The group was plagued by a series of poignant hauntings as three of them came down with mysterious illnesses that triggered anomalous hallucinations and paranoia for months.The following narrative was forwarded to me by a reader from the small nation of Brunei:"A much-loved sport amongst fervent fans and football enthusiasts, this game has beckoned millions to its allegiance, dominating the world of sports on a global scale and in some cases apparently, captivating even the scariest of sorts. In this story, a group of friends journeyed back in time to relay their appalling tale, which they claim, occurred during a friendly match with fellow schoolmates at a random field in the district during the 1990s.En route to their destination, the group cycled past a row of wooden houses and shops before reaching a wide stretch of road leading to the open field. Although the sun radiated its golden rays over the turf, a disturbing presence loomed in the dark shadows of the forests and seemed to drape the surroundings in a menacing façade. Wilted leaves cloaked the paved walkway as a decrepit rest house stood beside the precipice landscape. This didn’t bother the youngsters at all as they geared up to begin their much-awaited football match.It started off as an exciting first-half but 15 minutes into the next round, the goalkeeper kept a wary glaze at the nearby electrical poles. The curious lot stared blankly at their only source of defence against a possible goal and threw the ball in his direction. “Azim, what are you staring at? Focus on the game otherwise, we’ll have to ‘belanja’ the other team if we lose!” Nazri said. The goalie simply nodded and laughed at the mild teasing but an evident fear loomed in his eyes.As the game intensified, Daud, another player, skillfully maneuvered the ball in an attempt to strike for goal but before he could hit home, the striker dropped to his knees and twinge in pain. The others rushed to his aid and offered to escort him to the hospital but instead, Daud refused and opt to watch the game despite the untimely injury. While cheering on from the sidelines, he was taken aback by what seemed to be a piece of linen cloth dangling from one end of the electrical poles but dismissed it as nothing out of the ordinary. He occasionally diverted his attention back to the poles and was surprised to find that the ‘linen’ had shifted to another area. Only this time, it resembled a formidable ‘apparition’. His heart skipped a beat as he quickly glanced at the leaden sky. Darkness engulfed the skies as the sun took its leave over the horizon, radiating the last strokes of light, which resembled orange smears in the dusk, indicating that night was fast approaching. “It’s just my imagination. Must be the pain from my ankle,” Daud thought silently to himself and snubbed the idea of informing his friends about the strange sighting.Both teams refused to surrender to defeat and before long, night had fallen. “Just one goal!” Razak playfully said as they jubilantly tried to win the match. Then, a striker from the opposing team attempted to make his mark but inexplicably smashed his volley into the nearby forest. The players stole quick glances at one another, indicating their refusal to retrieve the ball from the creepy terrain. One of their teammates, Ali, eventually volunteered to recover the object and immediately emerged from the woods after a few short seconds. “That was fast. So excited to win the game?” Nazri teased but his happy-go-lucky friend remained silent, a solemn look darkened his expression. The others simply shrugged off Ali’s ’sulky’ mood and thought the poor guy was fuming over recovering the ball earlier on.As the match continued, Razak reinforced their attacking options and crossed for Ali to clip home the first goal but his teammate stood unresponsive to his gestures. Rage overwhelmed the defiant defender as he marched across the field to give Ali a piece of his mind. “If you’re angry over a small matter, don’t play. You’re just standing there like a statue! And why in the world do you reek of dead rats?” Razak shouted while covering his nose. Again, ‘Ali’ maintained his ‘poker face’. While the outburst transpired, Nazri tapped the furious defender on the shoulders and pointed toward the direction of the woods. Before them, their blithe comrade emerged from the dark shadows and ran hastily towards the others.