Video Thread 6/10/22

 Posted by at 11:55 am  Open Thread, Politics
Jun 102022
 

Glenn Kirschner – Trump recruits & deploys the Proud Boys on 1/6, making him part of the PB’s seditious conspiracy

Meidas Touch – Harry Litman REVEALS identity of Secret Star Witness for Jan 6 Hearings

The Lincoln Project – Last Week in the Republican Party – June 7, 2022

MSNBC’s Chris Hayes Dives Into Scapegoating of D.A. Boudin (Of course the recall is over – and, sadly, our side lost – but the opportunty to learn is always present. Incidentally, I could actually agree with Tom Cotton to this degree – there are WAY too many Republicans running around loose.)

CNN – Ex-gun industry insider speaks out about Republicans and NRA

Mini Horse Tries So Hard To Make His Very First Friend

Beau – Let’s talk about an analogy to help people understand the climate….

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Video Thread 6/4/22

 Posted by at 12:09 pm  Open Thread, Politics
Jun 042022
 

Glenn Kirschner – With J6 hearings to begin 6/9, we finally learn that DOJ is criminally investigating Trump. Why now?

Meidas Touch – Tucker Carlson admits he LIES to viewers in SHOCKING new interview

The Lincoln Project – The Republican Army

MSNBC – Jail: Facing Criminal Subpoena, Trump Aide Threatens Biden, Pelosi, Fauci (including very nice eyeroll)

CNN – He helped decode Mark Meadows’ texts. What he found scared him (Long but meaty. Partial transcript here.) https://crooksandliars.com/2022/06/intelligence-expert-says-jan-6-data

The Daily Show – The Story of Covfefe: Based on a True Typo

Beau – Let’s talk about Georgia showing Wyoming the way….

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Open Thread June 2, 2022

 Posted by at 6:46 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Jun 022022
 

Yesterday, I finished that last new cartoon for June, which is for the 28th. It kind of got me thinking. Some of us have probably heard about the “Habsburg jaw,” which this Habsburg certainly had, and the beard didn’t do much to hide it. These days I see a lot of jokes about moronic and generally poor MAGAts who perhaps result from inbreeding – but historicall, all the way back to ancient Egypt, it was not the poor butthe wealthy who famously inbred (presumably under theimpression that no one but others in their class were good enough for them.) Tutankhamen for instance – his mummy has been examined and by modern specialists, who indicate he had so many deformities he may never have had a pain free day in his short life. In Eurpoe, not only the Habsburg jaw but the Russian royal family’s hemophilia came from inbreeding. Of course it sometimes occurred among the poor as well, particularly if there were some reason which required them to live in isolation, such as the Sawney Bean case in Scotland – that family was anything but rich (although modern Scots with the surname Bean are thoughy to be descendants of MacBeth, so go figure.) I also have established my list to make a record for July of which cartoons from 2014 I can reuse and which I can’t. I haven’t started that actual reviewing yet, and I won’t start this week fur sure, but when I am ready, I’m prepared.

Cartoon –

Short Takes –

The Daily Beast – This QAnon Leader Could Control Key Elections in 2024
Quote – While the 65-year-old Willott remains all but unknown outside of QAnon, he’s a figure with growing influence in both the conspiracy-theory universe and the broader conservative movement. Along the way, many of Willott’s supporters have come to believe he’s John F. Kennedy Jr. in disguise. He’s also befriended Q-friendly celebrities, including comedian Roseanne Barr and The Passion of the Christ star Jim Caviezel…. Despite his growing influence, almost nothing has been reported about Willott’s background. The Daily Beast has amassed the most extensive reporting on Willott yet, from his background as a second-rate investigator looking into Bill Clinton in the 1990s to his reinvention as the cosmopolitan secret agent Juan O. Savin, to his new role as a power broker on the far right.
Click through for more than you will find anywhere else… stuff we probably ought to be aware of.

Politico – ‘It’s going to be an army’: Tapes reveal GOP plan to contest elections
Quote – The plan, as outlined by a Republican National Committee staffer in Michigan, includes utilizing rules designed to provide political balance among poll workers to install party-trained volunteers prepared to challenge voters at Democratic-majority polling places, developing a website to connect those workers to local lawyers and establishing a network of party-friendly district attorneys who could intervene to block vote counts at certain precincts.
Click through for story. I’m aware Politico is considered to be right leaning. But they seem to publish a lot of stuff one would think the right would not want us to know

Democratic Underground – The Party of the Brave
Quote – Republicans are more afraid of a teenaged boy wearing mascara than a teenaged boy buying an AK-15….
They are more afraid of losing their ‘white privilege’ than they are of losing their country….
They are more afraid of being called-out by Sean Hannity than they are of being called-up by the January 6 Committee.
Click through for full post. Nance Greggs is a community member at DU, but is highly respected aby other members, and this post may suggest why.

