Slog AM: Harris Reminds Everyone She’s a Democrat, Footage Shows Israeli Soldiers Allegedly Sexually Assaulting Palestinian Detainee, ISIS Affiliate Allegedly Plotted Terror Attack at Taylor Swift Concert

1. I read this headline as, “Harris reminds Hannah that Hannah thinks DeMoCrAtS aRe BaD!” and I wasn’t wrong.

   Also, I hope that the new publisher and editor hire a long-overdue copy editor/proofreader ASAP.

2. The gall of Kamala asking not to be interrupted. Because “young progressives” are always right. Especially when they forget to vote.

3. Walz said (some years back) he supported gun-safety laws to “make sure those weapons of war, that I carried in war, are only carried in war.” I think Walz was the right choice for VP, but he should probably walk that one back.

   Vance’s other accusation — that Walz somehow knew of his Guard unit’s planned Iraq deployment before it was announced and ducked out to avoid it — doesn’t even merit comment, let alone rebuttal.

4. I’m fully onboard with a ceasefire in Gaza and an end to the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian territories but I am at a loss as to what anyone expects to come from interrupting a speech. What could Harris have said in that moment that would satisfy you and what makes you think it matters at all? No one is crafting policy or making commitments with a mid-speech one-liner. She’s just killing time until security gets their hands on you.

5. @2 To be fair, engaged, young progressives usually do vote.

6. averagebob @6, quick question if you don’t mind my intruding. I’m just curious, considering you arrived fully formed on these comment threads only recently and you didn’t just fall from the coconut tree, what username did you previously comment as?

   Sadly, I don’t need to ask this question of “Ronald and Nancy”.

7. Yes, Hannah, if you want Donald Trump to win, keep saying that. I’m genuinely surprised that that’s your goal, but you do you.

8. Protestors shutting down roads and inconveniencing regular people is counterproductive and obnoxious. Protestors interrupting powerful politicians’ speeches is one of the proudest American traditions. Anyone who’s against both just conspicuously doesn’t care about the protestors or the issue they’re trying to raise (in this case Palestinian civilians, including children, being tortured, maimed and killed). Not a great look.

9. I’d wager Harris does want a Permanent Ceasefire in Gaza – Biden does, Blinken does, Sullivan does. We all do.

   They can’t force Israel & Hamas into one. Netanyahu and Likud dislike and distrust Dems because they’re too sympathetic to Palestinians.

   Cutting Israel off from arms shipments now won’t force a ceasefire. It will get that motherfucking sociopath elected. Then Netanyahu will have carte blanche and endless bombs.

10. I propose that the majority of Slog writers unite, form a political party and campaign under the slogan “cutting off our noses to spite our faces since 1991”.

11. Hannah, cut the crap about Harris “condescending” to the Palestinian protesters in the Michigan crowd. There’s an election to win here to beat a man who is planning on creating a dictatorship, and I’m ready for Kamala to boss around anyone trying to screw up her rallies. Let’s keep our focus on this slog blog, shall we, and put aside our ultra-liberal bonafides for once?

12. You folks calling for President Biden to unilaterally halt Congressionally approved military aid to Israel might want to look at the second paragraph of the first article of impeachment against Trump- the first one. It cited withholding Congressionally appropriated aid in order to force another country to change policy. Are you all asking President Biden to commit an impeachable act, of was it wrong to impeach Trump the first time? You can’t have both.

13. @12 I’d argue there is nothing more important than saving the lives of innocent civilians, especially children. Do you disagree?

14. @14 – that’s too much for these folks to wrap their heads around

    @Hannah – You should be asking yourself before reporting, were the same protestors that interrupted the campaign event the same as the United National Movement or were they provocateurs not aligned with them? If the latter, you need to investigate as to why they weren’t aligned with the United National Movement and maybe get their comment on things. It may well be that these protesters are just white co-opters trying to be performative in nature without consulting the United National Movement, who met with VP Harris before the event started.

15. @9 “Protestors interrupting powerful politicians’ speeches is one of the proudest American traditions.” It is? I remember when that dude threw a shoe at Dubya, but other than that, nothing substantial comes to mind.

16. Pandering to the hard-left-for-Palestine contingent will lose more votes than it gains, in Michigan or elsewhere.

17. Literally any cause you can name is more important than a fucking speech. People were annoyed for like 10 seconds. Get a grip.