“Sorry guys. Took a while for me to find the ball,” Ali said nonchalantly. The players exchanged bewildered looks amongst themselves as their eyes searched the grounds for the ‘mysterious’ doppelganger and remained practically speechless at the bizarre ordeal. “Why are you looking at me like that?” Ali said, his eyebrows frowning at the uncanny glances around him. Daud limped towards the disorientated lot and disclosed the mysterious sighting he had spotted earlier on. Azim confirmed the bizarre incident for he too, caught a glimpse of the ‘entity’. “We had better leave. This isn’t a good sign,” Razak said. As they gathered their belongings, a ball ricocheted against the goalpost and into the field. It moved bafflingly across the turf on its own and suddenly came to an abrupt stop.Out of the blue, it struck Razak on the face with a sturdy force as blood started oozing out from his nose. Fear paralysed the entire team instantaneously and they scurried from the premises, leaving behind all their belongings. The perplexed lot stared in amazement at Daud’s sudden vigor and agility for he zoomed past the rest despite his so-called ‘injury’. “I never ran so fast in my life. All I felt was numbness but was more concerned about the impending terror behind us,” Daud joked.The scampering crowd came to a sudden stop as a ghostly apparition emerged from the forest and glided towards the players while clasping a child’s bloody hands in the other. They vaguely caught sight of its distorted face and some managed to make a run for it but the others panicked and remained solidly still. As it released a petrifying laugh, the entity moved toward Razak and stared at him intently with its bloodshot eyes.The others summoned their inner strength and began reciting prayers to ward off the spirit. It took on a defensive stance and attempted to shatter their fortitude by disrupting the group’s unified chants. Its ear-piercing snarl sounded like a pack of wolves howling in the night but they kept their grit together till the ’spirit’ disappeared into thin air. The terrified lot nervously retreated to the exit, reciting prayers each step of the way.After a good five minutes, the group sighed in relief as they reached the junction to the main road. A deafening silence fell upon them as they ruminated over the uncanny state of affairs that ensued earlier. Their nightmare was, however, far from over. That night, the foreboding shadows crept into their homes fueling a lurid episode of bizarre occurrences.The group was plagued by a series of poignant hauntings as three of them came down with mysterious illnesses that triggered anomalous hallucinations and paranoia for months while the others experienced encounters out of the norm.Days after the dreadful field experience, Razak claims that his parents saw a ghostly apparition prying through his bedroom window. They initially perceived that it was a woman and child, who probably required help but as ‘it’ turned around to confirm their suspicions, the couple remained silent and intuitively knew what it was. A creaking sound then echoed near the gallery as they hurried towards the door to tentatively secure the bolt. “They don’t need the door, dear. They can simply go through any wall,” Razak’s father implied as his wife gestured for him to hush down. Peering through the corners of the shutters, his mother caught sight of a ‘poltergeist’ commonly known as ‘hantu pochong’ to the locals, but soon vanished into the shadows.The phenomenal encounters, seemingly plucked from the scenes of a horror film, continue to remain a mystery. In Azim’s case, several ‘visits’ scared the wits out of him as he struggled to fight his fears. “One night, a loud banging erupted on the front door. My parents thought it was a late visitor but after peeking through the window, they caught sight of a paranormal entity gliding from one corner of the house to the other,” he said frightfully.The daunting episodes didn’t stop there. At the stroke of three in the morning, he could perceive the sounds of loud footsteps, which then faded along the dark corridors. This was followed by strident thuds on the roof, which sounded like giant fingers drumming from above.Now in their mid-twenties, the group of friends evidently illustrated their hidden fears as they reminisced over the events of that fateful year. “It’s been more than ten years but the events remain freshly imprinted in my mind,” Razak said.The notorious field, known for its lurid ghost stories, has undergone major transformations throughout the years and a building now stands in its place. The colourful blossoms and green pastures have supplanted the once-gloomy surroundings. Behind the building, the great forest loomed high above the grounds and concealed its sinister facade.