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What you want to say – 21st October 2020 October 21, 2020

Posted by WorldbyStorm in Uncategorized.
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As always, following on Dr. X’s suggestion, it’s all yours, “announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose”, feel free.

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1. NFB - October 21, 2020

The government backpedal continues apace. Yesterday it was attendance at funerals. Today they can’t make up their mind whether underage GAA will go ahead: https://www.rte.ie/sport/gaa/2020/1021/1172871-only-senior-inter-county-games-permitted-during-level-5/

Click that link when you can, the content changes hour to hour it seems.

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WorldbyStorm - October 21, 2020

They had all weekend and Monday to prepare for this. Actually they had weeks before. It’s a staggering lack of attention to detail.

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2. Dr. X - October 21, 2020

The alt-right seem to be sniffing about, looking for chinks in the covid armour they can exploit. This includes disrupting an inquest into the death of a 17 year old from covid:
https://www.irishtimes.com/news/crime-and-law/courts/coroner-s-court/inquest-into-death-of-girl-17-in-mayo-covid-ward-stopped-over-rule-breach-1.4385492

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NFB - October 21, 2020

Jemima Burke named there is the “journalist” who heckled Tony Hoolohan a few weeks ago, after gaining access to a briefing by claiming to be employed by a non-existent newspaper. Comes from a family of proudly homophobic malcontents. No shame whatsoever.

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WorldbyStorm - October 21, 2020

To turn up at such an event where there are parents and relations who have lost a child and act like that. To adapt Nye Bevan’s words… they are lower than vermin. They really are.

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Dr. X - October 21, 2020

She has apparently been published in the Connacht Telegraph. So why on earth would she lie about being from a paper that hasn’t existed since 1926?

https://westernpeople.ie/2020/05/10/who-is-jemima-burke-the-mayo-journalist-whose-questioning-of-dr-tony-holohan-went-viral/

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3. CL - October 21, 2020

Since January 2017 Julia Hahn has been Special Assistant to President Donald Trump.

” Hahn is connected to Peter Brimelow… Brimelow founded the white nationalist hate group VDARE. VDARE traffics in the “white genocide” conspiracy theory, which suggests that white people are being systemically replaced in Western nations by non-white people. VDARE has published commentary by one of the principal organizers of the deadly white supremacist “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, and publicly defended that event on its third anniversary this August. Brimelow’s group has also published apologia regarding the ideologies espoused by far-right mass murderers in El Paso, Texas, and Christchurch, New Zealand….
Hahn also showed an interest in keeping immigrant children locked in ICE detention centers. On Aug. 22, 2015, Bannon emailed Hahn, McHugh and Miller a link to a Business Insider story about a Los Angeles-based judge who defied the Obama administration by ordering the release of immigrant children from ICE detention.
“Outrageous. She’s fanatical,” Hahn wrote to the group, referring to the judge.”
https://www.splcenter.org/hatewatch/2020/10/21/trump-official-brought-hate-connections-white-house

“Lawyers appointed by a federal judge to identify migrant families who were separated by the Trump administration say that they have yet to track down the parents of 545 children and that about two-thirds of those parents were deported to Central America without their children, according to a filing Tuesday from the American Civil Liberties Union.”
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/immigration/lawyers-say-they-can-t-find-parents-545-migrant-children-n1244066

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WorldbyStorm - October 21, 2020

All too believable unfortunately.

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4. tafkaGW - October 22, 2020

The longer read on the RISE website about the Covid pandemic in Ireland and the government response by Diana O’Dwyer is really worth reading.

Some of the best writing I’ve seen about Covid19 and its relationship to the systematic injuries inflicted by capitalism on workers and the poor. She’s spot on about the general ideology of pushing responsibility for containing the spread onto individuals while allowing bosses to operate workplaces designed to maximise the spread of the disease.

