Stephan: At one level this is a story about Trump's deliberate incompetence in handling the pandemic. At a more important level, it is about the willful ignorance and stupidity of the people who support him.
Photo Donald Trump posted to Twitter of him speaking to a largely maskless crowd refusing to socially distance at a Florida rally.
According to a new study from Stanford University, President Donald Trump’s campaign rallies have resulted in 30,000 COVID-19 infections that would not have happened otherwise — and 700 of the infected people died.https://platform.twitter.com/embed/index.html?dnt=false&embedId=twitter-widget-0&frame=false&hideCard=false&hideThread=false&id=1322527556126605313&lang=en&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.rawstory.com%2F2020%2F10%2Ftrump-rallies-responsible-for-30000-infections-and-700-s-stanford-study%2F&theme=light&widgetsVersion=ed20a2b%3A1601588405575&width=550pxLISTEN: Mark Cuban Joins The New Raw Story Podcast!
The president has come under sharp criticism for hosting large campaign rallies in the middle of a pandemic. Many of these rallies have been followed by localized outbreaks, and conservative businessman Herman Cain died after attending an indoor Trump event in Tulsa, Oklahoma, although it is not clear whether the rally was his point of infection.
At Trump’s rallies, masks are typically provided but not required, and the president has frequently made fun of masks, leading to low mask use at the events and little or no social distancing. While the rallies typically require temperature checks at the gate, this alone is not effective […]
Stephan: Perhaps because a majority of Americans have never been outside the United States, there is an extraordinary ignorance and lack of interest in our society about the importance of geopolitical relationships, and Trump and his administration feed on this to the detriment of the country. It is going to take years to repair what was done by Trump and his incompetent orcs.
United Nations
The United States once again became the largest member state of the United Nations (UN) that has yet to pay their regular budget assessments, a UN regular budget statement shows, disclosing the international organization is undergoing tight expenditure controls.
The statement was released by the UN at the Fifth Committee of the General Assembly at the 75th session of the United Nations, during which member states showed concern over the UN’s financial situation and called for timely payment for the UN’s regular budget assessments.
The report warned that the 75-year-old organization is undergoing a cash crisis as the deficit reached $106 million. Among the 69 member states with unpaid budget assessments, the U.S. remains the largest overdue member state.
According to the report, as of September 30, the U.S. accounts for 73 percent or $1.09 billion and 54.3 percent or $1.38 billion of the unpaid assessment in both regular budget and peacekeeping operations assessments respectively.
Sound financial situation is the guarantee for the UN to fulfill its mandates and to implement program activities. Without enough financial support, many UN operations would […]
Stephan: You cannot be a Republican and an ethical person, and that is not a politically partisan statement. The factual evidence of this truth is overwhelming.
An election worker guides voters in cars at a mail ballot drop-off site at NRG Stadium in Houston on Oct. 7. Voters can also cast their ballots at a drive-thru voting site. Credit: Go Nakamura/Getty
Texas Republicans have asked a federal judge to throw out at least 117,000 ballots cast in Harris County, a heavily Democratic area that has experienced an unprecedented surge in early voting this month. The brazen effort to undo legally cast ballots in a diverse, populous county is an eleventh-hour attempt to diminish Joe Biden’s chances of carrying the swing state on Nov. 3. Republicans claim that Harris County’s use of drive-thru voting violates the U.S. Constitution, requiring the judge to throw out every ballot cast this way—more than 117,000 as of Friday. This argument is outrageous and absurd. But the case landed in front of U.S. District Judge Andrew Hanen, one of the most notoriously partisan conservatives in the federal judiciary. Democrats have good reason to fear that Hanen will order the mass nullification of ballots as early as Nov. 2, when he […]
