Well, that does make a certain mathematical sense. Biden should be able to tap into the Obama machine directly, and he's cutting deals with the Bernie Bros over the platform (and, theoretically, what a Biden White House would actually do). In this perspective, Harris signals a commitment to black concerns while still bringing in the Clinton contingent. By the kind of logic that prevails in the Dems these days, that represents a broad-based coalition - and gives Biden a way to justify picking Harris to those who think she isn't black enough or "progressive" enough. Dems, of course, are so accustomed to being fractured and playing the identity politics game that the concept of "coalition" is magical enough to justify just about any enormity.

quote:

Originally posted by Z06:

HAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

This article is over a month old but still relevant.

An article in the Intercept last week reported that a Wikipedia editor was scrubbing the page of former Democratic Presidential candidate Sen. Kamala Harris (D-CA), considered a prominent member of the shortlist to be Joe Biden’s Vice Presidental pick. The piece mentioned changes such as removing a past campaign finance scandal and Harris’ record as a hard-line prosecutor. Changes not mentioned include removals of the alleged role nepotism played in her early political career and significant favorable additions about Harris.

Other Wikipedia editors have begun working to undo the changes made to the Harris page, although many details remain missing. On Twitter, the Wikipedia editor responsible for most removals was identified as Bao Nguyen, a former volunteer organizer for the Harris campaign. Similarly, editors previously created pages for fellow Presidential candidates Pete Buttigieg and Andrew Yang without disclosing their connections to them.

The Intercept article by Aida Chavez notes that in 2016, editors had been heavily involved in contributing to the article on Tim Kaine prior to him being announced as Hillary Clinton’s Vice Presidential pick. As a result, a user on Reddit created a script to monitor for activity about prospective VP picks for Biden and noticed significant editing of the page for Kamala Harris. Other Reddit users identified a single editor by the username “Bnguyen1114” as the primary party responsible for the activity.

Chavez delved into the editor’s activity on the Harris page and how he removed content potentially unfavorable to Harris. Among the edits noted was the removal of a paragraph regarding her defense of Orange County prosecutors implicated in widespread misconduct, which Nguyen claimed was removed for “proof-reading” yet not restored until after the Intercept piece. Nguyen also removed details about a campaign finance violation involving Harris’ campaign for District Attorney, removing most criticism of defenses Harris gave for the violation. A quote from Harris stating “it is not progressive to be soft on crime” was also removed by Nguyen, but restored shortly after the Intercept article.

Not mentioned were other removals of unflattering material by Nguyen. These included details about Harris benefiting in her early political career from a relationship with future San Francisco mayor Willie Brown, then the Speaker of the California Assembly, who she dated. Also excluded were the substantial salaries she earned at positions to which Brown appointed her and a quote from Brown’s mayoral campaign manager about how the relationship benefited Harris. Another editor subsequently removed all mention of Brown, claiming “sexist” framing. Mention of Brown’s appointments was later restored, though only noting them and briefly stating she and Brown were in a relationship at the time.

One other detail removed involved how Harris handled an investigation into the death of Mitrice Richardson, a black woman who, after being detained by the Malibu sheriff’s department for not paying her bill at a diner, was released in the middle of the night without a car or phone and was later found dead in a canyon. Harris eventually closed an investigation she had opened into the death under pressure from the public, stating there was insufficient evidence for criminal charges. Mention of the Richardson case is still absent from the article.

Many edits Nguyen made to the article on Harris also added positive material. This included significantly expanding content about her securing of mortgage settlements with the major banks, citing her own memoir for some details, and addition of material lauding her questioning of Attorney General Bill Barr during his nomination, uncritically repeating her claims Barr refused to answer her for fear of perjury. Nearly all the content in both instances remains in the article. Much of the extensive positive expansion by Nguyen was reversed by administrator Michel Aaij, or “Drmies” on Wikipedia, calling it “grossly excessive and excessively detailed” and poorly-sourced. Following Aaij’s reversal, Nguyen began cutting extensively from the article instead.

