Beltway Insider: Harris or Trump, Editorial Interference, Politics or Payback, Spain Flooding

Details: Category: Beltway Insider; Published on Sunday, 03 November 2024 09:07; Written by Janet Walker

The 2024 Presidential Election is ending. By Wednesday, November 6, 2024, the nation will have elected a new president. All the campaigning, lies, rhetoric, distortion of facts, slick marketing and PR slogans, upheavals, advertisements, and speeches, will be over.

The President's job approval rating, according to the website fivethirtyeight.com for the period ending November 3, 2024, increased by 0.5% to 40.0% of those polled who approve of his effectiveness as President and those who disapprove of his effectiveness increased by 0.7% at 56.0% of those polled. A slight 3% of the population polled have no opinion. Ratings are calculated weekly.

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Averaging the National Polls, with the Tuesday, November 5, 2024 election in 2 days, Vice-President Kamala Harris's popularity with prospective voters has decreased by 0.2% to 47.9% over the former president and convicted felon Donald Trump, whose popularity with prospective voters has increased by 0.5% to 46.9%. The political countdown site 270towin.com averages 15 national polls and places Vice-President Kamala Harris ahead with 48.4% an decrease of 0.9% and the former president Trump with 47.2%, an decrease of 0.3%, with 4.4% of the population polled undecided.

Harris or Trump

The decision for many is simple to move forward or return to the past. For others, the desire is more for payback, to finally get back at the establishment that stole the election, and politics has no bearing on the decisions.

Others, undecided voters, weigh the candidates positions and this campaign has produced many hot button issues, like the right to choose autonomy in medical decisions; should the Supreme Court led by five Justices beholden to a conservative former president and now convicted felon, be allowed to govern a woman's right to her own medical choices.

Other hot button issues are immigration, do we need a stronger southern border? Yes, we do. However, as the republican candidate explained the democrats have given American over to the immigrants and yet when the most comprehensive border control bill was presented, the former president made personal phone calls to his supporters to have the republicans veto the bill so no credit for border control would be given to the democrats. This is his way of using clandestine power to control Congress to block what is good for all Americans.

Medical Care costs. For the common man, and not the billionaire Big Pharma supporter this is a big deal. The democrats have capped the cost of Insulin, which 8.4million Americans or 11% of the population uses to control their diabetes, at $35.00. Big Pharma is a friend to the billionaire not the common man.

The economy is also a hot button issue. Both parties claim victory on the economy. With all the charts, graphs, numbers, and statistics that the campaigns have thrown at voters, the litmus test for the economy is simple, are you, the individual voter, who will step into the voting booth, better off today, that in January 2020? The only numbers that matter in the economy are the personal numbers representing each voter's income and assets.

Crime, many will say, is a big issue. And it is. Crime, however, is a state issue. If local jurisdictions aren't rising to meet the challenges of crime, the local vote is as imperative as the national vote. Vote for new local leaders, new local representatives, new senators.

At this point more than 72million Americans have voted, either by mail in or early in person voting. Some states offer same day registration. There is still time let your voice be heard.

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Major Newspapers Confront Editorial Interference

The fallout from Amazon founder and The Washington Post owner Jeff Bezos interference in the decision to force the cancellation of a planned Kamala Harris endorsement, that had already been written continues as Post readers, and staff voice their protests.

A statement from Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, who were responsible for uncovering The Watergate Scandal, "We respect the traditional independence of the editorial page, but this decision 11 days out from the 2024 presidential election ignores the Washington Post's own overwhelming reportorial evidence on the threat Donald Trump poses to democracy. Under Jeff Bezos's ownership, the Washington Post's news operation has used its abundant resources to rigorously investigate the danger and damage a second Trump presidency could cause to the future of American democracy and that makes this decision even more surprising and disappointing, especially this late in the electoral process."

Bezos began his statement stating, "presidential endorsements do nothing to tip the scales of an election." Then, why force the editorial board to stand down and risk the financial stability of the paper? In the first two days after the announcement more than 250,000 subscriptions were cancelled, and it wasn't simply subscribers who rejected Bezos, the top writers began resigning, and if advertisers begin to reject the notion of interference in the newsroom this may be the only blow that he understands.

As it is along with the growing number of subscribers rejecting the Amazon founder's interference in the newsroom, Robert Kagan and Danielle Allen, two Post writers resigned after the announcement and will become contributing writers for "The Atlantic."

"The move comes one week after the Post announced it was ending its practice of presidential endorsements, sparking widespread concern inside the news organization that the paper's owner, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, was trying to curry favor with former President Donald Trump. Sources close to the matter said Bezos scrapped the editorial board's planned endorsement of Vice President Kamala Harris, which was already drafted," CNN.com reported.

Setting A Dangerous Precedent

The interference, by Amazon Founder Jeff Bezos, sets a dangerous precedent as he cloaks the newsroom with his own judgement and while he states they are "principled" which translates to honorable, they are, in fact, opinions of the uniformed. While the Post owner, is clearly informed on many issues, this decision lends itself to other loyalties. The rich history of The Washington Post and the dedicated effort to become the paper of record was built on the principles of a free press, journalism, and the principles of journalism at its highest. Interjecting an opinion that is contrary to the notion of a free press becomes state sponsored or in this case owner directed press. How far does that interference extend? The Amazon founder is not a hands-on CEO, and his efforts in the past to turn the Post into a Fleet Street style, gossip-mongering, paper have been rejected.

