Defense Minister Says Israel Won't Assert Civil Control Over Gaza Post-War, In Bow To US Pressure

Israel’s defense minister Yoav Gallant on Friday published and circulated a document laying out the military's "vision for Phase 3" of the Gaza war, which ostensibly lays out a new scaled-down, more targeted approach for operations in the Gaza Strip. 

However, Gallant made clear the contents of the plan are not yet official Israeli policy, only that these are his ideas. "In the northern region of the Gaza strip, we will transition to a new combat approach in accordance with military achievements on the ground," Gallant’s office said of the policy proposal.

Operations will continue to focus on raids, demolishing tunnels, air and ground strikes, as well special forces operations in the north - even including all of these tactics apparently also continuing in the south, which will go on "for as long as is deemed necessary" until Hamas is eradicated and the hostages are freed.

Israel has recently announced a drawdown of reserve forces active in the Gaza Strip, and repositioning of troops, with an eye toward more targeted operations, which has been widely seen as a nod to US pressure for the campaign to deescalate. Gaza's Health Ministry has cited a Palestinian death toll of over 22,400 - which it says are mostly women and children.

Defense chief Gallant's plan is most interesting when it comes to the Hamas 'day after' - given this has been a point of contention between the Netanyahu and Biden governments. The White House has floated a plan that would eventually give control over to the West Bank-based Palestinian Authority (PA).

But Netanyahu has consistently rejected this, calling the PA terror supporters and sympathizers. But the Gallant plan is seeking to strike a compromise, it appears: 

"Gaza residents are Palestinian, therefore Palestinian bodies will be in charge, with the condition that there will be no hostile actions or threats against the State of Israel," Gallant’s office said in a statement on Thursday.

Al Jazeera’s Sara Khairat, reporting from Tel Aviv, said Gallant made it clear that Israeli officials want a "Palestinian entity" to be in charge of running civilian affairs in the Gaza Strip, but with "very specific conditions".

“Those conditions are that they won’t act hostile towards Israel, and they won’t act against it in any way, shape, or form.”

It's unclear who this "Palestinian entity" would be if the PA is not considered among the options. But the importance in this lies in that it's another significant concession to Washington's will... an affirmation that Israel won't assert civilian control over Gaza in a post-war scenario.

However, the reality is that we could be years from seeing any such 'day after' plan materialize, given that Hamas is still intact, after having lost likely thousands of fighters. And the sad question must be asked: will there be any Palestinian civilians remaining in the Strip to speak of?

Hamas will meanwhile continue to employ guerrilla tactics utilizing small teams which attack from the vast network of tunnels, which means they do not suffer large-scale losses in any single assault operation.

* * * 

Below: Hamas has been publishing footage of its close-quarter ambushes in Gaza almost on a daily basis...

⚡️Hamas publishes footage of their fighters targeting zionist vehicles in Gaza city axis pic.twitter.com/O616d8oZs9

— War Monitor (@WarMonitors) January 4, 2024

https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/defense-minister-says-israel-wont-assert-civil-control-over-gaza-post-war-bow-us

What Causes Depression That's One of Stroke's Most Common Complications?

 The mechanisms underlying poststroke depression (PSD), a common and debilitating complication of stroke, are unclear. Is it neurobiological, psychosocial, or both?

Two studies offer new insight into this question. In the first, investigators systematically reviewed studies comparing stroke and non-stroke participants with depression and found the groups were similar in most dimensions of depressive symptoms. But surprisingly, anhedonia was less severe in patients with PSD compared with non-stroke controls, and those with PSD also showed greater emotional dysregulation.

"Our findings support previous recommendations that clinicians should adapt the provision of psychological support to the specific needs and difficulties of stroke survivors," lead author Joshua Blake, DClinPsy, lecturer in clinical psychology, University of East Anglia, Norwich, United Kingdom, told Medscape Medical News.

The study was published online on September 5, 2023, in Neuropsychology Review.

A second study used a machine learning algorithm to analyze blood samples from adults who had suffered a stroke, determining whether plasma protein data could predict mood and identifying potential proteins associated with mood in these patients.

"We can now look at a stroke survivor's blood and predict their mood," senior author Marion Buckwalter, MD, PhD, professor of neurology and neurosurgery at Stanford Medicine, California, said in a news release. "This means there is a genuine association between what's happening in the blood and what's happening with a person's mood. It also means that, down the road, we may be able to develop new treatments for PSD."

