I'm reading "Joe Rogan Irresponsibly Suggests Kari Lake Has a Point About Election Fraud/Joe Rogan quickly veered into conspiracy territory in his most recent podcast" (Daily Beast). It begins:
Joe Rogan on Thursday let loose another doozy of a false claim, suggesting that despite a number of failed lawsuits and months of fruitless efforts, Arizona gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake may actually be correct about the wide-scale voter fraud she’s so far been unable to prove.
“It looks like there’s real fraud,” Rogan suggested during an episode of his podcast. “At the very least, there were voting machines that weren’t working properly,” Rogan said, at least somewhat correctly, an apparent reference to an incident in which some printers in Maricopa County voting centers didn’t make dark enough marks on ballots—a technical problem that former President Donald Trump also seized on at the time.
Boldface added.
Here's the clip that Kari Lake is sharing on Twitter:
I've transcribed it. Joe says:🔥WATCH & SHARE:
— Kari Lake (@KariLake) August 3, 2023
Joe Rogan sides with @KariLake on Arizona's Fraudulent Election
People are ditching the Fake News in exchange for truth-tellers like @JoeRogan.
You love to see it. https://t.co/Q3GcAeuHbp pic.twitter.com/sxP8GtSZkV
"How much election fraud do you think is real?... Because I don't think it's zero.... It's not zero, I think we could all agree it's not zero.... And we know these voting machines can be fucked with. And we know that there's some irregularities. All that Kari Lake stuff in Arizona that they're trying to dismiss. It doesn't look like that's invalid. It looks like there's real fraud there. It looks like real shenanigans there. At the very least, there was voting machines that weren't working properly. And it seems very suspicious that a lot of them were in Republican areas. There's a lot of shenanigans. And I think there's coordinated efforts to make sure that certain people get elected. I don't know how far they go, but I know it's not zero."
The Daily Beast article calls this "full-on conspiracy territory." Joe just said "it's not zero." He said "it's not zero" 3 times. Election fraud is something more than nothing.
How is that "full-on conspiracy territory"?! It's the most modest expression of curiosity on the topic as opposed to robotic mouthing of the opinion that the authorities have handed down and are straining to enforce. This Daily Beast article is part of the straining. If they're really so sure what they're saying is 100% true, why must they strain so hard? Why are they so afraid of debate? Why do they go to extremes denouncing those who entertain the possibility that it might be something less than 100% true?
That last question of mine is the thought that stimulates ideation of far-reaching conspiracy, not Joe's modest "it's not zero" observation.
And the article admits that Joe's less-than-zero remark was made "at least somewhat correctly"! But it was made "irresponsibly." You see? This is not about truth. This is about message control and the belief that the truth is too dangerous to explore. You want to talk about threats to democracy?
Posts
68 comments:
some printers in Maricopa County voting centers didn’t make dark enough marks on ballots—a technical problem
yep! just "some".. the "some" that were in the republican areas.. Just a random chance! EVERY TIME
It's more clear by the election that Dems (and I'm sure Republicans) are desperately trying to win by any means necessary, fair or foul. It's long past time to set the standard that the vote must be auditable, and indeed audited after every election.
We require this of corporations every year. Why not national office?
It's always a conspiracy with these people until it's proven true. Then they come out in degrees telling you this or that has always been know, or they're always said this or that- none of which is true.
At this point pretty much any breathing adult has to have some gut feeling that, while elections may or may not be stolen, there are some pretty non-traditional, bordering on flat-out criminal things that go on. Many new 'covid' changes that suddenly became SOP in some states. Never made state law by legislature, just...decreed by Dem Govs. Voting machines going down for a few hours in 80% of the Republican areas of Maricopa was the least of them.
All added up, its not nothing. And you'd have to have a block of butter for brains to not be the least bit curious about some of the goings on in 2020 and 2022. But then, curiosity is not something we attribute to todays journalist class.
Funny that there were voting machine and ballot problems only in those heavily Republican represented districts.
But that's just a coincidence.
Althouse's apparent theme of the day: When spin becomes propaganda and lies
Back when there were three TV networks (and PBS), reporters called out partisan spin and actually did their jobs as reporters. They'd cover left-friendly topics and ignore right-friendly topics, but never flagrantly lie. In the post-Dan Rather fraud scandal and Internet era, reporters have become defensive and want to keep their lower pay, limited influence jobs and retain small, partisan, and niche audiences. So, they lie.
