Madison Square Garden to Host First Fascist Rally Since 1939

Trump will hold a rally in the arena on Oct. 27

Nazi storm troopers fill the aisles as the crowd sings “The Star-Spangled Banner” at the opening of the German American Bund’s rally at Madison Square Garden.

On Oct. 9, 2024, Donald Trump announced that he had added a rally to his campaign schedule for Oct. 27. “We just rented Madison Square Garden,” Trump told the crowd at campaign rally stop in Scranton, Penn. “We’re gonna make a play for New York, it hasn’t been done in a long time. It hasn’t been done in many decades.”

It has been eight and a half decades in fact. From NPR:

On the evening of Feb. 20, 1939, the marquee of New York’s Madison Square Garden was lit up with the evening’s main event: a “Pro American Rally.” The organizers had chosen the date in celebration of George Washington’s birthday and had procured a 30-foot-tall banner of America’s first president for the stage. More than 20,000 men and women streamed inside and took their seats. The view they had was stunning: Washington was hung between American flags — and swastikas.

The rally was sponsored by the German American Bund, an organization with headquarters in Manhattan and thousands of members across the United States. In the 1930s, the Bund was one of several organizations in the United States that were openly supportive of Adolf Hitler and the rise of fascism in Europe. They had parades, bookstores and summer camps for youth. Their vision for America was a cocktail of white supremacy, fascist ideology and American patriotism.

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DeSantis Government Threatens to Imprison Tampa NBC Affiliate for Running Pro-Choice Ad

Another baby step on the march to the Handmaids' Republic of Giliead

Popular Information: On October 3, the Florida Department of Health sent a letter to Mark Higgins, the General Manager of WFLA, Tampa’s NBC affiliate. The letter, sent by Florida Department of Health General Counsel John Wilson, claimed that airing the ad violates Florida law. Wilson cites Florida’s law against “sanitary nuisance,” which prohibits “the commission of any act… by which… the health and lives of individuals… may be endangered.” Wilson argues that WFLA’s decision to air the ad could “threaten or impair the health and lives of women.” Wilson advised Higgins that, now that he has been notified that the ad is creating a “sanitary nuisance,” WFLA must stop airing it within 24 hours. Failure to do so, Wilson writes, would be a crime punishable by up to 60 days in prison under Florida law. The letter was first reported by investigative reporter Jason Garcia.

New York Times Finally Reports on Trump’s Incoherence and Lack of Accuity

After months, even years, of sane-washing Donald Trump, the New York Times reported on Saturday that Donald Trump has been delivering “rambling” and “fantastical” speeches at campaign rallies this year. But with just a month to go before the 2024 general election when many Americans are voting early, it is may be too little and too late to make a difference.

New York Times: New York Times (Paywall): “He rambles, he repeats himself, he roams from thought to thought — some of them hard to understand, some of them unfinished, some of them factually fantastical. He voices outlandish claims that seem to be made up out of whole cloth. He digresses into bizarre tangents about golf, about sharks, about his own ‘beautiful’ body. He relishes ‘a great day in Louisiana’ after spending the day in Georgia.”

“He expresses fear that North Korea is ‘trying to kill me’ when he presumably means Iran. As late as last month, Mr. Trump was still speaking as if he were running against President Biden, five weeks after his withdrawal from the race.”

DeSantis Wields Extra-Legal Powers to Fight Florida Abortion, Pot Amendments


Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis just can’t help himself: If there is a way to wield authoritarian power to advance his own political ends, he will do it and Florida law and Floridians be damned.

The Tampa Bay Times has reported on Puddin Fingers’ latest nefarious attempt to undermine Amendment 3, which would legalize recreational marijuana use. Herr Governor used the Florida Department of Transportation to issue a 30-second public service announcement paid with state funds asserting that “DUI crashes increase in states with legalized marijuana, putting everyone at risk.”

Except: The preliminary results of an Insurance Institute for Highway Safety study of injured drivers who visited emergency rooms in California, Colorado and Oregon showed that drivers who used marijuana alone were no more likely to be involved in crashes than drivers who hadn’t used the drug. That is consistent with a 2015 study by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration that found that a positive test for marijuana was not associated with increased risk of being involved in a police-reported crash.