“We probably stepped into forbidden grounds or accidentally offended the malevolent spirits. Whatever the case, this is something no one should experience,” Nazri said before concluding their tales." D**********POLL: WHAT DO YOU THINK? Vote & comment on paranormal, cryptid & unexplained mysteries!FERAL PEOPLE & WILD MEN - ISOLATED HOMININS | Join Us - LIVE CHAT | Q & A (REAL EYEWITNESS REPORTS!)LISTEN TO NARRATIONS OF PHANTOMS & MONSTERS REPORTS & CASES - PLEASE SUBSCRIBE, LIKE & SHAREPHANTOMS & MONSTERS RADIO Podcasts on SpotifyPHANTOMS & MONSTERS READING LISTCHICAGO MOTHMAN / O'HARE BATMAN YouTube PlaylistHave you had a sighting or encounter?Contact me by email or call the hotline at 410-241-5974Thanks. LonJOIN AMAZON PRIME - Unlimited Movie/TV Streaming& FREE 2-Day ShippingRegister a SNAP EBT CardTry Audible PlusBigfoot and Other Cryptid Videos on YouTube'KILLER BIGFOOT' HUNTED BY U.S. SPECIAL FORCES / GLIMMER MAN / MANTIS HUMANOIDSCRAWLER HUMANOIDS - GRUESOME INVADERS! (REAL EYEWITNESS ENCOUNTERS!)WEREWOLVES: DO THEY EXIST?'DOGMAN IN OUR YARD!' - AN OHIO FAMILY'S 12-YEAR SAGA WITH CRYPTID CANINES----------Become a Phantoms & Monsters Radio member - just $2.99 monthly, and receive these perks. Thanks for your support!-Members-only live chats-Exclusive members-only videos-Priority reply to members' commentsHave perks suggestions? LMK-----YOUR SUPPORT IS APPRECIATED! THANKS-----Project Threshold: Finale-----Have you had a sighting or encounter?Contact us by email or call the hotline at 410-241-5974Thanks. LonAlso available with audiobooknarration by Terry Springs,CBS-TV Las Vegas affiliate.This blog and newsletter are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Work 3.0 United States License.Registered trademark PHANTOMS AND MONSTERS ® / PHANTOMS & MONSTERS ® - USPTO #90902480 - Lon D. Strickler© 2005-2024 Phantoms & Monsters - All Rights Reserved

MILWAUKEE—Former President Donald Trump selected Sen. JD Vance, an Ohio Republican, as his running mate in the Nov. 5 presidential election. Trump made the announcement Monday on Truth Social. “After lengthy deliberation and thought, and considering the tremendous talents of many others, I have decided that the person best suited to assume the position of Vice President of the United States is Senator J.D. Vance of the Great State of Ohio,” Trump posted. “J.D. honorably served our Country in the Marine Corps, graduated from Ohio State University in two years, Summa Cum Laude, and is a Yale Law School Graduate, where he was Editor of The Yale Law Journal, and President of the Yale Law Veterans Association.” ?BREAKING: Trump picks J.D. Vance as his VP pick.??https://t.co/r3bTmLlKHI pic.twitter.com/XNfrWJpKoE— Tyler O'Neil (@Tyler2ONeil) July 15, 2024 Born in Middletown, Ohio, Vance graduated from the Ohio State University in 2009 and earned a law degree from Yale Law School in 2013. He joined the Marine Corps and served as a combat correspondent, a military journalist, in the Iraq War. He worked at PayPal founder Peter Thiel’s venture capital firm Mithril Capital between 2016 and 2017 and published his bestselling memoir “Hillbilly Elegy” in 2016. “Hillbilly Elegy,” which described Vance’s youth in the hollowed-out Rust Belt, captured the struggles of middle America and catapulted him to cultural and political stardom. Vance, who turns 40 on Aug. 2, moved back to Ohio and co-founded Narya Capital in Cincinnati with Thiel’s financial backing. In 2021, he launched a political campaign for Ohio’s open Senate seat. An endorsement from Trump, by then a former president, helped Vance win the Republican nomination. He went on to defeat the Democratic nominee, Rep. Tim Ryan, in 2022. Vance is a natural ideological fit for Trump, particularly on border security. Vance repeatedly has warned about the consequences of illegal immigration and has loudly supported funding the completion of Trump’s wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. Vance has opposed experimental transgender medical interventions for minors—often euphemistically branded “gender-affirming care” to hide the true nature of such procedures. He introduced the Protect Children’s Innocence Act to make interventions such as “puberty blockers,” cross-sex hormones, and transgender surgeries a felony when performed on minors. “Under no circumstances should doctors be allowed to perform these gruesome, irreversible operations on underage children,” Vance said in introducing the bill. Vance has indicated that he would support a federal ban on abortions after 15 weeks’ gestation, although he more recently said that