Again I ask, when if ever will a critical mass call them out and demand minimal integrity?
“You see? This is not about truth. This is about message control and the belief that the truth is too dangerous to explore. You want to talk about threats to democracy? “
By Jove!!!!!
Did Daily Beast say he was the horse dewormer guy or has Daily Beast concluded Joe was somewhat correct when the left veered into irresponsible conspiracy theory regarding Ivermectin?
Computers only do what you tell them to do. How do you know what you told it to do? You look at the program source code that you send into the compiler to create the machine instructions.
Yes but how do you know what the compiler does? You look at its source code, which gets sent into the old compiler to create the new compiler.
It turns out that that last step cannot be checked. The compiler doesn't have to do what its source code say it's instructed to do, because there's always the compiler in the loop and it has the same problem.
So you can't check what the machine does either.
The solution is don't hire hackers or don't use computers.
Ken Thompson "On Trusting Trust" Turing lecture.
Amusement isn’t the responsible reaction.
Here's more about curiosity vs conspiracy theories.
Election legitimacy?
Yes, it's a pole, and worse, it's a CNN pole. Still, its saying that tens of millions of Republicans still think 2020 was...questionable. And that's just Republicans. I am sure there are a few million independents who also have questions sticking in their gut.
Why all the conspiracy theorists?
The courts didn't look into it but declined on various grounds, mostly.
The fundamental disparity is that reasonable and serious people who talk about elections will say that elections are not perfect but that there was "no substantial fraud." Or as, in the case of the latest Trump indictment, Paragraph 2; "...the Defendant spread lies that there had been outcome-determinative fraud in the election and that he had won."
In other words, we serious people -- lawyers and legal-minded people for whom words and details matter -- are constrained by our need to say things that are accurate and defensible.
Meanwhile, people like Donald Trump and Kari Lake are free (within the bubble of their own support) to toss out completely fact-free allegations. And in the case of Trump, his current defense is, "It's First Amendment free speech!" Not that it was accurate.
Two different standards; for us in the serious world, it is what can be accurately and factually defended. For Trump, it is whatever entertains his base, and what he can get away with (or not!!) as non-defamatory and non-criminal.
And then what happens, is that when someone like me says, "There was no outcome-determinative fraud or impropriety in the 2020 election," is that TrumpWing fanatics respond, "Oh, great; how much fraud do you like? You are admitting that there was some fraud!" A fantastically stupid conversation.
This blog post seems to me like real trolling from Althouse.
As the ancient proverb says
When you are catching flak you are over the target.
Close your eyes and continue to believe the lies of the Progressive party who are fundamentally changing America as fast as they can because Americans are stupid.
The Daily Beast needs to use the extremist language, the shrieking condemnations and the condescending dismissal to sate the needs of their audience. After years of denouncing their political opponents as "literal Nazis", the drooling morons can't go back to level-headed disagreements or critiques. I long for the days when the empty-headed dolts were still screaming that Al Gore and Hillary Clinton got robbed by the big mean Republicans.
Thanks to Althouse for transcribing the Rogan audio. Let's look at what he said in detail.
"How much election fraud do you think is real?... Because I don't think it's zero.... It's not zero, I think we could all agree it's not zero.... "
So far, so good, Joe. Althouse agrees with that much, and so do I.
"And we know these voting machines can be fucked with."
Wait; what? Exactly how can voting machines be "fucked with"? Cite a single real, proven example of how voting machines were "fucked with." We just finished watching the biggest defamation lawsuit settlement in history where the Fox News Channel paid Dominion more than $700 million dollars for trafficking in those laughable theories. Is Joe Rogan saying that there are serious theories as to voting machine impropriety as distinguished from silly theories? You had better be specific, Joe, if you don't want to end up in court.
"And we know that there's some irregularities."
Ahhh; "irregularities." Back to reasonable and more modest allegations. Although I still don't know what Rogan is talking about.
"All that Kari Lake stuff in Arizona that they're trying to dismiss. It doesn't look like that's invalid. It looks like there's real fraud there. It looks like real shenanigans there."