18. @15, “there is nothing more important than saving the lives of innocent civilians, especially children.” Pick your suffering, this is played out in many conflicts all over the world. Nobody is arguing death is OK. We need to choose the best leaders to address these issues. Heckling someone during a speech ain’t that.

19. The way presidential candidate Harris responded to the protesters there to demand the slaughter in Gaza stop was REPUGNANT. The whole “if you want Donald Trump to be the president keep saying that, otherwise I’m speaking now” is exactly how Donald Trump behaves.

    Democrats really don’t get it even though it happened in 2016.

    They aren’t going to win JUST because they aren’t Donald Trump.

    The people of this country KNOW WHAT TRUMP IS GOING TO DO IF HE SQUATS IN THE WHITE HOUSE FOR ANOTHER FOUR YEARS. And just like last time, 75 million of them DON’T CARE AND WILL VOTE FOR HIM.

    Presidential candidate Harris is a Black/Asian woman running for president in the most racist and misogynist “first world” country in the world. Presidential candidate Harris needs to do better than “vote for me or Donald Trump will be POTUS again.” That didn’t work in 2016 and it will not work now.

    The people of this country want a leader who has ideas and a plan in place for how the people in this country who are suffering are going to be helped – the homeless, the almost homeless, the hungry. the weary price gouged who can barely afford to live, the retirees who pay more in taxes (percentage wise of their income) than billionaires, the working class whose taxes are going to arm, fund, aid, and abet Israel’s genocide in Palestine (WHY ARE AMERICANS OKAY WITH HUNDREDS OF BILLIONS OF THEIR TAXPAYER DOLLARS BEING GIVEN TO ISRAEL?!?!), all of the people who have had their rights taken from them (despite the Constitution stating those rights exist and there are no exceptions – women and all non-white people are human beings who all have the same rights as white men in this country, explicitly stated in the Constitution – basic human rights like bodily autonomy and the right to vote and the right to LIVE without the government interfering (that includes the police slaughtering Black people, fascists dictating what people can and cannot read, etc.), AND THE SEPARATION OF CHURCH AND STATE.

    Ignoring people who have been clamoring for an end to the slaughter and starvation in GAZA for over 10 months (in Detroit, where you need people to vote for you) is not the way to behave and will not win you the election.

    It’s like for one second there was so much positive energy after Biden stepped aside and now the Democrats are just back to the same old shit with a different face. Vote for us because we’re not Donald Trump.

    THAT’S NOT ENOUGH.
    
    SHOW US WHAT YOU ARE GOING TO DO FOR THIS COUNTRY.
    
    EXPLAIN IN DETAIL HOW YOU ARE GOING TO FIX EVERYTHING THAT HAS BEEN FUCKED UP SINCE TRUMP TOOK A DUMP ON THE ENTIRE COUNTRY.
    
    EXPLAIN IN DETAIL HOW YOU ARE GOING TO STOP THE CORRUPT AND CRIMINAL POLITICIANS AND JUDGES AND SUPREME COURT JUSTICES FROM THOROUGHLY BURNING THE ENTIRE CONSTITUTION AND DESTROYING THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT AND ENDING THIS COUNTRY.

    Democrats who behave like they don’t have to do anything for the people other than exist and collect their paychecks all because they aren’t Republicans or Trump sycophants NEED TO GO RIGHT ALONG WITH ALL OF THE REPUBLICANS AND TRUMP SYCOPHANTS.

20. @12 – I agree. Why aren’t the protestors trying to push for better gun control laws so we can prevent another Uvalde school shooting or preventing future high school shootings in the US? Why aren’t protestors going to the Southern states to protest for those states to finally adopt the ACA to help address the disparity in health care, especially with children from lower-income families? Why can’t we focus on what’s happening within our borders before trying to fix other countries’ and regions’ issues?

    Everything about the Palestinian protests are performative at best and mostly but white co-opting of non-US issues.

21. The ‘Michigan uncommitted’ claiming to care about Gaza are exclusively Republicans so they actually do want Trump to win.

    As far as Harris losing the progressive youth, that doesn’t seem to have hurt Emily Randall who the Stranger assured us also lost the progressive youth.

22. @22 – I agree. I’d like to hear more policy and plans for implementing them than “we’re not Trump”. We need a major overhaul of our education system, which had its’ major flaws revealed by the pandemic.

