2024 Election Heats Up & Five Cloned Dogs In Argentina
October 20, 2023
Not Your Typical Kennedy
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is shaping up to be one of the more influential candidates heading into the upcoming U.S. presidential election – sorry, Ron DeSantis. Earlier in October, the Kennedy scion announced that he would be running as an independent (instead of a Democrat), throwing the race between Biden and Trump into a little bit of chaos. He told a crowd of supporters that he was “declaring independence” from a whole laundry list of institutions: Wall Street, Big Tech, Big Pharma, the military-industrial complex, the “mercenary media,” the “cynical elites,” Democrats, Republicans, and “the entire rigged system.” I think you can get a decent idea of his platform from just that list, but there’s one more thing you should know – he’s a staunch anti-vaxxer.
Both major parties are hoping that he plays spoiler for the other side in what’s currently a close race, with Trump pulling closer to the sitting president. In a recent poll, Biden scored 49% of voters when pitted against Trump (who had 46%), but when Kennedy was thrown into the mix, that gap widened a bit – Biden scored 44%, Trump had 37%, and Kennedy had a respectable 16%.
However, Kennedy has a ways to go if he really wants to make his mark next November. In order to appear on ballots in all 50 states, Kennedy needs lots of cash and tens of thousands of signatures in each state. His campaign will also have to contend with each state’s unique campaign laws, and might even face lawsuits from both parties if they feel he’s blocking their candidate’s chances.
“It was an incredibly, incredibly difficult period of time in 2004 because there was a full-fledged campaign to keep us off the ballot by the Democratic Party and its affiliates,” said Theresa Amato, the campaign manager for Ralph Nader in 2000 and 2004. “Every other week, we would end up with a new summons challenging the candidacy in one state or another.”
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A Nice Prize In This Trying Time
- On Thursday, Mahsa Amini, the 22-year-old Kurdish-Iranian woman who died in the custody of Iranian police last year, was posthumously given the E.U.’s top human rights award. Her death after she was arrested for violating Iran’s mandatory hijab law sparked widespread protests against the country’s authoritarian religious regime.
- The award is named after Soviet dissident (and Nobel Peace Prize laureate) Andrei Sakharov. Its purpose is to honor those who defend human rights and freedoms, and began in 1988. Last year’s award was given to the entire populace of Ukraine for their resistance to Russia’s invasion.
No Free Radio In Russia
- According to Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), an American reporter has been detained in Russia. Alsu Kurmasheva, a dual Russian-American reporter, was reportedly taken into custody at the Kazan airport in southwest Russia on Wednesday while she waited for authorities to return her passports, which they’d confiscated.
- She was arrested on charges of failing to register as a foreign agent, which Russia requires of any organizations or individuals receiving foreign funding. For context, RFE/RL is a U.S. government-funded media organization, and is supervised by the U.S. Agency for Global Media, an arm of the U.S. government. Her arrest marks the second U.S. journalist arrested by Russia after Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich was detained in March.
Additional World News
- Tropical Storm Tammy expected to drop heavy rain on the Caribbean this weekend (NPR)
- What to know about Hezbollah, the powerful Iran-backed group on Israel’s border (CNN)
- IAEA team gathers marine samples near Fukushima as treated radioactive water is released into sea (ABC)
- Hamas spokesman reportedly among scores arrested in occupied West Bank (CNN)
- Drones attack a US military base in southern Syria and there are minor injuries, US officials say (AP)
- “Beyond absurd”: GOP savages Biden easing of Venezuelan oil sanctions (Politico)
- China’s Xi, seeking end to Israel-Hamas conflict, calls for ceasefire and two-state solution (CNN)
“I am not afraid of an army of lions led by a sheep; I am afraid of an army of sheep led by a lion.” – Alexander the Great
The Not-So-Massive Consequences Of Election Fraud
- Former President Donald Trump’s former lawyer Sidney Powell has pleaded guilty in the election interference case against herself and almost 20 other defendants as part of a cooperation agreement with prosecutors. The news comes a few days before her trial was scheduled to start.
