Open Thread February 2, 2024

 Posted by at 5:48 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Feb 022024
 

Yesterday – well, actually all this week I have been sleeping later than usual. I’m pretty cool with that, except that I don’t want to do it Saturday – the radio opera will be Anthony Davis’s X: The Life and Times of Malcolm X. It premiered in 1986… so it’s about time it came to the Met. Two of his four other operas have been “The Central Park Five,” for which he won a Pulitzer (but which I have not heard) and “Amistad,” which I have heard, on the radio, from Chicago Lyric Opera, and which choked me up. That must be almost 20 years ago – or more – , since I attempted to capture it on cassette tape, and only partially succeeded. Do I need to say that this Anthony Davis does not play pro basketball? So if you wasnt to learn more, be sure to Google (or Duck Duck Go) “Anthony Davis composer.”

Robert Reich has posted an article which is, or ought to be, pretty scary. How do you even prepare for something like that?And we know there are a lot of people who would gladly go along with it. We need our best legal minds to start getting on it right now (yesterday would be even better.)

Joyce Vance explains the border “crisis” as well as possible. But it’s hard to explain why states like Idaho, Montana, North Dakota, and Ohio are so worried. We don’t actually have a problem with illegals from Canada – do we? (By the way the answer to that first question is “No.” If you secede, you lose your citizenship. It’s not like someone who moves to another country but retains US citizenship.


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Open Thread August 15, 2023

 Posted by at 6:03 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Aug 152023
 

Yesterday, it was still cool – a high of 73F. It’s supposed to be warmer today, but still only in the high 80s. Also yesterday, Andrew Weissman said this on MSNBC: “The exact words because this is the provision that the court has to find to release someone on bail in Georgia, is that the defendant poses no risk of intimidating witnesses.” The reference is to the specific lehal language used in the Georgia criminal code. Federally and in most states, the burden of proof is on the government, but Georgia is different. I can tell you this caused a virtual party at Democratic Underground, with a plethora of jokes of various degreess of taste.  And also yesterday – last night, really – after 9 p.m. my time – an alert came in that Trump** and 18 others had been indicted by a grand jury in Georgia.  (I had heard earlier that they didn’t keep a 5:00 quitting time, but sent everyone to dinner and then re-convened into the night.)  The alert didn’t name the 18 others, nor were they listed in the linked story at the time, but Axios usually develops these stories, so they may (or may not) be there now.

Cartoon –

Short Takes –

CNN – Exclusive: Georgia prosecutors have messages showing Trump’s team is behind voting system breach
Quote – Investigators in the Georgia criminal probe have long suspected the breach was not an organic effort sprung from sympathetic Trump supporters in rural and heavily Republican Coffee County – a county Trump won by nearly 70% of the vote. They have gathered evidence indicating it was a top-down push by Trump’s team to access sensitive voting software, according to people familiar with the situation. Trump allies attempted to access voting systems after the 2020 election as part of the broader push to produce evidence that could back up the former president’s baseless claims of widespread fraud.
Click through for details. The nitty-gritty details of evidence are almost never anywhere near as much fun as the sweeping descriptions of the crime. But in order to prove stuff- prosecutors must dig through them.

Daily Kos (MargaretPOA) – Of Course Republicans are Angry. They Have Been Out Gamed… AGAIN.
Quote – As usual, Republicans acted on the assumption that Democrats would behave as dishonestly and unethically as they, themselves and so would never in a million years appoint a Special Counsel, even though the Democrats are as aware as anybody else that there is no evidence of wrongdoing because there was no wrongdoing. Republicans thought that they were safe to loudly and publicly demand a Special Counsel because they would never get one because they, themselves would never grant that if their positions were flipped. The fact that Republicans have long used a partisan DOJ to do their dirty work means that they can’t imagine an independent DOJ.
Click through for all the reasons – the quote is the first one. I like it because we all know it’s so, but it’s said so concisely and still in enough detail to be satisfying.