Like what? EXACTLY what? This is nauseatingly bullshit. Give me one serious, proven, valid Kari Lake "fraud" theory. Such casual usage of "fraud" by Rogan. Casual, and baseless. This is the point in the interview where a competent election law litigator would undo Joe Rogan where we would get to the point, as we did in Covid, where Rogan just confessed that "I'm not a doctor; I'm an idiot. I'm just a wrestling commentator."
"At the very least, there was voting machines that weren't working properly."
Again, that delicate cocktail of reasonableness mixed with nonsensical outrage. Some voting machines that did not work "properly."
And it seems very suspicious that a lot of them were in Republican areas. There's a lot of shenanigans.
The factless-nonsense mixer in our cocktail. I'm going to have to look for "shenanigans" in the U.S. Code Annotated.
And I think there's coordinated efforts to make sure that certain people get elected.
Okay so that if that isn't "full-on conspiracy theory," I don't know what is. Of course at one level, Rogan is correct. There ARE coordinated efforts to get certain people elected. They are called "political campaigns." Run by "political parties." But of course what Rogan is saying -- but not saying clearly -- is that there are organized criminal conspiracies to rig elections so that certain people get elected. And yeah; saying that and no more is rank conspiracist bullshit.
I don't know how far they go, but I know it's not zero."
And that's a wrap. The final, conciliatory pivot back to reasonableness. Proving nothing, showing nothing. Providing absolutely zero valuable information to the Joe Rogan audience. But accomplishing two things: (1)making Joe Rogan seem like a reasonable, informed, moderate guy, and (2)normalizing the dangerously insane election loser Kari Lake.
The Daily Beast is the least impartial "news source" out there. Why would anyone read it or put any credence into anything it prints? It would be more reasonable to seek a comment from Dianne Feinstein or perhaps John Fetterman if one should really wanted to confuse the issue.
A similar story is playing out in Harris County. Not enough ballots were delivered to precincts, despite a warehouse full of ballots and check up calls made to precincts to make sure they had enough ballots. It is pure coincidence that it was mostly conservative precincts that didn’t have enough ballots and all the calls went to mostly democrat precincts. Coincidence isn’t fraud, right? You can’t prove it was intentional, except why weren’t the ballots not fully delivered in the first place. Precinct judges didn’t even get as many ballots as there initial requests, well some didn’t and you can guess which ones.
The case against the Ferguson police officer has never been described as a conspiracy theory. The various charges against Donald Trump have never been described as a conspiracy theory. Why are some allegations described as allegations and others characterized as conspiracy theories.....There does seem to be a widespread conspiracy to put Donald Trump in jail. It involves high ranking individuals at the very top of our government and is furthered with the connivance of many well known media figures.
It's an effort to discredit Joe Rogan. He has shown that he is more nuanced, skeptical and credible than NPR and NYT. He doesn't follow the narrative and has an audience, so he's got to go.
Once you get Democrat voters in on the absentee voter fraud, flooding the system with unnecessary, untraceable, and unverifiable absentee votes, you have then start fucking with GOP areas where people turn out same day.
That's what they did to Kari Lake in Maricopa County.
BTW...what a joke it has become that the outcome from our politicized, cowardly, crooked courts is what liberals use as the arbiter of election truths. Morons.
When the Supreme Court refused to hear Texas vs. PA you know all courts were washing their hands. Nobody wants to touch this very real hot potato.
I kind of uh understand the concern for message control because if you cast serious doubt on 3000 countries' voting systems then then faith in elections falls apart.
Because copycat skeptics are taking questions about machines in Maricopa county and applying them to counties that don't use those machines.
Like in Missoula we mark the ballot first and then put it in an optical scanner. All scanners are publicly tested a month before the election.
And what a pain in the ass because then you do have to count each vote by hand to compare results.
When our local copycats realized we didn't have a Dominion machine or anything like Maricopa or Philly, they regrouped and decided we need to dispense with the optical scanners and count every vote by hand.
A warehouse full of election workers totting up each of 15+ different races. Foolproof!
Meanwhile the average dope heard there's some crooked shit going on downtown, someone oughta look into it, etc.
You are an insurrectionist if you believe that there was vote fraud in 2020.
... or any other election.
You are an insurrectionist if you believe that there was vote fraud in 2020.
... or any other election.
If you've paid any attention to what went on in AZ - I LOOKS LIKE there was real fraud.
The collective left? OBEY! NO PROOF!