I don’t think that we’re talking here about a ‘transitional demand’, as I believe someone commented here before: a near-Zero Covid strategy is doable, and desirable, even in a capitalist context: just look at, for example, Vietnam and NZ.

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WorldbyStorm - October 22, 2020

Excellent research and analysis by her and by RISE.

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5. NFB - October 22, 2020

30 or so far right anti-maskers on O’Connell Street today. Garda watching on. No arrests, no “on the spot” fines, no dispersal that I could see reported. Pathetic.

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NFB - October 22, 2020

They did arrest a section, eventually, but with a display of patience that is inconsistent with Garda reaction on other protests, to put it mildly.

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6. CL - October 22, 2020

“economics as it’s practiced now is the study of capitalism. It takes the axioms of capitalism as givens and then tries to work from those to various ameliorations and tweaks to the system that would make for a better capitalism, but they don’t question the fundamental axioms…

capitalism likes to pretend that it’s nature itself, and that’s what economics is today, largely.
Take the term “efficiency.” In capitalist economics, that’s just regarded as almost a synonym for “good,” but it completely depends on what the efficiency is being aimed at. You know, machine guns are efficient, gas chambers are efficient. So, “efficiency” as such does not mean “good.” It is a measure of the least amount of effort put in for the most amount gotten out…..
Capitalist economics misunderstands and misjudges the world badly, and that’s why we’re in the mess we’re in — caught between biosphere degradation and radical social inequality. These are both natural results of capitalism as such, a result of the economic calculations we make under capitalist axioms….

We’re in a science fiction novel, as a culture. Science fiction is the realism of our time, as I’ve been saying over and over again. It’s the best way to describe the world that we’re in.”
https://jacobinmag.com/2020/10/kim-stanley-robinson-ministry-future-science-fiction

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7. CL - October 22, 2020

“The Government has won a key Dáil vote on its controversial mother-and-baby home legislation by the substantial margin of 78 votes to 67….
In a statement to RTÉ News after the Dáil vote, Social Democrats TD Holly Cairns said: “I asked the minister on the outset, if he will be considering any of the amendments put forward by TDs that are based on input from survivors and human rights experts? He said no.

“It is disgraceful that after pleas from survivors of institutional abuse that the government will not even consider one of the over 60 amendments from the opposition.” ….
“We are talking about the most serious kinds of human rights violations – missing children, forced disappearances, illegal adoption and so much more horrific systematic institutional abuse,” she said.

Sinn Féin’s Louise O’Reilly said on social media that she was “devastated for the survivors of institutional abuse”.
https://www.rte.ie/news/politics/2020/1022/1173326-mother-baby-home/

“Dr Maeve O’Rourke: Here’s a full analysis of the problems with the Government’s Mother and Baby Homes Bill

The Clann Project Report discusses in detail the State’s human rights law obligations to ensure access to archives relating to systematic human rights violations.
Just this month the UN Special Rapporteur on the promotion of truth, justice, reparation and guarantees of non-recurrence published a report to the UN General Assembly that addresses access to archives as a crucial enabler of memorialisation and transition.”
https://www.thejournal.ie/readme/maeve-orourke-analysis-mother-and-baby-homes-5240049-Oct2020/

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Paul Culloty - October 23, 2020

And the Data Protection Commissioner now says that decision is illegal:

https://www.irishexaminer.com/news/arid-40070054.html?type=amp

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Alibaba - October 23, 2020

Good catch and great news.

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CL - October 24, 2020

“Green Party representatives and party officers are considering their position amid a slew of member resignations over the Mother and Baby Homes legislation…..
It’s understood the Green Party head office was informed of a number of resignations in the hours following Thursday’s vote.
One senior party source said that elected representatives as well as party officers are considering their positions.”
https://www.irishexaminer.com/news/arid-40070084.html

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Fergal - October 24, 2020

What were the Greens thinking? Or have they well and truly left their brains outside Leinster House?
I exclude FF and FG… this was their Ireland after all…

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sonofstan - October 24, 2020

Greens and thinking? As they showed the last time in govt. and are showing again, anything outside their cosy light green agenda is beyond their feeble powers of ratiocination.
And you’re right about FFG – it was their Ireland. The rest of us forced to live (or die) in it.

