Open Thread October 21, 2022

 Posted by at 6:58 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Oct 212022
 

Yesterday, I did get my ballot into the mail in time for the daily delivery/pickup. So I’ll be watching my email carefully for the “received” and “counted” emails (as if I didn’t always watch my email carefully.) In it (my email) today was a “The Warning” from Steve Schmidt – abbreviated because I’m a free subscriber – with perhaps the most blistering takedown of Kevin McCarthy you’ll ever see without profanity. And one from Jpoyce Vance had an analysis of the court decision on the Trump**-Eastman emails. I also received confirmation to visit Virgil Sunday. He called again also, and was much less confused, which was a relief.

Cartoon –

Short Takes –

The Daily Beast – Shadow Government in Putin’s Own Backyard Plots Against Him
Quote – Belarus’ opposition, led by Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, is plotting to form an alliance with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to try to hamper any hopes that Russia may have of territorial expansion beyond Ukraine and further into Europe. The concern is that Russian President Vladimir Putin is eyeing Belarus much like how he’s eyeing Ukraine—and hoping to envelope Belarus into Russia itself, Valery Kavaleuski, a foreign affairs representative for the Belarusian opposition leader, told The Daily Beast. “Russians are looking at us in the same light as they look at Ukraine,” Kavaleuski said. “‘This is a state that is temporarily dependent. This is the nation that does not deserve to be next to Russia,
Click through for article. I don’t know how much of this is wishful thinking, and – maybe because – I don’t know how much real power Tsikhanouskaya has. I haven’t seen it elsewhere, but it claims to be an exclusive, so that alone does not discredit it.

Crooks and Liars – Paul Krugman: Here’s What Dems Should Do If GOP Gains House Majority
Quote – So what should be done to avert this threat? If Republicans do gain control of one or both houses in November, Democrats should use the lame-duck session to enact a very large rise in the debt limit, enough to put the issue on ice for years. Republicans and pundits who don’t understand the stakes would furiously attack this move, but it would be far better than enabling extortion — and would probably be forgotten by the time of the 2024 election.
Click through for the why, and the backup plan. I haven’t heard much from Krugman lately, presumably because I don’t subscribe to the NY Times. But he has always known what he is talking about, and he is right again. I hope he gets attention from those who need to hear this.

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Open Thread October 20, 2022

 Posted by at 6:47 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Oct 202022
 

Yesterday, an email from Faithful America informed me that the group was a contributor to a PBS Frontline documentary calledc”Michael Flynn’s Holy War,” which had aired Tuesday night. I went looking for it to see whether I could stream it, and I did find it here. So, I streamed it. The URL does not look like one needs to be a Passport member to stream it, but I am one, so I can’t be sure. But I’m sharing it anyway, because this is important information in my opinion.  Also yesterday, I filled out my ballot, signed and sealed the envelope, stamped it, and added the most aggressively patriotic stickers I could find.  I dated it as of today, so I’ll try to get it out before the mail is delivered/picked up.  On top of that, (don’t faint!) Trump** sat for a deposition in the Carroll defamation case.  No content released yet.  This is a civil suit, which means if he took the Fifth, the fact that he did s CAN be used against him.

Cartoon – 20 1020Cartoon.jpg

Short Takes –

First we have a story from a collection of sources regarding John Durham and the investigation Bill Barr instigated into Christopher Steele, which has taken three and a half years. In all that time, he only charged three people, of which only one resulted in conviction (on a plea deal, with a sentence of probation only, which is not nothing, but it’s also not much.  Incidentally, the one charge that person pled to was unrelatred to the investigation.) Two people went to trial, and the second has just been acquitted of all remaining charges (one charge was dropped.) The first trial also resulted in acquittal. Durham still hadn’t given up, but will likely now get more pressure to do so. The “investigation” appears to be simply a scavenger hunt for mares’ nests.

The Daily Beast – Humans Are Hardwired to Cheat. Here’s How We Stop Ourselves.
Quote – What evolutionary and economic theories have to do with stuffing fish filets into fish and sneaking an (alleged) vibrating butt plug into a chess match may not be immediately apparent. But behavioral scientists like University of Arizona associate professor Mary Rigdon think about sporting competitions in much the same way that biologists like Strassmann study evolution. “We have this idea that competition should naturally lead to better athletes and more exciting and entertaining sporting activities,” Rigdon told The Daily Beast. “But we started to ask the question: Is there a possibility that competition can actually generate unethical behavior?”
Click through for article. It’s not about elections, but it certainly has some application to them. But it also has application t other things. Have you ever said, or wanted to say, “It isn’t a competition” in a conversation when one person appeared to be “one-upping” others? I certainly have. Is it possible that the discomfort (or more) that many white people feel about white privilege stems from a feeling that they are being accused of cheating? I think I’ll be saving this article.