The study was published in November 2023 in Brain, Behavior, and Immunity.

'Surprising' Findings

"There has long been uncertainty over whether PSD might differ in its causes, phenomenology, and treatability, due to the presence of brain injury, related biological changes, and the psychosocial context unique to this population," Blake said. "We felt that understanding symptomatologic similarities and differences would constructively contribute to this debate."

The researchers reviewed 12 papers that sampled both stroke and non-stroke participants. "We compared profiles of depression symptoms, correlation strengths of individual depression symptoms with general depression, and latent item severity," Blake reported.

They extracted 38 symptoms from five standardized depression tools and then organized the symptoms into nine dimensions.

They found mostly nonsignificant differences between patients with PSD and non-stroke controls in most dimensions, including negative affect, negative cognitions, somatic features, anxiety/worry, and suicidal ideation. Those with PSD more frequently had cognitive impairment, and "work inhibition" was more common in PSD.

But the most striking finding was greater severity/prevalence of emotional dysregulation in PSD vs non-stroke depression and also less anhedonia.

Blake acknowledged being "surprised."

One possible explanation is that stroke recovery "appears to be a highly emotional journey, with extreme findings of both positive and negative emotions reported by survivors as they psychologically adjust," which might be protective against anhedonia, he suggested.

Moreover, neurologically driven emotional dysregulation "may similarly reduce experiences of anhedonia."

However, there was a "considerable risk of bias in many of the included studies, meaning it's important that these findings are experimentally confirmed before stronger conclusions about phenomenological differences can be drawn," he cautioned.

Common, Undertreated

Buckwalter said her team was motivated to conduct the research because PSD is among the top problems reported by chronic stroke patients, and for most, it is not adequately treated.

However, "despite the high prevalence of PSD, it is very poorly studied in the chronic time period." In particular, PSD isn't "well understood at a molecular level."

She added that inflammation is a "promising candidate" as a mechanism, since neuroinflammation occurs in the stroke scar for decades, and chronic peripheral inflammation can produce neuroinflammation. Aberrant immune activation has also been implicated in major depression without stroke. But large studies with broad panels of plasma biomarkers are lacking in PSD.

To address this gap, the researchers used a proteomic approach. They recruited 85 chronic stroke patients (mean age, 65 years [interquartile range, 55-71], 41.2% female, 65.9% White, 17.6% Asian, and 0% Black) from the Stanford Stroke Recovery Program. Participants were between 5 months and 9 years after an ischemic stroke.

They analyzed a comprehensive panel of 1196 proteins in plasma samples, applying a machine learning algorithm to see whether the plasma protein levels "could be used to predict mood scores, using either the proteomics data alone or adding age and time since stroke." The proteomics data were then incorporated into multivariable regression models, along with relevant clinical features, to ascertain the model's predictive ability.

Mood was assessed using the Stroke Impact Scale mood questionnaire, with participants' mood dichotomized into better mood (> 63) or worse mood (≤ 63).

'Beautiful Mechanistic Model'

Machine learning verified a relationship between plasma proteomic data and mood, with the most accurate prediction occurring when the researchers added age and time since the stroke to the analysis.

Independent univariate analyses identified 202 proteins that were most highly correlated with mood in PSD. These were then organized into functional groups, including immune proteins, integrins, growth factors, synaptic function proteins, serotonin activity-related proteins, and cell death and stress-related functional groupings.

Although no single protein could predict depression, significant changes in levels of several proteins were found in PSD patients. A high proportion (45%) were proteins previously implicated in major depression, "likely providing a link to the underlying mechanisms of chronic PSD," the authors stated.

Moreover, 80% of correlated immune proteins were higher in the plasma of people with worse mood, and several immune proteins known to have anti-inflammatory effects were reduced in those with worse mood.

And several pro-inflammatory cytokines were implicated. For example, interleukin 6, which has been extensively studied as a potential plasma marker of major depression in non-stroke cohorts, was significantly elevated in patients with worse mood after stroke (P = .0325), "implicating a broadly overactive immune system in PSD."