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WorldbyStorm - October 24, 2020

Heard some rumblings about people leaving the GP this last day. I’m pretty sure that the Examiner article has more than a grain of truth in it.

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8. yourcousin - October 23, 2020
9. Jim Monaghan - October 24, 2020

The founder of modern Irish Trotskyism. ”
GERRY LAWLESS:ONE OF the most colourful figures in the history of Irish socialism, Gerry Lawless, who has died in London, made legal history by taking the first case heard at the European Court of Human Rights.

It was against his internment during the 1950s. He was the first citizen of any European country to take legal action against a government and, though he lost, he set an important precedent.

Gerald (usually known as Gerry, but also as Géry for a time) Lawless was born in Dublin’s North Strand in August 1936, the fifth of nine children to Edward Lawless, a helper on a delivery lorry, and his wife Theresa (née Bell).

As a boy he joined the Fianna, youth wing of the IRA, and moved on to the IRA. He first came to the attention of the authorities in 1953 when he was convicted of malicious damage to a plate glass window bearing an image of Queen Elizabeth II. In 1956, in the first of many splits in which he was involved, he joined most of the IRA’s Dublin brigade in leaving the organisation. The dissidents joined up with Saor Uladh, an earlier Northern-based split.https://www.marxists.org/history/etol/writers/lawless/index.htm?fbclid=IwAR20cS7QwHw9t66nWs0EjQlSX_psu0gHwwzgQRME2vmazxZfJOTTdN0HRrg This site is doing a collection of his writings. Can someone confirm his pen names when writing for various journals across the water.

“

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10. lcox - October 24, 2020

Some here may already be aware of this but the Greencastle People’s Office (resisting Dalriadan mining in Co Tyrone) have put their name to a statement by environmental justice groups across Europe challenging a problematic-looking “research project” funded by the EU to the tune of €3 million:

Click to access statement-H2020-MIREU.pdf

The point of said project is apparently to develop a “social licence to operate” for mining companies across the EU periphery, drawing on problematic research into anti-mining resistance:

http://www.envjustice.org/2020/09/mireu-backfires/

(in German) https://taz.de/Einseitiger-Kampf-um-Bergbauprojekte/!5720507/

EP question from Spanish GUE/NGL deputies:

https://www.europarl.europa.eu/doceo/document/E-9-2020-004817_EN.html

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11. Paul Culloty - October 24, 2020

Depressing if confirmed later:

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roddy - October 24, 2020

Red C go through some convoluted process to push the SF figure down.

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Paul Culloty - October 25, 2020

The FF vote appears to be melting away like snowflakes:

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WorldbyStorm - October 25, 2020

Makes sense the drift to FG. That 18% undecided will be fought for I’d guess.

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gypsybhoy69 - October 26, 2020

Not sure it’s that depressing. As long as I’ve been alive I’ve known I lived in a right leaning country. One where the right was mostly polling 80%+.
Seems to be me we’re down to one predominantly right wing party with influence. I’m looking at the positives in this poll.

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WorldbyStorm - October 26, 2020

That’s a good point.

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12. yourcousin - October 25, 2020

RIP Jerry Jeff Walker

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yourcousin - October 25, 2020

The song that first turned me on to Jerry Jeff. This one strikes home as my old man was a long haired redneck (or a hip neck if you like).

The story behind the song.

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yourcousin - October 25, 2020

And the anthem of the cosmic cowboys (totally unrelated but I love it).

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yourcousin - October 25, 2020

And fuck it, as long as I’m spamming the page with shit, my favorite Jerry Jeff song.

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WorldbyStorm - October 25, 2020

Definitely not spamming.