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Open Thread October 19, 2022

 Posted by at 7:09 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Oct 192022
 

Yesterday, Colorado Public Radio News had a couple of unusual animal news stories. Nine Ukranian refugees have received amnesty at Keenesburg, CO’s Wild Animal Sanctuary. And our native Bighorn sheep and introduced (70+ uears ago) mountain goats are having a turf war over nutritional supplements newly accessible due to climate change. I’ll just provide the links in case anyone wants details. Also, Virgil called – to tell me he’s in prison – apparently he had one of the vivid dreams he has been having and thinks are real, but this time, instead of thinking someone from his past had phoned him, he thought he had been home – and called to tell me where he was. What with all the other dreams, I suppose I shouldn’t have been surprised – but this is a new level and it kind of shook me. At least he still remembers who I am and that we love each other. On the bright side, my ballot arrived. 24 hours from mailing to arrival is pretty darned good, IMO.

Cartoon – 19 Cornwallis RTL

Short Takes –

truthout – Ron DeSantis’s Ousting of Elected Official Sets a Dangerous Precedent
Quote – In an early August press conference, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis delivered a shocking announcement: He was abruptly suspending Andrew Warren, the elected chief prosecutor for Hillsborough County (Tampa) and an outspoken critic of the governor…. All three of Warren’s opinions cited by DeSantis… stand in direct opposition to the governor’s political goals. The two public officials have clashed over these and other issues repeatedly over the past several years…. Warren … argues that his removal violates the will of Tampa voters who elected him in 2016 and 2020. These voters were further disenfranchised when his replacement was handpicked by DeSantis, who lost Hillsborough County by a nine-point margin in the last gubernatorial election.
Click through for details. This is not even the first time DeSantis has done this. I thought the first time that this couldn’t possibly be legal or constitutional. Yet he seems to be getting away with it.

The Daily Beast – New Book Reveals Jim Jordan’s Dirty Tricks With Impeachment
Quote – The book presents a less than flattering portrait of Jordan, who would likely be the Judiciary Chairman if the GOP takes back the House. He is instead consistently shown to be far more interested in defending Trump than getting down to the truth. The book includes scenes like Jordan heading to the White House to read a transcript of Trump’s call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky before it was released to the public, only to receive a partial account that excluded more concrete evidence of a quid pro quo. Trump’s team, Bade and Demirjian say, wanted House Republicans to go on the record defending Trump before they knew all the facts.
Click through for more, including specific examples. It should be no surprise that Jordan is not actually the loose cannon he appears to be – that is a deliberate choice to muddy whatever waters are likely to impede fascism.

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Video Thread 10/18/22

 Posted by at 11:54 am  Open Thread, Politics
Oct 182022
 

Glenn Kirschner – J6 panel subpoenas Trump; Supreme Court rejects Mar-a-Lago docs case; could indictments be next?

Meidas Touch – Bombshell January 6 Footage EXPOSES GOP LIES about Nancy Pelosi (Repetetive, but at least short)

The Lincoln Project – Time for Answers

Ojeda Live – Politics IS NO JOKE!

Tiny Foster Kitten Becomes King Of His House

Beau – Let’s talk about Biden, Hannity, and a voicemail….

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Open Thread October 18, 2022

 Posted by at 7:13 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Oct 182022
 

Yesterday, I got the email that my ballot is in the mail to me. So I dropped what I was doing and reviewed the last three (out of 11) measures I hadn’t already revieed, and marked my cheat sheet Then I started on the county and local measures, and discovered part of the flyer was missing (it hadn’t been stapled.) I don’t live inside any city limits, but I do live in a school district (obviously) and two special districts – water/sewer and fire.  I think the rest of the flyer may be in the car, and I will check when I get a chance, but in the meantime I was able to find a sample ballot on the web for my county, and none of those districts have any measures on the ballot. So I think I’m ready.

