On today's BradCast: Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein would be weeping in their graves --- but they're still alive and joining many of us in calling out WaPo's cowardly billionaire owner today for kowtowing to a wannabe dictator who's not even in office yet. Thus is the shameful price --- and cost to American democracy and Freedom of the Press --- of American Oligarchy, 2024-style. [Audio link to full show follows below.]

Among our stories today, before opening up our phone lines for listeners to "endorse" the Presidential candidate of their choosing, just one week before Election Day in arguably one of the most critical elections in U.S. history...

• Last week, more than 20 absentee ballots were burned in an apparent case of arson inside of a U.S. Postal Service collection box in Phoenix, in the battleground state of Arizona. Today, hundreds of ballots were burned in a ballot drop-box in Democratic-leaning Vancouver, Washington as well as Democratic-leaning Portland, Oregon. The FBI is investigating and local law enforcement report they have identified a "suspect vehicle" thought to be connected to the incendiary devices used in both cases in the early A.M. hours on Monday.

• Last week, Donald Trump-supporting billionaire Elon Musk, the richest many on Earth, kicked off a "lottery" where registered voters in battleground states who sign his pledge would become eligible for a one million dollar give-away each day before next Tuesday's Election Day. The DoJ subsequently warned Musk that the stunt was likely an unlawful vote-buying scheme under federal law. On Monday, the Philadelphia District Attorney sued Musk for running what he is describing as an unlawful lottery in violation of Pennsylvania law.

• On Friday, the Washington Post --- with the now-laughable tagline "Democracy Dies in Darkness" --- announced it would not be making an endorsement in the Presidential race for the first time in nearly 50 years. It's billionaire owner, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos --- whose space travel company has billions of dollars of contracts with the federal government --- was reportedly behind the decision that undercut the legendary Watergate paper's own Editorial Board that was set to endorse Kamala Harris. The decision came just after the billionaire owner of the Los Angeles Times --- who happens to be a close friend of Elon Musk --- forced that paper to do the same. It is what noted U.S. fascism expert Timothy Snyder describes in his landmark 2017 book, On Tyranny, as "obeying in advance," which he strongly warns against as "Lesson One" when fascists threaten to take power. Will Bunch of the Philadelphia Inquirer also has a few thoughts in response about the "billionaire cowards" at the two papers who are already "showing what life under a dictator is really like", even before Donald Trump's becomes President again (if he ever does.)

• With all of that in mind --- and a few more stories of note here or there --- we open up our phones for listeners to make their own endorsements today on air in this year's election. That, because The BradCast and our many affiliate stations --- many associated with the Pacifica Radio Network, founded in 1946 to, specifically, stand up against then-rising fascism --- are not owned, run or controlled in any way by billionaires or their corporations. The result: a lot of calls today, with endorsements for Harris, Trump and --- because our live-listener base largely draws from KPFK, our very left-ish flagship station here in Los Angeles --- for the Green Party's Jill Stein, as a protest vote against the Biden-Harris Administration's position on Israel. (Never mind how much worse a Trump Administration would be on the same issue...which leads to a few very lively conversations with listeners today!) Please tune in!...

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We've been telling you for months on The BradCast that it was likely to be a very bumpy road to Election Day ... and likely beyond it, depending on how things go. We are now on that road. Lots of bumps, as predicted, but still plenty of hope to help us all stay positive in the closing days. [Audio link to full show follows this summary.]

Among our occasionally bumpy, occasionally hopeful coverage on today's program...

• We open with some encouraging listener mail from a family of democracy champions, and their recommendation to help you stay engaged and hopeful and helpful above and beyond voting, by checking out the very cool Markers for Democracy, "Saving our democracy, one postcard at a time."

• A U.S. Postal Service mailbox with a number of mailed absentee ballots in it, was set ablaze overnight at a post office in Phoenix, Arizona. Authorities are investigating the likely case of arson in the battleground state, and a USPS spokesperson suggests that, if you use a mailbox for your absentee ballot, try to drop it in "before the last collection time each day." Good advice. Better advice: Deliver that ballot in person to a precinct, voting center or town/county election headquarters, as allowed in your jurisdiction.

• Also in Phoenix, Arizona today, details on charges filed against a 60-year old man suspected of shooting at the windows of a Democratic National Committee field office for Kamala Harris in Tempe, three times times over the past several weeks. Law enforcement officials say the man, now in custody, was found to have more than 120 guns and 250,000 rounds of ammo at his home, and a machine gun in the car he was driving. They say he appeared to be planning "a mass casualty event". No one was injured in the shootings, but the Harris field office was eventually closed. He has been charged with seven counts related to terrorism. He is also accused of hanging hand-made political signs critical of Harris and Democrats, lined with razor blades and a substance labeled as "biohazard" in a Democratic-leaning Phoenix suburb.

• Given the disturbing allegations this week by Donald Trump's longest-serving White House Chief of Staff, retired 4-star U.S. Marine General John Kelly, describing his former boss as a "fascist", a fan of Hitler, and an opponent of the Constitution, rule of law and military vets injured or killed in the line of duty, Kamala Harris is leaning on a strong anti-fascism message in her closing argument, just over a week out from Election Day. We share both her initial response to Kelly's remarks yesterday in D.C., as well as those from a CNN town hall last night where she made no bones about her answer when asked if she believed the disgraced former President was, indeed, a fascist.

• In case you are still unclear about what Donald Trump will do if he is elected again and how he will continue to undermine the rule of law, he said on a radio show this morning that he plans to "fire" Special Counsel Jack Smith "within two seconds" after taking office. "He'll be one of the first things addressed." Never mind that Trump wouldn't actually have the legal authority to do so. Smith, of course, has filed felony charges against Trump in D.C. for his many failed attempts to steal the 2020 election, and in Florida for having stolen thousands of pages of highly classified national security documents upon leaving the White House and refusing to return them to the federal government.

• And, in case you're confused about who Donald Trump is referring to when he vows "retribution" against "the enemies within", it is you. E&E News has a new report out today detailing how Trump, when he was last allowed to be President, withheld FEMA aid following natural disasters in several states --- Washington, California, Georgia, Utah and Maryland --- due to political disagreements he had with their Governors following his election loss in November of 2020.

• Desi Doyen joins us today for our latest Green News Report, tracking record heat, drought and wildfires in the U.S. Northeast; the U.S. Senate races which could determine who wins the majority in the upper chamber this year, and how that is likely to affect action on our climate crisis; and the Biden Administration's race to get climate and infrastructure funding out the door before next year's changing of the guard.

• Finally, since it has been --- and will continue to be --- a bumpy ride between now and Election Day (and, likely beyond), we close today with some hopeful words of encouragement from our current, unflagging Vice President and, perhaps, next President of United States...

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We've got a helluva BradCast for you today, on two different topics, both of hugely critical importance to American democracy and this year's elections. [Audio link to full show follows below this summary.]

FIRST UP... On Tuesday, two different major media outlets offered alarming new reports on, among other things, Donald Trump's long-time admiration for Adolf Hitler. Both detailed stories are based in part or full on new interviews with Trump's longest-serving White House Chief of Staff, General John Kelly, who also served as Trump's Dept. of Homeland Security chief before being brought over to head up his White House.

The very conservative Kelly explains in his on-the-record, recorded conversations with the New York Times' Michael Schmidt (free link!) that he had been reluctant, as a longtime, high-ranking member of the military, to speak out publicly about his old boss, given his belief that the military should largely stay out of public politics. But Trump's recent, repeated comments about "the enemy within", in reference to the former President's personal domestic political opponents, and his remarks about unleashing the U.S. military against them, changed his mind.