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6to5against - October 26, 2020

spent a very pleasant hour listening to all of that last night on your recommendation, yc. Definitely not spam.

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sonofstan - October 25, 2020

Ah, no…

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sonofstan - October 25, 2020

My JJW favourite

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yourcousin - October 25, 2020

My first Jerry Jeff album was volume 2 of “A Man Must Carry On”.

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CL - October 25, 2020

‘Sammy Davis Jr.’s version of the song reduced President Richard Nixon to tears’

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13. 6to5against - October 25, 2020

a propos of nothing, a thought…

I spent a very enjoyable afternoon in the garden, tidying it up and starting work on a storage box I’ve half intended to build for the last few months. Tomorrow I have a mind to relay some carpet that we took up during the summer when a new pup arrived in the house and started pissing on everything.

All the sort of things many of us do when we have a few days off and the country is locked down.. They add a bit of purpose to the day and leave you feeling good about yourself afterwards.

But I went back over my day there, and my plans for tomorrow and virtually everything I did would likely be denied to me as an activity if I was a renter rather than an owner.

Renters might have access to a garden and I’m sure nobody minds if they do a little maintenance, But they generally can’t redesign the space, or indulge in a bit of harmless DIY building. which is half the fun, or more. Most rental agreements don’t allow pets, so I would never have had that problem, or any of the fun things that came with it. And had I sneaked a pet in and they pissed on the carpet, I would have had all the hassle worrying about damage and deposits.

And I would have faced a few days of lockdown with time on my hands on little to do.

Yet another invisible (social) cost of being poor.

but only if we’re homeowners. I went back over my day and a

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WorldbyStorm - October 25, 2020

Completely agree. There’s a real imbalance there. This is hellish for a lot of people and no end in sight.

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14. ar scáth a chéile - October 26, 2020

And its bye bye Pinochet

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WorldbyStorm - October 26, 2020

Genuinely a great great moment.

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ar scáth a chéile - October 26, 2020
ar scáth a chéile - October 26, 2020

..but to be middle aged ( living for near half a century under the neo-lib hegemony he with his Chicago boys helped pioneer) is very heaven.

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ar scáth a chéile - October 26, 2020

But this is youth’s triumph.maximum respect to the school girls who started it all last October
Mauro Osorio (@mausorio) Tweeted:
Es increíble, pero lo de Chile de hoy comenzó con unos adolescentes.
https://t.co/MtPRsfPLzM https://twitter.com/mausorio/status/1320540322309591042?s=20

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15. EWI - October 26, 2020

Another day, another Irish Times filled with columnists clearly hewing to a sneaky anti-lockdown editorial line at the IT.

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16. EWI - October 26, 2020

Under the Labour government of Harold Wilson (1964-1970), a secret Foreign Office unit initiated a propaganda offensive in Chile aiming to prevent Allende, Chile’s leading socialist figure, winning power in two presidential elections, in 1964 and 1970.

The unit – the Information Research Department (IRD) – gathered information designed to damage Allende and lend legitimacy to his political opponents, and distributed material to influential figures within Chilean society.

The IRD also shared intelligence about left-wing activity in the country with the US government. British officials in Santiago assisted a CIA-funded media organisation which was part of extensive US covert action to overthrow Allende, culminating in the 1973 coup.

A Foreign Office planning document written in 1964 had noted that Latin America was “a vital area in the Cold War and checking a Communist takeover here is at least as important a British national interest as negotiating trading and stepping up exports”.

The report added that the US was “anxious for the United Kingdom to do as much as possible in the propaganda field” in Latin America.

Several months before Chile’s 1964 presidential election, a British Cabinet Office unit called the Counter-subversion Committee’s Working Group on Latin America, advised the IRD that “it will be important to prevent significant gains by the extreme left” in Chile, “now and later”.

