August 02 2024

Paris Olympics Update
1 Harris Faces Tough Battle in Presidential Race Amid Changing Voter Dynamics
2 Simone Biles Makes Historic Comeback at Paris Olympics, Ledecky Reaches Milestone
3 Intel to Lay Off Thousands in Cost-Cutting Move, Stock Falls 20%
4 9/11 Mastermind Spared Death Penalty in Plea Deal
5 US Recognizes Venezuelan Opposition Leader's Election Victory
8/2/1990 Iraq invades Kuwait

Paris Olympics Update

1 Harris Faces Tough Battle in Presidential Race Amid Changing Voter Dynamics

Kamala Harris struggles to rally the Obama coalition, facing significant losses among working-class and nonwhite voters, while maintaining strong support from college-educated voters.

The presidential race has tightened considerably and, though Trump is still favored to win…Inspired by their historic standard bearer, exuberant partisans proclaim the second coming of the Obama coalition

Start with the working class. While Obama carried them by 4 points, four years later Clinton lost them by 3 points. Four years after that, Biden lost them by 4 points and, four years later, Harris in the Times poll is losing them by 15 points. Contrast this with the trajectory of the college-educated vote. As noted, Obama carried these voters by 6 points. In 2016, Clinton carried them by 13 points and four years later Biden carried them by 18 points. Today, Harris’ lead over Trump among the college-educated is 20 points

Similarly, consider the class trajectories within the white vote. In 2012, Obama lost the white working-class vote by 20 points, a bounce back performance after the Democrats’ catastrophic performance with this demographic in the 2010 election. Gaining back some of Democrats’ lost white working-class support was a widely-ignored key to his re-election, particularly his success in Midwest/Rustbelt states. But famously Clinton in 2016 did much less well, losing these voters by 27 points (and the election in the process because of these voters’ defection in three key Rustbelt states). Then in 2020, Biden lost this demographic nationally by a slightly lower 26 points, which included slight improvements in those key Rustbelt states—an underrated factor in his victory. But today in the Times poll, Harris is losing these voters by a whopping 38 points.

The trajectory of the nonwhite working class also highlights another key difference between the Harris coalition and the Obama coalition. Recall Obama’s massive 67-point margin with these voters in 2012. That margin dropped to 60 points for Clinton in 2016 and further to 48 points for Biden in 2020. Now Harris, despite her progress relative to this year’s fading Biden campaign has only a 29-point margin among these very same voters.

Article Source: Ruy Texeria, Liberal Patriot

2 Simone Biles Makes Historic Comeback at Paris Olympics, Ledecky Reaches Milestone

Three years after Tokyo, Simone Biles wins all-around gold, becoming the oldest champion since 1952 and securing her ninth Olympic medal.

Three years after withdrawing from the team final of the Tokyo Olympics because of a mental block, a move that prompted critics to call her a loser, a quitter and un-American, Simone Biles on Thursday proved to the world — and to herself — that she was unstoppable. Wearing a leotard reminiscent of Wonder Woman’s suit, Biles, 27, won the all-around title at the Paris Games, becoming the oldest all-around champion since 1952 and only the third woman — and the first since 1968 — to win two Olympic all-around titles. The gold was Biles’s ninth Olympic medal, pushing her record total of Olympic and world championship medals to 39 and reaffirming her standing as one of the best athletes of all time.
NYT

Katie Ledecky became the most decorated female Olympic swimmer of all time 

Ledecky now has 13 Olympic medals -- eight golds, four silvers and a bronze -- one more than compatriots Jenny Thompson, Dara Torres and Natalie Coughlin and Australia's Emma McKeon.
Reuters

Article Source: NYT, Reuters

3 Intel to Lay Off Thousands in Cost-Cutting Move, Stock Falls 20%

Intel announces major layoffs and pauses dividend payments as part of a $10 billion cost-reduction plan amid declining sales

Ed note: Semiconductors are critical for modern life. Some have gone so far to say that semiconductors are the new oil. The United States lacks manufacturing capacity for the most advanced chips, those needed for artificial intelligence. US firms, notably Nvidia, contract the manufacturing of their chips to firms mostly in Taiwan. The island nation of Taiwan is located in perhaps the most dangerous geopolitical flashpoint in the world, with China stating is intentional “unify” with the independent nation. US policymakers have recognized this dangerous dependence and have stated the intention to bring semiconductor manufacturing back to America. The CHIPS and Science Act of 2022 provides $53 billion to domestic semiconductor firms. Intel and the Taiwanese firm TSMC are the only two major companies globally capable of making semiconductors at scale. Intel is America’s national champion when it comes to semiconductor manufacturing. That is the context needed for the next story.