As of late this afternoon, Fox "News" reportedly still hasn't found time in its 24/7 schedule to play any of the disturbing, freely available audio from Schmidt's three conversations with Kelly, as published yesterday. So we figured we'd go ahead and do so ourselves on today's program. You're welcome!

In short, Kelly's remarks detail how Trump...

• meets the very "definition of fascist", is "certainly an authoritarian", "admires people who are dictators" and "prefers the dictator approach to government;
• repeatedly praised Hitler during Kelly's time in the White House and insisted the German dictator "did some good things";
• doesn't understand either history or the U.S. Constitution, though frequently insisted he knew more about the President's Constitutional authority than the lawyers in the White House Counsel's office did;
• looked down on those who were disabled or killed on the battlefield, confirming that Trump would often described them as "losers and suckers";
• and that, never mind his policies, many of which Kelly might agree with, the man simply doesn’t have the character to serve as President of the United States, which is far more important than any particular partisan policy positions.

That, of course, is the quickest of summaries. Tune in for more. And for a really harrowing report on Trump's disturbing views of the military ("only suckers went to Vietnam"), the Constitution, rule of law, and extraordinary lack of character, see Jeffrey Goldberg's article yesterday at The Atlantic, headlined "Trump: I Need the Kind of Generals Hitler Had". It includes more from Kelly and opens with the story of a murdered woman in the military whose family was told by Trump at the White House that he would personally pay for her funeral. Then, when the bill arrived, he was reportedly furious, refused to pay it, and declared "It doesn't cost 60,000 bucks to bury a fucking Mexican!"

NEXT UP... In a sharp, if perhaps welcome, turn, we're joined today by CHRIS MELODY FIELDS FIGUEREDO, the Executive Director of the nonprofit Ballot Initiative Strategy Center.

The record 11 different abortion rights related referendums on the ballot in 10 different states this year, in the wake of SCOTUS overturning Roe v. Wade in 2022, have received a fair bit of attention from the media. But, in fact, there are more than 150 ballot measures on the ballot this year across 41 states right now, on everything from how elections are run, to how redistricting should happen, to who gets paid sick leave, to raising the minimum wage, to stuff like banning trophy hunting and cracking down on retail theft. All of which has the potential to reshape state policy on key issues nationwide for years to come.

In a very lively conversation today with Fields Figueredo, we discuss much of the above and more, including the explosion of the use of citizen ballot initiatives (and reasons for it); ongoing efforts in Republican-controlled states to make such citizen referenda harder to get onto the ballot and more difficult for voters to adopt; why very progressive initiatives are frequently adopted in otherwise very "red" states; how a number of critical initiatives this year could radically change politics as we know it in states like Ohio; whether there is a real correlation between initiatives on the ballot and partisan turnout; some of the sneaky initiatives on ballots in some states this year; and where progressives can go to get advice on how best to vote on often deceptive or confusing referendums. (I've got twenty of them on my ballot here in Los Angeles this year!)

"Ballot guides are my favorite thing," she tells me, admitting that she's a huge "nerd". "There are a number of organizations in your state that may be producing ballot guides that give you information in plain language," Fields Figueredo advises. "Go to organizations that you trust. Also a great resources is the League of Women Voters. Their ballot guides put it in simple language. We also have a Ballot Measure Hub. It's not going to have every single ballot measure in the country, but I would go to trusted news sources or local organizations that are going to try to put these issues into plain language."

Yup, it's another five pound BradCast in a one pound bag today! Enjoy!...

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On today's BradCast: Finally! Some real and tangible justice for two of the 2020 election heroes who were grievously harmed by the disgraced former President's insidious lies, and other important news just weeks before your final chance to vote in arguably the most critical election in U.S. history. [Audio link to full show follows this summary.]

Among our coverage on today's program...

• We're now less than two weeks out from Election Day, your last chance to vote --- and help others to do the same --- in the 2024 election. Have you voted yet? Are you doing all you can to help and encourage others do so? Will you feel good ten years from now about however you decide to vote this year?

• In New York on Tuesday, a federal judge ordered [PDF] former Donald Trump lawyer and disgraced federal prosecutor Rudy Giuliani to turn over, within seven days, his NYC penthouse apartment (valued at around $5 million) and most of his valuable luxury items to Shaye Moss and her mother Ruby Freeman, the Atlanta, Georgia election workers who the disgraced former NYC Mayor (along with Trump himself) repeatedly defamed following the 2020 election. Late last year Giuliani was found liable for defaming the mother and daughter by using racist attacks to falsely claim they had tampered with ballots during tabulation in Fulton County, GA. A jury awarded them $150 million. They are about to collect a sizeable portion of that award. It's a small price to pay by Rudy, who ruined his own life while endangering and ruining the lives of others, all in service to Trump's Big Lie that the 2020 election was stolen from him. These are just a few of the countless lives ruined by the man who is running again for President for the sole reason that he needs stay out of prison.

• A strong signal was sent to all 2024 election officials in Arizona and around the nation on Monday, with the guilty plea [PDF] from an elected Republican Supervisor and MAGA election denier in rural Cochise County who had attempted to block the certification of results in the state's 2022 midterms. Peggy Judd pleaded her felony charge down to a misdemeanor after she and a fellow Republican Supervisor, who still faces trial in January, raised doubts about the accuracy of the county's computerized vote tabulators. The plea agreement, announced by AZ's Democratic Attorney General Kris Mayes, comes just days after a state judge in Georgia made clear that certification of election results is a mandatory, not optional, duty, even if officials may have questions about fraud or the accuracy of results. But, wait! Haven't we questioned the accuracy of computerized voting and tabulating systems in the past? Yes, we have! But there is a right --- and lawful --- way to do it, as discussed on today's show. And the way for candidates, elected officials and other voters to legally challenge results is in open court after the certification of results. That is particularly true in a County like Cochise where all voters are allowed to vote on verifiable hand-marked paper ballots.

• The Georgia Supreme Court on Tuesday upheld last week's lower court rulings that blocked new, last-minute polling place rules instituted by the MAGA-majority on the State Election Board. Opponents of the new rules argued they could be used as a pretext to bollocks up and/or delay certification [PDF] of this year's election results in the critical battleground state.

• In another critical battleground state, North Carolina, Donald Trump has apparently decided that changes made in 2020 to help voters safely cast their ballot in the middle of a pandemic were great after all! Well, Trump has decided they are great this year, anyway. At least for voters in the western, heavily Republican-leaning part of the state following devastation from Hurricane Helene just weeks ago. New procedures instituted to make voting easier for those affected by the deadly storm are just fine, apparently, according to the disingenuous, hypocritical, flip-flopping Trump. That, after he'd previously declared many of the very same or similar voting accommodations in 2020, after more than 230,000 Americans had died on his watch before the election, to be a "big scam" because he thought it might help Democratic voters.

• But, before we give Republicans in North Carolina too many plaudits for doing the right thing, CBS News finds that an 1,800-member strong group of self-proclaimed "election protection" activists in the state (read: Republican election deniers, in this case) are targeting those with "Hispanic-sounding last names" in a campaign to challenge certain voters on the rolls. Lee County, NC Republican Party Chair and head of the so-called North Carolina Election Integrity Team, James Womack was caught on video tape explaining how such voters may be "suspicious", as part of an eight-state effort to suppress the vote, headed up by longtime GOP "voter fraud" fraudster and Trump attorney Cleta Mitchell.