[…]

The IRD initiated its propaganda offensive in Chile by covertly supporting Frei in the months leading up to the election. As Elizabeth Allott, a longstanding IRD officer, wrote shortly after Frei claimed victory, the unit had focused on “the distribution of our more serious material to reliable contacts and to securing the publication of certain press articles” critical of Allende, and favourable to Frei.

Allott had also proposed “SPA [special Political Action] with supporting action from the US” to split the left vote.

https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2020-09-22-exclusive-secret-cables-reveal-britain-interfered-with-elections-in-chile/

If that’s what someone like Wilson would do, imagine what the Tories may have been up to in the decades since.

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WorldbyStorm - October 26, 2020

Not in any sense to take away from your broad point, re what has happened since, but just on the timeline, was Wilson aware of the IRD’s activities – given he himself was under threat from internal groups within the British intelligence services and the British establishment as is now generally acknowledged. Certainly it’s unlikely he knew about the Chile 1964 Presidential Election activities because he came to power later in 1964.

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17. Alibaba - October 26, 2020

Regarding conspiracists:

‘The people here believed in a malignant hidden hand behind everything that was happening and everything that has ever happened. They denied that the virus was real. For many non-conspiracists, the sight of upwards of five thousand people from all over southern England crammed together shoulder to shoulder without face masks in Central London, in defiance of the rules against large gatherings, would seem a display of selfishness provocative enough to justify its being broken up by the police. But what is democracy without political protest? And it was a genuine political protest. It was an anti-government demonstration, and the participants had sincerely held convictions. And yet the star speaker at this rally, supposedly organised to fly the flag of resistance to state oppression, was David Icke.’

https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v42/n20/james-meek/red-pill-blue-pill

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18. sonofstan - October 27, 2020

From an interview with Joni Mitchell, talking about fan mail:

I got a letter from a little girl in Ireland who wrote to me. Her father was in a rock’n’roll band and they were going off to play someplace. She went outside to see them off, and one of the guys in the band came up to her and said, “Here, you should have this.” And he gave her what she called a “wonky tape recorder.” It had The Circle Game on it and he said, “This is a song that you should know, a girl your age.” At that time the English were terrorising Ireland, and they’d fly over in battalions with helicopters, and they’d do it at 8pm, right when the people were putting their children to bed. She said it was terrifying, this brigade of helicopters going over, and “I survived the war by putting the wonky tape recorder up to my ear and listening to The Circle Game.” It’s hard to beat that, in terms of reward for your song. I found that very exciting.

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WorldbyStorm - October 27, 2020

As a regular visitor to Belfast in the late 80s for a while I do remember there were BA helicopters on station over the city for hours. And I wouldn’t be suprised if there were regular flights in and out of bases in Armagh and so on – all hugely disruptive – but batallions deliberately sent out at 8p to interrupt kids being put to sleep is a stretch. It seems like she misinterpreted what was said?

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sonofstan - October 27, 2020

Yeah, a bit of a stretch.
I was more interested in the fact that it shows something that Brits tend to be unaware of: how their private little war was seen elsewhere.

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19. Aonrud ⚘ - October 27, 2020

Oh dear…

Meanwhile, the board of management of Antifa are presumably having to send out a lot of takedown notices for copyright infringement.

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20. CL - October 27, 2020

“Cork city councillor, Lorna Bogue, has resigned from the Green Party.

It is understood she resigned last Thursday over the Government’s handling of the sealing of the Mother and Baby Home records for 30 years.
Ms Bogue said the Greens have not yet made public the number of resignations from the party over the past few days sparked by the fallout from the mother and baby homes records bill.”
https://www.irishexaminer.com/new

-“why is the State’s insistence on secrecy around the institutional abuse which happened in Ireland stronger than ever?….

victims/survivors of institutional abuse are equal citizens who have the same constitutional and human rights as everyone else.
It is only by recognising and respecting those rights now that the State can demonstrate remorse for, and capacity for change from, its previous pattern of abuse.
This is a principle that should have underpinned all responses since 1999 to our terrible legacy of unlawful family separation and systematic cruelty and exploitation in institutions nationwide….