Food For Thought

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Open Thread August 13, 2023

 Posted by at 5:58 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Aug 132023
 

Yesterday, the radio opera was “La Sonnambula,” by Vincenzo Bellini. Bellini, along with Donizetti was at the top of composers working in the bel canto style, and this is an opera full of beautiful ornaments, and beloved by both Maria Callas and Joan Sutherland – both of whom had ranges which included solid low ranges, which is the kind of singer for whom the star role was written (when it’s sung by those who basically just sing soprano, some of the low notes are adjusted a bit.) I’m not familiar with the soprano in this production, which was recorded in Liège, Belgium; the only name I recognize is that of René Barbera, whom I heard in Santa Fe years ago – maybe as many as ten years ago. The story is easier to wrap your head around if you can get into the frame of mind at the time – sleepwalking? What’s that? The plot turns on the heroine sleepwalking into and collapsing in the hotel room of a man not her fiancé, being found there by her fiancé’s jealous ex-fiamcée, and almost losing him as a result. But it does end happily. A phrase from this opera is the epitaph of Bellini, who died young: “Oh, lovely flower, I did not think that you would fade so fast” (but in Italian.) Off to see Virgil now, will let y’all know when I get back.

Cartoon –

Short Takes –

SPLC – Florida sets up formerly incarcerated people to vote, then arrests them
Quote – [John Boyd Rivers] was among 41 formerly incarcerated people, also known as returning citizens, who were arrested in 2022 and 2023 for voter fraud in Florida following the 2020 election. Nearly half took plea deals, fearful of facing the unknown of a jury trial and guilty verdict. To date, only Rivers and one other have been tried in court. He drew a split verdict: not guilty of knowingly registering to vote while ineligible but guilty of willful, fraudulent voting.
Click through for story. Administrative incompetence is one thing. A deliberate set-up is quite another. As always, the cruelty is the point.

Robert Reich – Donald Trump, Samuel Bankman-Fried, and the rule of law
Quote – A prominent billionaire is arrested on criminal charges. At his arraignment, the presiding judge releases him pending trial on condition he not to try to influence potential witnesses and orders him not to speak with the media about the pending trial. He repeatedly violates the order. Eventually, the judge has had enough. He revokes bail and orders him jailed pending trial. I’m not referring to Donald J. Trump…. No, the person I’m referring to is Sam Bankman-Fried, the founder of the collapsed cryptocurrency exchange FTX. Bankman-Fried — whose wealth had soared to $28 billion before the collapse — had been under house arrest at his parents’ home in Palo Alto, California since his arrest in December on fraud charges stemming from FTX’s implosion.
Click through for full article. Yes, I realize if Trump** is put into pre-trial detention, there will likely be some violence. And I’m in favor of preparing for that as much as necessary to minimize the damage. I’m not in favor of just letting it go. Letting it go would be neither just nor prudent.

Food For Thought

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Video Thread 7/27/2023

 Posted by at 11:42 am  Open Thread, Politics
Jul 272023
 

Glenn Kirschner – 8 SEARCH WARRANTS were obtained in investigation of Trump’s documents/obstruction/espionage crimes

The Lincoln Project – #HitlERA

PoliticsGirl – Dear White Women

Parody Project – Pence Man

Summer Campers Find Out They’re Going Home With Rescue Puppies

Beau – Let’s talk about the Michigan elector claims getting strange….

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Open Thread June 26, 2023

 Posted by at 5:52 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Jun 262023
 

Yesterday, I promised that if I found out anything more about what the heck is going on in Russia I would share. There is no consensus, but I’m going to refer you to two links – Heather Cox Richardson, who spends a few paragraphs on it from an historian’s viewpoint before changing the subject, and the other a video from Beau. Be aware you do NOT have to watch the video to get the content. If you click on the three dots to the right of the Share and Save buttons, you will be offered the opportunity to view a transcript. It won’t be perfect, but it will give you a solid idea. Bottom line is this isn’t over, and no one knows what is next. But we can’t rule out an opportunity to see “Swan Lake” (which is traditionally performed for a regime change.)