"We demonstrated for the first time that we can use plasma protein measurements to predict mood in people with chronic stroke," Buckwalter summarized. "This means there is a biological correlate of mood but [it] doesn't tell us causality."

To tease out causality, the researchers used their own data, as well as information from a literature review of previous studies, to assemble a model of how the immune response following a stroke could change both serotonin and brain plasticity.

"We used the most highly correlated proteins to construct a beautiful mechanistic model of how poststroke depression may work and how it may relate to mechanisms in major depression," Buckwalter said.

The model "posits an increased inflammatory response that leads to decreased tryptophan, serotonin, and less synaptic function, all of which contribute to symptoms of depression."

Currently, selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors represent the "best treatment" for people with PSD, but "unfortunately they don't work for many patients," Buckwalter noted. The findings "provide clues as to other molecular targets that are candidates novel therapies for poststroke depression."

Blake commented that the proteomic study "complements the work by us and others interested in understanding PSD."

Mood disorders "must be understood in terms of the dynamic relationships between structural neurological alterations, cellular and microbiological changes, psychological processes, and the person's interactions with their social landscape," Blake said.

New Treatments on the Horizon?

Gustavo C. Medeiros, MD, assistant professor, Department of Psychiatry, of the University of Maryland School of Medicine, Baltimore, said that knowing which individuals are more likely to develop PSD "allows treatment teams to implement earlier and more intensive interventions in those who are at higher risk."

The findings [of the proteomic study] may also "help clarify the neurobiological correlates of PSD…[which] may help the development of new treatments that target these neurobiological changes," said Medeiros, who wasn't involved with either study.

However, he warned, "we should interpret their results with caution due to methodological reasons, including the relatively small sample size."

Also commenting, Bruce Ovbiagele, MD, MSc, MAS, MBA, MLS, professor of neurology, UCSF Weill Institute for Neurosciences, California, said the proteomic study has some "clear limitations," including the lack of Black or African American patients in the cohort, which limits generalizability, "since we know that Black and African American people are disproportionately affected by stroke and have very high rates of PSD and very severe presentation."

The study by Blake et al. "was interesting because the phenotype of depressive symptoms after stroke differs from what's seen in the general population, and the authors figured out a way to better understand the nuances of such differences," said Ovbiagele, who wasn't involved with either study.

He said he was also surprised by the finding regarding anhedonia and suggested that the findings be replicated in a study directly comparing patients with PSD and patients with depression from the general population.

The study by Bidoki et al. was funded by AHA/Paul Allen Foundation, the Leducq Stroke-IMPaCT Transatlantic Network of Excellence (MSB), the Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute (MSB), the Alfred E. Mann Foundation (NA), and an Alzheimer's Association Research Fellowship to one of the authors. No source of funding was listed for the study by Blake et al. The authors of both studies, Medeiros and Ovbiagele, declare no relevant financial relationships.

https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/what-causes-one-strokes-most-common-complications-2024a10000dx

Active Surveillance for Low-Risk PCa: Sprint or Marathon?

 Seventeen years ago, Philip Segal, a retired accountant from suburban Toronto, Canada, was diagnosed with prostate cancer in a private clinic. After rejecting brachytherapy recommended by an oncologist, he went on active surveillance to watch, but not treat, the Gleason 6 (grade group 1) tumor. As he approaches his 80th birthday later this year, Segal said he plans to maintain the status quo. "It definitely brings me some peace of mind. I'd rather do that than not follow it and kick myself if there was a serious change," he said.

Meanwhile, 2 years ago and 200 miles away in suburban Detroit, Bruno Barrey, a robotics engineer, was diagnosed with three cores of Gleason 6 and went on active surveillance.

Six months after the original diagnosis, however, Barrey, 57, underwent a follow-up biopsy. This time, all 16 cores were positive, with a mix of low-risk Gleason 6 and more advanced Gleason 3 + 4 lesions. His tumor was so large he underwent radiation therapy in 2023, ending his brief stint on the monitoring approach.

The two cases illustrate the complicated truth of active surveillance. For some men, the strategy can prove to be short-lived, perhaps 5 years or less , or a life-long approach lasting until the man dies from another cause.

