(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . Abbreviated Pundit Roundup: Hacked documents, political hacks, and the state of the race [1] ['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.'] Date: 2024-09-25 Paul Farhi/Vanity Fair: Why News Outlets Are Sitting on Hacked Trump Documents The pilfered VP-vetting materials failed the “newsworthy” test, says New York Times editor Joseph Kahn. Politico and The Washington Post also passed on publishing docs from the breach, which—as Popular Information revealed Tuesday—appears more extensive than originally known. Even if the material wasn’t revealing, Robert’s actions may have been. His emails—oddly via an AOL account—were written in clear, colloquial English, suggesting to one reporter that he was “a useful idiot,” an intermediary recruited by Iranian overseers. It’s also telling that Robert approached political reporters, not those covering national security, whose suspicions about a foreign-influence campaign would have likely been immediately aroused. A lingering question: Would the news organizations Robert approached have bit on the hack if it had contained more newsworthy information? x Guy finally pulled the US out of a misbegotten war we should have gotten out of years ago, showing genuine political courage, and US political & media elites *savaged* him for it. That's when coverage of his administration went full negative & never came back. https://t.co/TO8j79FbgX — David Roberts (@drvolts) September 24, 2024 Lisa Needham/Public Notice: Trump's pitch to women is getting weirder and weirder It's like he's trying to hypnotize people into forgetting he took away their rights. In case that message, or lack thereof, wasn’t clear, he weirdly read his own post nearly verbatim at a weekend rally in North Carolina. According to Trump, under the Biden-Harris administration, women are “more stressed and depressed,” but if he wins, “I will fix all of that, women, I will fix all of that. And at long last, this national nightmare that we’re going through will be over. Women will be happy.” (Watch below.) Things took an even weirder turn during last night’s Trump rally in Pennsylvania, where the adjudicated rapist addressed women directly and made a cultish attempt to hypnotize them into believing he’s something he most definitely is not. “I am your protector,” he said. “You will no longer be abandoned, lonely, or scared. You will no longer be in danger … you will no longer be thinking about abortion.” (Watch below.) ... It comes as no surprise that Trump has no actual plan as to how he’ll make people stop thinking about abortion or how he will rescue women from the ostensibly crushing depression of the past four years. Indeed, he really has no plans at all except brutal mass deportations, tariffs that will send costs skyrocketing but still not fill the hole he’ll blow in the federal budget with giveaways to the rich, and whipping up racist and transphobic hatred. But when it comes to abortion, Trump’s problem goes beyond his overall inability to detail specifics. Instead, Trump — and the entire GOP, really — are victims of their own success. x Trump and Vance are turning to (mostly young-)dude influencers and podcasters like Theo Von and the Nelk boys (AKA Full Send) for lots of long interviews...which could mean turning out young men.https://t.co/3jxqoqg9os How male are these audiences? VERY. pic.twitter.com/0rivji9Emq — Danielle Kurtzleben (@titonka) September 24, 2024 Harvard Kennedy School Institute of Politics: Harvard Youth Poll A national poll released today by the Institute of Politics (IOP) at the Harvard Kennedy School indicates that among 18-to-29-year-olds nationwide, Vice President Kamala Harris holds a commanding 31-point lead over former President Donald Trump among likely voters in a multi-candidate matchup. The 48th Harvard Youth Poll shows Harris leading Trump 64% to 32% among likely voters in a two-way hypothetical scenario with her advantage expanding as young people become more engaged in the electoral process. The poll also finds: A significant enthusiasm gap between young Democrats and Republicans, with 74% of young Democrats saying they will "definitely" vote, compared to 60% of young Republicans. A widening gender gap, nearly doubling from 17 points in the Spring poll to 30 points now, with Harris leading 70% to 23% among likely female voters. Harris outperforming Trump on key personal qualities and issues, with substantial leads in empathy (+33), relatability (+24), honesty (+22), climate change (+32), abortion (+31), health care (+26), and gun violence prevention (+25) among all young adults. Harris's job approval as Vice President has significantly improved, increasing from 32% in the Spring poll to 44% now. x Team updates! 