But that’s not all. Not content to let the citizens of Florida make up their own minds about access to reproductive medical treatment, the failed presidential candidate and go-go boot–wearing governor also sent his private army of goons to the homes of people who had signed a petition to get Amendment 4 on the ballot to ostensibly corroborate that they actually signed the petition, which would overturn Florida’s Draconian six-week abortion law. This, after the deadline to challenge the petition had passed.That was a ham-handed and clearly illegal use of state resources to further MeatBall Ron’s personal agenda.
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Trump and Wealthy Donors Have Started Undermining the 2024 Election Results

ABC News

Judd Legum at Popular Information offers a pretty good explainer on how Donald Trump and billionaire asshats like Peter Theil are already calling into question the results of the presidential election before a single vote has been cast. It’s rich that Trump is accusing the U.S. Postal Service of ineptitude in handling mail-in votes, since the postmaster general, Louis DeJoy, is a Trump appointee:

There are 49 days until Election Day in the United States. Although the presidential race remains extremely close, Donald Trump and his allies have escalated their efforts to undermine the results.

In a post to Truth Social on Sunday morning, Trump falsely claimed that the United States Postal Service (USPS) “has admitted that it is a poorly run mess that is experiencing mail loss and delays at a level never seen before.” Trump asked, “how can we possibly be expected to allow or trust the U.S. Postal Service to run the 2024 Presidential Election?”

Read more here.

34th First Annual Ig Nobel Prizes Feature Dead Trout, Guidance Pigeons, Drunk Worms

From IFL Science:

The 2024 Ig Nobel Prizes have been announced, and once again prove that science can be funny, which only sometimes gets in the way of it being good.

Highlights this year include research comparing the movements of live and dead trout, and sober and drunk worms. Apparently, being drunk may harm a worm’s capacity for movement more than being dead interferes with trout’s.

The Ig Nobel awards each year honor (or dishonor) research that “first makes you laugh, and then makes you think.” One such discovery won this year’s Ig Nobel for Medicine with the revelation that side-effects may make medicine more effective. How did the authors discover this important information? They gave people placebos (ie fake medications with no ingredients targeted at their condition). The capacity of the human mind to heal ourselves, at least partially, when given a treatment we think will work is remarkable, but requires some sort of belief.

Trump Serves Word Salad Answer on Funding for Childcare – Mainstream Media Ignores His Dysphasia Again

Donald Trump serving up word salad at the Economic Club of New York, Sept. 5, 2024
Donald Trump serving up word salad at the Economic Club of New York, Sept. 5, 2024

Question from panelist Reshma Saujani, founder of the nonprofit Girls Who Code and its campaign to help mothers, Moms First: “If you win in November, can you commit to prioritizing legislation to make child care affordable? And if so, what specific piece of legislation will you advance?”

Answer from former President and current GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump: “Well, I would do that and we’re sitting down, you know, I was, somebody, we had Senator Marco Rubio and my daughter, Ivanka was sooo..uh..impactful on that issue. It’s a very important issue… But I think when you talk about the kind of numbers that I’m talking about, that, because, the child care is, child care is ..couldn’t, you know, there’s something you’d have to have it in this country, you have to have it. uh but when you talk about those numbers compared to the kind of numbers that I’m talking about by taxing foreign nations at levels that..they’re not used to but they’ll get used to it very quickly. And it’s not gonna stop them from doing business with us, but they’ll have a very substantial tax when they send product into our Country. Those numbers are so much bigger than any numbers we’re talking about including child care…that it’s gonna take care. We’re gonna have. I look forward to having no deficits within a fairly short period of time. Coupled with the reductions that I told you about on waste and fraud and all the other things that are going on in our country. Because I have to stay with child care..I wanna stay with child care but those numbers are small relative to the kind of economic numbers that I’m talking about including growth..but growth also headed up by what the plan is that I just..uhh..that I just told you about, we’re gonna be taking in trillions of dollars. And as much as child care..uhh..is talked about as being expensive, it’s relatively speaking not very expensive compared to the kinda of numbers we’ll be taking in. We’re gonna make this into an incredible country that can afford to take care of it’s people…and then we’ll worry about the rest of the World. Let’s help other people. But we’re gonna take care of our country first, this is about America first, is about Make America Great Again. We have to do it because right now we’re a failing nation. So we’ll take care of it. Thank you.”

Here is Kamala Harris’ answer to a similar question:

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