Whether or not there was fraud, there was certainly a problem in the way Maricopa County handled its elections. I thought Kari Lake's lawsuit did a good job revealing that much. My suspicion is that a lot of the GOP establishment hostility towards cleaning up voting/combatting fraud is because it would reveal how often even in GOP areas elections are mismanaged through failure to follow laws/SOPs, mismanagement of money, outright corruption and kickbacks, etc.
when democrats win ... under cover of darkness ..under suspicious circumstances... after absurd excuses on why so many machines 'crashes" ... after weeks and weeks of "counting" - you shall obey the "results"
“This is about message control and the belief that the truth is too dangerous to explore.“
The Democrat(ic) Party became a cult of antiAmericanism during the 80’s. LBJ was my first warning. Jimmy Carter my second. “Feminist” Bill and Hillary was strike three and I was out. I went full apostate.
The left, the uniparty, the alphabet agencies don't give a damn about the truth. It has been decades, yet people refuse to see what is being done, in the open now.
In a functioning Republic, voter fraud would be investigated by people looking for answers-not by people who have an agenda to bury what actually happened.
2020 is settled science, covid is settled science. The Party has given you the truth, and if you refuse it, you are punished.
“The "Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.”
We are, or should be, way past being surprised at such behavior. The marxist, post modern rabbit hole has been with us a long long time.
Again, Orwell wrote a detailed account of how a totalitarian state functions. Yet somehow this is a surprise to people.
Try having your 11 year-old daughter coming home from school in 1998 asking, “Why did you and Mommy never tell me that oral sex IS sex?”
I believe Joe Rogan has at least one daughter.
Kari Lake lost when she told Arizonans who'd voted for McCain she didn't need them. She didn't need to lose through cheating. On the other hand, the "without evidence" claim from people who don't want to find anything they don't want to see is a bit rich.
The legalification of ordinary discourse is a problem way beyond elections. When it suits our purposes, we pretend that there is no difference between “the truth” and “the facts the party assigned the burden of proof is able to establish with admissible evidence to the satisfaction of one or more designated humans at the scheduled time of a court proceeding.” We can all see — when it suits our purposes — that this equivalence is false. Even when “the burden of proof” is beyond a reasonable doubt and the “designated humans” must be a unanimous panel of twelve jurors carefully selected for impartiality, the legal system sometimes fails spectacularly to arrive at the truth. We get to decide through legislation how much failure of this sort is tolerable, and we always decide it is greater than zero because zero is prohibitively expensive.
In the case of elections, we know of various ways to improve the probability that the legal result represents a verifiably true count of verifiably legal and free votes, including paper ballots, in-person casting of ballots in a place and manner in which secrecy is protected, and purple fingers. We have chosen instead to tolerate a high risk that the legal result of an election will fail to correspond to the true result. Perhaps it is not too late to make different choices going forward.
You can reasonably conclude that there is election fraud whenever and wherever election officials resist the idea of a proposed audit, and where elected judges with partisan affiliations find reasons to quote 'lack of standing' or 'moot questions' as a reason to stall investigations into tampering. There is a good reason to expect a sense of finality in electoral contests - but there are better reasons to nurture the public's faith in elections.
"Why are they so afraid of debate? Why do they go to extremes denouncing those who entertain the possibility that it might be something less than 100% true?"
Why, oh, why? Why do progs always do what they can to promote their own power, by any means necessary? Why don't progs do debate, ever, when there's obviously nothing to debate and propaganda works so much better?
"ideation of far-reaching conspiracy"
No need to go there. Progs rule. They coordinate easily and quickly, being on the same page at all times.
"This is about message control"
Well, yeah. What else is new?
"the belief that the truth is too dangerous to explore."
As the Russia collusion hoax demonstrated, truth means nothing. Untruth derailed Trump, and the people responsible paid no price. Except in the Supreme Court, progs rule. Any danger is minimal.
"You want to talk about threats to democracy?"
There's democracy, and then there's "our democracy." As long as nice women support progs, the latter prevails.
Valid voting computers are merely arithmetic based... add, subtract, transmit and print.
Proprietary code? BULLSHIT.
There's no mystery to an adding machine's code unless it is written in. If you aren't allowed to audit an adding machine it isn't a valid tally.
https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2023/07/forensic-exam-2020-michigan-election-finds-illegal-ballots/
The "election" presented a mass of unprecedented anomalies.