🌎Team Earth has raised $224K 🚀Team Space has raised $250K — Geeks & Nerds for Harris Walz (@GeeksForHarris) September 25, 2024 Last night’s Geeks and Nerds fundraiser paid off. Martin Pengelly/The Guardian: ‘Morally indefensible’ – but George W Bush will not come out against Trump While Dick Cheney has endorsed Harris, there have been no comments from other senior Republicans from Bush’s era The MSNBC host Lawrence O’Donnell this week hit out at George W Bush, the Republican former president, for refusing to weigh in on America’s looming presidential election. “All any decent person wants him to do is to say, ‘Don’t vote for Donald Trump, and here’s why,’ and he won’t even do that,” O’Donnell told the Fast Politics podcast, of the Republican president who was in office from 2001 to 2009. Increasingly, Bush – and some other top Republicans from his political era – are looking lonely in their ongoing refusal to take a side in an election in which many have warned that US democracy is under threat from Trump’s open sympathies with autocracy. x NEW 2024 Asian American Voters Survey by National Opinion Research Center 🟦 Harris 66% 🟥 Trump 28% The poll in April-May showed Biden at 45 and Trump at 31 — umichvoter 🏳️‍🌈 (@umichvoter) September 24, 2024 Catherine Rampell/Washington Post: Trump gets compared with history’s great villain because his rhetoric is that bad Words have power. If not wielded responsibly, they can lead to political violence. There’s a semisatirical theorem, known as Godwin’s Law, which posits that if any online discourse goes on long enough, it inevitably leads to a Hitler or Nazi comparison. No professional pundit wants to be guilty of tripping this law. After all, equating a political figure with fascists sounds absurd. It’s just so over the top. It also might not win over any additional allies; people roll their eyes and tune out when they hear commentators or historians warn, yet again, about another big bad Great Dictator. Problem is, Donald Trump seems intent on making the Hitler comparison happen. Mike Godwin himself has said it’s fine to use the comparison when it comes to Trump: x By all means, compare these shitheads to Nazis. Again and again. I'm with you. — Mike Godwin 🥥🌴🇺🇸 (@sfmnemonic) August 14, 2017 Greg Sargent/The New Republic: The One Way Mark Robinson’s Collapse Really Could Take Down Trump As the bombshells worsen for the MAGA candidate for North Carolina governor, a top strategist for his Democratic opponent explains what beating Trump in the state really requires. The scandals are getting worse for Mark Robinson, the GOP candidate for governor in North Carolina. After CNN broke the news of his incendiary comments on a pornography message board—including describing himself as a “black Nazi”—much of his staff quit. Now the national GOP has stopped funding his ads. You’ve heard talk about how Robinson’s collapse could help doom Trump in must-win North Carolina. But how exactly would that happen? What would it look like? We talked to Morgan Jackson—chief strategist for Attorney General Josh Stein, the Democratic gubernatorial candidate—about the state’s deeply interesting demographics, how Kamala Harris can win there, and what could still go wrong. Listen to this episode here. This is a podcast, which I normally don’t feature but it’s got Josh Stein’s chief strategist Morgan Jackson, who knows as much about North Carolina politics as anyone living. See NE 02 👀: x #New General election poll - Nebraska 🔴 Trump 56% (+16) 🔵 Harris 40% 01 - 🔴 Trump +21 02 - 🔵 Harris +15 03 - 🔴 Trump +42 Survey USA #A - 558 LV - 9/23 — Political Polls (@PpollingNumbers) September 25, 2024 Biden got 52% there in 2020 to Trump’s 46. Cliff Schecter on especially egregious grifting: [END] --- [1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2024/9/25/2272666/-Abbreviated-Pundit-Roundup-Hacked-documents-political-hacks-and-the-state-of-the-race?pm_campaign=front_page&pm_source=trending&pm_medium=web Published and (C) by Daily Kos Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/