23. Volume XVII of “We Never Learn Our Goddamn Lesson”
    
    By Ralph Nader, Jill Stein, Winona LaDuke

    Fuck around and find out.

    Love,
    
    Justices Neil Gorsuch, Amy Comey Barrett, and Brett Kavanaugh

24. @27 one of those justices is on the Court because RBG was too self important to retire under Obama, another is because Mitch McConnell did what Dems can never do and kept his caucus in line, and the third is because Hillary was an incompetent candidate (not because Jill Stein existed).

25. 28: Those 3 sit on the Supreme Court because of who was sitting in the WH. And that is courtesy of Jill Stein.

    Your 3 observations are interesting but, ultimately, (save for #3, which I’d frame as not entirely accurate and not entirely wrong) irrelevant – the “but for” is the WH occupant.

    I didn’t put Alito and Roberts on the list, but could have. Those courtesy of Ralph Nader.

26. @15: I always wonder, though: why are innocent children more important than innocent adults?

27. @14, 16. Two words: Leahy Laws. The president absolutely has the authority to stop arms shipments to nations committing human rights abuses.

28. @29 blaming Stein is a pathetic deflection from the abject failure of the Dem candidate to do their one job. Hillary was the worst candidate in modern history and we’re all paying the price.

29. @29
    
    https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3989209

    “Perhaps the most important insight is this: Minor
    
    parties are not monoliths, whose votes are obviously transferrable to the most ideologically
    
    proximate major party—as they would have to be if Greens, at 1% of the vote, in fact “stole” an
    
    Electoral College majority from Clinton, or Libertarians, at 3%, a popular vote plurality from
    
    Trump. Rather, as in past elections, in 2016 Libertarian and Green Party supporters’ major party preferences were heterogeneous and many would have abstained from voting if they had been unable to choose their preferred candidate. Clinton’s advantage among Greens, alone, therefore was insufficient to overcome even her narrow deficits in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin (but
    
    perhaps in Michigan), and win the election. To do so, she had to net votes among Libertarians—
    
    who outnumbered Greens, by three-to-one—also. But they preferred Trump over Clinton, by
    
    approximately two-to-one. Simply put: too few minor party voters viewed Clinton as the “lesser
    
    of two evils” to justify the conclusion that their intransigence cost her the presidency.”

30. “ it has a high Arab-American population who rejected President Joe Biden over Israel’s genocide in Gaza.”

    Joe Biden received 81% of the vote in the Michigan Democratic Party primary.

    “On the bright side, Harris spoke with leaders of the Uncommitted National Movement before the rally.”

    Which is exactly why she was entirely correct to handle the protest the way she did. The protestors have made clear that their demands can never be met. So whatever Harris does, she can never expect them to support her and stop protesting, because they prefer Donald Trump being President to Kamala Harris being President. As does Hannah. Which is obviously bad. So that being the case, tell them to shut the fuck up and stop doing things to help get Donald Trump elected.

31. Looks like Hannah hit a nerve among the Isreal Über Alles sorts, along with others who’d enable and legitimise apartheid, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and genocide.

    Keep it up- it’s well deserved.

32. I’m sure the GOP will love to see a ’68` Chicago Redux protest/riot. The Strangler would too. Let’s remember that when DJT wins in 2024.

33. @35 telling voters to “shut the fuck up” is possibly the best way to get your opponent elected

34. @38 — trying to get Donald Trump elected is bad. Trying to get Donald Trump elected when he will be worse than Kamala Harris on the issue the protestors claim to care deeply about is worse. Trying to get Donald Trump elected after Kamala Harris picked Tim Walz to be VP when the protestors said that was critically important to them is worse still!

    If you show up at a rally for the Democratic Party candidate for president and do things to try and get Donald Trump elected — which is the protestors’ and Hannah’s primary goal and has been through the entire campaign — it’s perfectly appropriate for the Democratic Party candidate to tell you to stop and for the crowd to drown you out. They were never voting for Biden, they will never vote for Harris, and they prefer a Republican president to a Democratic one so they can go out and have really cool street protests. So yes, it’s perfectly fine to tell people like that to shut the fuck up and get out of the way of those of us that are actually working to keep Donald Trump out of the White House.

35. Complaining about Harris asking protestors who she’d already met with to allow her to talk is pretty rich when her opponent literally thinks protestors against him should be beat up, arrested, or run over with cars.