It is jarring to hear all these claims of "conspiracy theories" when we are living in a world awash with conspiracies that have been proven to be true, some of those conspiracies involving the most important events of the past several years. The people who keep insisting there are no conspiracies come across as idiots or worse. Yet they keep throwing it out there.
Of course, it does not help things at all that most of the media is in on the conspiracies, or at least are too stupid to know what a conspiracy is when it is staring at them in the face.
LMFAO! Kari Lake suggests that the U.S. House of Representatives just skip "impeachment" and go ahead and "decertify" the 2020 election, and appoint Donald Trump as President.
Ann Althouse invited comment: "You want to talk about threats to democracy?"
Yes, I do.
Your blind belief that we still have a functioning democracy in the United States, in the presence of so much evidence to the contrary, is quite off-putting and non-sensical.
The United States government just arrested our candidate for the 3rd time, Ann. On Trumped up charges. Hundreds of people are languishing in DC political prisons on charges of "parading."
At what point are you willing to admit we no longer have a democracy? What has to happen before you will admit this? Please tell us. Where is the line that, once crossed, causes you to admit that we no longer have a democracy?
Clarification note: I believe the comment about "Harris County" refers to Texas, and the city of Houston.
No process is perfect, and Rogan is trivially correct to claim that the defect (or "fraud") rate is "not-zero". BUT! At present we have a -- I dunno, call it a philosophy -- structural and systemic bias in favor of processing any ambiguous ballot then burying the evidence of the problem. Consider a dimpled chad. It can be "cured" by mind-reading and clairvoyance -- and punching out the card completely as the instructions required. Ballot issues could arise from any ambiguity. It could be a mail ballot with an unrecognizable signature. It could be a potential voter showing up with no photo ID and creating a "provisional" ballot, which is then counted as valid whether an ID is later presented or not. It could be an entire box or suitcase full of ballots for which the chain-of-custody documentation has gotten separated or is retroactively created (forged?). All such problems have been documented in Texas recently. At present we argue -- rather like "better that 10 guilty men go free than 1 innocent man be jailed" -- it's said that "it's better that 10 bogus fraudulent forged and illegal ballots be counted as a legitimate vote, than that one valid ballot be rejected (because racists have a history of rejecting minority voters and their votes.)" The current process tries to cure bad ballots -- especially when the contest is close. (Al Franken's. Al Gore's.) These cures become a problem because urban areas with more voters and proportionately more defects are disproportionately supportive of Democratic (dare I say, Black and Black-endorsed) candidates.
Voter errors and process managers' incompetence favor one party.
This is about message control and the belief that the truth is too dangerous to explore.
It is dangerous, but necessary to explore the voter fraud. Dangerous because when it is proven, then every law and piece of legislation passed or signed by those fraudulently "elected" becomes arguably invalid. Then, you don't have legitimate laws or legislation. This is probably whey our courts and judges are such cowards on this issue.
Joe Biden was elected via voter fraud. Therefore his Supreme Court pick is fraudulent.
The uni-party and deep state HAVE to protect voter fraud at all costs. If you claim to value the "rule of law" you have to have legitimate laws that rule. In America, that is supposed to be done via the will of the people through a legitimate voting process.
I think there is some voter fraud in every national election. Both Democrats and Republicans do it, as much as they think they can get away with. The difference is that Democrats are better at it than Republicans are.
some printers in Maricopa County voting centers didn’t make dark enough marks on ballots—a technical problem
Except that they were all — as in every one of them — working perfectly in testing the day before. Who had access to those machines overnight and who provided that access?
If there wasn't fraud going on there was at least dereliction of duty by the Maricopa County Board of Elections. I saw a couple who were just ahead of me in line at my local precinct have their ballots rejected. Mine was accepted. Their ballots had been printed just seconds before mine on the same printer. Although I don't know how they are registered, I haven't heard that any Democrats having their ballots rejected. The only reason I can come up with for mine not being rejected is that I have always been registered as an Independent in Maricopa County.
Too many adverbs have irresponsibly crept into journalism.
BTW, Professor, the link to the Daily Beast is bad.
Althouse asks...
If they're really so sure what they're saying is 100% true, why must they strain so hard? Why are they so afraid of debate? Why do they go to extremes denouncing those who entertain the possibility that it might be something less than 100% true?
Answer: 2024.
Except that they were all — as in every one of them — working perfectly in testing the day before. Who had access to those machines overnight and who provided that access?