Which kind of race a man will run depends on a wide range of factors: His comfort level living with a cancer, or at least a tumor that might well evolve into an aggressive malignancy, changes in his prostate-specific antigen (PSA) level and results of a magnetic resonance imaging test, the volume of his cancer, results of genetic testing of the patient himself and his lesion, and his urologist's philosophy about surveillance. Where a patient lives matters, too, because variations in surveillance levels exist in different geographic areas, domestically and internationally.

"Active surveillance is a strategy of monitoring until it is necessary to be treated. For some people, it is very short, and for others, essentially indefinite," said Michael Leapman, MD, clinical lead at Yale Cancer Center in New Haven, Connecticut. "While there are differences, I think they are mainly about who is the ideal patient."

Michael Leapman, MD

Most studies show that roughly half of men in the United States who go on active surveillance abandon it within 5 years of diagnosis. Rashid Sayyid, MD, a clinical fellow at the University of Toronto, Canada, found in a paper presented to the American Urological Association in 2022 that the number leaving active surveillance increased to nearly two thirds at 10 years.

Peter Carroll, MD, a urologist at the University of California, San Francisco, and a pioneer in the active surveillance in the late 1990s, said the major reason men abandon the strategy is because monitoring reveals the presence of a more aggressive cancer, typically a grade group 2 (Gleason 3 + 4) lesion. But other reasons include anxiety and other emotional distress and upgrades in blood levels of PSA and increases in the rating scale for MRI for the likelihood of the presence of clinically significant prostate cancer.

Laurence Klotz, MD, of the University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, who coined the term active surveillance strategy in 1997 and published the first studies in the early 2000s, said it is important to consider when the data on surveillance were collected.

Laurence Klotz, MD

Since 2013, when MRI began to be adopted as a surveillance modality for men with prostate cancer, the dropout rate began declining. The reason? According to Klotz, MRIs and targeted biopsies result in greater accuracy in staging the disease, determining which patients need to be biopsied, which helps some men avoid being diagnosed to begin with.

Klotz cited as an example of the emerging change a 2020 study in the Journal of Urology, which found a 24% dropout rate for surveillance at 5 years, 36% at 10 years, and 42% at 15 years in a series of 2664 grade group 1 patients on active surveillance at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York City from 2000 to 2017.

Leapman cited a 2023 study in JNCI Cancer Spectrum using the National Cancer Database that found a decline in the percentage of patients who had grade group 1 in biopsies from 45% in 2010 to 25% in 2019.

"There is more judicious use of PSA testing and biopsy in individuals who are more likely to have significant prostate cancer," Leapman told Medscape Medical News. "And MRI could also play a role by finding more high-grade cancers that would have otherwise been hidden."

The changing statistics of prostate cancer also may reflect decreases in screening in response to a 2012 statement from the US Preventive Services Task Force advising against PSA testing. The American Cancer Society in January 2023 said that statement could be driving more diagnoses of late-stage disease, which has been surging for the first time in two decades, especially among Black men.

Sayyid said patients must be selected carefully for active surveillance. And he said urologists should not promise their active surveillance patients that they will avoid treatment. "There are numerous factors at stake that influence the ultimate outcome," he said.

Progression of Gleason scores is estimated at 1%-2% per year, Sayyid added. When active surveillance fails in the short to medium term — 5-10 years — the reason usually is that higher-grade cancers with Gleason 3 + 4 or above were initially missed.

Sayyid said he counsels patients aged 70 years and older differently than those in their 50s, telling younger patients they are more likely to need treatment eventually than the older patients.

Factors that can affect the longevity of active surveillance include the presence or absence of germline mutations and the overall health and life expectancy and comorbidities such as heart disease and diabetes in a given patient, he said.

Urologists hold varying philosophies here, especially involving younger patients and the presence of any level of Gleason 4 cancer.

William Catalona, MD, of Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine in Chicago, Illinois, who developed the concept of mass screening with PSA testing, originally opposed active surveillance. In recent years, he has modified his views but still takes a more conservative approach.

"I consider active surveillance a foolish strategy or, at best, a short-term strategy for young, otherwise healthy men, especially those having any Gleason pattern 4 disease."

"More than half will ultimately convert to active treatment, some too late, and will require multiple treatments with multiple side effects. Some will develop metastases, and some will die of prostate cancer."

