u/table_fireplace

It's nice not to be mentioned as a team who could relocate anymore. That was a big fear 15-20 years ago, with Ralph Wilson's age and with the Bills doing annual games in Toronto for a few years. Now with the new stadium, they won't be leaving WNY for a few decades at the earliest, and hopefully never.

As much as it would have sucked, there's a part of me that wishes Trump had been approved to buy them back in 2014. They'd probably have moved to LA and be absolutely terrible, but maybe he would've been distracted and never run for President.

I'm surprised that only one of them (Manziel) has faced domestic violence allegations. Trump's losing his touch.

It is unfortunate, but in 2024 they took the lead basically the second in-person early voting opened. Dems holding onto it this long is a great sign.

And if they do well with non-partisan voters, which has happened in FL specials, some surprise wins are very much possible.

Even then, they owe a lot of their win to rejecting the far right as candidates. Moderate conservatives still aren't great, but it can't be counted as some right-wing victory.

Now let's take care of our job these next nine days.

Most sports team owners aren't great people. But one who doesn't get nearly as much shit as he deserves is Jimmy Haslam, who owns the Cleveland Browns.

He did get some flack for trading for alleged sex criminal Deshaun Watson and giving him a fully-guaranteed $230 million contract, though the heat has largely gone down for that horrible decision. But on top of that, he's funding Vivek Ramaswamy even after he released that awful ad. (You'll also see Cincinnati Bengals owner Mike Brown on the list - he gets criticized a lot for being a cheapskate, and that's extra galling now that he apparently has money to give to a bully who wants to be Governor).

I'm sorry, Browns fans. Your team has had it rough for a while, and having this guy in charge must make it hard to watch.

I'll grant that the polls and Round 1 results weren't promising. But the election still has to happen. Hoping Brazil does the right thing.

I remember Frank Mrvan being heavily targeted in 2022, easily beating back his challenger, and never being seriously challenged by the GOP again. He's got some staying power in a district that isn't that blue anymore. And I'm sure you know Beau Bayh could pull off a win for Secretary of State.

Thanks for doing your part!

For what little it’s worth, a supermajority doesn’t get you anything extra in Canada. A bare majority is enough, especially since breaking with the party on votes is almost unheard of in most cases.

It will make this harder to fix down the the road, though.

The Texas turnout so far has been impressive, but it gets better. In Tarrant, Harris, and Dallas Counties, there's a very clear trend where the bluer the precinct is, the higher the turnout is.

It's all they have.

They can't run on the economy, or immigration, or being anti-war in the Middle East, or fighting crime, or anything else that Republicans would want to run on in recent elections. They've botched all of those issues hideously. So what's that leave? That's right, racism. Or 'racial anxiety' or whatever you want to call this.

Just like with Ramaswamy's awful ad, it's an attempt to rally their worst voters for the worst reasons. It's a Hail Mary that I doubt will work, but it's not something we can ignore. We've got to use these ten days to turn out enough voters to swamp all the people who will come out for this ad. Thankfully this sub is the kind of place where we're all doing that anyway, and the results are looking great.

Far fewer, but it's not really a fair comparison since many states have expanded mail voting and early in-person voting since 2018. Turnout is up from 2022, which is the only election I would say is similar to this one.

This is big. Turnout is up vs. 2022, which is the only comparable election due to how early voting laws have changed. And that 2022 figure of 105M includes Election Day, when the majority of votes will still be cast.

We're ending Friday with 24,271,661 votes cast nationwide. For comparison, just over 105M votes were cast in 2022. And we've got ten more days plus Election Day to blow that out of the water.

Tomorrow is our 2nd last weekend to get out there and get out the vote. Let's bring this home!

If you don't get a better answer, directly donating to the Texas Democratic Party will help them prioritize who to fund, and help them keep building for the future.

Never forget that Republicans followed up their terrible recruiting in Senate races with terrible recruiting in House races.

Here's IA-2 Republican candidate Joe Mitchell informing us not only that Trump's ballroom is making a difference to the people in Iowa, but that 'we don't ride bicycles in Iowa'.

I thought that sounded ridiculous already, but apparently Iowa's had a famous state-wide bike ride, RAGBRAI, for over 50 years. Where do they find these people?

At least get Cal and Stanford out of the Atlantic Coast Conference for goodness' sake.

I'm sure we're all excited for another take on the Ramaswamy ad, so here we go.

Like all of us, I'm disgusted by the ad. And I've also thought 'what were they thinking?' But I've noticed that the pundits of the world universally assume it'll be a bad thing for Ramaswamy. And I understand why - it's clearly horrible. There is, however, a logic behind why he chose to make and release the ad, where it could benefit him.