Food For Thought

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Open Thread May 24, 2022

 Posted by at 6:48 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
May 242022
 

Yesterday, Colorado Public Radio News published thefirst photo of the first bud (at leasst in eighty years) on the Camp Amache rose. It is pink. I cropped the photo so it would fit here. I was deeply touched.   I’m looking forward to seeing it after it opens.

Cartoon –

Short Takes –

CPR News – Why two CPR News journalists are in Europe with Colorado’s National Guard
Quote – Colorado’s Army and Air National Guard units are just some of the 1,200 Guard members from six states — Maryland, which has a state partnership with Estonia, Illinois, Michigan, Pennsylvania and West Virginia — taking part in this exercise. In total, more than 3,400 U.S. military and 5,100 allied service members are spending this month participating in Defender and various other exercises, with names like Swift Response, Iron Wolf, Flaming Thunder and Summer Shield, across Eastern Europe…. Now, the U.S. military will be the first to tell you that Defender is unrelated to what’s happening in Ukraine (and the former Foreign Service officer in me would agree with that). American troops rotate, train and exercise regularly across the region as part of the nation’s relationship with Europe…. Yet, this annual exercise has taken on added significance — to reporters like me, and readers like you, and possibly the people of Estonia too — because of what’s happening in Ukraine.
Click through for story. It’s a good day to be a Coloradan Despite Lauren Boebert (and Doug Lamborn), we have reasons to take pride in our state. (And it has some gorgeous phptps pf Tallinn.)

The Conversation – He’s Australia’s 31st prime minister. So who is Anthony Albanese?
Quote – To continue the slow burn theme, if Albanese is to be believed, his ambition for leadership formed late. Those who reach leadership positions are typically consumed with an aspiration for the top job from early in their parliamentary careers — if not before. They are fuelled by a sense of their own prime-ministerial destiny. Albanese is different. On his telling, it was only in 2013, on the defeat of Rudd’s second government, that he first entertained thoughts of becoming leader. Until then he had contented himself with the role of “counsellor and kingmaker”.
CLick through for background. I won’t promise that this will be my last article on the Australian election – I hadn’t planned having another one, but I think this has merit. I am convinced that the so-called “fire in the belly” which so many pundits say leaders need is actually a bad thing if one wants the best possible leadership.

NM Political Report – In light of drought, NM congresswomen introduce bills focused on water and science
Quote – “We know that our farmers and our communities are struggling to meet their water needs,” U.S. Rep. Melanie Stansbury, a Democrat representing the state’s 1st Congressional District, said during a press conference on Thursday. “And the pieces of legislation that we introduced this week will be game changers to help address those needs, put resources into the hands of our communities, and to address the long term water security of our communities.”
Click through for details of the proposals.  Of course we all knew that getting the right women into the right offices would be beneficial to everyone.

Food For Thought

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Open Thread May 23, 2022

 Posted by at 7:13 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
May 232022
 

Yesterday, I woke up before the alarm went off, and just stayed up, since I knew the weather could be problematic. It actually turned out not to be. there was no snow or ice or even frost on the windows – a couple of drops of rain was all. I took my time driving, the roads were almost all dry, and the short spots where they were not (bridges ot dips) were only wet, not icy. Virgil was a litttle short of sleep … and so was I. But we enjoyed each other’s comapny. And I got home as easily as I went down. (However, I wouldn’t be surprised if, when you see this, I am actually still asleep, even if you get to it later than usual.)

Cartoon –

Short Takes –

truthout – Judge Blocks Biden from Ending Title 42 in “Arbitrary, Racist” Ruling
Quote – Human rights advocates say Title 42 forces people legally seeking asylum in the United States into perilous situations in Mexican border cities, where Human Rights First has identified nearly 10,000 violent attacks on migrants. “Beyond the devastating humanitarian impact of Title 42, the court’s ruling also fails to recognize well-established domestic and international law,” said Krish O’Mara Vignarajah, president and CEO of Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service. “Seeking asylum is a legal right, and yet this bedrock of the American legal system is quickly eroding at a time of unprecedented need.”
Click through for an explanation at least in part why the immigration authorities at the southern border are still doing such a – (cough) – such a rotten job. It isn’t all on Biden by a long shot (granted that some of it is).

