Hinderaker Would Ignore Real Solid Data, To Support His Delusions…

Ahem.

John’s fever dreams notwithstanding, Kamala is likely 57% to 43% favored — to win.

About 60-40.

Forget the finance bro betting pool; they are betting strictly on what they would hope would happen, to improve their take-home pay in the form of reduced personal income taxes, and reduced regulation on the securities businesses they generally run.

There you have it. And certainly, something wild (well outside all the polling, as happened in ‘16) could happen, but 538.com was right in 2008, 2020, 2012 (missed on 2016), 2018, 2020 and 2022. And Trump is a much more known quantity now, than he was in 2016. And that in no manner helps his chances.

I like those odds.

Out.

Time To Pay The Piper: Stick A Fork In Tangerine…

The evidence will show that when warned that Mike Pence, his sitting Vice President might be put in mortal danger — including direct attempts on his life — by Tangerine’s scheme to overturn the election results, Tangerine responded “So what?“.

That makes out a case for the felonies, all by itself — and more importantly — is clearly disqualifying, for ever seeking office again, in any capacity. Here’s the 165 pager, one he’s been claiming it is “unfair” to unseal. What is unfair, is that he thinks he should be able to conduct his felony trials in secret. No, the people have a Constitutional right to observe and report on his felony trials. That the GOP thought he should be nominated… is clearly… bonkers. Here’s the Special Counsel, tonight:

…The defendant [Trump] asserts that he is immune from prosecution for his criminal scheme to overturn the 2020 presidential election because, he claims, it entailed official conduct. Not so.

Although the defendant [Trump] was the incumbent President during the charged conspiracies, his scheme was fundamentally a private one. Working with a team of private co-conspirators, the defendant acted as a candidate when he pursued multiple criminal means to disrupt, through fraud and deceit, the government function by which votes are collected and counted — a function in which the defendant, as President, had no official role.

In Trump v. United States, 144 S. Ct. 2312 (2024), the Supreme Court held that presidents are immune from prosecution for certain official conduct — including the defendant’s use of the Justice Department in furtherance of his scheme, as was alleged in the original indictment — and remanded to this Court to determine whether the remaining allegations against the defendant are immunized. The answer to that question is no.

This motion provides a comprehensive account of the defendant’s private criminal conduct; sets forth the legal framework created by Trump for resolving immunity claims; applies that framework to establish that none of the defendant’s charged conduct is immunized because it either was unofficial or any presumptive immunity is rebutted; and requests the relief the Government seeks, which is, at bottom, this: that the Court determine that the defendant must stand trial for his private crimes as would any other citizen….

If nothing else, the people should have the right to review this highly damning evidence, before they decide to cast their votes in November. Even if one can suspend disbelief long enough to argue that maybe he is not guilty of these felonies — no rational person can conclude that he was not (at best), indifferent to putting his second in command in mortal danger — from his own mob.

As I say… that alone is… disqualifying. So, let’s even just forget the applicable federal criminal law implications, for a moment — who might vote… for such a sociopath? Elon Musk, it would seem. Damn. All to preserve his federal government welfare payments — to his electric car company.

नमस्ते

The Entirety Of Steve’s “Chart” Today Is Explained By Levels Of Educational Attainment, By Democrats.

Let us stipulate — at the outset, that Steve Hayward’s “charts of the day”, about 90% of the time… rely either on (i) faulty data, or (ii) directly misstate the data that they do purport to depict.

But he does — on rare occasion — offer charts that are completely explainable, by simply looking at them, without the overlay of his odious prejudices. Today is just such a day.

Of course — he never states the obvious, and simplest explanations, preferring to reach for bizarre conspiracies he claims to see being orchestrated — against the frothy hard right.

His false conclusion — from today’s chart, is that Republicans, regardless of level of education — report about equal numbers of friends who do not share their views. That bit of data is explainable by the fact that there are far fewer Republicans, than there are Democrats, at every educational level in the United States. When you are the minority “view” — as Steve is, you will report lots of “friends” who do not share your views. Pretty simple.

The second part of his chart depicts a rising number of Democrats who self report as having mostly friends who share their views, as their educational attainment level rises.

Instead of Steve’s silly explanation, I would offer that… as a person becomes more educated, and more aware of both national and international policy implications, from democratic as well as republican points of view… one clearly recognizes that — especially as to MAGA Republicans, they hold views that are mostly 18th or 19th century based — and thus long discredited — in polite society.