• Finally, Desi Doyen joins us today for our latest Green News Report, after Cuba is hit by an island wide power outage followed by a hurricane; Deadly deluges strike New Mexico, France and Bangladesh; Scientists declare the largest, longest coral bleaching event on record; And oil industry lobbyists prepare to reverse Joe Biden's landmark regulations if Donald Trump wins or steals the Presidency this year...

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If you find you today's BradCast informative, entertaining or helpful, please let folks on Twitter know. I suspect we won't otherwise get much traction over there today for some odd reason. [Audio link to full show follows this summary.]

It's amusing how, in April of 2023, not long after he purchased Twitter, Elon Musk was asked by Tucker Carlson about "New Twitter's" role in the 2024 election. His response: "The goal of new Twitter is to be as fair and even handed as possible. So, not following any political ideology."

That. Was. Darling! Just over a year later, Musk has leveraged his site almost entirely on behalf of Donald Trump, flooding his nearly 3 million followers with out and out false claims, often echoing the disgraced former President, including blatant, evidence-free lies about election fraud by Democrats.

That's in addition to the, at least, $100 million that the world's richest billionaire has plowed into political action committees to support a second term for Trump. One such Musk-funded group is called Future Coalition PAC. It is currently running a wildly cynical set of ads targeting Arab and Muslim voters in the battleground state of Michigan, claiming that "Kamala Harris Stands With Israel". The very same Musk-bankrolled group is simultaneously running ads targeting Jewish voters in battleground Pennsylvania with the message "Two-Faced Kamala Harris Stands With Palestine".

Another of Musk's PAC's recently created a website called Progress 2028, tailored to look like an official Harris Campaign page, while pushing decidedly false messages. ("Let's remove barriers for undocumented immigrants who are undocumented!") Apparently, all of that is legal. Though the group is also sending out false text messages, seemingly impersonating the Harris Campaign, pushing voters to the Progress 2028 website. That may not be legal.

But it was on behalf of yet another Musk dark money super PAC, the one he calls America PAC, in which he's invested at least $75 million, that, he announced over the weekend, that he will be giving away $1 million dollars to one lucky person each day --- so long as the person is registered to vote in a battleground state and signed his petition in support of the 1st and 2nd Amendments. Noted election law professor Rick Hasen, following the first big, lottery style check Musk handed out on stage Saturday during a rally in Pennsylvania, details how what Musk is doing is "clearly illegal vote buying". That's right. While using wild lies to make the evidence-free case that Democrats are committing election fraud, Musk is committing actual election fraud on behalf of Trump, each and every day between now and Election Day. (Anyone home, DoJ?)

His million dollar giveaways to encourage voter registration (a violation of 52 U.S.C. 10307(c), barring "offers to pay...either for registration to vote or for voting") began on the same day that Musk lied to attendees at a weekend rally in PA about Dominion Voting Systems somehow stealing the 2020 election for Joe Biden. (Similar lies cost Fox 'News' more than three-quarters of a billion dollars last year in a record settlement with Dominion to end the voting technology company's defamation suit against the rightwing propaganda outlet hours before the trial was to begin.)

We're joined today by the perfect guest to discuss all of the above and more. EDDIE PEREZ was formerly a longtime official at Hart-Intercivic, one of the nation's few major voting machine companies. He then went on to work as the chief of Twitter's Civic Integrity unit, back before Musk bought the social media site...when they still had a Civic Integrity unit! Perez is now on the Board of Directors at the nonpartisan, nonprofit, Open Source Election Technology (OSET) Institute and penned an oped for MSNBC last week headlined: "I ran Twitter's civic integrity team. Elon Musk has no idea how elections work."

In addition to debunking a number of Musk's false claims (no, Dominion doesn't even have voting systems in Philadelphia, for example!), Perez speaks to how Twitter (now ridiculously renamed X) has changed since Musk's takeover, turning it into a den of far-right conspiracy theories, hate speech and other dangerous nonsense.

"The degree to which the entire platform has obviously fallen off the deep end is incredible," he tells me. "I think it's fair to say Musk has thrown out the window any kind of commitment to having actual facts about the reality of how elections are run. What we have right now is basically a referendum on whether billionaires and oligarchs are going to shape the public's understanding of how elections are run. Are they going to do that by spreading false rumors and flooding the airwaves? Or are we going to listen to election professionals? And are we going to have standards and journalistic facts to educate the American people about how their elections are actually run with integrity?"

What would Twitter have done in the old days, before Musk purchased it, if someone like Musk had spread the disinformation he is now using the platform to spread? "Twitter took it seriously," says Perez. "What would have happened is there are different ways we would redirect users to actual, credible information. You do that not through censorship, not through taking things down. If you had a post that made an obviously false claim about some election process or voting, you might see a label on that Tweet saying, 'Here's some more information' [with links to credible sites, like the National Association of Secretaries of State]. They took it seriously. We're not going to slash and burn and taken people's posts down. But if we see an opportunity to send them to good information from trusted sources, why not do that? That helps voters. That helps democracy."

Perez also offers a number of pieces of advice on how listeners and voters can push back against the even larger avalanche of lies that is absolutely going to begin spewing forth shortly, in the event that Kamala Harris defeats Trump this year.

"They need to get their answers from their local elections office. You need to check your ballot before casting it. If you have a by-mail ballot and you haven't returned it yet, I recommend turning it in to a drop-box. And when you see inflammatory images [on social media and elsewhere], ask yourself, 'What's the story behind this? What's the context?' And find out where it came from" before blithely passing it along to others.

We've got a lot to learn from Perez today! Please tune in for a very lively, informative and, yes, at times, maddening BradCast!

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Step with us through the bizarre Fox 'News' looking glass on today's BradCast, where we try to make sense of all the stuff that the disgraced former President, his beclowned running-mate, and their television and social media propaganda partners really hope you don't make sense of at all. [Audio link to full show follows this summary.]

Among our stories today...

• The string of good news rulings continue from state judges in Georgia. Last night, just after airtime, yet another judge issued a ruling striking down new rules recently instituted by the MAGA-majority on GA's State Elections Board. Democrats, Republicans and voting rights advocates alike charge that the SEB's new rules are unlawful, might result in chaos, and could be used to try and delay or even block the certification of votes at the County level in the critical battleground state. The judge in this challenge, filed by a Republican, found seven of the Boards new rules to be "illegal, unconstitutional and void." As we've reported in recent weeks, some of the new rules actually make sense. But instituting them this late, while voting is already underway, is likely a very bad idea. Apparently, according to the judge in last night's state court ruling, they are also unlawful.

• Unlike Donald Trump, Kamala Harris, the Democratic nominee for President does not appear to be afraid of adversarial interviews by real journalists --- or even by Bret Baier of Fox 'News'. The full, 26-minute interview from Wednesday is here. We share a clip or two including the moment when Harris clapped back hard against Baier's attempt to whitewash Trump's recent threats to use the U.S. military against his perceived domestic political opponents, who he has been repeatedly describing of late as "the enemy within".

