Glenn – Steve Bannon’s ruse rejected by Trump appointed judge; Trump still using the big lie to sow division
Meidas Touch – Texas Paul DEBUNKS new Deranged Hunter Biden Conspiracy Theory
The Lincoln Project – The GOP’s Crazy Candidates
Robert Reich – The Secret to the GOP’s Assault on Your Rights | Robert Reich
Brent Terhune – The worst drag race I ever been to
Beau – Let’s talk about dominoes from the Colorado….
Yesterday, I started working ahead so I won’t lose sleep or sanity over juggling visiting Virgil and maintaining the blog. Speaking of Virgil, Colleen asked whether the half-day limit was related to the holiday and I said I didn’t thinks so but wasn’t sure. I didn’t say that the only facility he had previously been to with a half-day limit was an infirmary. So when he called today, I asked him, and he said, yes, he’s in an informary, but hadn’t told me because he didn’t want to worry me (ri-i-ight.) He said one of his legs collapsed. I said “Even with the walker?” and he replied “I couldn’t get to the walker fast enough.” So we’ll see what shape he is in. I pointed out that knowing that, yes, something happened, but he is getting medical care actually relieves my mind.
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Robert Reich – The beginning of the end of regulation
Quote – West Virginia v. EPA is the latest battle pitting America’s big businesses (in this case Big Oil) against the needs of average Americans. In this Supreme Court — containing three Trump appointees, two George W. Bush appointees, and one George H.W. Bush appointee – big business is winning big time. The financial backers of the Republican Party are getting exactly what they paid for.
Click through for article. The 2020s are looking more and more like the 1920s every day. I hope we get to the 1932 election while I’m still alive (and I hope it doesn’t take until 2032 to do it.)
The Daily Beast – The Sleeper ‘Wire Fraud’ Scheme That Could Nail Trumpworld
Quote – While the Jan. 6 hearings have delivered explosive testimony and evidence suggesting that a number of former administration officials may face criminal liability related to the attack on the Capitol—possibly all the way up to Trump—there’s another potential criminal liability that has largely been lost in the news. That would be the sprawling wire fraud conspiracy which the Jan. 6 special select committee alleged in its second hearing, on June 13, a scheme which legal experts say contains the ingredients for possible federal charges against officials with the campaign and the Republican National Committee—as well as Trump himself.
Click through for details. I know, y’all don’t care what brings hem down as long as it is something, and the sooner the better.
Food For Thought
Glenn Kirschner – J6 hearing reveals Trump knew mob was armed, wanted to lead them to the Capitol to stop Biden’s win
Meidas Touch – Michael Cohen REACTS to Trump Officials Being Indicted and Subpoenaed
The Lincoln Project – Last Week in the Republican Party – June 28, 2022
Robert Reich – This is Why We Need to Get Money Out of Politics
Liberal Redneck – Not So Supreme Court
Beau – Let’s talk about what they’re going after next….
Yesterday, the news was filled with testimony from Tuesday’s hearing. And rightly so – I guess a lot of people did not realize, and still don’t, who Trump** so obviously is. Of course he throws dishes against the wall. Of course he tries to do bodily harm to anyone who pisses him off. Of course he’s the last person in the world who shold have the nuclear codes. How did so may people miss that? And I don’t even mean his cultists. I mean how did so may sane people still manage not to see that? It’s not as if Hillary didn’t warn us. At least more people are realizing it now. The other thing that was in the news (at least my news feed) was our primaries. I already reported that Tina Peters, the County Clerk who stole the voting equipment, lost her primary to run for Secretary of State (the bad news is that the winner is almost as bad.) Other bad news is that Boebert won her primary. I had no part in that, but I still apologize on behalf of my state to the entire nation. We can only hope that Democrats and Unaffiliateds combine to oust her. Sadly, that’s merely a hope.
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The New Yorker – The “Gap” in the Constitution That Led to January 6th
Quote – Yes, it’s absolutely true that our Presidential-election system in particular has significant vulnerabilities. Some of those vulnerabilities are in the Constitution itself. As long as we retain the constitutional provision for the Electoral College, we won’t be completely out of the woods. State legislatures have the authority to replace a popular vote, to directly appoint the electors for their state. But they can’t do it retroactively. And that gets to what Giuliani and Trump were trying to do.
Click through for full discussion. All communication requires those communicating to share at least some assumptions (there’s a group exercise invilving peanut butter and jelly which brings this point home vividly), and one of those assumptions that we make without realizing it is that we expect our elected officials to act in good faith. For much of my life, though that wasn’t 100% true, there were enough who were that it was safe to assume it. Then came Reagan, Gingrich, and a host of others, and now it is no longer safe to make that assumption.