    Those of us without myopic memories or who have ever seen swing state ads know that those clips get plastered in ads all over swing states to paint all Democrats as liberal pro-terrorist crazies. The short-sightedness when Trump wants to involve the U.S. directly in participating in the Gaza assault with Israel is mind boggling.

36. @39 “If you show up at a rally for the Democratic Party candidate for president and do things to try and get Donald Trump elected — which is the protestors’ and Hannah’s primary goal and has been through the entire campaign”

    This assertion is beyond absurd, and you were probably saying the same thing a couple weeks ago about people calling for Biden to step down.

37. THE DEMOCRATS HAVE KEPT THIS GENOCIDE GOING. THEY ARE IN POWER.
    
    THEY COULD STOP FUNDING ISRAEL RIGHT NOW AND THAT WOULD END THE GENOCIDE.
    
    ISRAEL AND THE DONORS RULE THIS GOVERNMENT AND THEY KEEP PLAYING THE PEOPLE FOR SUCKERS. SOME ARE WAKING UP TO THE GAME.

38. “If you show up at a rally for the Democratic Party candidate for president and do things to try and get Donald Trump elected — which is the protestors’ and Hannah’s primary goal and has been through the entire campaign…

    Why even bring that fucking nonsensical garbage to this thread? If you want to debate politics and strategy, then fine, and honestly I’m torn about the way Harris handled the protesters. There were likely more constructive methods by which the protesters could have voiced their concerns, and there was probably a more nuanced response Harris could’ve offered in the moment. But “Hannah supports Trump!” is lowest common denominator type shit. Please take that childish nonsense over to reddit or some other trash site and don’t pollute our otherwise decent forum with it. Even freaking raindrop’s offering more worthwhile takes here.

39. The basic line of the pro- apartheid zionists is ‘nice democracy you got there, wanna keep it?’ with the implied threat that working for peace in the middle east for both Israel and Palestine is going to cause Trump to win. The Dems need to message better that they will work towards peace. Trump and the zion crazies here can keep trying with Bibi because that’s working really well. Every peacenik has to continually state they are against Hamas. Where are the pro Israelis who are willing to denounce the Bibi, the settlements and the ongoing ethnic cleansing?

40. @35: “The protestors have made clear that their demands can never be met. So whatever Harris does, she can never expect them to support her and stop protesting,”

    Bingo. Pandering for the votes of persons who simply will not vote for Harris, as @18 noted, simply costs Harris votes. Even the Stranger has admitted that Gaza doesn’t drive votes, not even in ultra-liberal Seattle after ten solid months of the Stranger screaming “GENOCIDE!!” Gaza won’t drive voters anywhere else, either.

    @44: Your yelling at Bax might have been more effective if you’d given a single example of anything he’d written that was factually incorrect. Even if Hannah and the Stranger don’t want Trump elected, everything they write makes it harder to defeat Trump, so what’s the difference?

    (Also, if you describe Reddit as a trash site, whilst Slog allows @22 and @43 to continue posting comments, you’ve pretty much eliminated any hope of anyone taking you seriously.)

41. @35 “The protestors have made clear that their demands can never be met. So whatever Harris does, she can never expect them to support her”

    Not true. Their “demand” is clear–an embargo on arms to Israel–and Harris has announced she will not even consider it. She could win their support she just doesn’t care to.

    https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2024/08/uncommitted-movement-voters-michigan-kamala-harris-meeting-gaza-ceasefire/

    “The morning after Wednesday’s rally, the Uncommitted movement sent out a press release explaining their experience speaking with Harris, and requesting a formal meeting to discuss an arms embargo. Less than one hour after that email was sent, Harris’ national security advisor, Phil Gordon, tweeted that the vice president was absolutely not interested in stopping the flow of weapons.”

42. @47

    the Sociopathy
    
    runneth DEEP
    
    in America,
    
    LLC bitch-
    
    es. Will it
    
    Cost the
    
    Dems
    
    an

    Election?
    
    can we Dare
    
    question them
    
    or is that the Surest
    
    Way to Elect the Fascist?

    by holding our
    
    Leaders Accountable?

    our Warmakers’re
    
    Calling the
    
    Shots

    this may End
    
    rather Poorly.

43. @47: ‘Their “demand” is clear–an embargo on arms to Israel–and Harris has announced she will not even consider it.’