• Meanwhile, as Donald Trump continues to completely avoid or otherwise wilt during any real interviews outside of his rightwing fantasy world --- due to his cowardly inability to handle real questions from real journalists who don't play along with the imaginary dystopian Biden-Harris hellscape he and Fox have created for their brain-poisoned followers --- his Vice-Presidential running mate continues to stick his neck out for Trump in the real world. And, somewhat understandably, he's making an utter hash of it, because it's all built on Big Lies and nonsense. J.D. Vance, after weeks of trying to change the subject while being pressed to answer if he believes Trump lost the 2020 election, finally answered the question yesterday. His answer is "no". So, apparently Trump won the 2020 election?! Well, yes, Vance explains, because of "Big Tech companies" who, in 2020, "engaged in industrial scale censorship backed up by the federal government" to block the "real scandal" of Hunter Biden's laptop costing the Trump-Pence ticket "millions of votes". You remember that, right? Back when Trump, not Biden-Harris, was actually in charge of the federal government? It's complicated. We explain. We also explain how Trump and his $75 million benefactor and Twitter/X owner, Elon Musk, really are --- literally --- working together to engage in industrial scale censorship to block distribution of Trump Campaign documents hacked by Iran and to ban journalists who link to it. (Contrast that with Trump singing the praises of hacks and other election interference by Russia back in 2016 and 2020. As noted, it's complicated.)

• Finally, Desi Doyen joins us for our latest Green News Report, amid the costly cleanup of recent climate change-fueled hurricanes which are now raising everyone's insurance rates, not just for those who live in hurricane zones; as the U.S. Small Business Administration's disaster loan fund has now out of money, thanks to said hurricanes, with Congressional Republicans refusing to refill the coffers; and as our corrupted SCOTUS, curiously, chooses NOT to block the Biden EPA's new emissions limits for power plant...for now...

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Apparently it's Fascism Week on The BradCast, as the former President's rhetoric and threats become increasingly dark, and as all warning signs continue to blink brighter and brighter red, no matter how few seem to notice. [Audio link to full show follows this summary.]

BUT FIRST... before we get to our guest to discuss that today, a bit of mostly encouraging voting news out of two critical states...

• The first day of early voting on Tuesday in battleground Georgia smashed the state's record by more than doubling it, with at least than 328,000 ballots cast yesterday. Of course, that doesn't necessarily tell us who those voters were voting for. But the best news may be that lines were reportedly moving very quickly thanks to the state's new check-in procedure which is said to take seconds rather than minutes.

• More good news out of Georgia: After a state judge declared certification of results by County officials to be mandatory, as opposed to discretionary, in a ruling [PDF] released yesterday (they must do so by the deadline specified in state law, which is 5pm Monday following the Tuesday election), the same judge went on to temporarily block, at least for this election, a new rule instituted at the last minute by GA's MAGA-controlled State Elections Board mandating a hand-count of the number of ballots cast at the polling place at the end of the Election Day, before they are shipped off to the County. It's a smart rule, if poorly written. It's already done in many states. But the lateness of the adoption of that rule, according to the judge, threatens to result in chaos and confusion in an election that is already under way. (Late today, after airtime, a separate state judge blocked at least seven new SEB rules permanently, including the hand-count rule, declaring them "illegal, unconstitutional and void.")

• The Nebraska Supreme Court today spanked the state's Republican Sec. of State and Attorney General for their attempt to block a law adopted by the Legislature earlier this year mandating the immediate restoration of voting rights for people who have completed the terms of their felony sentences. That means hundreds or thousands of additional residents may now be able to vote this year in a state which could determine who wins the White House and which party wins control of both chambers of Congress.

THEN... we're joined by longtime domestic extremism expert, journalist and author, DAVID NEIWERT to discuss the increasingly fascistic and alarming rhetoric and threats by Donald Trump --- and his supporters --- as Election Day nears.

The disgraced former President and convicted felon has, in recent days, added "the enemy within" to his ongoing threats of mass deportation of millions of migrants, citing his perceived domestic political enemies as "more dangerous" than foreign threats and suggesting he might use the National Guard or active duty U.S. military to take them on, if elected to another term in the White House.

Retired top military officials are now warning about the threat that Trump poses to the nation, its people and its Constitution, with Trump's own Chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Mark Milley, recently describing him as "a total fascist" and "the most dangerous person to this country."

"The road to fascism is lined with people telling you to stop overreacting," Niewert, who has been warning about Trump's fascist tendencies for at least 9 years (read this, for example, from his blog back in 2015), quips today. "But I think in the past year, the mask has really come off. Especially in the last few months --- the explicit eliminationism" and his suggestion of directing the military against "the enemies within."

And, yet, the race, according to pre-election polling averages, is said to be a tie. Does half of the voting public not take Trump's threats seriously? Do they not know about them? Or do they know and take him at his word, but don't care and actually want such a ruler for the U.S.?

"I would say about two-thirds of the population is in basic denial about it," Neiwert tells me. "The vast majority, both Democrats and Republicans, they don't acknowledge that this stuff is happening, that this stuff is being said, and is building force." But, in particular, he notes, "The Republican Party is now really wholly owned by this element of the right," after having "utterly failed to redeem itself from that horrific moment [on January 6th, 2021] and instead has just doubled down."

The prolific Neiwert, whose most recent book is The Age of Insurrection: The Radical Right's Assault on American Democracy, has penned three books during the Trump-era, including 2018's Alt-America: The Rise of the Radical Right in the Age of Trump and Red Pill, Blue Pill: How to Counteract the Conspiracy Theories That Are Killing Us in 2020. After years of contributing to both major media outlets and smaller blogs alike, he also now writes on similar topics at his Substack page.

Today, he discusses how and when what was once describes as the "alt-Right" movement, eventually came to take complete hold of the GOP. "What we're really talking about here is authoritarianism," he argues. "It began really gathering steam in the early 2000s. Ultimately, the origins of that had to do with 9/11. The sheer flood-tide of fearmongering that erupted across the country and was sustained for years in the wake of 9/11. It had a really profound effect on the national psyche."

"You can actually jack up the levels of authoritarian personalities, the authoritarian response within the country, by fearmongering. That's why Trump's whole appeal all along has been fearmongering. He's fearmongering about the immigrants, the crime, Black people, whatever it is he can fearmonger on. That's how you get people to get into what I call an 'authoritarian crouch.'"

And that's where we now are, he explains, with Trump's first term "a practice run," Neiwert suggests we ain't seen nothing yet if Trump wins this year.

"I don't think Americans have any idea what that's going to look like, to have mass police raids, rounding up Latino families, taking people away and breaking up families and frequently deporting actual citizens. If Trump wins and he goes about doing the mass deportation, it's going to make America into a police state. And I don't think Americans are prepared for what that's going to look like."

Before we get there, of course, we've got to get past the election, which Neiwert predicts, if Trump loses, could look like "the Brooks Brothers riot times ten. Which, in a way, is what January 6 was about, too." But, aside from voting, what can be done to change the course this nation seems to be on? For that, tune in. Members of the mainstream corporate media may not like Neiwert's answer, given his argument that "the media plays a central role in all of this because they're the ones constantly telling us to stop overreacting" as they've spent years effectively working to "normalize Trump's behavior...normalize fascism."

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We've got a number of encouraging news items on today's BradCast regarding both this year's elections in battleground Georgia and accountability for still more of those who lied about the 2020 contest there on behalf of the disgraced former President. [Audio link to full show follows this summary.]

Among our stories today...

• The Biden-Harris economy continues to fire on all pistons, far outpacing that of Donald Trump when he was in the White House, no matter how little those facts seem able to break out above the noise of his increasingly authoritarian threats and related madness. Moreover, many major financial firms and experts have determined that Kamala Harris' economic plans will result in far more growth (higher GDP), lower inflation, more job creation and much lower government deficits and national debt than Trump's economic proposals. All of that is true no matter how little attention it receives from our corporate mainstream media. But we try to give that at least a bit of attention today, with some help from Rachel Maddow, as voting is now underway across the country and Election Day just three weeks away.