Reuters – Analysis: Australian women unleash new political force on climate, integrity
Quote – Women who left successful careers in business, medicine and media to enter politics as independents were on track to win five seats from Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s Liberal party in its affluent urban heartland in Saturday’s general election, as moderate voters abandoned the government…. Personifying the disruptive change were centrists, mostly women, dubbed “teal” candidates because of teal-coloured marketing material used as they targeted seats held by Morrison’s conservative party.
Click through for full analysis. Lona did such a good job of summarizeing the election results in her comment (scroll down) that I thought I’d use this article, since it’s more about something new than general politics.

Crooks and Liars – Cassidy: Our Maternal Death Rates Only Bad If You Include Black Women
Quote – “About a third of our population is African American; African Americans have a higher incidence of maternal mortality. So, if you correct our population for race, we’re not as much of an outlier as it’d otherwise appear,” Cassidy said in an interview with POLITICO. “Now, I say that not to minimize the issue but to focus the issue as to where it would be. For whatever reason, people of color have a higher incidence of maternal mortality.”
Click through for story. Can you believe this? Not his thinking it, tha’s nrmal for Republicans, but presumably not realizing what kind of blowback he would get from it?

Food For Thought

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Video Thread 5/16/22

 Posted by at 12:02 pm  Open Thread, Politics
May 162022
 

Glenn Kirschner – Federal prosecutors open grand jury probe into Trump’s removal of top secret docs to Mar-a-Lago

The Lincoln Project – Thank you, Jen.

MSNBC – America ‘Needs To Prepare For’ Insider Threats To Elections

Twitter – CNN – White supremacist terrorism

Politics Girl – Quick Civics

Food-Obsessed Cat Has Taught Himself To Open Containers With His Teeth

Beau – Let’s talk about a cliff analogy….

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A Red Flag in Colorado

 Posted by at 10:27 am  Politics
May 132022
 

This is the first lead article I have posted since I took over the senior editor spot. I don’t plan to do it unless there is something extraordinary that comes up, and even then not when the material is accessible on the web for a Short Take. Therefore, most of the time, as now, it’s going to be a message from an email (which I can quote in full).

I received this email from Ike McCorkle, the presumptive Democratic Candidate for Congress in the district currently held by Ken Buck. I don’t suppose what is happening there could happen in every state – but it could happen in any state which mandates county, district, or state assemblies of parties as all or part of the candidate selection process, and it explains a lot.  Here’s what Ike has to say:

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

We’re writing today to give you an early warning about something truly dangerous unfolding on Colorado’s Eastern Plains.

Ike McCorkle (L) Ken Buck (R)

In April, Colorado politics watchers were shocked to see Incumbent Congressman Ken Buck (R-CO) take a humiliating defeat at the Colorado Republican assembly for Colorado’s 4th Congressional district that saw him lose his spot at the top of the ballot and nearly lose his Congressional seat in one fell swoop.

The man who dealt the unexpected blow to Buck was one Bob Lewis, an Elbert County real estate agent. While Lewis is a political outsider and little is known about him, what we do know should be deeply concerning.

At the assembly, Lewis criticized Buck for referring to believers of the 2020 stolen election theory as “conspiracy theorists” and received assistance from the extreme right-wing FEC United, a Castle Rock based Colorado militia group, known for calling for Governor Polis to be hanged.

Everything known about Bob Lewis

Much like how the traditional Conservative Scott Tipton was unseated by insurrectionist aiding Congresswomen Lauren Boebert. Across the state we are seeing a resurgent wave of extreme right voters throwing out their own members of Congress who they don’t believe are radical enough. In CD-7 an election conspiracist also managed to beat a sitting Republican Congressman, Doug Lamborn, making it to the top of their ballot as well.

If Bob Lewis beats Buck our campaign will be the only thing holding back a Boebert 2.0 from representing over 700,000 Coloradans in Congress. 

This November, whether we are taking on the devil we know, Congressman Buck, or the devil we don’t, Bob Lewis, we will be running on bringing people together, not dividing them. We’ll be fighting for the notion that rural Coloradans deserve a right to good jobs, fair wages, election integrity, and bodily autonomy.