    Existing law requires the United States to provide certain levels of military assistance to Israel. (https://www.cfr.org/article/us-aid-israel-four-charts#:~:text=Since%20the%20start%20of%20Israel's,appropriations%20act%20in%20April%202024.)
    
    An arms embargo would constitute a sweeping violation of that law, and so no candidate for president (who, let’s recall, must ensure laws get enforced) can unilaterally promise to embargo arms sales or deliveries to Israel. Furthermore, all the waaaaaaaaay up @14, you’ll find Harris’ party declared withholding Congressionally-approved foreign aid was an impeachable offense when Trump did it. So the Uncommitted folks were asking the Democratic candidate for president for a promise to break US law, outright and wholesale — in a way that would make her a total hypocrite as well, by the standard set by her own party.

    But, just for the sake of argument, let’s assume she promised to do this, and somehow there wasn’t a nationwide uproar over her promise to make a legal and radical change in US policy without consulting Congress. What then ensures she gets the “Uncommitteds” support? Why can’t they just demand something else? If they can start by demanding something she absolutely cannot deliver, then what’s to stop them from demanding anything and everything else, too?

    Finally, as even the Stranger has admitted, “Gaza Isn’t Driving Votes.” So, the votes she would lose — and those would be counted in the millions, if not tens of millions — would easily swamp whatever support the Uncommitteds might (or might not) give her.

44. “Existing law
    
    requires the United States
    
    to provide certain levels of military assistance to Israel.”

    and when Isreal
    
    Genocides the Fuckoutta
    
    its Captives in Palestine are
    
    we Still Required to send to them
    
    two-thousand pound Bunker Bustin’
    
    Bombs because it’s not ‘Actual Genocide’?

    the World cries out
    
    for Palestine and you
    
    quote the fucking Law

    and Humanity
    
    is not Allowed in-
    
    to any Discussion.

45. @50: “the World cries out
    
    for Palestine…”

    Gaza Isn’t Driving Votes.

    “…and you
    
    quote the fucking Law.”

    And you use your own personal double-secret definition of “genocide,” which you won’t ever share, and demand that everyone else in the world agree with it. How’s that working out for you?

    “and Humanity
    
    is not Allowed in-
    
    to any Discussion.”

    Because the very best way to prevent the ‘Fascist’ from getting elected is to demand the president disobey the law and ignore Congress. Riiiiiiiiight. No fascism there!

46. right wormmy

    Genocide
    
    Enablers
    
    gotta
    
    stick
    
    tog-
    
    eth-
    
    er

    or
    
    Split
    
    Apart.

    End our
    
    Complicity
    
    for War Crimes

    even tho
    
    Wormtongue
    
    says ‘just say YES!’
    
    to Zionist Genocide

    & don’t
    
    be Complicit
    
    in Israeli Massacres.

47. @52: “Genocide
    
    Enablers
    
    gotta
    
    stick
    
    tog-
    
    eth-
    
    er”

    Hence your praise for the eliminationist SJP, the eliminationist street protestors in Seattle, the eliminationist rhetoric at this very site, and your support for demanding a future leader willfully break our laws.

    Enabling future genocide is a lotta work, ain’t it?

48. well
    
    I guess
    
    YOU’d be
    
    our Expert
    
    in That Dept
    
    Wormtongue.

49. @50: I didn’t actually quote the law; I merely mentioned it existed. Even mentioning the existence of a law is now something only “Genocide Enablers” do?

    Endlessly throwing the word “genocide” around, making accusations and threats against anyone who disagrees with you, carefully not noticing the persons and groups you’ve vocally supported would be very happy in wiping entire societies off the face of the earth — none of it has worked, and none of it speaks to the great moral superiority you’re always trying to claim here. And, after all of that, the very blog which has enabled all of this tells you that your common cause simply isn’t driving votes.

    If this is what your success looks like, I can only wonder about what you might call failure. No doubt you can easily redefine those words, as well.

50. too long
    
    cannot read
    
    hard pass wormmy

51. @56: OK, shortened, to match your attention span:

    “Gaza Isn’t Driving Votes.”

    You lost.

    Go home.

52. you sound like
    
    Little Lebowski
    
    Wormtongue:

    have you found
    
    many pinky toes?

53. @58: “sound like
    
    Little Lebowski”

    Predictable result of edits made per complaint @56.

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