Survivors have been treated as though they cannot be trusted with the evidence of their own past…..
The ability of many to piece together their own history – including such fundamental aspects as their own identity and health conditions – has been denied. In addition, society’s opportunity to properly engage with our recent past and dismantle the similar systems that prevail at present is significantly curtailed…..

The State’s ever-expanding censorship of testamentary and archival evidence is unlikely to fully survive future litigation. Putting survivors through the intense stress and delays of litigating for access to basic information will be yet another incalculable failure on all of our part.

Ireland’s international human rights reputation is also at stake, as critical reports and urgent recommendations by independent treaty monitoring bodies and human rights experts continue to pile up. ..The human rights abuses described by survivors are among the most serious recognised by the international community…

Forced disappearance, torture, inhuman and degrading treatment, widespread arbitrary detention and systematic violations of the right to respect for family and private life all require the State to investigate in a manner that includes victims/survivors….
These things all depend on the State producing the evidence it holds and forcing the production of privately held records.-
https://www.rte.ie/brainstorm/2019/0503/1047282-10-ways-institutional-abuse-details-are-still-being-kept-secret/

“Just before she turned 7, my mother was called into the parlour of Bessborough and told to meet her new ‘mammy and daddy’ – a Cork couple in their 50s, with one grown-up son.
She was literally handed over by the nuns.
She was given their surname. Up until then, she had just been called Mary. …
“My mother was told there was nothing in the records about her. No files. Not a scrap of paper….Nearly seven years spent in a mother and baby home, of course, there were records, but she wasn’t getting access to them….
when you bury records, you bury people’s past and their right to discover who they are.
My mother has never told her story publicly before. But she gave me permission to write this piece because she believes what the Government did last week was ‘shameful’.
She wants to add her voice to the thousands of other people shouting stop…..Don’t seal the records.
https://www.irishexaminer.com/opinion/commentanalysis/arid-40071053.html

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CL - October 27, 2020

“Fianna Fail TD Niall Collins has hit out at those campaigning to unseal records collected by the Mother and Baby Homes Commission (MHBC), claiming that some of its proponents are spreading ‘fake news and lies’….
News of Mr Collins’s communication follows claims made by Fianna Fail senator Lisa Chambers that Sinn Fein has ‘politically hijacked’ the Mother and Baby Homes Bill for its own purposes.”
https://extra.ie/2020/10/27/news/irish-news/fianna-fail-td-hits-out-fake-news-mother-and-baby-home-records”
https://extra.ie/2020/10/27/news/irish-news/fianna-fail-td-hits-out-fake-news-mother-and-baby-home-records

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CL - October 28, 2020

“On Tuesday, Sinn Fein children’s spokesperson Kathleen Funchion TD denied an allegation that her party was “using paid advertising” to influence the issue….
She was responding to a claim made on social media by Fianna Fail TD Cathal Crowe, who said her party was “putting paid advertising out on this and infiltrating survivor support groups.
“If they had been more responsible with their information we wouldn’t have this huge upset.”
https://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/opposition-dispute-claims-they-have-exploited-mother-and-baby-homes-controversy-1026337.html

“Despite having more special advisers than the Taoiseach, not one it appears mentioned to Eamon Ryan that his party would be damaged by the sight of Minister Roderic O’Gorman at the helm of one of the most contentious bills in modern Irish politics….
It’s early days for this calamitous government and although it was often touted that the Green ‘mudguard’ would be back in play to protect the senior hurlers, it appears the most detrimental blow to the Green Party has already been struck and their remaining members appear to be celebrating.”
https://www.irishexaminer.com/opinion/commentanalysis/arid-40071656.html

“Of all the less than desirable national traits we possess, our consistent failure to exorcise the ghosts of the past is one of the worst.
We have a tendency, instead, to bury them and hope they never raise their head again. As we have seen with depressing regularity over the last few decades, that seldom ends well.