Over the course of the last four years The Washington Post, along with other democratic (or self-governing) broadsheets, maintained coverage of the post Trump presidency and every legal challenge and indictment, trial, and conviction, along with all the sordid details, providing fair and unbiased coverage. The decision by Post owner Jeff Bezos to force the editorial board to stand down is wrong and creates the possibility that The Washington Post is no longer self-governed by the principles of journalism.

Former President Donald J. Trump Found Guilty on All Counts

Politics or Payback

From the moment former President Donald Trump lost the 2020 election his spin doctors were at work devising a scheme to override the loser status that goes along with losing a campaign, which is how they devised the notion of a stolen election.

Stop the Steal became the rallying cry to incite the disgruntled, who invested their vote, and came up, like in the Superbowl or any other high stakes event, on the losing side. This slogan, generated by a marketing and PR team, provided the former president with the power to create outrage and discontent, similar to Adolf Hitler's tactics when energizing the population to support him.

And it worked, in 1932, leading to unprecedented horrors, and it worked in 2020. The events of January 6, 2021, punctuated the power of the PR campaign. This rhetoric has continued to add fuel, to energize the disgruntled who are hoping for payback.

Trump and his team allowed comedian Tony Hinchcliffe to "warm-up" his recent Madison Square Garden rally. "In the lead-up to Trump, comedian Tony Hinchcliffe, who goes by Kill Tony, referred to Puerto Rico as a "floating island of garbage," made a crude joke about Hispanics and birth control, inferred that Jews are cheap and Palestinians are "rock-throwers" and made a racist comment about a Black man in the audience eating watermelon," reported CBSnews.com. Calling these attacks sick humor, placating the denigration and racial slurs moves society closer to 1932, and the constant messaging of us verses them, those evil, dirty, fill in the blank with your choice of slur, is the same tactics which catapulted Hitler to power.

Even as the political process should not be about payback, it always is. This election is not about going back to 1932 or 2016, it is about moving forward, moving beyond the divisions as a nation divided against itself cannot stand.

Mail in and Early Person Votes

To date 72,181,302 mail in and early in-person votes have been cast. Throughout the race the swing states have been the focus. The totals of these ballots cast can be seen here.

While there are many unknown factors in this data, including if the votes were cast along party lines, and more importantly how did the independent voter cast their ballot, the totals do reveal strong showings in every state, and a renewed energy in the voting process.

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Coronavirus Total

The CDC has recommended every person from age six months, including senior citizens should receive at least one shot of an updated COVID-19 vaccine, annually. The death toll from Covid-19 has dramatically decreased, as has transmission of the virus. Even as confirmed new cases continue each week, fewer are dying from the newer variants.

For the seven days ending November 3, 2024, the total number of confirmed coronavirus cases reported by The World Health Organization increased by 150,610 confirmed cases totaling 776,696,616. The total worldwide death toll increased by 2,381 to 7,072,509 deaths. The United States has stopped providing Covid data to the World Health Organization. (Data updated October 20, 2024, from The World Health Organization).

Spain Flooding Death Toll Reaches 250

Unprecedented natural disasters are increasingly more frequent around the world. As North Carolinians continue to confront the tragedies of Hurricane Helene and the widespread flooding that swallowed entire regions, more than 4000 miles away the region of Valencia, Spain, is recovering from a very similar and deadly natural disaster that has claimed more than 250 lives.

Unlike Hurricane Helene, where residents had warning, according to the National Weather Service, residents of Valencia had not received any warning, either from local metrological forecasts or the cell phone warning system, that would have alerted them to the impending disaster.

"Residents of the hard-hit town of Paiporta told The Post that people had been playing soccer, walking in the streets and otherwise going about their normal lives Tuesday, with no sense that their creek was about to overflow with such power that the deluge could destroy a bridge and stack cars on top of one another," The Washington Post reported.

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The shocking aftermath of the Valencia region floods, have people less concerned over the cause, although climate change and the warmer Mediterranean Sea has contributed to a frequency of unprecedented storms across the continent, and more concerned over the lack of government warning and preparedness systems.

Even as government officials are explaining they did nothing wrong, which essentially translates to we did everything right and followed all protocols in our pre-warning systems, the death toll and loss send a far different message. The government has issued a media blackout and banned employees from talking to any media.

The region received a year's worth of rain, in less than 24 hours, which resulted in flooding that was so severe that travelers caught in their cars were forced to abandon them, the current carried thousands of automobiles blocking tunnels in Alafafar, the hardest hit town in the Valencia region.

Even as the weather service mentioned the possibility of strong rains, no region wide shelter in place warnings were issued, which would have forced business to close and allowed residents time to secure important documents, prized items, personal property and seek higher ground.

In the days following the unprecedented weather phenomenon, residents are at a loss, digging out of the mud, hoping to find anything that may have survived, and hoping against hope of finding loved ones who may still be buried, alive.

For more information on President Joe Biden: Whitehouse.gov.

Janet Walker is the publisher, founder, and sole owner of Haute-Lifestyle.com. A graduate of New York University, she has been covering international news through the Beltway Insider, a weekly review of the nation's top stories, for more than a decade. A general beat writer/reporter and entertainment/film critic, she is also an accomplished news/investigative news/crime reporter and submitted for Pulitzer Prize consideration "Cops Conspire to Deep Six Sex Assaults" in the Breaking News Category. Ms. Walker has completed five screenplays, "The Six Sides of Truth," "The Assassins of Fifth Avenue," "The Wednesday Killer," "The Manhattan Project," and the sci-fi thriller "Project 13: The Last Day." She is a member of the Los Angeles Press Club, the National Writers Union, and the International Federation of Journalists.