What evidence is there that they worked perfectly in testing, or even that they were tested?
@NorthOfTheOneOhOne
Thanks. Fixed.
You are making an assumption that “some printers in Maricopa County voting centers didn’t make dark enough marks on ballots—a technical problem” is equal to good old fashion fraud! Come on. The problem was addressed on election day. Kari Lake and the likes of Charlie Kirk want you to believe that the failures were deliberate. Of course they would. They didn’t like the results. But Maricopa is a Republican run county. Did they sabotage the election? No.
The printing error affected 17,000 votes.
However,
“County officials say everyone had a chance to vote and all ballots were counted because those affected by the printers were taken to more sophisticated counters at election headquarters.
In mid-February, the Arizona Court of Appeals rejected Lake’s assertions, concluding she presented no evidence that voters whose ballots were unreadable by tabulators at polling places were unable to vote.”
In conclusion: It is a conspiracy theory to suggest that there was fraud. Kari Lake spun a lot of tales. Most people don’t believe her. Rogan likes a good story.
Blogger cassandra lite said...
Kari Lake lost when she told Arizonans who'd voted for McCain she didn't need them. She didn't need to lose through cheating. On the other hand, the "without evidence" claim from people who don't want to find anything they don't want to see is a bit rich.
She made two mistakes. The other one was to tell people to vote on election day. That was an invitation for the rival candidate, who was running the election, to disable the voting machines in Republican districts on that day. With a Soros backed candidate like Hobbs you cannot be too trusting.
Actually, the mailin ballots made more sense. Arizona has a complicated ballot that includes local races. On election day, the ballot is printed, which gave the fraudsters the opportunity. We voted using the mailin ballot at an early voting site which included an ID check.
The big question, in my view:
If people can cheat and change the outcome of the vote for President, why would they not cheat? Can we just trust that people would not cheat to change the outcome of the vote? Because there is absolutely nothing else we make that assumption about.
Wild Chicken wrote:
"Like in Missoula we mark the ballot first and then put it in an optical scanner. All scanners are publicly tested a month before the election."
Are they tested against the actual ballots a week after the election?
If we are to use automated machine counting, we need to test against the machines' counts after the election in addition to doing so before the election via random sampling of entire, individual precincts after the election.
cassandra lite said...
Kari Lake lost when she told Arizonans who'd voted for McCain she didn't need them. She didn't need to lose through cheating. On the other hand, the "without evidence" claim from people who don't want to find anything they don't want to see is a bit rich.
8/4/23, 8:43 AM
The McCains voted for Biden. The people who voted for McCain, were suckers who believed he was a Republican, when he was a traitor. He lied to us, and stuck us with Obamacare. They aren't Kari Lake Voters to begin with.
I would argue it would be irresponsible to have a big megaphone like Rogan does and not tell the public what you really feel about any subject. WTF?
A lot, if not all of the Rogan Covid podcasts that were taken down, on account of "spreading mis and disinformation" have now proven to have raise legitimate concerns, to the extent that maybe lives could have been saved. (Like 2020 election fraud, that's another one still in limbo)
The more they speak of their honor, the more carefully we're going to count our spoons.
That the MSM invariably inserts the word "false" before "claim of election fraud" tells us all we need to know about their agenda. A claim or allegation is not false unless it's disproved, which of course these allegations cannot be, given the way the system was set up to make votes unverifiable.
Like in Missoula we mark the ballot first and then put it in an optical scanner. All scanners are publicly tested a month before the election.
The printers in AZ were supposedly all tested the day before the election and were reported as all working fine...
In my small Arizona town even people who don't like Lake think that Maricopa County screwed up the election to her detriment and that Maricopa officials screwed up 2020 to Trump's detriment.
Given what has been revealed about the process by her team you'd have to be dense, a Democrat or a recalcitrant judge not to suspect wrongdoing or incompetence or both.
It is now after noon, blog time. I've submitted a couple of comments, going straight to the content of the blog post, all substance, no personal attacks, no repetition. No reason to exclude them, unless it is viewpoint discrimination and/or personal animus aimed at me.
None of my comments this morning have made it through moderation, to posting on this or any other page. While I am seeing other comments, from hours later, posted above. 53 comments at this writing, around 1:00 blog time.