This is true of both economics, and race/civil rights, generally.

Increasingly, it is also true of women’s rights to autonomy over their own bodies, and shockingly, now extends to denying rights to women who are not married and don’t have children.

That sort of insanity is the stuff that educated Democrats are utterly allergic to.

As people become more educated, they are less likely to fall for Trumpian nonsense.

That at bottom is all his chart depicts.

You heard it here first.

Johnson Saw Only What He Wanted To See… YAWN.

We all know that last night was never going to change the race much, and it did not.

But Scott Johnson — like all of the frothy hard right — is in desperate need of some piece of good news about the Tangerine possibilities (or more accurately, the MAGA slow motion, dark and befuddled train wreck).

So he thinks he saw a great Vance “victory”.

Me? I saw Tim Walz remind America in simple, plain spoken terms, that Donald Trump is both incompetent, and a sociopath.

And yet, I am a realist — I know this debate didn’t really matter at all. Do get out and and vote, or mail in your ballot — before November.

That is all that’s left to do. Protect America — from tyranny.

Onward.

I Guess Paul Missed Bibi’s “Thanks!” — To Mr. Biden, Just Tonight…

Odd. But perhaps not so, given it is Mirengoff we are talking about.

When it comes to Israel, Paul has never been one to let the actual facts get in the way of a long, largely fictional, foaming at the mouth rant.

To wit: every mainstream media outlet inside Israel, and outside of it across the globe is reporting that Mr. Biden specifically aided Netanyahu in shooting down missiles as they flew into Israeli air space this evening.

That fact is entirely absent from Paul’s whining about how the US isn’t doing enough for Israel.

That renders everything else he writes as highly suspect. He simply won’t accept that not every matter is gonna’ break his way, when it comes to Israel.

Even at almost 70 years, he remains… a child, as to international policy matters.

Out.

New Model For Early Star Formation Identified, By ESA’s Hard Work — And JWST Data…

Let us again tonight (after a generally civil Veep debate here), fire-up our imaginations with new learnings, from deep in frigid interstellar space.

It seems many of the stars from the early Universe’s epoch of star formation may have emerged from large super-heated clouds rather than exclusively from colder matter collapses, driven by gravity alone. Here’s the fulsome story from across the pond, at the European Space Agency:

…Looking deep into the early Universe with the NASA/ESA/CSA JWST, astronomers have found something unprecedented: a galaxy with an odd light signature, which they attribute to its gas outshining its stars.

[Viewing light from] approximately one billion years after the Big Bang, galaxy GS-NDG-9422 (9422) may be [showing us all] a missing-link phase of galactic evolution between the Universe’s first stars and familiar, well-established galaxies.

“My first thought in looking at the galaxy’s spectrum was, ‘that’s weird,’ which is exactly what the Webb telescope was designed to reveal: totally new phenomena in the early Universe that will help us understand how the cosmic story began,” said lead researcher Alex Cameron of the University of Oxford, UK.

Cameron reached out to colleague Harley Katz, a theorist, to discuss the strange data. Working together, their team found that computer models of cosmic gas clouds heated by very hot, massive stars — to an extent that the gas shone brighter than the stars — was nearly a perfect match to Webb’s observations.

“It looks like these stars must be much hotter and more massive than what we see in the local Universe, which makes sense because the early Universe was a very different environment,” said Harley, of Oxford, UK, and the University of Chicago, USA….

Indeed, we are still catching up on last week’s news — due to our time away… but it does thrill me, to see how much we are learning every day, from this next gen space ‘scope. And to be certain, it humbles me to think about how much we really don’t know — about our own cosmic neighborhoods. Onward.

नमस्ते

And — Here’s Something That ACTUALLY Matters: Tangerine Claims He’s Not Just A King — But A Demi-God.

In DC federal court tonight, Tangerine claimed that the Supremes essentially made him… a GOD.

He claims he can ask for discovery evidence in a felony matter that no other indicted defendant ever could. Irrelevant discovery, from the government — simply to stall, delay and obscure the fact that he himself… committed felonies.