Cartoon –

Short Takes –

The Bulwark – The Munich Model for Trump’s National Security Extortion
Quote – And even if these documents fail to work as a get out of jail free card, Trump has another card to play. He could call on his waiting army of supporters to threaten more violence on the public order. He has done this—and carried out such a threat—before. And he has already said, plainly, that he might do so again. Those in charge of prosecuting the former president should keep in mind history’s clearest example of everything wrong with appeasing a narcissist: the calamity of Munich.
Click through for full op-ed. I am beginning to think that, or at least to wonder whether, the delay in indicting is due in whole or part to exactly this – and wanting to gat defense mechanisms in place in advance to miniize the destruction. And that the presebce of MAGAts in police forces, national guards and other agencies complicates the effort, in part by making secrecy dauntingly difficult. It’s not as if we have’t see agencie formed for our protection include individuals bent on destruction.

Letters fron an American – October 15, 2022
Quote – Kinzinger’s point was that Trump clearly knew he was leaving office because he was deliberately trying to create chaos for his successor. When he abruptly pulled the U.S. out of northern Syria in October 2019, he abandoned our Kurdish allies, forcing more than 160,000 Syrians from their homes and making them victims of extraordinary violence. The Pentagon considered Trump’s November 11 instructions “a rogue order,” since they had not gone through any of the appropriate channels, and disregarded them.
Click through for full letter. There is a great deal more analysis. I picked this quote to demonstrate that complete and total obedience in the military is neither desirable nor expected. This example demonstrates how not obeying an order which is not lawful is supposed to work – and does work more often than you might think.

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Open Thread October 17, 2022

 Posted by at 7:17 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Oct 172022
 

Yesterday, I managed to get in a grocery order. It came within the first ten minutes of the two-hour window, and I had it all put away before that window was half over. No substitutions, and only two things missing – one I had ordered as an afterthought just because the website had it (they so often don’t), and the other was one flavor of something I had ordered nine flavors of. Eight out of nine is even better than two out of three. So that’s all good. I think I’ll throw in Robert Reich’s latest caption contest above the TC cartoon, because the winner, Harry Sanderford, must have worked so hard to get it just right.

Cartoon –

Short Takes –

The New Yorker – Donald Trump, January 6th, and the Elusive Search for Accountability
Quote – So did any of the committee’s work matter? When the January 6th hearings began, on June 9th, Trump’s average approval rating in the polls was 41.9 per cent, and his average disapproval rating was 53.5 per cent, according to FiveThirtyEight. As the hearings ended, Trump’s average approval rating stood at 40.4 per cent. All that damning evidence, and the polls were basically unchanged. The straight line in the former President’s approval rating is the literal representation of the crisis in American democracy. There is an essentially immovable forty per cent of the country whose loyalty to Donald Trump cannot be shaken by anything.
Click through for article. Not for the Committee, but for our Deomcratic Republic – vote like your life depends on it.

ProPublica – A User’s Guide to Democracy
Quote – Sign up for a series of personalized emails in which our journalists will help you answer questions like:
What are my current representatives doing about the issues I care about?
Who’s running for office in my district?
How can I hold my representatives accountable?
How does Congress even work, exactly?
How can I safely vote during this pandemic?
Click through for details. This is less an article than a signup for a newsletter. And you likely do not need it. But you may know someone who does. I was unable to put in my address (I tried two browsers), but of course, I know my district.

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Open Thread October 16, 2022

 Posted by at 6:49 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Oct 162022
 

Yesterday, the radio opera was “Il Corsaro” by Verdi. I had never heard of it, but I instantly assumed it was based on Lord Byron’s poem, “The Corsair,” and it turns out I was correct. It’s early Verdi, before 1850. The protagonist (the pirate) has his headquarters on a Greek Island (Byron was obsessed with the Greek Islands) while the antagonist is a Turkish pasha. Being grand opera as it is, three of the four principal characters are dead by the time it ends, and I wouldn’t be too sure the fourth won’t also suicide after the curtain falls (although she might not. She’s pretty tough.) The music is stunning. I can see why some of the 20th century’s biggest stars wanted to bring it back into the repertory. Sadly the 20th century – at least the second half – was a tough time for “new” opera (“new” meaning anything unfamiliar to the sudience.) Opera lovers are not yet completely out of that mind set, but it is getting better. More forgotten operas are getting revived, and mre new ones are being premiered by major houses – and getting good responses – than any time in my life. Many are not what one would expect. One was based on “Marnie” (not the Hitchcock movie, exactly, but the book that inspired it.) Another was based on a Luis Buñuel‎ movie (surrealism – think Salvador Dali but in a movie. In other words, weird.)