- Powell is the second of the group to plead guilty after a local Republican bail bondsman, Scott Hall, who had potentially incriminating evidence against Powell. Powell was named a special counsel to investigate “election fraud,” after she pitched a plan to suspend normal laws and use military force to seize voting machines, in December 2020.
- Powell pleaded guilty to six misdemeanor counts of conspiracy to commit interference with election duties, earning her six years’ probation, a $6,000 fine, and $2,700 in restitution to the state. She’ll also have to turn over documents and testify truthfully in her co-defendants’ trials – which might spell trouble for Trump.
State Department Official Signs Off
- Josh Paul, who worked in the Bureau of Political-Military Affairs for more than 11 years, announced on his LinkedIn page yesterday that he resigned “due to a policy disagreement concerning our continued lethal assistance to Israel.” Paul said that he cannot work to support a set of policy decisions that include sending over arms, which he believes to be “shortsighted, destructive, unjust, and contradictory to the very values that we publicly espouse.”
- Paul wrote that while “Hamas’ attack on Israel was not just a monstrosity; it was a monstrosity of monstrosities…the response Israel is taking, and with it the American support both for that response, and for the status quo of the occupation, will only lead to more and deeper suffering for both the Israeli and the Palestinian people – and is not in the long term American interest.” The news comes as President Biden returns from a trip to show support for Israel, and gears up to request billions of dollars in aid for the country.
Additional USA Reads
- Marine killed in Camp Lejeune barracks and fellow Marine held as suspect, the base says (CBS)
- Why Joran van der Sloot likely can’t be prosecuted for Natalee Holloway’s murder, despite admitting he killed her (CNN)
- Far-right influencer sentenced to 7 months in 2016 voter suppression scheme (Politico)
- Donald Trump endorses Jim Justice in West Virginia Senate primary (CNN)
- Reporter is ‘shocked’ after Nebraska governor dismisses her as being ‘from Communist China’ (NBC)
- Activists turn backs on US officials as UN-backed human rights review of United States wraps up (AP)
- Romney mulled Trump job for ‘noble and self-centered’ reasons, book says (Guardian)
Let’s See If He Can Clone Another Victory
- Javier Milei is Argentina’s Donald Trump equivalent. He’s a far-right libertarian (also a self-described anarcho-capitalist) who took the country’s presidential election by storm, and is the favorite heading into Sunday’s general election. He also has five dogs, and they’re all cloned.
- Milei’s five “four-legged children” have become mascots for his campaign. While on the campaign trail, he waves around a chainsaw onstage (he’s going to make big cuts to government spending) while passing out pictures of the pups to the audience. As a display of his economic tendencies – Argentina’s struggling economy is a key topic in the election – his dogs are named after famous conservative economists like Murray Rothbard, Milton Friedman, and Robert Lucas.
- The cloned dogs were actually spawned from the DNA of Milei’s old dog, Conan, who died in 2018. Prior to his death, the then-economist had paid a company $1,200 to freeze a sample of Conan’s tissue with the intent of cloning the dog later on. Following Conan’s death, he paid $50,000 to that same company for a procedure that would guarantee him at least one Conan clone from that DNA. To the surprise of everyone involved, the procedure returned five clones – who he now credits as “the best strategists in the world” heading into Sunday’s vote. Maybe if he wins the election we can at least get a cool sitcom out of Casa Rosada, the Argentine White House.
Additional Reads
- Elephant collapses and dies at St Louis zoo after small dog runs loose (Guardian)
- Americans’ net worth surged by a record 37% from 2019-2022 (CNN)
- Tilda Swinton, Steve Coogan, Maxine Peake & Charles Dance Sign UK Arts & Culture World Petition Calling For End Of Israel’s Gaza Siege & Bombing (Deadline)
- Olympic icon Mary Lou Retton suffers ‘scary setback’ in battle with rare form of pneumonia (CBS)
- MTV cancels EMAs awards show in Paris, citing Israel-Hamas war (ABC)
- Robert Downey Jr. Deal Part of Taiwan, China Court Case (Variety)
- DeLorean with only 977 miles on it was found in Wisconsin barn (CNN)