abortion laws should be up to the states. The Ohio senator has argued that the U.S. should shift its focus to East Asia, criticized unaccountable U.S. military aid to Ukraine, and backed funding for Israel during its war with the Hamas terrorist organization. Vance has three children with his wife Usha Chilukuri Vance, whom he married in 2014. Trump selected Vance two days after a gunman opened fire at a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, in an apparent attempt to assassinate the former president. A bullet grazed Trump’s right ear, spraying blood on his face. As Secret Service agents rushed him offstage, Trump raised his fist repeatedly in a defiant gesture, shouting, “Fight! Fight! Fight!” Rallygoer Corey Comperatore, a former fire chief who lived in Sarver, Pennsylvania, died from a gunshot wound sustained after he dove on family members to protect them. A spokesman for Allegheny Health Network said two other Pennsylvania men were wounded and in critical condition: a 57-year-old resident of New Kensington and a 74-year-old resident of Moon Township, USA Today reported. Vance warned that Democrats’ exaggerated rhetoric about Trump inspired the assassination attempt. “Today is not just some isolated incident,” the Ohio Republican said Saturday. “The central premise of the Biden campaign is that President Donald Trump is an authoritarian fascist who must be stopped at all costs. That rhetoric led directly to President Trump’s attempted assassination.” This is a breaking story and will be updated. The post BREAKING: Trump Picks JD Vance as His Running Mate appeared first on The Daily Signal.

The real purpose of The Heritage Foundation’s policy and personnel plan for the next conservative president is to speak on behalf of forgotten Americans, Heritage President Kevin Roberts said Monday at the leading think tank’s Policy Fest at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee. “You might say that the real purpose of this huge, broad-scale effort, unprecedented in the history of the conservative movement,” Roberts said of Project 2025, “isn’t so much about policy per se as it is to remind people elites in Washington, New York, the Left Coast, [and] Brussels that the time has come to stop forgetting about forgotten Americans.” Organized by The Heritage Foundation beginning in spring 2022 and including contributions from over 100 other conservative organizations, the 2025 Presidential Transition Project, known as Project 2025, aims to equip an incoming conservative president with policies to rein in the size and power of the U.S. government’s bureaucracy. Roberts spoke at Heritage’s Policy Fest on the first day of the Republican National Convention, which will run Monday through Thursday, when Donald Trump is scheduled to accept the party’s nomination for president a third time just days after an attempt on his life. Project 2025 is “a representation of what a majority of Americans feel and believe,” Roberts said, a plan “to restore self-governance to the American people, so that they can, according to their choice, their customs, their habits, build their families, live in their communities, go about their lives and their businesses and their jobs—as we like to say, living the good life.” President Joe Biden’s reelection campaign launched a website dedicated to attacking Project 2025 and has posted what Roberts and others call baseless claims about the policy initiative, including falsely asserting that Project 2025 seeks to “terminate the Constitution.” “The reason progressive Democrats hate these ideas so much is because they are a threat to their power,” Roberts said. If implemented, Project 2025 will make Washington, D.C., “a heck of a lot less important in our lives so that we can go about our own lives,” Roberts said. The Heritage president also honored Corey Comperatore, the former fire chief who was shot and killed in Butler, Pennsylvania, during the attempted assassination of Trump on Saturday evening. “I would dare say, not having met Corey, but feeling like I know him, that he personifies what this movement is about,” Roberts said. “A man who went to church every Sunday, a man who literally gave his life protecting his family, a man who was doing something that any of us from the far left to the far right should think we should be able to do at any point in this country and not be threatened with violence, and that is to attend the political rally of our choice.” The post Project 2025 Represents ‘Forgotten Americans,’ Reduces Washington’s Influence, Roberts Says appeared first on The Daily Signal.