Since the Intercept article, editors have attempted to reverse a number of changes Nguyen made to the article, though have so far rejected completely undoing his removals, arguing every change should be vetted carefully. This has not necessarily fixed the issues with Nguyen’s removals. While a brief mention of the campaign finance scandal when Harris ran for District Attorney has been expanded, where the material prior to being removed noted her many attempts to excuse, defend, or downplay, the campaign finance violation, the article now only states Harris accepted “full blame” for the violation.

Readers of the Intercept article began investigating Nguyen’s identity after the piece was published. An IP address apparently belonging to Nguyen was identified due to edits made right before his account’s first edits. Combined with his use of the same account name on another social media site, online sleuths identified the editor as Bao Nguyen, a Bay area lawyer listed on LinkedIn as a “Volunteer Organizing Leader” for the Harris Presidential Campaign. Katherine Maher, Executive Director of the Foundation that owns Wikipedia, criticized Nguyen’s identification as doxing in a reply to one person posting the name on Twitter and also criticized Nguyen for violating policies on conflicts of interest. On Wikipedia, Nguyen acknowledged the accuracy of the identification, though claimed he mistakenly thought his common last name made him sufficiently untraceable.

While Nguyen has denied being “employed” by the Harris campaign, he stated that he has volunteered for Democratic campaigns and met Harris. Such volunteer work could be construed as a “conflict of interest” on Wikipedia, which editors are expected to disclose on articles they edit. His failure to disclose is not unusual, as the creator of the page on 2020 Democratic Presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg also volunteered in one of his campaigns, but did not disclose this fact. More egregiously, the editor who created Wikipedia’s page on Andrew Yang, another 2020 candidate, did not disclose that she was the marketing manager for Yang’s non-profit. She later served on his campaign.

Such editing by editors with conflicts of interest, including paid editing as with Yang’s page, is a common problem on Wikipedia even when going against policies and, in cases of undisclosed paid editing, the site’s Terms of Use. However, Wikipedia’s greatest source of bias on political articles remains the site’s agenda-driven editors whose editing has become so slanted even the site’s own co-founder has accused Wikipedia of becoming too left-wing.

Update — After the publication of this article, Bao Nguyen admitted his involvement with both the Harris and Biden campaigns. On a page for discussing concerns about editors with conflicts of interest, Nguyen admitted he was a volunteer on the Harris campaign. He also mentioned briefly volunteering for Biden’s presidential campaign. In response to concerns, Nguyen committed to recusing indefinitely from further edits to the Harris page. Due to this disclosure, an administrator imposed a restriction on Nguyen prohibiting him from editing articles about Harris, Biden, and other political figures for whom he has volunteered.



https://www.breitbart.com/tech...en-vp-kamala-harris/

Don't sit idly by in our grandstand and saying the other grandstand is full of losers. The Dems are smart about this and how they're going to play the game and they've been playing it the better part of this year.

They are down to the last 80 days of the game and they pushed off the convention and VP announcement as long as they could so there isn't as much time to attack Biden and Harris together.

They will get a 2 week or so bump and now we're down to 65 or so days. The media will bend over for them and that's how the dog and pony show will go until November.

They will do razzle dazzle and everything else to keep up the wave's crest until then.

They already have 45% of the vote and they hope the razzle dazzle, platitudes, attacks on Trump and everything else will sway 6% of the undecided and swing voters.

The playbook is already written and we're going to make a mistake to write them off as unviable.

45% are for Biden, 45% will be for Trump and all the Dems needs is magic and media help to sway 51% of that 10% gap to win.

Bill Kristol can he be any more obvious ?

Kristol:

Just an innocent thought: We’ve seen Biden in office for over four decades, and we’ve seen Trump nonstop for the last four years. We’ve seen enough to make up our minds about them. So let’s skip the presidential debates but have three vice-presidential debates.

"just an innocent thought"

quote:

Bill Kristol can he be any more obvious ?

Bill Kristol is the ultimate A-hole.

I just got an email from my CA teachers union. With Kamala on the ticket, this is an excellent opportunity to push for higher taxes on the "rich".

