Odds and Ends — 24 February 2024

preparedwombat(78)

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Why, yes, as a matter of fact I do make a mean red beans and rice.

Cryptocurrency, Investing, Money, Economy, Business, and Debt:

Judge Signs Off on Binance's $4.3B Plea Deal With U.S. Prosecutors

Newly released Satoshi emails reveal a treasure trove of early Bitcoin lore

Coronavirus News, Analysis, and Opinion:

Early COVID-19 research is riddled with poor methods and low-quality results − a problem for science the pandemic worsened but didn’t create

Politics:

Republicans Were Warned Not to Use Informant’s Claims

At the center of it all was the unsubstantiated accusation that Mr. Biden had taken a $5 million bribe from the executive of a Ukrainian energy company, Burisma.
But what neither Mr. Grassley nor any of the other Republicans who amplified the claims said in their breathless statements was that FBI officials had warned them repeatedly to be cautious about the accusation, because it was uncorroborated and its credibility unknown.
All that the form proved, federal law enforcement officials explained, was that a confidential source had said something, and they had written it down. And now federal prosecutors say the claim was made up.

National Rifle Association and Wayne LaPierre are found liable in lawsuit over lavish spending

Senate GOP Runs from Alabama Ruling on Embryos

The National Republican Senatorial Committee is urging candidates to strongly oppose the Alabama Supreme Court ruling restricting access to fertility treatments.
Republicans have struggled to find a winning strategy on reproductive issues since the conservative-led U.S. Supreme Court reversed Roe v. Wade — and the Alabama case has given Democrats a chance to bash GOP candidates about the slippery slope of red states’ post-Roe restrictions.

”Oh my God”: Tommy Tuberville mocked for “running in circles” in disastrous IVF interview

”He clearly doesn’t know what IVF is,” MSNBC panel says, adding that the issue is a “nightmare for Republicans”

I may be going out on a limb here, but perhaps going from being a football coach to being a United States Senator is not a particularly viable career path.

Russia. It’s always been Russia.

Trump’s political career is inextricably linked to Putin and there are many theories as to why.
The ‘why’ doesn’t really matter. It makes no difference if Putin has been blackmailing Trump with kompromat or if Trump sincerely believes that Russia deserves to dominate Europe.
But all the same, there’s a simple, non-conspiratorial explanation. Russia has a long history of playing spygames and waging information warfare against other states.
In Trump, they saw an American politician who was wholly transactional and they realized that this presented them with an opportunity: If they helped Trump in such a transparent and ostentatious way that it was basically public, then Trump would see Russia as being on his side, and so would treat them as allies.

Texas Doctors Refused to Treat Ectopic Pregnancy

https://twitter.com/BidenHQ/status/1761214656687865928
- BidenHQ

https://twitter.com/acnewsitics/status/1761259250788266154
- acnewsitics

RNC Fights to Restrict Voting by Mail

Fearing that Democrats hold a crucial edge in ballots cast before Election Day, national Republicans are working to convince their voters to take advantage of mail and early voting this year.
But the party’s army of lawyers is, more quietly, sending a very different message. The RNC is fighting in courtrooms and legal filings in key election battlegrounds across the country to make it harder to cast a mail ballot and to have it counted.

https://twitter.com/YorukIsik/status/1761054182923018374
- YorukIsik

Marjorie Taylor Greene Demands Judge Be ‘Disrobed’

https://twitter.com/MuellerSheWrote/status/1761052645106880687
- MuellerSheWrote

A Vote for Trump Is a Vote for Putin—and a World in Danger

Putin now senses that he is a Trump victory in November away from a triumph in Ukraine, a vindication of his policies of brutality and aggression—and an era in which he will threaten the countries of Eastern and Central Europe with another period of Russian domination.