We are running an honest campaign based on the real issues affecting Eastern Coloradans. Partisan rhetoric and furthering divisive conflict between Americans solves nothing and should not be the ambition of leadership.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

I have been to assemblies in Colorado (in 1992 I actually made it to the state one), so I know how people get there. They start the process by turning out one cold night in February to attend a very small meeting of people from their precinct. Those who turn out for this are only the most dedicated (even fanatical) of party members, and not even all of those. It excludes people who work swing shifts. It excludes people who cannot drive at night (as I no longer can.) It excludes parents who cannot get child care. No doubt you can think of other categories who might be excluded. It is also a bloody nuisance. But it is where the delegates to the County Assembly are decided (based on what percentage of the vote their candidate gets in February). And the County Asssembly is where the delegates to the State assembly are decided (also based on percentages of votes  received by their candidates.) If a party contains extremists, it is practically inevitable that they will be over-represented at State Assemblies. Fortunately for Colorado, these assemblies only determine who will be on the primary ballots, not on the general election ballots, so there is time and means to correct some of the worst travesties. But that doesn’t always happen. Lauren Boebert is a case in point.

My recommendation to every Democrat – and even to every sane Republican – is to read up on your state’s election processes, and find out if there is a way – short of venturing out into a blizzard – that you can get involved in that process in your state before it comes time to cast your ballot in November. Particularly if there are any political storms brewing. Buck has, I believe, a decent chance of winning the primary. But it’s not a certainty. It’s much closer to certain that whoever wins the Republican primary in that district will win the general. And if that candidate is not Buck, we will have lost the only Colorado Republican in the House who was willing to work with Senator Bennet to get National Historical Monument designation for the Amache internment camp from World War II. Fifteen years ago – even five years ago – if you told me I’d be writing in defense of Ken Buck, I would not have believed it. But that is where we are now.

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Open Thread May 13, 2022

 Posted by at 7:11 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
May 132022
 

Yesterday, I paid a couple of bills. I didn’t venture outside, though I suppose I might have, because besides the evacuations the day before, we also has spring winds (to blow them away) – but that’s a straight stick which points two ways, – the winds could aldo have brought the fires (and their smoke) closer. Not difficult to justify doing what I wanted to do anyway (grin.)

Cartoon –

Short Takes –

truthout – DeSantis’s Congressional Maps Deemed “Unconstitutional” by Judge He Appointed
Quote – Smith will likely replace DeSantis’s gerrymandered maps with one of two that the Republican-controlled legislature had previously passed, which the governor had vetoed earlier this year. Though still advantageous to the GOP, those maps are seen as somewhat better (though by no means perfect), in terms of respecting Black voters’ voices, than the ones DeSantis demanded be passed after his veto.
Click through for article. Here’s my take on DeSantis.

Media Matters – Fox News melts down following revelation Karine Jean-Pierre called the network racist. She’s right.
Quote – It’s not just people on the left pointing out Fox’s racism. In 2020, amid the George Floyd protests, The Daily Beast reported that it “spoke to more than a dozen Fox News insiders, who all suggested that behind the scenes there is a growing despair among employees about the network’s role in demonizing and spreading fear about Black Americans in particular.” One Fox staffer quoted in the piece described some of the network’s personalities as “a white supremacist cell,” adding, “This is rank racism excused by Murdoch.” Another described Fox programming as “white supremacist crap.”
Click through if you can stand to. Shall we expect Fox staff to treat Karine with even more disrespect than they did Jen? (OK, I grant I was shocked when Doocy said on camera that he would miss her because she’d always been a “good sport.”)

Robert Reich – Personal history: The Supreme Court I argued before fifty years ago
Quote – Douglas, Marshall, and Blackmun were the intellectual leaders of that Supreme Court. Their opinions gave the Court its moral heft. They drew not only from the Constitution as written but also from the nation as it had evolved. They understood the moral leadership America needed to protect the rights of the voiceless and the powerless. Today’s Supreme Court majority doesn’t have a clue about the Court’s moral authority, and couldn’t care less.
Click through for history, nostalgia, and moral clarity. Today’s FFT is a meme drawn from this article.  Feel free to share it.

Food For Thought

WASHINGTON, DC – JANUARY 16: Former U.S. Labor Secretary Robert Reich testifies before the Joint Economic Committee January 16, 2014 in Washington, DC. Reich joined a panel testifying on the topic of “Income Inequality in the United States.Ó (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)

 

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