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BREAKING: Trump Picks Vance As Running Mate

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NBA star Steph Curry and his Golden State Warriors coach Steve Kerr both expressed sadness over the attempted killing of former President Donald Trump but also called for stricter gun control.Following the shooting of Trump, members of the Team USA Olympic basketball team were asked by reporters for their reactions to the horrific events.Kerr, who is both the coach of the NBA's Warriors and Team USA, said his team would be paying special attention to how they conduct themselves on behalf of the country:"This is a time where we feel very proud to represent our country wearing USA on our chest, competing in the Olympics," Kerr told reporters while in Abu Dhabi, UAE. "We've talked to the players about how important it is to show the best version of us as human beings to represent our country in a respectful, dignified manner. It makes you want to do that even more so, because this is really shameful for us to sit here and think about what happened and what's going on in our country."ESPN noted that Kerr's father was assassinated in 1984 in Beirut, Lebanon, after being targeted by a militant group called Islamic Jihad. Malcolm Kerr served as the president of the American University of Beirut."It's such a demoralizing day for our country, and it's yet another example of not only our political division but also gun culture," Kerr continued, then describing the shooter. "A 20-year-old with an AR-15 trying to shoot the former president. It's hard to process everything, and it's scary to think about where this goes because of the issues that already exist in the country. So this is a terrible day.""Thank God Trump wasn't hit, but it's just so demoralizing in every which way," he added.'Obviously, gun control first and foremost.'However, the attempted assassin, Thomas Matthew Crooks, has been widely reported to have taken his father's legally purchased rifle to commit his crimes. The gun was purchased in 2013, ABC News reported.Curry, an NBA champion and Team USA star, also weighed in from Abu Dhabi. Curry echoed sentiments of sadness but also called for further restrictions on firearms."It's obviously a very sad time in general," Curry said. "All the conversations around the election and the state of politics in our country, and then you have a situation like this, which just [evokes] a lot of emotions around things that we need to correct as a people," he said in front of a Team USA backdrop."Obviously, gun control first and foremost, because the fact that that's even possible for somebody to have an attack like that. But just more so you want to [see] positivity and hope. It sounds cheesy, but it's real. That's when our country's at its best, and it just adds another blemish to what's going on. So sad is just the word," he concluded.Curry and Kerr were both guests at the White House in early 2023 to present basketball jerseys to the president. At the same time, Kerr and some of his players participated in a round table on the matter of gun control.Kerr's anti-gun activism goes back many years, having even made statements blaming Republicans for shootings.They "refuse to do anything about the violence, the school shootings, the supermarket shootings," Kerr said in 2022. They put their "desire for power ahead of the lives of our children, our elderly, and our churchgoers," he added.Curry has more broadly spoken out against gun violence but is generally less vehement than Kerr in his calls for stricter laws.Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

Bill Maher called former President Donald Trump "the luckiest motherf***er" after Trump survived Saturday's assassination attempt — and the comedian also "unequivocally" denounced the shooting, which took place during Trump's rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, and said he's "glad" Trump is "OK."Maher — host of HBO's "Real Time" — made his statements from a comedy show concert stage just hours after the assassination attempt.'When I saw that photo today of him with the blood streaming down his face — I don’t wanna say the election’s over, but ...'You can view video of Maher's commentary here; he was scheduled Saturday night for a show in Minneapolis, the Hollywood Reporter said."I’m sure that there will be jokes that people will make because they hate him so much that they wished it went the other way," Maher told the crowd. "Not for me.”In fact, Maher lamented that "whoever was the shooter has done so much damage to the left. Lost a lot of moral high ground in the ‘you’re the violent people.' ... Liberals don't shoot people. Liberals don't solve it that way."Turning again to Trump, Maher noted, "I gotta say this: The luckiest motherf***er that has ever walked the face of the earth," after which the crowd erupted in laughter.Maher noted again that he's "happy [Trump is] OK"; then he pointed out Trump's good fortune in winning the 2016 election, even though "he lost the popular vote by a lot," because he "pulled an inside straight" in the Electoral College. Maher added that Trump's luck also showed itself with the "Democratic turmoil" and concern over President Joe Biden's candidacy. "Always lucky, lucky, lucky," Maher said of Trump.