• Given all the attention Donald Trump is, paradoxically, enjoying for so many of his outrageous lies and threats of late --- not only against migrants in the country, but now to American citizens that the disgraced former President regards as "the enemy within" --- it's about time that the Harris Campaign (via ads) and Harris herself (during rallies) is calling him out for it. Especially now that he has begun vowing to unleash the National Guard and U.S. military against Americans if he is allowed back into the Oval Office.

• The parade of former top aides from the Trump White House speaking out against him and endorsing Kamala Harris this year continues to grow. On Monday, Trump's former Deputy Press Secretary Sarah Matthews joined several of her former colleagues in endorsing the Democratic Vice President in order to help "ensure that Donald Trump never steps foot in the Oval Office again." She joins Trump's former Comms Director and Press Secretary Stephanie Grisham, his former White House Director of Strategic Communications Alyssa Farah Griffin, and Cassidy Hutchinson, the top aide to Trump's former Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, among others, in putting country over party to sound the alarm about the dangers of a second Trump term.

• Donald Trump's longtime buddy and former Fox 'News' reporter Geraldo Rivera has also now joined other previous pals and supporters of the former President, like billionaire Mark Cuban, to endorse Kamala Harris this year. Rivera charged, in a detailed Twitter post on Monday night, that Trump is a "sore loser" and that if you are a Republican who believes in his "Big Lie" that the 2020 election was stolen from him, "Donald Trump has made a liar of you."

• As noted, we've got several seemingly good pieces of news out of Georgia, where today's first day of Early Voting is, according to the Sec. of State's office, breaking 2020's record. The same officials also stated that absentee ballots have gone out in good order and were not adversely impacted by the recent hurricanes. That is good news for voters smart enough to take advantage of the ability to cast a verifiable hand-marked absentee paper ballot in the battleground Peach State. Those who vote at the polls, unfortunately, will still be forced to vote on the state's insecure, 100% unverifiable touchscreen voting system. But please don't let that stop you from voting, no matter what, if it's your only option!

• A state judge in Fulton County, Georgia on Tuesday issued a no-uncertain-terms ruling [PDF] that county election officials must certify results before the deadline set by state law, which is at 5pm on the Monday following the Tuesday election. Certification, the judge made clear, is a ministerial duty, not a discretionary option. It is required even if a County election official may have concerns about fraud or error in the tally, or has not received certain public records which they may seek prior to certification. Questions about such results are to be adjudicated in open court after certification, not via private deliberations of county election officials. The unequivocal ruling comes in the wake of a number of new rules recently instituted by the newly-seated MAGA majority on the Georgia State Election Board that have alarmed a number of Democrats who worry the new rules may be used as a pretext by MAGA election officials at the county level to block the certification of results they don't like this year in the critical battleground state. Presuming the judge's very clear ruling today is not overturned by a higher court, it should put some of those concerns to rest, even as there is still much to be concerned about when it comes to GA's elections this year.

• The fallout from Georgia's 2020 election, when Donald Trump tried but failed to steal it from Joe Biden, continues. In good news out of a St. Louis, Missouri court last week, Fulton County, GA election workers Shaye Moss and her mom Ruby Freeman have struck a deal with the rightwing propaganda website called Gateway Pundit, its dopey, dishonest owner Jim Hoft and his dopey, dishonest brother Joe Hoft. The Hoft brothers had tried to avoid accountability for their defamatory lies about Freeman and Moss --- echoed by both Trump and his sleazy, disgraced attorney Rudy Giuliani --- that the women had committed fraud during the tabulation of ballots in 2020 at the State Farm Arena in Atlanta. Despite all related claims about them being quickly debunked by state officials, Gateway Pundit identified the two women by name and continued to lie about them for months and years after, resulting in death threats and the need for them to relocate from their homes. In July, an attempt by Gateway Pundit and the Hofts to shield themselves from the defamation lawsuit filed by Freeman and Moss by declaring bankruptcy was rejected by the judge in the lawsuit. The terms of the deal announced last week by the attorneys for both parties have not yet been disclosed. Freeman and Moss previously won a $148 million lawsuit against Giuliani and struck an undisclosed settlement with rightwing media outlet One America News which they had similarly sued for defamation.

• Finally, Desi Doyen joins us for our latest Green News Report, with the ongoing aftermaths of Hurricanes Helene and Milton, and some much better news about the long-overdue death of Old King Coal in the U.K....

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We have a responsibility to call it out on today's BradCast. So we do. [Audio link to full show follows this summary.]

Donald Trump's anti-immigrant, anti-free press, anti-federal government (Biden's federal government, never Trump's), anti-law and order, anti-anyone he believes shows insufficient fealty to him sentiment is growing increasingly menacing by the day. Sometimes by the hour.

It's not just rhetoric. At a rally on Saturday in California, Trump suggested a heckler should "get the hell knocked out of her". Earlier that same day, after week's of his lies about FEMA's response to Hurricanes Helene and Milton, federal officials working on recovery in one of the hardest hit areas of North Carolina were sent an emergency notice to "stand down and evacuate" from Rutherford County after National Guard troopers "had come across x2 trucks of armed militia saying they were out hunting FEMA."

In recent days, his lies about "illegal migrants" on murderous rampages, having taken over entire cities and towns has grown more Hitlerian and eugenicist (they have "bad genes"); he has called for CBS and all of the other broadcast networks to have their licenses revoked (networks have no such licenses) and for 60 Minutes to be "taken off the air"; the man who, as President in 2017, claimed to "love the First Amendment. Nobody loves it better than me", recently said "wait until you see what I’m going to do with" the New York Times if he is elected again. All of that as he has continued his vow to "put in jail" those who criticize judges and Supreme Court Justices who he likes, as he repeatedly promises retribution against "the enemy within," now including threats to use the nation's military to do so.

If you thought he was just going to be going after immigrants he doesn't like, think again. "What is so jarring to me is these are not just Nazi-like statements. These are actual Nazi sentiments," Robert Jones, founder of the Public Religion Research Institute and author of “The Hidden Roots of White Supremacy” told Politico.

With three weeks to go before Election Day and early voting underway in most of the nation now, the disgraced former President and convicted felon is largely tied with Democratic nominee Kamala Harris, both nationally and in the seven battleground states, if you believe the pre-election polling averages. Are Americans not hearing what Trump is saying? Or do they not care? Or is this what they actually want? Is all of this not being adequately reported by our by mainstream corporate media? Or is it simply being ignored by voters?

In the second half of today's show --- after covering a number of the items above --- we open up the phones for listeners thoughts on all of it, with some excellent callers from a number of political viewpoints, from both here in Southern California and across the country...

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When it rains, it pours on today's BradCast. [Audio link to full show follows this summary.]

Among the muck we wade through today...

• Hurricane Milton walloped much of central Florida after coming ashore as a Cat 3 om Wednesday night, just south of a worst-case-scenario direct hit on Tampa Bay. But, as we've learned since covering Hurricane Katrina way back in 2005, it's best never to say "they dodged a bullet" too early.

• Just in case your favorite media outlets featuring wall-to-wall wind-whipped reporters foolishly risking their lives by standing outside in multi-colored rain slickers to fulfill your disaster porn needs forgot to tell you that man-made climate change exacerbated Milton's awesome destructive power and signals an even grimmer future for us all, Desi Doyen has you covered today.