Back in 2016, when the infamous 'Grab 'em by the pussy' tape was released, everyone was horrified, including many Republicans. Trump, notably, didn't back down, defending his awful words. And there was some exit polling to suggest that as awful as it was, some Trump voters loved it. Why? Pure sexism, that's why. It helped motivate that low-propensity base who just never voted before because there wasn't anyone terrible enough for them.

Then in 2018, we saw Christine Blasey Ford speak up about the abuse she endured from Brett Kavanaugh. And his behaviour at his confirmation hearings motivated Democrats, but it also motivated Republicans. They didn't have much to get excited about, but suddenly they had a woman to hate, and a sex criminal to defend. It likely won them a few races they otherwise would've had slip away. And it's certainly not lost on me that Heidi Heitkamp and Joe Donnelly lost races after voting not to confirm Kavanaugh, while Joe Manchin held on after voting for him (a vote I strongly disagreed with, but he did win).

One thing we can forget is that a lot of people are very, very sexist. And those people will absolutely love seeing a survivor of sexual abuse be humiliated and mocked. I'd like to believe it's a small number, but the Manosphere rolls on, and we just came off an election where the least qualified man ever beat one of the most qualified women ever. My point is that while I think this ad is likely to blow up in Ramaswamy's face, there's a totally plausible world where it helps his campaign. It'd be a gross indictment of a lot of voters, but after all we've seen, we know it's possible.

Now, I'm not just going to say we should let a monster like this win. Of course not! If you're not volunteering for anyone, make it Amy Acton. Ohio Dems are running a coordinated campaign to get out the vote for all their candidates, and you can sign up to make calls or send texts. This thing will still be decided by turnout, being a midterm, and we've got the edge there.

But don't think for a moment that being really cruel and sexist means this race is over. We've got to fight to make it over, and send a message that this kind of shit doesn't win.

You do have one option still. Since you're registered to vote in NC, you are still allowed to vote in-person in NC, either during early voting or on Election Day.

Obviously this isn't simple. You would have to return home and go to your early voting location or Election Day polling place to vote. However, if you're able to, you can still vote this way.

Early voting runs from now through October 31st, and you can vote at any early voting site in the county you're registered in. Or you can vote on November 3rd, Election Day, at your polling location.

I hope someone else will chime in if there's a way to get an absentee ballot to you, but I know you are allowed to vote in person. Good luck!

Trump is off to another key swing state to make sure the GOP wins the Senate race there.

On Monday, he's heading on down to Corinth, Mississippi.

I've liked Scott Colom for a while, but never imagined this race would be up for grabs at all. And even if it's not, every bit of GOP support here isn't going to Alaska, Iowa, or Texas.

Two weeks from now, we'll be watching the results roll in. Let's make these two weeks count by volunteering to win as much as we can.

In the meantime, a whopping 13,648,482 votes are in and banked. Keep up the amazing work!

I don't think it'll work like this, and I hope not, but I see where he's going with this.

Ramaswamy is doing what Trump did with the Access Hollywood tape in 2016. Namely, banking that while 'elites' are horrified, the voters he wants will love it.

Where he's wrong is, while I have no doubt that the hardest-core MAGA voters will love the cruelty, there's not as many of those people anymore. In 2016, people were well-off enough that they could afford the luxury of cruelty. Now, those same voters are turning on Trump because they can't afford gas and are being sent to Iran. And everyone who was never on the MAGA train is angrier than ever and sure to vote.

I don't think his bet will pay off. But it's also on us to make sure it doesn't pay off by working to get Amy Acton elected.

So one thing Ramaswamy and his team didn't consider when they even suggested making this awful ad is that a lot of people have suffered parental abuse. And they've been subjected to the sort of shit Acton's mom said about her. Being called a liar when you speak up about abuse is sadly standard. Many people have been through this.

And they're going to view Acton with a lot of sympathy, and Ramaswamy with a ton of contempt. Rightly so.

I don't have much else to say except that I'm furious with everyone who approved this bullshit, and I'll be finding time to squeeze in a phonebank shift for Acton in response. This kind of horrible tactic can't become normal.

Usually when I think 'worst ads', I think of silly self-destructive ones like the ear-melting Conor Lamb ad, or 'I'm not a witch', or the Dr. Oz crudités rant.

This ad is the worst because it's self-destructive and cruel. It can't be spun as fun or silly. It's just deeply hurtful to Acton, and to anyone who's been abused.

And it's showing up. Ramaswamy is already getting yelled at over it at rallies. Republicans everywhere are condemning it. I think it's really going to affect votes from this point on.

So this one definitely takes the crown for recent political ads, but it's not a fun win. It's disgusting, and I hope he goes down hard for it.

I'm not sure. Apparently some of the counties with extended hours also had long lines to deal with. Some county results have been trickling in here and there on Bluesky but I haven't seen a statewide total yet.

Relative to the same point in 2024 (the end of the 1st day of early voting).