaries. If this happens, do you think it's possible that the convention delegates could select someone who didn't run in the primaries?

I think the last time this happened was in 1968, when Bobby Kennedy was shot and the convention settled on Hubert Humphrey. Do you think something like this is a possibility in 2020? Would it necessarily be a bad thing?