Reportedly they have uncovered virtual farms of Russian bots hitting Twitter with mass quantities of tweets stirring the pot for Trump 2024, castigating the Democratic president and selling up the inadequacies of Trump’s Republican rivals. Interesting in noting the Bots have pretty well migrated off of Facebook, which was reportedly their center hub in 2015 – 2016. More curious the messaging is little different than callers on am (conservative) talk radio — or about identical — presumably not bots talking, though we are whatever iterations from the Rush Limbaugh “Mega Ditto”-heads of the 1990s. This is an aging group on a curious to figure but perhaps declared dead or aged media landscape likely not aping anything directly from the Twitter sphere, meaning — I do not know what the echo chamber here is or how the Twitter bot army effectively shuts down those presidential ambitions of Nikki Haley.

Marianne Williamson, preparing for the long haul of no good election returns, has kvetched that the DNC has rigged everything for Joseph Biden. Possibly. There are ways around that, as Bernie Sanders never quite grasped, which is to win this over that black electorate in South Carolina — seemingly the greatest obstacle for someone not the Establishment choice to win the nomination especially after Sanderistas successfully jettisoned the super delegates past the first round so they aren’t any longer strategically pushed into news casts of where Clinton sits.

How does she go about that? In the 2020 election I saw some tweets from Bernie supporters complaining that Biden’s message for the black electorate was essentially that he had a black friend. It turned out they misjudged it in that they thought it sodas Obama when actually it was Clyburn. In the 2024 run of things, I do have the thought of slicing her self help books to various demographics and falling flat in the “diversity” spell.

If Biden doesn’t run, someone else will. And it will be awkward as s/he smiles less past Harris.

Drat.

Well. At least John Sununu’s in it.

Much ridiculed, a Florida state legislator introduced a bill requiring bloggers — bloggers who make money off of this blogging — to register with the state if they cover the governor or the governor’s employees and bureaucrats. It is but one jackass who did this, and not the governor, which in one way puts the bill on the level of the random “give 16 and 17 year olds half a vote” legislations that sometimes slide into the corner of the news. On the other hand, this is seemingly on the behest of a governor trying to sharpen cultural matters for a presidential run, so I grasp the idea — “Is he copying Hungary’s Orban?” headline.

I am reminded of an explanation on how the Russian Duma works under the current Putin regime. Someone works to outdo someone else in legislation by introducing, say, the “Ban the Goths and Emo Act”, so as to give a fiery speech about how George Soros is working to destroy the Russian youth by dumping the Western subcultures of a goth and emo. Shuffling about the frightening Russian government / Russian Orthodox Church production Children Versus Wizards, I grasp a basic message. From there, not much happens, because they just fulfill a role of forwarding Putin’s last barn burner speech.

The bill spotters around, dead on arrival. But I guess it might have pleased DeSantis, and follows comments on strengthening libel acts?

Several weeks ago, a n allegation erupted that George Santos had once been a drag performer of some kind or other. It made sense in terms of what I understand of the man’s biography — upper or upper middle class and homosexual and of appropriate places for such things. The fact that he denied it suggested it may just be false — why deny y something so innocuous and trivial when bigger stuff are frying your political career? As it turned out, some photos came out and he accepted the past and I guess move on to the real stuff that, at the very least, marks him as a one term congressman.

I see new allegations springing up, and I guess they will do so from here on out, that some conservative Republican politicians voting for some such legislation curbing and regulating drag performances in age appropriate manners dressed in drag. The photos appear to be fraternity or school pep assembly material. And this makes sense as well, if I follow some biographical assumptions of from whence conservative Republican legislators sprung: the type that dabbled in high school pep assembly crap and the type who did stunts with frats. I do not know where the hypocrisy claim comes in — the regulations of drag performances and in attempting to disallow minors from seeing essentially strip acts may go too far and leave minors from not being allowed to see essentially clown shows, but the intent remains pretty clear and has nothing in common with a Power Puff Football contest or that one yahoo dude who stuck two basketballs under his shirt and play fondled them as he awaited for whatever that pep assembly show was my Freshman year — one of a few things I remember of high school pep assemblies as I did not go to very many.

I guess we will be getting more Republican drag regulators with photos of basketballs stuffed under their shirt. I am assured it means something.

I never understood what was so completely conspiratorial about “it originated in an experimental lab in Wuhan”. The virus originated in Wuhan. They were doing experiments with viruses in Wuhan. It made as much sense as anything else. The denial of the possibility, and declaration that speculation on it was racist, leads to conspiracy theorizing, beyond the scope of the actual conspiracies of a number of competing governing agencies shutting down the speculation as a matter of different purposes and motives — where when and if it comes to pass that it was the case, the conspiracy theories will claim confirmation beyond this one item. I never understood why this was supposed to be racist — it is not declaring the virus creation and leak inherent in Chinese racial characteristics, or even cultural practices, and to the extent which the virus was causing an uptick in hate crimes to Asian immigrants it was doing so without any regard to theorizing on lab origins. Hell — the only alternative origin, some less than desirable practices at open markets, was probably worse for the effect.

I am stuck on this weird confusion of stated inferences. I never much had the problem with “Wuhan Virus” until its social rejection left it the providence of a-holes. But that is easily intellectually scuttled — I am not tied to the name. The dilemma of the social rejection of “lab leak theory” is it remains an intellectually honest concept that was never disproved by the facts on the ground, even as its social rejection left it the providence of 9/11 truthers and qanon-ers.

Chicago mayoral election results. The incumbent losrs, and she makes the phone call to presumably both the candidates who beat her out for the run off, but the newspaper of Chicago reports at least one of them.

Vallas waited until Lightfoot’s concession call and speech before claiming his place in the runoff. When he did take the podium, he asked the crowd to give the outgoing mayor a round of applause for her service and courage.

I suppose the problem with this game I am thinking about is that a brief look see the other candidates beyond this are … Respectable enough not kooks … The Natural Law Party sat this one out… So there is no amused entertainment value in the thought experiment. But really. Given this was taken to have four candidates jostling for a shot. The other five candidates running… Did they call the two candidates to concede, and if they had would the winning candidates have to short change them because they really just need to hear from Lightfoot?

“Look, Roderick. You got .4 percent of the vote. Go away.”

Chris Elliott must be cursing Scott Adams for the likely sales drop and ensuing loss of residuals from his voice over role on the Dilbert cartoon.

Then comes the “check your privilege” throw down. And granted, there is “privilege” in being amongst the cultural norm and the minority of minorities is the abnormal — to the point where a “Right to exist” comes to be the constant refrain for any measure or petition to the New York Times.

But. Is this even paying attention to what you Bill Maher or four out five articles on transgenderism in the National Review (if not the comments section) are fretting on? Or — and there would be no great way of alleviating the problem of a permanent “are you sure” delay that counters this — a trendy social contagion brings people who are most likely not into permanent body changes at a time in their lives of maximum sexual confusion and social positioning. Or — transgendered is the new gay, gay is the new straight, straight is the new Mormon.

Or. Viagra is not prescribed, generally, to underaged minors. Breast enhancements are frowned upon as well. That is generally speaking the battle lines for this particular parcel of the culture war. Beyond that there is a pile of temporary measures in there — make up. Dyed hair. Wow. And I suppose the “do need t care what adults do” pivot sounds too much like “a choice”, but it is as it is.

What the Hell is anyone supposed to do with this rant given its flimsiness and the fact its producer feels so confident in its unassailablle soundness?