Cartoon –

Short Takes –

SPLC – Advocates Register Voters after Supreme Court Victory over Gerrymandering
Quote – “I’m gonna go out on a ledge and say over 90% of our students were not registered to vote,” [Monica] Clarke said. “It was this huge wakeup call for me and others who were working with me. We were kind of shocked, kind of scared, kind of surprised – all of the above – and not just that they weren’t registered, but they didn’t even want to register. They had such a negative view of voter registration, of voting, of the government and police.” That was when she became an activist for voting rights, growing the university’s voter registration service into a mission unto itself. And, as the nation notes the 10th anniversary of the Shelby decision this weekend, Clarke sees the same forces that created the need for the Voting Rights Act still threatening people of color.
Click through for article. My BFF, who is black, has worked for the election department (and believe me, she votes) but has troble getting her young adult sons to regiter, so I get it. I don’t like it, but i get it. Maybe the FFT would help?

The Warning – Steve Schmidt – What is No Labels doing?
Quote – No labels lacks basic transparency around its donors, motives and strategy. They are purposely opaque. For example, they decry the imminence of a Biden-Trump rematch as unacceptable without ever being clear whether they measure Biden as similarly unacceptable as Trump. Why the mystery? Would they abandon their plans if Gretchen Whitmer or Gavin Newsom were the Democratic nominee? What exactly is the basis of the emergency? Is it Trump running again? Is it Trump winning again? Is the effort built around the belief that Biden can’t beat Trump? Perhaps the premise is that Biden is fueling demand for Trump? Does No Labels view Biden and Trump as equivalent figures, men, leaders and threats? Shouldn’t they say, or perhaps more importantly, shouldn’t someone ask?
Click through for article. I have said it before, and I will keep saying it whenever I needto, for as long as I need to: NEVER TRUST ANYONE WHO WILL NOT TELL YOU WHERE THEY STAND. I get it that many people are tired of labels (mostly because crooks and liars have achieved that end by design.) I get it that left and right do not fully describe posotions (although if you add up and down to that mix, the result comes much, much closer.) But the very name “No Labels” screams “I will not tell you who I am.”

Washington Post (no paywall) – He wanted to pet dogs for his 100th birthday. Hundreds lined up.
Quote – “We live in a nice little community, and I thought I could get some of my neighbors and friends to come,” said Alison Moore, adding that she planned for her father to sit outside her home with a banner and assemble a small line of dogs for him to admire and cuddle. Human treats and dog treats would be served…. “I was shocked,” said Alison Moore, explaining that some people drove more than 10 miles to attend the celebration.
Click through. I had planned to stop at two, but my cousin sent me this link – and I felt I had to share

Food For Thought

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Video Thread 6/20/2023

 Posted by at 12:01 pm  Open Thread, Politics
Jun 202023
 

Glenn Kirschner – Republican witnesses like Barr, Esper, Bolton & others will SINK Donald Trump at trial

MSNBC – Atlanta area law enforcement preparing for possible Trump indictment in Georgia

The Lincoln Project – The Breakdown – No Labels Elects Trump**

Armageddon Update – Top Secret Moron

Cop Spends 8 MONTHS Trying To Catch An Escaped Beefalo

Beau – Let’s talk about questions on Trump’s other cases….

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Open Thread May 6, 2023

 Posted by at 6:01 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
May 062023
 

Yesterday, I got 8 out of 8 correct in the Conversation’s weekly quiz for the second week in a row. I can’t possibly keep this up. This week, most of the credit goes to the quiz author. The wrong answers were mostly so off the wall that it wasn’t really difficult. The only one I actually had to guess was the one about Karl Lagerfeld, and that was a true-false, so the odds were better than when there are four answers.  and, yes, Virgil called to say Happy Anniversary.  You knew he would (I certainly did.)

