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PBC News & Comment: Trump Loyalist at DNI Spins Fears of Russian and Iranian Cyberattacks

In bizarre pre-election announcement, Trump’s puppet DNI says Russia and Iran are sending threats, disinformation to voters using widely-available data…–John Ratcliffe delivers murky statement, saying Iran is helping Trump to win, and that data from “dark web” being used—when it’s widely available

–Pelosi keeps Dems focused on Russia as the bad actor

–federal judge accepts White House claim that Trump’s tweets aren’t official orders

–Trump moves to dismantle civil service for federal workers

–Senate Republicans blast Mnuchin in squeeze play over Covid relief

–Deep State action: Defense Secretary on loan from Raytheon changes Trump order to cut US troops in Germany, deploying them to Russian border states

–Trump isn’t winning the Jewish vote, so he threatens to label human rights organizations as anti-Semites for criticizing Israel

–US is feverishly trying to block approval of nuclear weapons ban treaty

–SecState Pompeo signs anti-abortion declaration supported by repressive nations

–boycotted by Dems, Senate Judiciary approves Barrett nomination 12-0 as NY Times courtwatcher Linda Greenhouse looks at fate of abortion rights

–will the second and last prez debate be different? Trump is averaging 50 lies a day

–breaking agreement with CBS, Trump releases video of 60 Minutes interview he cut short, with damaging statements about killing Obamacare

–Trump campaign cash crunch leads to blame game

–late in the contest, Obama surfaces to slam Trump and encourage blacks to voted for Biden

–Trump has widely abused laws and rules about campaigning at White House, but GOP demands investigation into Biden’s Amtrak charter for whistlestop tour

–Supreme Court intervenes to block drive-up voting in Alabama, and has injected confusion into mail balloting in South Carolina

–in $200 million ballot campaign to change labor laws in California, Uber/Lyft annoy their drivers and use nonprofit postal rates

–Covid quarantine rules prevent DOJ lawyer from arguing for federal takeover of rape/defamation case against Trump

–Jeffrey Epstein’s pimp, Ghislaine Maxwell, loses legal argument as deposition is released

–Colorado wildfires go wilder, jumping the Continental Divide above the tree line

–10 years after release of Iraq War Logs, Kevin Gosztola examines the impact

–our daily Covid-19 update, prepared by Linda Lewis

–from the scene, GrayZone Project releases video report on Bolivian election

–the latest judge at Gitmo assigned to 9/11 case may be forced out

–after 2 years, Facebook appeal panel gets up and running

–Googlers object to secret contract for Google Cloud to support virtual border wall

–ICE is rounding up Africans at risk of death in home countries, and deporting some

–worldwide protest briefs: Nigeria and Thailand