• While Donald Trump has been lying to you about FEMA and the Biden-Harris Administration's response to both Hurricane Milton this week and Hurricane Helene last --- and putting his own brain-poisoned supporters at grave risk in the bargain --- three points worth noting today: 1) Everything out of Trump's mouth on these subjects is a lie. (But you knew that, right?) 2) All of the Republican Governors in all of the effected states have lauded the response from FEMA and Joe Biden. 3) Since they're all on the ballot this year, it's worth noting that a whole bunch of Republican Congressmembers from Florida voted against funding FEMA at all this year just DAYS before Helene made landfall, even as many of them are now demanding more money for FEMA. As you or someone you know may be voting in the Sunshine State soon, you should know the names of those hypocrites. They are: Reps. Aaron Bean, Gus Bilirakis, Kat Cammack, Byron Donalds, Matt Gaetz, Laurel Lee, Anna Paulina Luna, Cory Mills, Bill Posey, Mike Waltz, and Daniel Webster.

• As Donald Trump continues to line his pockets (his own, not his campaign's!) in a seemingly desperate, hopefully Going Out of Business sale --- Shitty golden sneakers! Cheap silver coins! Worthless NFTs! $100,000 diamond-encrusted watches! (They make a perfect off-the-books Christmas bribe from your favorite foreign autocrat!) --- his $59.99 Trump-endorsed, Lee Greenwood-branded "God Bless the USA" faux-leather bound bibles may be his sleaziest scheme yet. But that hasn't prevented Ryan Walters, the MAGA Superintendent of Public Schools in Oklahoma, from trying to force state tax-payers into buying 50,000 of them to place in every classroom, even while all but ignoring a year-old, already-funded state mandate to purchase emergency asthma inhalers for schools. (He'll get to it, okay? He's busy with the Trump Bible thing right now! Never mind that child who died at school for lack of one!) Oh, and as long as we're on the topic, AP did some digging this week to find that Trump's "God Bless the USA" bibles are actually "printed in a country that the former president has repeatedly accused of stealing American jobs and engaging in unfair trade practices --- China." In reality, AP discovered, they actually cost less than $3 a piece to print. But, don't worry, while Bible experts say it's crap, you can still buy a version hand-signed (or so the website says?) by Trump himself for the low-low price of just $1,000 if you act now!

• Finally, Desi Doyen joins us to help mop things up with our latest Green News Report on Milton's landfall, Republican disinfo on FEMA and its funding shortages, and President Biden's landmark rule that will now, officially, finally replace every toxic lead water in America! (Sure, but does he have overpriced, crappy, Chinese-made bibles to sell?)

All that before I close the show with an offer you can't refuse! God bless the USA!...

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As we go to air on today's BradCast, we're girding for the monster Hurricane Milton's direct impact on Florida's central Gulf Coast over the next several hours, even as millions in that state and five others struggle to recover from devastation following Hurricane Helene less than two weeks ago --- and as all of us prepare for November 5th and whatever may come thereafter. [Audio link to full show follows this summary.]

This week, amid Helene recovery in North Carolina, the state Board of Elections, in a unanimous, bipartisan vote, approved a list of emergency measures for voters in the state's hardest hit counties. Naturally, Trump Republicans on social media are already lying and spreading disinformation about those measures and, of course, Fox "News" is playing along. That said, with the Trump Campaign itself calling for measures to expand access for voters in Republican areas of the state following Helene, it seems like Team Trump is also preparing to have legal (and political) complaints ready to go after the election --- if they lose.

That strategy, however, is not new for them. Even before Helene, the RNC says they are involved in scores of lawsuits across dozens of states. Many of them have been filed by groups like the American First Legal Foundation, founded by far-right Trump adviser Stephen Miller. One such novel suit filed by the group seeks a ruling in Arizona that judges may toss out election results over "failures or irregularities" by local officials. America First Legal is currently seeking such a ruling, however, only in counties where Kamala Harris is believed to be narrowly ahead of Trump.

Similar efforts are also underway by Republicans in other battleground states such as Michigan, Nevada and Pennsylvania, even if they don't think they will actually win the suits. The strategy, according to election law experts, appears to be to have these complaints in place before the election so they can be cited afterward, and used by election officials at the state and federal level to try and overturn results --- only in the event that Trump loses, of course.

At the same time, the Government Accountability Project, a longtime whistleblower support organization, founded in 1977 in the wake of Daniel Ellsberg's release of the Pentagon Papers, has published a new guide meant to support election officials and poll workers who may have legitimate reason to blow the whistle this year, particularly in battle grounds states. The 37-page booklet [PDF], entitled "On the Front Lines of Democracy: A Guide to Speaking Up for Election Officials & Workers," offers specific legal advice for those may have seen something and want to say something about it, but don't know exactly how to do so while protecting themselves in the bargain.

We're joined today by DANA GOLD, GAP's Senior Director of Advocacy & Strategy and the Director of the group's Democracy Protection Initiative, which was formed in advance of the 2020 election, "in anticipation of a highly partisan environment" when they were "very concerned about foreign and insider threat of illegal election interference," she explains today.

"We didn't have a lot of whistleblowers, though," says Gold. "We had a fire extinguisher ready. But, as we know, the 2020 election ended up being actually quite secure, fair and free, and administered safely." That said, as we discuss today, "the threat landscape has changed in 2024."

Gold outlines a number of "primary threats to elections" as identified by research in "this very hyper-partisan environment." She says foreign interference remains a concern, but also "the risk of disinformation being spread widely, which can have the result of suppression, delay, eroding confidence in the election results. And potential insider threats. People who are essentially election deniers who believe that the 2020 election was stolen despite every piece of evidence showing that the election was free and fair."

"This is a really volatile environment and election officials and workers are on the front lines, and may be in the best position to see efforts to suppress the vote. They may see insider threats. There are opportunities for election officials and workers who may see problems, and feel very scared and not clear about how to raise that concern, especially if the threat is their supervisor, someone in a position of power."

Given my own long history of reporting on election whistleblowers over the past two decades --- usually related to voting systems and their vendors --- the question of how to determine who are legitimate whistleblowers in this atmosphere, and who are not (but may even think they are) is a rich topic of discussion. Also, given that heroic whistleblowers like Reality Winner --- a national security official who exposed the fact that Russian intelligence operatives had actually infiltrated voter registration systems in several states before the 2016 election --- ultimately received a five-year prison sentence for having done so, Gold grapples with how to best encourage whistleblowers to come forward, while still protecting their legal and civil rights.

"That's why this is really important for us, in terms of a strategy of trying to disseminate this guide, to make election officials and workers, and any employee, aware of their rights, and their risks and options."

"Document everything," she advises those who may believe they have witnessed an election-related violation of law. "Write it down contemporaneously. Make sure that's secure. Check for allies in their co-workers. Note witnesses. Date things. There are ways to shore up the verification piece, which will be critical to both insulate them and make a difference." She adds, of course (citing Mesa County, Colorado's former MAGA County Clerk, Tina Peters, who just received a nine year prison sentence for tampering with voting systems, even as she uncovered nothing!), "they should not break the law to do so."

"Whistleblowers are such an important piece of democracy itself," Gold asserts. "The information provided by a whistleblower fuels those mechanisms of accountability that are our representative democracy. Very important tools in our collective efforts to ensure free and fair elections." To that end, she tells me, the group provides "legal and strategic support and advocacy, so we can protect them, in this environment particularly."

There is much more of note in our fascinating and lively conversation today. Please tune in!...

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Apparently, it's Disaster Month on The BradCast. And while they are, so far, nominally, "natural disasters", they are all made worse, more ferocious, more expensive and more deadly thanks to the global warming caused by the man-made burning of fossil fuels and the lawmakers who have, for decades, ignored and/or lied about both the science and the warnings. [Audio link to full show follows this summary.]