In fairness to this Government, it has now tried a novel approach to our age-old inclination for secrecy – it wants to bury things in the future. The decision to pass the controversial Mother and Baby Homes Bill into law was, in turns, baffling, ­frustrating and disgraceful.”
https://www.independent.ie/opinion/comment/sealing-the-mother-and-baby-files-is-another-betrayal-by-official-ireland-39671795.html

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21. Paddy Healy - October 27, 2020

I was just going to post this. There was no word on RTE news about it

My email address is now paddy.healy25@gmail.com

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NFB - October 27, 2020

On the front page for me?

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WorldbyStorm - October 27, 2020

Yeah me too.

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22. Paul Culloty - October 27, 2020

The “LGB Alliance” are attempting to spread their ideology to Ireland, but thankfully have made the basic error of leaving their HQ in London.

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WorldbyStorm - October 27, 2020

Funnily enough the Phoenix had a good point about this the other week saying that the efforts to stoke up a culture war over this hasn’t worked here in large part due to the sheer ineptitude of those trying to the stoking – stuff like you point to with importations of activists from the UK which sits completely at odds with attitudes in the state. Some people are going to have very varying views on this, sincerely, but so far so good re legislation passing uncontroversially and just a bit of cop on and avoiding raising the temperature here.

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23. Paul Culloty - October 27, 2020

By the end of today, over half of the 2016 US electorate will have already voted, and given that NY voting only began on Saturday, it could be about 70% by Election Day itself:

https://electproject.github.io/Early-Vote-2020G/index.html

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CL - October 28, 2020

” -The parties’ differing approaches to mail-in ballots have resulted in an early lead for the Democrats, according to a predictive analysis by the data firm TargetSmart. It found that Democrats had cast 49.4 per cent of early ballots as of Monday, while Republicans had cast 40.8 per cent of them.

Geoff Garin, a Democratic pollster, noted that TargetSmart’s data suggested a sharp increase in “new” voters who did not cast a ballot in 2016.
“With over 14m non-2016 voters already having voted early this year, we are looking at a huge expansion of the electorate, and the data so far indicate the expansion is working to the benefit of Joe Biden and other Democrats,” Mr Garin said…..

Larry Sabato, director of the University of Virginia’s Center for Politics, said: “These early-voting people are heavily Democratic in many key states because they are worried that Trump . . . will find ways to keep their vote from counting.”

He added: “While the heavy early vote is good news for Democrats, it does not automatically prove Democrats will prevail, since Republicans will be voting disproportionately on election day itself.”…
The increase in early voting could result in a delay in establishing the victor of the election. Some states, including battlegrounds such as Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, will not start counting mail-in ballots until election day, meaning the tabulation process could last for several days.
That means the early vote counts — which will disproportionately include election day votes — could show Mr Trump with a lead that might narrow or even disappear as mail-in ballots are counted.
“Big problems and discrepancies with mail-in ballots all over the USA. Must have final total on November 3,” Mr Trump said in a tweet on Monday.-”
https://www.ft.com/content/8d8fa717-8923-4223-af75-bd6d31d25d9a

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24. CL - October 28, 2020

‘The coronavirus pandemic, the fear of postal delays and the passions inspired by the presidential candidates, both pro and con, have all contributed to the record early vote….
Campaign officials and elections experts are still trying to determine the extent to which the high turnout so far reflects voters simply casting their ballots earlier than they normally would and to what extent it reflects high enthusiasm that could translate into a record turnout.’ NYT.

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25. Paul Culloty - October 28, 2020

An Ireland Thinks poll released today shows that 18% of SF supporters would vote for Trump, compared with 11% for FF, 8% for Labour, and perhaps surprisingly, only 5% for FG – which suggests that an element of Sinn Féin support is the nationalist vote that goes to more right-wing parties elsewhere in Europe. No surprise about Aontú loyalties, however:

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