“When I saw that photo today of him with the blood streaming down his face — I don’t wanna say the election’s over, but ..." Maher said before pausing and chuckling with the crowd. He added, "Yes, MAGA nation finally has its full martyr. They loved it when he went to jail. The mug shot. I gotta say, he is insane, and he is a criminal. But that mug shot? F***ing nailed it. Perfect."Maher also said Trump reacted to the shooting "like he rehearsed it," putting up a fist like the former president did. Maher also acknowledged the "idiot conspiracy theorists ... who will say, ‘Oh, they planned it.’""[Trump] gets grazed, and the other guy gets shot — it's so Trump," Maher also said. "But you know, it’s gonna work for him. I can see the memes now: 'The man the libtards couldn’t kill.' 'Biden can’t get through a debate and a bullet can’t stop Donald Trump.' It almost doesn’t matter who the Democrats put up now.”Like Blaze News? Bypass the censors, sign up for our newsletters, and get stories like this direct to your inbox. Sign up here!

President Donald Trump named Sen. James David Vance (R-Ohio) Monday as his vice presidential pick. Trump said in a statement Monday afternoon that after "lengthy deliberation and thought, and considering the tremendous talents of many others, I have decided that the person best suited to assume the position of Vice President of the United States is Senator J.D. Vance of the Great State of Ohio." Vance is former Marine who was born in Middleton, Ohio; served with the 2nd Marine Aircraft Wing in the Iraq War; graduated from Yale Law School; served as a corporate lawyer; worked as a venture capitalist; penned the best-selling book "Hillbilly Elegy"; and then became a U.S. senator. Vance was initially a fierce critic of Trump, telling NPR in 2016 that he couldn't stomach the then-Republican presidential candidate. While insisting in a 2016 New York Times op-ed that Trump was "unfit for our nation's highest office," Vance nevertheless understood the real estate magnate's appeal, noting: To those humiliated by defeat, he promises we'll win again. To those discouraged by a government unable to care for the people it sent to war, he promises to take care of our veterans. To those voters furious at politicians who sent their children to fight and bleed and die in Iraq, he tells them what no major Republican politician in a decade has said — that the war was a terrible mistake imposed on the country by an incompetent president. Having seen over time that Trump was not only willing but able to make good on many of his promises — including driving up wages, securing the border, and refraining from partaking in his predecessors' custom of starting at least one new war — Vance quickly came over to Trump's side. Vance apologized to Trump on cable news in 2021, stating, "I ask folks not to judge me based on what I said in 2016 because I've been very open that I did say those critical things and I regret them, and I regret being wrong about the guy. I think that he was a good president. I think that he made a lot of good decisions for people, and I think he took a lot of flak." Vance also came to understand that Trump's America First agenda was not devoted to the protection of America as an idea but rather to the prioritization of the concrete realities that make up America, specifically its citizens and physical homeland. In his recent speech at the National Conservatism conference in Washington, D.C., Vance said, "I'm most optimistic about the future of this movement and the future of our country ... because for the first time in a very long time, it is clear that the leader of the Republican Party is not some donor who's desperate for cheap labor, and it's not some random person who claims to speak for this or that constituency. The leader of the Republican Party is a guy who actually plans to put American citizens first — and that is Donald Trump." In an interview last week with New York Times columnist Ross Douthat, Vance provided additional insights into his political conversion, noting, "Like a lot of other elite conservatives and elite liberals, I allowed myself to focus so much on the stylistic element of Trump that I completely ignored the way in which he substantively was offering something very different on foreign policy, on trade, on immigration." Trump clearly did not hold a grudge about Vance's earlier comments and misgivings, having endorsed him when he ran for the U.S. Senate in Ohio. 