What is going on with moderation? I can understand that comments "may need to pass through moderation," and so some delay is involved. What I don't understand is why substantive, rule-compliant posts are being withheld.
Are there other, different commenting rules that we should be adhering to?
Matt: "In conclusion: It is a conspiracy theory to suggest that there was fraud. Kari Lake spun a lot of tales."
Here's Matt pretending like he knows. Having watched Lake's expert testify about the failure of the machines, contradicted only by the people likely responsible for the failure, I would say that the courts' conclusions were as likely motivated by reluctance to turn over an election than by facts.
But, unlike Matt, I don't "know."
Usual comments here that the errors were always _only_ in Republican districts.
Comments like that are always wrong and always completely imaginary. I mean, they might really be true but are still never based on anything at all but the speaker's own experiences. And those experiences have to do with things like which articles he reads.
It's more of a conspiracy theory to say there is zero voter fraud, and there have been convictions in court that prove it. The question is, is the fraud large enough, concentrated enough and skewed enough to change the outcome? Is it organized, or is it just individual actors like college students voting twice?
"In America, that is supposed to be done via the will of the people through a legitimate voting process."
Those who are supposed to be acting in furtherance of the will of the people prefer to think of themselves as rulers (except around election time when they'll call themselves 'public servants' in their campaign speeches) and don't generally worry too much about what the little people think or want.
Ms. Althouse,
Your post, like Rogan's comment, is provocative, but ultimately both are ignorant and/or irresponsible or both.
Lake brought a lawsuit based on this conduct and lost. The judge found that, crediting plaintiff's own evidence, the technical printer problems did not reflect intentional or bad faith conduct, and that in fact the evidence, including evidence of massive efforts to address the problem in real time, was inconsistent with a finding of bad faith.
The judge also found that all the ballots that suffered from printing problems which prevented their being read by some scanners were in fact read by more sophisticated scanners and counted, so that it was impossible for Lake to prove the required element of impact on the election. Again, the governmental effort to ensure that all ballots were counted is completely inconsistent with a finding of fraud.
And this, in an election that Lake lost by 17,000 votes.
A subsequent investigation by a Republican former Supreme Court justice found that the problem with the printers was the result of using thicker paper--which had been adopted post 2020 at the prompting of right wing critics to reduce the risk of voter fraud.
So yeesh. How could Joe Rogan responsibly conclude that this conduct "looks like fraud?" And how could you endorse that conclusion? I wonder if your social isolation is impairing your judgment. Not your finest hour.
Stephen's post is a delightful example of dishonest garbage.
1: I note he provides NO links to back up his claims.
2: the printers were tested the night before the election. they worked
The printers were repeatedly used during Democrat heavy early voting. They worked
Election Day, with heavy Republican voting, all of a sudden they stopped working.
Possible explanations:
A: Malice
B: Magic
C: Got one, Stephen? Does the judge have one? Does the Maricopa County elections office have an explanation for how the settings on the printers changed between when the were tested teh night before, and when teh failed Election Day?
3: Once the voting equipment stopped working, voting stopped. If the judge claimed that the Lake campaign could not provide affidavits for 17k people who were in line and didn't get to vote because of the problems, and that said lack of affidavits meant Lake hadn't "proved" that the obvious election fraud (the printer's settings didn't change by themselves) had affected teh outcome, then the problem here is that the judge is a dishonest hack
not that it wasn't an obvious cause of election fraud
Because it was and is an obvious case of election fraud.
Unless the Hobbs supporters running the Maricopa election can prove that the ballot printers settings were changed for a non-fraudulent reason, then in a sane system of justice the fact that their systems disenfranchised GOP voters should in and of itself be sufficient grounds to force a new election.
That teh "judge" is desperate to support the obviously corrupt Democrats is not an argument in favor of the judges rulings
So yeesh. How could Joe Rogan responsibly conclude that this conduct "looks like fraud?" And how could you endorse that conclusion? I wonder if your social isolation is impairing your judgment. Not your finest hour.
The lefties weigh in. The printers worked perfectly the day before election day. Was the "thicker paper" used only in Republican districts?
How to tell me there was vote fraud without actualy telling me there was vote fraud. The more you scream that there wasn't vote fraud the more I know there was vote fraud.
It took over 3 years for the Democrats to admit they stole Harvey Milk selection using the people's Temple cult. I have no reason to give them the benefit of the doubt today.
Post a Comment