Of course, the $$ Billions would be used "for the children".

quote:

Originally posted by Scoutmaster:
I just got an email from my CA teachers union. With Kamala on the ticket, this is an excellent opportunity to push for higher taxes on the "rich".

Of course, the $$ Billions would be used "for the children".

That's fantastic, especially for the "rich" in California. Because they obviously don't pay near enough.


California 13.3% Tax Rate May Be Raised To 16.8%...Retroactively
Robert W. Wood

Most Californian’s think they already pay high taxes, and they are not wrong. But a tax bill, AB 1253 (Santiago), would impose even higher taxes, and retroactively to January 1, 2020. If passed, high income Californians would pay another 1% on income over $1,181,484, 3% on income over $2,362,968, and 3.5% on income over $5,907,420. These dollar thresholds look odd, but are $1M, $2M and $5M plus inflation adjustments. They would hit only very high income Californians, hiking California’s tax rate on income over $1 million from 13.3% to 14.3%. California’s highest rate would be a whopping 16.8%. You can read Assembly Bill 1253 for yourself. If it passes, it could cause some Californians to hop in their Teslas and head for Texas, Nevada, Washington, or somewhere else. Anywhere would mean lower state taxes. The current top 13.3% rate—which it is worth noting is the same on ordinary income and capital gain—dates from 2012.

With the 2018 federal tax law changes, paying 13.3% in non-deductible state taxes (after a $10,000 cap) is even more painful....

https://www.forbes.com/sites/r...tively/#332f3b84c026

quote:

Originally posted by Balzé Halzé:

quote:

Originally posted by Scoutmaster:
I just got an email from my CA teachers union. With Kamala on the ticket, this is an excellent opportunity to push for higher taxes on the "rich".

Of course, the $$ Billions would be used "for the children".

That's fantastic, especially for the "rich" in California. Because they obviously don't pay near enough.


California 13.3% Tax Rate May Be Raised To 16.8%...Retroactively
Robert W. Wood

Most Californian’s think they already pay high taxes, and they are not wrong. But a tax bill, AB 1253 (Santiago), would impose even higher taxes, and retroactively to January 1, 2020. If passed, high income Californians would pay another 1% on income over $1,181,484, 3% on income over $2,362,968, and 3.5% on income over $5,907,420. These dollar thresholds look odd, but are $1M, $2M and $5M plus inflation adjustments. They would hit only very high income Californians, hiking California’s tax rate on income over $1 million from 13.3% to 14.3%. California’s highest rate would be a whopping 16.8%. You can read Assembly Bill 1253 for yourself. If it passes, it could cause some Californians to hop in their Teslas and head for Texas, Nevada, Washington, or somewhere else. Anywhere would mean lower state taxes. The current top 13.3% rate—which it is worth noting is the same on ordinary income and capital gain—dates from 2012.

With the 2018 federal tax law changes, paying 13.3% in non-deductible state taxes (after a $10,000 cap) is even more painful....

https://www.forbes.com/sites/r...tively/#332f3b84c026

They are also talking of a "Wealth Tax", ie, in addition to state income taxes, anyone worth more than "$xxx" would have to pay something like .5% of their net worth, each year, to the state.

But not to worry, I am sure all such $$ will be used to serve the people, to make the state a better place to live, to save the planet.

California leading the charge for wealth re-distribution. Blue state solution for everything, raise them taxes!

Ps...don’t forget to tack on our annual pay raises.

https://www.breitbart.com/poli...eally-bad-decisions/

Kamala Harris: Young People Are ‘Stupid’ — ‘They Make Really Bad Decisions’

from 2014 video at link

During a speech to the Ford Foundation, the then-California Attorney General used young people as a punchline, saying they are “stupid” and that’s why they have to live with resident assistants in dormitories.

Harris was talking about drug offenders in the criminal justice system during her time as the San Francisco District Attorney and said, “What’s the other thing we know about this population? And it’s a specific phase of life. And remember, age is more than a chronological fact. What else do we know about this population, 18 through 24? They are stupid.”

The audience burst into laughter. The camera cut to one woman, though, who didn’t appear amused.