Sayyid takes a more liberal approach. "I would counsel an eligible patient considering active surveillance that at the current time, I see no strong reason why you should be subjected to treatment and the associated side effects," he said. "And as long as your overall disease 'state' [the combination of grade, volume, PSA, and imaging tests] remains relatively stable, there should be no reason for us to 'jump ship'. In my practice, another term for active surveillance is 'active partnership' — working together to decide if this is a sprint or a lifelong marathon."

Carroll reported research funding from the National Institutes of Health.

https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/active-surveillance-low-risk-pca-sprint-or-marathon-2024a10000eq

CVS raises expectations for enrollment in some Medicare plans

 CVS Health said on Friday it expects enrollment in its fast-growing Medicare Advantage plans for people aged 65 and above to exceed its previous targets in 2024 helped by strong new sales and member retention.

The healthcare conglomerate, which owns health insurer Aetna, said it expects to add at least 800,000 members to its Medicare Advantage plans this year, versus its previous forecast of adding 600,000 people in 2024.

Medicare Advantage plans differ from traditional Medicare as they are offered by private insurers and are paid a set rate to manage healthcare for people aged 65 and older or with disabilities.

Aetna competes with larger rivals UnitedHealth and Humana in the Medicare Advantage market.

CVS' plans benefited from favorable "star ratings" from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, which determine reimbursement levels and can sway enrollees in choosing plans.

CVS, in a regulatory filing, reaffirmed its 2024 adjusted profit forecast of at least $8.50 per share. The company also expects 2023 profit at the higher end of its previous range of $8.50 to $8.70 per share.

Analysts on average expect adjusted profit of $8.59 per share in 2023, according to LSEG data.

CVS had tempered its 2024 earnings forecast in November to account for potentially higher medical costs at its insurance unit as older adults increasingly avail healthcare services deferred during the pandemic.

Separately on Friday, the company formally appointed Tom Cowhey as its chief financial officer, who held the position on an interim basis since October.

Cowhey's predecessor Shawn Guertin, who has been on leave of absence since October, will leave the company on May 31, 2024.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/1-cvs-says-2024-medicare-120614847.html

'US intelligence confirms Islamic State's Afghanistan branch behind Iran blasts'

 Communications intercepts collected by the United States confirmed that Islamic State’s (ISIS) Afghanistan-based branch carried out twin bombings in Iran that killed nearly 100 people, two sources familiar with the intelligence told Reuters on Friday.

"The intelligence is clear-cut and indisputable," one source said.

That source and a second, both of whom requested anonymity to discuss the sensitive issue, said the intelligence comprised communications intercepts, without providing further details. The collection of the intercepts has not been previously reported.

Wednesday's bombings, the deadliest of their kind in Iran since the 1979 Islamic Revolution, added to regional tensions over the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza and attacks by Yemen's Tehran-aligned Houthi group on commercial shipping in the Red Sea.

ISIS on Thursday claimed responsibility for the bombings, saying two operatives wearing explosive suicide belts staged the attack during a memorial service for Qassem Soleimani, a senior military commander assassinated in Iraq in a 2020 U.S. drone strike.

The Sunni Muslim militant group, however, did not specify that its Afghanistan-based affiliate, known as ISIS-Khorasan (ISIS-K), was responsible for the bombings in the southeastern Iranian city of Kerman.

“The U.S. has pretty clear intel” that ISIS-K conducted the attack, the first source said.

The Central Intelligence Agency declined to comment.

ISIS harbors a virulent hatred for Shi'ites -- Iran's dominant sect and targets of its affiliate's attacks in Afghanistan -- who it views as apostates.

ISIS claimed responsibility for a 2022 attack on a Shi'ite shrine in Iran that killed 15 people and 2017 bombings that hit the parliament and the tomb of the Islamic Republic's founder, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.

Iran on Friday said security forces had arrested 11 people suspected of involvement in Wednesday's attack and had seized explosive devices and vests.

While Taliban crackdowns have weakened ISIS-K and prompted some members to leave Afghanistan for neighboring countries, the affiliate has continued focusing on plotting foreign operations, U.S. officials say.

https://news.yahoo.com/exclusive-us-intelligence-confirms-islamic-184238509.html

Microsoft, OpenAI hit with new lawsuit by authors over AI training

  OpenAI and its financial backer Microsoft were sued on Friday in Manhattan federal court by a pair of nonfiction authors who say the companies misused their work to train the artificial-intelligence models behind the popular chatbot ChatGPT and other AI-based services.