And Special Counsel Jack Smith is having NONE of it. Neither is USDC Judge Chutkan:

…The defendant urges a rudderless approach to discovery by seeking to do away with the materiality standard for discovery demands. Having previously argued — by misquoting the relevant law — that he was entitled to discovery with “some abstract logical relationship to the issues in the case,” ECF No. 167 at 5, the defendant [Trump] now abandons that erroneous test in favor of no materiality standard at all, ECF No. 235 at 21-22. To muddy the applicable standard, the defendant cites a single district court opinion, United States v. Sutton, No. 21-098-01, 2022 WL 2383974, at *9 (D.D.C. July 1, 2022), which does not reflect the overall state of the law in this District. See United States v. Libby, 429 F. Supp. 2d 1, 6 n.10 (D.D.C. 2006)….

[Donald Trump’s] the defendant’s opposition includes his standard and unsupported refrain that the Government’s position is motivated by improper political considerations. That allegation is false — just as it was false when the Court denied the defendant’s motion to dismiss the case on grounds of selective and vindictive prosecution. See ECF No. 198. The Special Counsel’s mandate is to uphold the law. It has no role or interest in partisan politics and has faithfully executed its prosecutorial duties in this case. The Government’s position, set forth on the schedule ordered by the Court, is rooted in a faithful application of binding D.C. Circuit caselaw namely, a careful analysis and balancing of the Hubbard factors….

So — we all agree: Tangerine has lost his mind — in thinking he is above all our laws.

Gee — I wonder why the Powerline boys (claiming to be champions of “law and order“!) are completely mum on these issues.

Onward.

Hinderaker Essentially Complains That We Have A Free Expression Clause…

John Hinderaker tonight seeks to mock Kamala Harris — and he fails. And fails, miserably.

Hinderaker seems to think (under our First Amendment) that Americans should NOT have a choice, as to whether they stand when our anthem is played (or whether they take a knee).

John cannot understand (or even hear that) Kamala supports the right of people to dissent from our more troubling policies.

If they choose to do so, by not standing for the anthem, so be it.

That is what peaceful protest is all about. John just loves “gotcha” questions — rather than accepting the complexity of allowing Americans the freedoms they’ve won — with their own bloodshed.

We all get that John prefers a dictatorship, and curtailed liberties.

Kamala Harris and the Democratic Party… believe in our Constitution.

The question is: does John?! It would seem he doesn’t.

Out.

Merck Has Completed The Acquisition From Curon, Of CN201 — Showing Potential For Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma

This is truly a minor note.

Paper filler, really. There was never any doubt (Hart Scott, or otherwise) that the deal would not get done. But it is closed, and so that is moderately good news. Not at all unexpected — so it is definitively “priced in” to Merck’s NYSE print, as of early August 2024.

…[Merck] today announced the completion of the acquisition of CN201 from Curon Biopharmaceutical (Curon), a novel investigational clinical-stage bispecific antibody for the treatment of B-cell associated diseases.

“By actively depleting B-cells, CN201 offers applications spanning both B-cell malignancies and autoimmune diseases. We look forward to building upon the foundational work started by the Curon team,” said Dr. Dean Y. Li, president, Merck Research Laboratories.

CN201 is currently being investigated in Phase 1 and Phase 1b/2 clinical trials for the treatment of patients with relapsed or refractory non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma (NHL) and relapsed or refractory B-cell acute lymphocytic leukemia (ALL), respectively. Preliminary data suggest CN201 has activity in patients with relapsed or refractory B-cell hematologic malignancies and is well tolerated, potentially leading to significant and sustained reductions in B-cell populations….

Now you know. And… onward to another glorious fall day in the steel and glass canyons, tomorrow! Smile.

नमस्ते

Rwanda Update: Funerals Limited To 50 Attendees; At Least 27 Confirmed Cases Of Marburg’s — And Now, Nine Dead.

As of the first day of October 2024, the outbreak in Rwanda (that nation’s first ever experience with Marburg’s) seems to be accelerating, so public health officials are taking aggressive new measures — absent an approved vaccine on hand.

Until further notice, all funerals will be limited to 50 close associates — and the public is being encouraged to use safe burial practices. Here’s the latest, from Bloomberg reporting:

…Rwanda has reported nine deaths from its first-ever Marburg virus outbreak and confirmed 18 patients are in isolation, according to its health ministry.

Most of the fatalities have been healthcare workers from an intensive care unit in the capital, Kigali. To curb its spread, Rwandan authorities have restricted funeral sizes no more than 50 people….

Now you know — all as my Buffs get a week off, this Saturday — to prep for K-State in two weeks (it will be the late game on ESPN, 9:15 pm Eastern, from Boulder’s Folsom Field). Smile.

नमस्ते