Is this the October Suprise? | Opinion

— October surprise? Jack Smith has filed a massive collection of evidence demonstrating Trump’s direct involvement in an attempted coup against the government of the United States, and Judge Chutkan may make it publicly available. The next two to three weeks will decide what we see and when, as Trump’s lawyers first will file their opposition to the release. For anybody who’s been paying attention, we all knew Trump and his buddies were criming against our country during the last weeks of his presidency (apparently Merrick Garland missed that for two years), but the release will probably drive a short news cycle which may inform a few low information voters.

— For the first time ever, Democrats make it rain in all 50 states. Over at Daily Kos, Morgan Stephens is reporting that the DNC is sending money to every state in the union, something we haven’t seen since Howard Dean’s “50 state strategy” back in 2008. This is great news; rightwing billionaires have been funding Republicans, particularly in low population states, for decades and the result has been the Red sweep of rural states and areas. Democrats are going to try to break some Republican supermajorities and help out down-ticket Red state candidates; the Harris campaign has also pitched in $25 million for the effort. Now, if they’d just convince some leftie mega donors to buy radio stations in those Red states (media is cheap in those areas!), we could seriously get about flipping a few purple or even Blue.

— Speaking of radio… Louise and I are in New Orleans where yesterday I was the opening keynote speaker for the Grassroots Radio Conference . Last night we hung out with old friends David Sirota and Sam Seder (who keynoted this morning) and new friend Wajahat Ali at the home of the conference organizers, Dr. MarkAlain Dery and his extraordinary wife Liana Elliott, who also started and run WHIV here in New Orleans. The conference is about and for mostly low-power FM stations that are popping up all around the country (my show is on many of them). This is a very encouraging trend!

Want more breaking political news? Click for the latest headlines at Raw Story.

— Justice Department sues Alabama for purging voters off the rolls. As I’ve noted in several of my newsletters here, Republicans across America are purging their voting rolls, depriving literally millions of people of their right to vote. Ever since 5 Republicans on the Supreme Court said a state can do this if a voter fails to vote in the last election, they’ve been going whole hog, but in a few cases they’ve been stopped or slowed down. Most recently, the Justice Department sued Alabama for their purges, saying it’s too close to the election. If you live in a state Republicans control, go to vote.gov and double-check your voter registration; if you live in a Blue part of the state and didn’t vote in the midterms, chances are they’ve already removed you from the rolls and you’ll have to re-register to vote.

— Jews and Catholics warn against Trump’s latest attack on religious voters. In two rallies, Trump has told Jewish people that if he fails to win the election it’ll be their fault. He made similar comments in a Truth Social post about Catholics. Now some religious groups are starting to push back by warning their people about political tests for religious people, but they’re massively outnumbered by the thousands of churches and televangelists and religious radio stations that are blatantly and illegally promoting Republican candidates this year. The IRS really needs to enforce the law!

— Will NYC Mayor Adams claim he was just taking tips? Ever since six Republicans on the Supreme Court ruled that if a politician does favors for somebody (in this case, the country of Turkey) and then gets paid or spiffed, that’s not a bribe that can be prosecuted but a tip. It’d be a novel defense and its probable that Adams took gifts before he helped out the Turks, so it’ll be interesting to see if his lawyers try this one out. The level of corruption among the six Republicans on the Court is truly breathtaking, and it’s a bad sign for our democracy as they continue to promote a corrupt political culture.

— Once again, the media will refuse to do their damn job and fact-check Republican lies, this time in Tuesday’s Vance/Walz debate. Expect Vance to use the “firehose of lies” strategy, where you throw out a half-dozen or so lies in a single sentence or two, forcing your opponent to burn his time rebutting them. Trump tried it with over 30 lies in his debate with Harris, and the moderators only called him on two of them. Now CBS “News” says they’ll allow Vance to tell all the lies he wants and it’ll be up to Walz to fact-check them because, apparently, facts don’t matter any longer in the American news media culture. Disgusting.

— Crazy Alert! JD Vance is attending an event today with a corrupt evangelist who said Harris uses “witchcraft.” Lance Wallnau is a big-shot in the evangelical world, and he’s doing a tour of swing states this month to encourage people to vote Republican. His efforts, by the way, are being subsidized by your and my tax dollars, as he claims a nonprofit statute. Earlier this month, Wallnau tried out the misogynistic and hateful old “Jezebel” trope against Vice President Harris, saying, “She can look presidential. That’s the seduction of what I would say is witchcraft. That’s the manipulation of imagery that creates an impression contrary to the truth, but it seduces you into seeing it. So that spirit, that occult spirit, I believe is operating on her and through her.” If anybody is channeling evil spirits, in my opinion it’s Wallnau; he’s the embodiment of the people Jesus warned us about.

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