Intel plans to lay off thousands of employees this year and pause dividend payments as part of a broad cost-saving drive more than three years into Chief Executive Pat Gelsinger’s turnaround effort. Gelsinger laid out the plan to reduce costs by more than $10 billion next year as the chip maker reported second-quarter sales of $12.8 billion, down 1% and below analysts’ forecasts in a FactSet survey. Reaching that cost-reduction goal will require cutting jobs and lowering capital expenditures, among other moves, the company said. The company’s stock fell 20% in after-hours trading.

Article Source: WSJ

4 9/11 Mastermind Spared Death Penalty in Plea Deal

Khaled Sheikh Mohammed to avoid execution as part of a plea agreement, ending years of legal disputes over CIA torture and Guantánamo Bay treatment

The alleged mastermind of the September 11 2001 attacks on the US will be spared the death penalty as part of a plea agreement that aims to end years of legal wrangling over his treatment by the CIA and interrogation under torture in Guantánamo Bay. Khaled Sheikh Mohammed, who is accused of plotting with the late al-Qaeda founder Osama bin Laden to hijack planes and fly them into the World Trade Center and Pentagon, will now receive a minimum sentence of 2,976 years in a military tribunal, the 59-year-old’s lawyer said on Wednesday.

Article Source: FT

5 US Recognizes Venezuelan Opposition Leader's Election Victory

Despite Maduro's claims, the US backs Edmundo González as the rightful winner of Venezuela's presidential election

The United States on Thursday night recognized Venezuela’s opposition presidential candidate, Edmundo González, as the winner of the country’s disputed election. The announcement, by Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken, comes despite a claim by the country’s authoritarian president, Nicolás Maduro, and by the government-controlled electoral body, that Mr. Maduro had won the Sunday election. Mr. Maduro has yet to produce clear evidence of a victory, and election officials have failed to provide a vote count. Mr. González’s campaign says it has receipts from more than 80 percent of voting machines that indicate he won by an insurmountable margin.
NYT

Ed note: this piece was written in the WSJ OPINION section by the leader of the Venezuelan opposition Maria Corina Machado under the headline “I Can Prove Maduro Got Trounced”

I am writing this from hiding, fearing for my life, my freedom, and that of my fellow countrymen from the dictatorship led by Nicolás Maduro. Mr. Maduro didn’t win the Venezuelan presidential election on Sunday. He lost in a landslide to Edmundo González, 67% to 30%. I know this to be true because I can prove it. I have receipts obtained directly from more than 80% of the nation’s polling stations. We knew that Mr. Maduro’s government was going to cheat. We have known for years what tricks the regime uses, and we are well aware that the National Electoral Council is entirely under its control. It was unthinkable that Mr. Maduro would concede defeat.
WSJ

Article Source: NYT, WSJ OPINION

8/2/1990 Iraq invades Kuwait

Sources

2. https://open.substack.com/pub/theliberalpatriot/p/the-harris-coalition-is-not-the-second?r=d9vo5&utm_medium=ios

3. https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/01/world/olympics/simone-biles-gymnastics-watch-all-around.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare; https://www.reuters.com/sports/olympics/swimming-australia-win-womens-4x200-freestyle-ledecky-breaks-medal-record-2024-08-01/

4. https://www.wsj.com/tech/intel-intc-q2-earnings-report-2024-6ec4ea69?st=sx8chrtozmoplp2&reflink=article_imessage_share

5. https://on.ft.com/3SytmGR

6. https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/01/world/americas/venezuela-election-gonzalez-maduro.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare; https://www.wsj.com/articles/i-can-prove-maduro-got-trounced-venezuela-election-stolen-772d66a0?st=k3lsi7xg29plw8h&reflink=article_copyURL_share

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