Writers Nicholas Basbanes and Nicholas Gage told the court in a proposed class action that the companies infringed their copyrights by including several of their books as part of the data used to train OpenAI's GPT large language model.

Representatives for Microsoft and OpenAI did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the complaint.

The lawsuit follows several others filed by fiction and nonfiction writers ranging from comedian Sarah Silverman to "Game of Thrones" author George R.R. Martin against tech companies over the alleged use of their work to train AI programs.

The New York Times also sued OpenAI and Microsoft last week over the use of its journalists' work to train AI applications.

Basbanes and Gage are both former journalists. Their lawyer, Michael Richter, said it was "outrageous" that the companies could use their works to "power a new billion-dollar-plus industry without any compensation."

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/microsoft-openai-hit-lawsuit-authors-213944912.html

 by Catherine Yang via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

The U.S. Supreme Court accepted a petition for immediate review regarding a Colorado Supreme Court decision to strike former President Donald Trump from the 2024 presidential ballot.

“The petition for a writ of certiorari is granted,” reads the procedural order.

Oral arguments are scheduled for Feb. 8.

Petitioners’ and amicus briefs are due by Jan. 18, and respondents’ and amicus briefs are due by Jan. 31, with any reply briefs due by Feb. 5.

The Colorado Supreme Court had disqualified President Trump as a candidate on Dec. 19 in an order that left little chance for the actual removal of his name from the ballot.

On Dec. 27, the Colorado GOP filed a petition with the U.S. Supreme Court asking three separate questions regarding the application of Section 3 of the 14th Amendment and political parties’ First Amendment rights to primary their candidate of choice.

On Jan. 3, President Trump filed a separate petition with a simpler question: Did the Colorado Supreme Court err in its ruling?

The U.S. Supreme Court has taken up President Trump’s petition, and has yet to accept to reject the Colorado GOP’s petition.

‘Chaos’

Colorado was the first state to disqualify President Trump, and the first state to hold hearings regarding the merits of a Section 3 challenge at all.

The legal theory that President Trump can be disqualified under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment rests on the premise that the events of Jan. 6, 2021, constituted an insurrection, and that President Trump actively participated in or instigated it. It also assumes that individual state courts at various levels have the authority to adjudicate the eligibility of a presidential candidate under Section 3.

There have been at least 60 of these challenges across the country in recent months, according to President Trump’s attorneys.

However, the majority of these challenges have been dismissed for a wide range of reasons, with several courts citing lack of jurisdiction.

Officials and some judges have argued that if individual state courts were meant to be able to rule if a presidential candidate engaged in insurrection and whether that affected his eligibility, it could result in “chaos,” with upwards of 50 different rulings.

In several amicus briefs filed with both the Colorado GOP and Trump petitions, experts and concerned voters argued much the same.

The Colorado decision has already created a ripple effect, with legislators in other states calling for disqualifications of President Trump as a candidate on their own ballots, as well as other states calling for the disqualification of President Joe Biden from state primaries in retaliation.

Soon after the Colorado Supreme Court ruling, Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows similarly disqualified President Trump as a candidate in a decision phrased as having little chance of actually removing him from the ballot. That decision is being appealed in state court, and marks the third jurisdiction that has found that President Trump engaged in an insurrection—without him, or any Jan. 6 defendant, having been charged with such.

The lawsuits and wide range of rulings have raised a host of legal questions: Does the Constitution allow states to define “insurrection” individually? Does Congress hold sole authority over disqualifying candidates under Section 3? Does the disqualification from holding office allow states to prohibit candidates from running in primary elections, or can a candidate be disqualified or exempted via a vote by Congress as late as Inauguration Day?

As such, several amicus brief authors have requested the U.S. Supreme Court adjudicate more than what the appellants have asked, including to hold a full hearing on the merits of the case.

A group of 45 Colorado voters had filed an amicus brief on the Colorado GOP petition, urging the Supreme Court to do more than merely reverse the Colorado Supreme Court ruling.

Such a ruling “would solve nothing and actually makes matters worse,” they wrote. “The Colorado court has unleashed harms which will creep beyond Colorado’s borders.”

https://www.zerohedge.com/political/supreme-court-takes-trump-ballot-disqualification-case