'He will not let you down. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!' "Like some others, J.D. Vance may have said some not so great things about me in the past, but he gets it now, and I have seen that in spades," Trump said in his endorsement statement. "He's strong on the Border, tough on Crime, understands how to use Taxes and Tariffs to hold China accountable, will fight to break up Big Tech, and has been a warrior on the Rigged and Stolen Presidential Election. J.D. is a Marine who served in the Iraq War, a graduate of The Ohio State University, and earned a Law Degree from Yale — a great student." "He will put America first," added Trump. "J.D. Vance has my Complete and Total Endorsement. He will not let you down. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!" Concerning the recent efforts by the media to dig up Vance's old critiques of Trump, Donald Trump Jr. said to CNN, "We're 100% confident that JD is America First to the core." "No one in the Senate has been a stronger supporter of my father," added Trump Jr. Outside the Trump family, Vance has also secured the confidence of other big names on the populist right. Tucker Carlson told Politico earlier this year, "I feel like I've got a really good sense of senators, and he's by far the smartest and the deepest of any I've ever met." "He's the one public intellectual that we have who’s in office, and it's incredibly powerful," said Steve Bannon. "This movement has needed someone like J.D.." While there may have been numerous reasons behind Trump's decision to pick Vance as his running mate — including Vance's staunch pro-worker populism and the fact he does not hail from the same state — the former president's contrarian reflex may have been a factor. After all, leftists, liberals, and even some nominal Republicans have urged Trump not to pick Vance. 'Picking Vance would allow the Biden campaign to sell the message that this is truly a MAGA ticket that needs to be defeated.' USA Today columnist Dace Potas suggested Saturday that Trump should choose "a more traditional" and "boring" candidate — certainly not Vance. "A radical VP choice, such as 39-year-old Sen. J.D. Vance of Ohio, could shift some of the heat away from Biden and refocus media and voter attention back onto Trump's MAGA message and the extreme politics that come with it," warned Potas. "First, Vance is off-putting to principled GOP voters. I know because I am one, but the stats agree," said the self-described Republican columnist. "Second, picking Vance would allow the Biden campaign to sell the message that this is truly a MAGA ticket that needs to be defeated. Sure, Democrats will try this tactic anyway, but a more unity-focused Republican ticket with a traditional conservative would make this angle look even more preposterous to the right-leaning swing voters that Trump needs to win." Instead of Vance, Potas recommended former U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haley as the ideal running mate. Former Obama adviser and Democratic strategist David Axelrod suggested Vance should be disqualified for suggesting that Biden's inflammatory rhetoric set the stage for the attempted assassination on Trump. After the shooting at the Trump rally Saturday, Vance wrote, "The central premise of the Biden campaign is that President Donald Trump is an authoritarian fascist who must be stopped at all costs. That rhetoric led directly to President Trump's attempted assassination." Axelrod wrote, "If @JDVance1 is on the short list for VP, this Tweet, sent an hour after the assassination attempt in PA, ought to disqualify him in the eyes of the Trump campaign. Wrong vibe in that moment." "Trump probably doesn't want a shoot-from-the-hip VP," added Axelrod. Trump evidently had no problems proving Axelrod wrong again or disappointing the likes of Potas. Trump noted further in his announcement of Vance as his VP, "J.D. honorably served our Country in the Marine Corps, graduated from Ohio State University in two years, Summa Cum Laude, and is a Yale Law School Graduate, where he was Editor of The Yale Law Journal, and President of the Yale Law Veterans Association. J.D.’s book, 'Hillbilly Elegy,' became a Major Best Seller and Movie, as it championed the hardworking men and women of our Country. J.D. has had a very successful business career in Technology and Finance, and now, during the Campaign, will be strongly focused on the people he fought so brilliantly for, the American Workers and Farmers in Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Ohio, Minnesota, and far beyond." Like Blaze News? 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