Millions are (hopefully) fleeing Florida today as Category 5 Hurricane Milton bears down on its central Gulf Coast, with an "eye" toward landfall on Wednesday night in or near Tampa. A direct hit there could result in unspeakable damage. And it all comes just over a week since Hurricane Helene slammed the state before moving on to five others in the U.S. Southeast, leaving a trail of destruction and at least 230 dead in its wake.

The National Weather Service's warning about Milton today is terrifying, describing "potential impacts" of the storm surge, wind, and rainfall flooding as anywhere from "Devastating to Catastrophic" in several cities along the state's central West Coast. Yesterday, Tampa's Mayor Jane Castor was blunt when she warned residents: "If you choose to stay in one of those evacuation areas, you’re going to die."

Like last week's Hurricane Helene, Milton experienced rapid intensification, spinning up from a Cat 1 to a Cat 5 in less than a day as it traversed record hot waters in the Gulf of Mexico, thanks to anthropogenic climate change. The monster system's sudden drop in pressure over the Gulf yesterday momentarily choked up NBC Miami's Chief Meteorologist, Jim Morales, as he described the " incredible, incredible, incredible hurricane," seemingly taking in what he was seeing, what it meant for millions in peril in the Sunshine State, and for everyone around the world who will now being seeing similar and worse in the years ahead. "I apologize. This is just horrific," he added as he composed himself.

We're joined today by "Climate Guy" GUY WALTON, a 30-year Weather Channel veteran who now tracks daily weather and climate extremes at his Guy on Climate website. He is also the author of "World of Thermo" children's book series on climate change.

"I think on top of this hurricane, [Morales] was thinking about hurricanes of the future, and how warm the water temperatures are getting around the planet. It's going to become the norm," Walton tells me. He predicts that the cost of a direct hit on the densely populated Tampa region --- which has not seen a direct landfall in more than 100 years --- could top historic storms such as 2005's Katrina. "It's going to be taking a path that could lead to being the most destructive hurricane, dollar-wise, in the US."

"Milton is going to bisect Florida in one of the most heavily populated areas, from Tampa to Orlando. We haven't seen a storm like this go right through Tampa since 1921. The destruction of this thing is going to be awful," warns Walton.

We discuss why rapid intensification of so many of these storms is now happening all over the world, and why it can be so dangerous. We discuss who's to blame for it. ("It's all our fault.") We discuss what Project 2025's threat to privatize the National Weather Service would mean to meteorologists like him, and how the one-two punch of Helene and Milton might affect this year's Presidential election.

"After Milton and Helene, which are both going to be attributed to being so bad because of global warming or climate change, I'm hoping that Democrats really pounce on the destruction and really point a finger at just about every Republican."

IN RELATED NEWS TODAY...

• Why Project 2025's scheme to privatize FEMA and it's federal flood insurance program --- along with other agencies at DHS --- to "shift the majority of preparedness and response costs to states and localities instead of the federal government" (page 135), is both insane and anti-American.

• How years of Republican lawmakers in North Carolina over-riding vetoes of the state's Democratic Governor to massively weaken building codes on behalf of the construction industry --- amid increasing threats of a changing climate --- made Hurricane Helene far worse, far more expensive and more deadly for their own constituents than it needed to be.

• And, finally, Desi Doyen joins us for, you guessed it, our latest, very hurricaney, Green News Report...

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On today's BradCast: Too many hurricanes. It's almost as if there is some reason this is suddenly happening...even if Florida's U.S. Senator Rick Scott (up for re-election in four weeks, btw!) pretends as if doesn't have a clue. [Audio link to full show follows this summary.]

Among our stories today...

• With less than four weeks to go before Election Day, folks in more than half of the states are now voting, registration deadlines are closing, and a group of Muslim imams and faith leaders have written a letter of endorsement [PDF] for Kamala Harris, noting "she is a committed ceasefire candidate...and the best option for ending the bloodshed in Gaza and now Lebanon." They also argue: "Knowingly enabling someone like Donald Trump to return to office, whether by voting directly for him or for a third-party candidate, is both a moral and a strategic failure. Particularly in swing states, a vote for a third party could enable Trump to win that state and therefore the elections,” the clerics argue. They advise that "given [Trump’s] well-documented history of harming our communities and country, as well as what he has promised he will do to Muslims and Palestinians should he return, it is incumbent upon us not to allow our high emotions to dictate our actions to our detriment.”

• Hurricane Milton spun up overnight from Category 1 to dangerous Category 5 in less than 24 hours, as it rapidly intensified over record warm Gulf of Mexico waters on a path toward the West Coast of central Florida. Milton formed just over a week after Hurricane Helene experienced similar rapid intensification in the Gulf before making landfall in the Big Bend region of Florida's panhandle --- the third storm to do so in less than 13 months. Helene then went on to devastate five more states in the U.S. Southeast, with the death toll now from that storm at 230. But, as Desi Doyen explains today, if Milton makes a direct hit on highly populated Tampa Bay, as currently feared, we could see an unspeakable disaster unlike anything we've seen in this country since at least Katrina back in 2005, if not longer. Landfall for Milton in Florida is currently expected on Wednesday night or Thursday morning.

• But, it barely took a full day before Donald Trump and his social media minions began unleashing lies about the federal response to Hurricane Helene last week. In a social media post last Monday, for example, the disgraced former President accused the Biden Administration of "going out of their way to not help people in Republican areas." (Attempting to withhold disaster relief to Democratic areas is something that Trump actually did as President.) Trump further lied that President Biden "left Americans to drown" in North Carolina, and falsely said in an interview that the government is "going out of their way to hurt" Trump voters in the western part of the state. "They’re not getting water, they’re not getting anything," Trump said.

  NC Gov. Roy Cooper described it as a "relentless vortex of disinformation, dialed up by bad actors and platforms like X [Twitter]." The shameful lies (many of them dangerous ones) have required FEMA to set up a "Rumor Response" page in order to debunk them and help keep their employees safe.

  We're joined today by TOM SULLIVAN from on the ground in western North Carolina, specifically from Asheville where he lives, in Buncombe County, one of the hardest hit regions following Helene. Sullivan is a political activist and organizer, and the longtime morning blogger at our friend Digby's Hullaballoo blog. After a week without power or water --- it just came back to his residence on Sunday. And, boy, was he bothered to learn of the lies that had been going on over the past week about what is happening in NC, particularly in hard hit Asheville. He tells us the claims by the rightwingers are simply untrue and that FEMA, in fact, is everywhere there.

  "There are aid stations, trailers, and relief groups on every corner in downtown. It's the most accessible city in the region," he tells me. "The helicopters are going out to remote coves. A lot of people are cut off. So it's mostly helicopter, military, people with high-water vehicles who can get through to these remote areas. And there are hundreds of them." They have been dropping food and other aid since the moment the storm passed, according to Sullivan, who lives in a largely undamaged part of the town. He says the water system will still be down for weeks, and he details some of the devastation he has seen in the area.

  "Everything is working great. The coordination is superb," he asserts, even as he and others who are just now coming back online, have been appalled and enraged by the lies that have been told about what's actually going on on the ground. "More than just being a threat to FEMA employees who try to help people, this disinformation --- they are scaring people. Especially the rumor about '[FEMA's] going to take your property.' If people are afraid to sign up for the aid, they are not going to get aid, and that's hurting them."