“That is why we put them in dormitories, and they have a resident assistant,” Harris continued.

“They make really bad decisions.”

quote:

Originally posted by recoatlift:
California leading the charge for wealth re-distribution. Blue state solution for everything, raise them taxes!

Ps...don’t forget to tack on our annual pay raises.

You don't understand. California is a big, wealthy state that's on the cutting edge in a number of fields. It takes a lot of the taxpayers' money to buy enough votes from the "free shit" crowd to win an election there.

quote:

Originally posted by Il Cattivo:

quote:

Originally posted by recoatlift:
California leading the charge for wealth re-distribution. Blue state solution for everything, raise them taxes!

Ps...don’t forget to tack on our annual pay raises.

You don't understand. California is a big, wealthy state that's on the cutting edge in a number of fields. It takes a lot of the taxpayers' money to buy enough votes from the "free shit" crowd to win an election there.

Seems the Dem strategy fits the pattern, first you provide a safety net, which then becomes a hammock, which then becomes a straight jacket. The more the gov't gives you, the more they own you.

quote:

Originally posted by Scoutmaster:

quote:

Originally posted by Il Cattivo:

quote:

Originally posted by recoatlift:
California leading the charge for wealth re-distribution. Blue state solution for everything, raise them taxes!

Ps...don’t forget to tack on our annual pay raises.

You don't understand. California is a big, wealthy state that's on the cutting edge in a number of fields. It takes a lot of the taxpayers' money to buy enough votes from the "free shit" crowd to win an election there.

Seems the Dem strategy fits the pattern, first you provide a safety net, which then becomes a hammock, which then becomes a straight jacket. The more the gov't gives you, the more they own you.

Although it does beg the question, as Cali continues to turn into a cesspool for most residents, and those residents continue to vote with their feet and leave, who's going to be left to pay those insane taxes? And when silicon valley feels the pinch, they'll send an unmistakable message to Sacramento to knock it off. Then what? Cali is in a death spiral, the only question remaining is how fast they intend to spin their way down the drain.

It wouldn't bother me to see a few of those elite hollywood celebrities paying out a good % of their wealth.

quote:

Originally posted by az4783054:
It wouldn't bother me to see a few of those elite hollywood celebrities paying out a good % of their wealth.

I get that sentiment, but sooner or later they'll come for everyone else, too. Then it'll be too late.

quote:

Originally posted by az4783054:
It wouldn't bother me to see a few of those elite hollywood celebrities paying out a good % of their wealth.

Yeah, the thing about our tax law is that you won't get penalized if you want to pay more to the US Treasury. Buffet, Gates, Bezos and all the "socialists" in Hollywood are free to pay a 50%-70% or more tax rate if they want to. No one, including Uncle Sam, will stop them.



.

quote:

Originally posted by az4783054:
It wouldn't bother me to see a few of those elite hollywood celebrities paying out a good % of their wealth.

No matter how high and mighty they may act, even celebs will eventually vote with their feet and get out of Cali when they feel the pinch.

Here's the thing that gets me- and I've seen this repeatedly when some politician or other makes some decision, or chooses a running mate or whatever- People pop up and say "(insert name of politician) just lost the election" or "...just won the election" or "...just threw away his chances."

Over and over I see this. Now, tell me, guys- honestly, do you really think that before Joe Biden's handlers chose Kamala Harris as his VP, Donald Trump would have lost this election, and that this decision of picking Harris is the deciding factor in his winning a second term?

Come on. Donald Trump is going to have a second term. He was going to have a second term before Harris was chosen, and the choice of Harris doesn't mean he's going to really, really, really have a second term.

I don't know why people feel the need to say this kind of thing- that this one thing is the deciding factor. Do people think it makes them look politically savvy, to make these empty declarations? It doesn't make them look savvy; quite the opposite, actually. It's damn silly.

Oh, yes, "Trump was in trouble before Harris was declared, but now, he's on easy street." Well, thank goodness the outcome didn't hinge on Donald Trump's strong leadership and his increasing political acumen, otherwise, he'd be in real trouble without Harris in the picture!

More optimism, less pessimism