Cartoon – My Everyday Erinyes (#369) is up here:

Short Takes –

Letters from an American – May 4, 2023
Quote – Weirdly, Senator Mitt Romney (R-UT) at a Senate Budget Committee hearing today blamed Democrats for not raising the debt ceiling themselves last year without help from the Republicans. Kate Riga of Talking Points Memo broke down this argument. If the Democrats had raised the debt ceiling through reconciliation, without Republican votes, Republicans would have insisted that it was the Democrats, not them, who had burdened the country with debt when, in fact, the Republicans added almost $8 trillion to the debt under Trump. Romney’s complaint amounts to berating the responsible Democrats for not protecting the country against the Republicans, who are willing to burn down the country. As Riga put it: “Darn you Democrats for not taking care of the debt ceiling then, because you knew we’d refuse to raise the limit unless you conceded to our demands, and look what a sticky spot we’re in now.”
Click though for much more (Click “continue reading”). They used to say “Seinfeld” was a show about nothing. This, on the other hand, is a letter about everything.

Crooks & Liars – Texas Bill Would Allow State To Overturn Harris County Elections
Quote – The measures call for the “abolition” of election administrators in counties with populations larger than 1,000,000—a metric that only applies to Harris County, which Republican state lawmakers have taken a keen interest in in the aftermath of the 2022 midterm elections…. Since then, the Harris County Elections Office report concluded that they couldn’t determine if potential voters were pushed away because of the issues at polling centers.
CLick through for story. This is so blatant that even now I can hardly imagine it succeeding though the courts. Even the courts we have now. But there is always a possibility. Clearly they think they are on to something.

Food For Thought

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Open Thread April 5, 2023

 Posted by at 7:03 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Apr 052023
 

Yesterday, the forecast predicted snow after 8:00 pm. Not unexpected in April ( or even in May), but for most of last week snow had been in the prediction for yesterday, and then for a couple of days it wasn’t predicted, and them it came back at the last minute. Also, within 6 days – next Monday – we’re supposed to expect a high of 80°F. Again, not entirely unexpected in April. As a person who grew up on the San Francisco Peninsula, the weather here continues to surprise me. One of the reasons I wanted to live in Colorado was that I wanted to experience four seasons. I just didn’t expect them to be all in the same week.

 

 

 

Last night NBC projected

Janet Protasiewicz as the winner in the Wisconsin Supreme Court race by a margin of 57.5% to 42.5%. Even if there are some votes out, that is a commanding margin. This means we are on track to get Wisconsin back to the sane side of the aisle. You can breathe again.

Cartoon – 05 veto RTL + Passover

Short Takes –

Axios – Trump pleads not guilty to 34 counts in hush-money case
Quote – Former President Trump pleaded not guilty Tuesday to 34 counts of falsifying business records in the first degree in a Manhattan criminal court related to 2016 hush money payments…. The historic indictment of the only president to be impeached twice has unified the Republican Party around him. Nearly every Republican in elected office has defended Trump and decried the indictment as politically motivated — with only a few prominent GOP defectors…. While that message is playing well with GOP voters, a new CNN poll indicates that 60% of Americans approve of the indictment.
Click through for more information. Here it is – the story we’ve all been waiting for – and now we can take a deep breath and start waiting for the next thing – whatever that may be. There are many possibilities.

Mother Jones – This Race Could Decide the Fate of Democracy in Wisconsin—and the 2024 Election
Quote – [I]f Daniel Kelly, a former conservative justice who criticized Hagedorn as “supremely unreliable” and was defeated by a liberal justice in April 2020, had still been on the Wisconsin Supreme Court, Trump’s effort to overturn the election in Wisconsin likely would have succeeded, plunging the state and the nation into a constitutional crisis. Now Kelly is running again for his old job against Janet Protasiewicz, a progressive judge in Milwaukee County[.]
Click through for details. I’ve written about this before. Yesterday was the day. Robert Reich and Mary Trump also weighed in (with similar views.)

Food For Thought

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