  "Some of our Republican officials are telling people to just cut it out," explains Sullivan, while suggesting "there may be a backlash to this" on November 5, even as he concedes he is not yet seeing enough of it to know exactly how it may all shake out at the ballot box in the closely divided battleground state.

  Sullivan also tells me that he spoke to the local elections director today, and shares an update on what election officials will be doing in order to accommodate voters this year, just weeks away from Election Day, with absentee balloting already underway. He worries, as does Brian Beutler at "Off Message" today, that the campaign of lies following Helene is a "trial run" for what is likely to come after Election Day if Trump loses once again...

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Tick-tock. Time is running out for all of the Trump scams, as detailed on today's BradCast. Unless, of course, he wins on November 5th --- or has more success stealing the Presidential election this year than he did in 2020. [Audio link to full show follows this summary.]

Among the Trump scams, rackets and accountability for having fallen for them on today's program...

• Melania Trump, according to her new book, is virulently in favor of abortion rights. According to her publisher, she also wanted $250,000 to be interviewed by CNN.

• You know about many of Donald Trump's legendarily failed rackets from the old days: Trump University, Trump Steaks, Trump Water, Trump Vodka, Trump Casinos, just to name a few. More recently, during the time he's been running for President again, there's been Trump Sneakers, Trump Bibles, Trump Digital Trading Cards, Trump Coins, Trump Cryptocurrency and, introduced just last Friday, "Swiss-made" Trump Watches. He's selling them for $100,000 a pop! Even though, according to experts, they appear to be Chinese-made crap, if they even exist, and appear just as likely to be an open invitation to foreign influence peddling and money laundering. We explain.

• All of the above enumerated rackets, by the way, are private rackets. Any profits from them do not go to his Presidential Campaign, but straight into Donald Trump's pocket. And so --- according to the new 165-page filing [PDF] by Special Counsel Jack Smith, unsealed by U.S. District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan on Wednesday afternoon --- was Trump's attempt to steal the 2020 election. New evidence in the filing from prosecutors in his 4-count federal indictment in D.C., further details how the disgraced former President and convicted felon was fully aware that he'd lost the election in 2020, but didn't care. He was going to fight to steal it anyway. He also knew he had put Vice President Mike Pence's life in grave danger on January 6th, 2021. His response: "So, what?" And all of that, as prosecutors argue in their brief, was done in Trump's capacity as a private candidate for office. It was not done as part of his official duties as President. Smith's motion is meant to make that case in hopes of preventing the corrupted U.S. Supreme Court from dismissing the case on the basis of their absurd, anti-American, anti-Constitutional, made-up-from-whole-cloth ruling in Trump v. U.S. declaring criminal immunity to sitting Presidents for crimes committed as part of their "official" duties.

• In Colorado today, a state judge unleashed a brutal, if accurate, take-down of disgraced former Mesa County Clerk, Tina Peters during her sentencing hearing. Once a MAGA superstar, she is now a convicted felon on charges related to a criminal scheme to breach voting system software in her own County, based on false claims that fraud software was implanted in them to flip votes from Trump to Biden in 2020. The judge told Peters today: "I am convinced you would do it all over again if you could. You’re as defiant as any defendant this court has ever seen. You are no hero. You abused your position and you’re a charlatan." He called out her continuing claims of evidence-free fraud as "just more lies. No objective person believes them. No, at the end of the day, you cared about the jets, the podcasts and people fawning over you." He then sentenced her to nine years in prison before she was handcuffed and hauled out of the courtroom to immediately begin serving her time. See ya, Tina! May she be the first of many.

• Finally, Desi Doyen joins us for our latest Green News Report, as the deadly disaster in six states continues to unfold in the U.S. Southeast following Hurricane Helene, which at least succeeded in finally helping to bring the issue of climate change to the top of Tuesday's Vice Presidential debate between Democrat Tim Walz and Republican J.D. Vance...

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We have, of course, Special Coverage on today's BradCast of Tuesday night's one and only Vice Presidential Debate, likely the last direct face-off between the two tickets before Election Day. [Audio link to full show follows below.]

It was somewhat disorienting to watch a Presidential ticket debate that didn't include name-calling, one-liner zingers and direct personal attacks. But with "Minnesota Nice" Democratic Governor Tim Walz taking on Ohio's Republican U.S. Senator J.D. Vance, who has an historically low favorability rating and a desperate need to improve his likeability among the electorate, perhaps we shouldn't be surprised that the debate ended up coming across more like an olde tyme, pre-Trump Era (even pre-Rove Era) 1990s Presidential debate.

But Vance's politeness was there only to try and mask his well-documented, far-right, autocratic MAGA policy preferences on everything from abortion to gun safety to climate change to health care to his running-mate Donald Trump's violent attacks on our democracy, leading to evasive answers to questions from both the CBS News moderators and Walz himself on whether he believed, for instance, that the 2020 election was stolen from Trump. "Tim, I'm focused on the future," Vance said, refusing to respond. "That is a damning non-answer," Walz replied, adding: "He lost the election. This is not a debate. It's not anything, anywhere other than in Donald Trump's world." It wouldn't be the only direct question that Vance deflected.

While a nervous Walz stumbled through some of the early moments of the debate, he regained his footing thereafter and displayed a command of facts, data and reality on a host of topics raised by the moderators. The Yale Law School trained Vance also proved to be a competent debater, deftly smoothing over his extremist, hard-right record and former persona as a Trump-opponent, while doing his best to focus his fire on Kamala Harris whenever possible...facts be damned.

We're joined today, as we frequently are on such occasions, by longtime friends and old school bloggers, HEATHER DIGBY PARTON of Salon and Hullabaloo, and 'DRIFTGLASS' of his eponymous blog and The Professional Left Podcast for some help in making sense of whatever played out in the New York City studios of CBS last night. (Reportedly it was in the same studio that Captain Kangaroo was taped. Make of that what you may.)

Both Parton and Driftglass agree that the two Vice Presidential candidates "accomplished what they set out to do" and, as Parton added, "as far as the niceness thing", that should be chalked up to the fact that "Donald Trump wasn't there being a jackass."

"Vance needed to soften all of the ridiculous extremist policies of himself and Donald Trump, and present himself as something other than a full-blown King Cobra, which I think he managed to do," she says, referencing her coverage of the debate at Salon today, in which she described Vance as possessing "all the charm and warmth of a King Cobra." On Tuesday night, she explains today, "he sounded semi-sane. I'm sure most people who haven't been following him probably thought, 'Oh, well, he's not that bad.'"

Both also agree that they would have have preferred to see a more aggressive Walz, even if that might not have been what the MN Guv needed to do to reach whichever undecided voters still exist out there. Instant polling of debate watchers released shortly afterward, gave Vance the slimmest of edges over Walz and a big bump in favorability for both candidates, even as Walz' favorability remains far higher than Vance's.

"Clearly they are executing a strategy," explains Driftglass. "I wanted to see [Walz] come out there with a sword in both hands and just scream, 'Liar!' for 90 minutes," when what he needs, "tactically, is to go out there and be the nicest guy you ever met. I think for the people he is striving to reach, it worked."

On the other hand, he continues, Vance's job was to "polish up the turd" that Trump put on the ticket "to make him look like a human being so that he can go out there and be the nice guy." The result, says Driftglass, "was a festival of whatabout-ism and lying."

We discuss much of the sane-washing, whatabout-ism, lies and damning non-answers to a host of topics raised during the 90-minute debate on Tuesday --- and Walz' responses to them --- in our very lively Special Coverage today...

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