Before diving into the short takes, I want to quickly share this link from Joyce Vance where you will find all 291 of the election deniers who will be on the ballot in 24 days, sorted by how likely they are to win their elections, and searchable by state and by office they are running for. If for any reason it doesn’t work for you, here’s the link to Joyce’s newsletter and you can try from there, but you will be confronted by a couple of silky chicken moms, each with two chicks, and I warn you, they look strange.

Cartoon –

Short Takes –

The Daily Beast – The Jan. 6 Committee Gave Us Some Bad News About the Secret Service
Quote – The Secret Service has too many secrets. The Federal Bureau of Investigation requires a thorough investigation. These are among the most striking conclusions that emerged Thursday from the last public meeting of Congress’s Jan. 6 committee. Laying out its meticulously crafted case against former President Donald Trump for leading an insurrection against the government he had sworn an oath to protect, the committee made it clear that there were many targets that warranted further investigation. Not least of these were the two law enforcement agencies that had long prided themselves on being among the U.S. government’s most shining examples of integrity and service.
Click through for story. The emphasis here stood out to me.. If you would prefer a more panoramic view, you can check out HuffPost also.

HuffPost – The Most Important Midterm Elections Have Nothing To Do With Congress
Quote – Over the last two years, state legislatures have served as the epicenter of the far-right’s assault on American democracy. Republicans have used their dominance of that level of politics, one that often sails beneath the radar in major election seasons, to enact new restrictions on voting, target state election systems with conspiracy theories meant ultimately to undermine them, and potentially pave the way for future efforts to overturn elections they lose in ways former President Donald Trump failed to do in 2020.
Click through for the details. This is going to be harder to track down.The Colorado General Assembly (as we call our State House) has 100 seats, and the Colorado State Senate 35, and we have 8 Congressional Districts. Californioa has 52 Congressional Districts. I don’t know how big the State Legialatures are, but I’m guessing bigger than ours. And so are those of multiple other states. Just vole blue.

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Open Thread October 12, 2022

 Posted by at 6:48 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Oct 122022
 

Yesterday, my radio station started its fall fund drive, so I started audio streaming, beginning with “The Score” – a one-hour program about music in film which I listen to weekly, generally during that one hour every weekday when there’s a program I don’t care for. This week’s theme was “mad scientists.” Timely for me, both because I had used that hour just the day before to watch a short biography of Thomas Midgley, Jr., called “The Man Who Accidentally Killed The Most People In History.” I thought of him when the host remarked that “mad scientists” in film seem to share a total disregard for the dangers of their creations. But throughout the program, I was also wondering if the whole mad scientist thing hd become so pervasive that the concept became part of the inspiration for QAnon, and other creations of the Alt-Right, with their disdain for actual science and facts. If so, it took long enough. In literature, it traces back to the 16th Century (Christopher Marlowe) and, considering actual science developed out of alchemy, almost certainly goes back to the dawn of humanity. Has anyone besides me ever wondered how humans, with all our crazy tendencies that are hard wired into us managed to survive this long at all?

Cartoon –

Short Takes –

The Daily Beast – Kremlin TV Exposes the Real Goal of Putin’s ‘Revenge-Bombs’
Quote – [State Duma Defense Committee’s head Andrey] Kartapolov urged Russians to unite behind Putin, and his desperate plea spotlighted the true reason behind Moscow’s barrage of missiles: to curb waning public support for Putin’s mindless war…. Konstantin Dolgov, the former Russian commissioner for human rights,… yearned for pained reactions from Ukrainians affected by the strikes, asking: “Are they whining yet? Are they howling yet?”
Click through for the story. My visceral response is, “Republicans, everywhere, by any name, are all the same – the cruelty is the point.” However, Republicans everywhere, by any name, also lie. A lot. So who knows.

CPR News – Republicans hope to take back the House. Here’s what it could mean for Colorado’s representatives
Quote – While he’s not measuring any drapes, GOP Rep. Doug Lamborn said he would seek the chairmanship of the Strategic Forces subcommittee of the House Armed Services committee. He was named the ranking member of that committee in January. The delegation’s longest serving Republican, Lamborn… also currently sits on the House Natural Resources committee[.]
Click through for full article – or, even better, check out your own state’s representatives – not just yours, but all of them. Every state almost certainly has one or more reps whose presence, or chairmanship, on this committee or that committee could turn the House into even more of a horrorscape than their mere presence in the House suggests.

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