Robert Reich – The rogue court and the fight ahead
Quote – I keep telling the young people I work with and in the classes I teach that I grew up in an America that expanded constitutional rights, battled racism and protected voting rights, and enlarged the middle class. I tell them that if we did it then, we can do so again. They hear me but I’m not sure they believe me. Their young lives have been marked mostly by public failure. Many were motivated to vote for Barack Obama in 2008 and 2016, and against Trump in 2020, but their patience is wearing thin.
Clivk through for full argument (there’s also a video). I know, voting is not enough, but it has to start with voting. We have to give good leaders some authority – something to work with. If we don’t, their leaders get authority.
Food For Thought – I think this is the first time I have seen a New Yorker cartoon depict a real person, though it’s probably happened.
Yesterday, I realized Nameless has posted Sunday evening after I sent the email – I’ll pick it up in next week’s, but for regular readers, here’s the link – https://www.7thstep.org/blog/2022/06/26/there-is-no-joy-in-mudville/ I didn’t see it immediately because I was loking for an email response to my visit-Virgil notification, and when I found it, it was a notificaion that he has been moved again. I needed to address that right away because they only have certain hours in which they read and answer emails, so I didn’t get to PP right away. And I realize this OT is pretty lightweught. Sometimes that happens. BTW, there’s another hearing today I’ll be watching it after the fact. And one final note – I’m not big on podcasts myself as a learning method (I find it difficult to sit still and listen), but this one, recommended by the editor of Mother Jones, appears to be seriously content-rich, down to earth, and something you can recommend to anyone whose shock at current events leads them to wnt to learn more. It’s called “How to Citizen.” https://www.howtocitizen.com
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The New Yorker (Borowitz) – Women Declare Themselves Corporations to Force Supreme Court to Grant Them Rights as People
Quote – Attorneys across the nation indicated that they have been swamped by requests from clients seeking to incorporate as soon as possible. “The Supreme Court decided in 2010 that corporations are people, so all we want is to be treated like corporations, ” Carol Foyler, who now goes by the corporate name FoylerCo L.L.C., said.
Click through for full (short) article. I’ve heard lots of ideas less intelligent than this one.
Robert Reich – When I was Baby Jesus
Quote – What was I to do? I did the only thing my five-year-old brain could come up with: I apologized to God. I did it quietly as I lay on the straw on the stage, under my breath so no one else would hear, and then apologized again during the prayers and Christmas carols. I whispered, “God, I didn’t have a choice. I was cast as Baby Jesus. I don’t celebrate Christmas. It’s against my religion. Please forgive me. Thank you.”
Click through for his thoughts on yet another horrible SCOTUS decision.
Food For Thought
Yesterday, I tried to catch up on things I need to order, starting with two prescriptions. I succeeded in ordering one; the other one, after counting, I put off for a week since I have almost 4 weeks supply on hand. Then there were a few jewelry supplies I’d ben pl;anning ro order but was waiting for a sale (and it’s almost Memorial Day.) So I put that order together and placed it. Then I started looking for a small “boom box” (yes, they are still using that term – that surprised me too), but didn’t get far, because the combination of features I want is appaently unusual. I also started a list for a grocery order, but did not place it, because it was Tuesday, and Wednesday is the day that prices change (if they are going to), and I like to know what I am getting into, so I’ll place it today for tomorrow.
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Crooks and Liars – Wisconsin GOP Gubernatorial Candidate: None Of The Above
Quote – Wisconsin Republicans refused to endorse any of the four candidates for governor at their annual state convention for the first time — a symbolic rejection of the political apparatus that has been blamed by its own members for failing to deliver statewide victories in recent years.
Click through for answers to questions you undoubtedly have. There will eventually be a candidate, because there is a primary (sadly).
Robert Reich – Bombardment by the billionaires
Quote – This is the same crew, not incidentally, that’s been fighting unions and flooding Congress and statehouses with cash to support Trump election deniers, prevent tax hikes on themselves, and kill off Biden’s and the Democrats’ agenda…. This billionaire bombardment gives Biden and the Democrats an opportunity to tell America whose side they’re on and whose side they’re not on — in effect, to declare class war on the class warriors. Will they take it?
Click through for his reasoning and recpmmendations. The Reich on the left has a history of being right, and he has the education and experience to be. So I hope he is listened to. I franklly have no idea what, if anything, will work.
Just Security – Prosecuting Trump for the Insurrection: The Well-Founded Case for Optimism
Quote – For example, in one New York Times piece weighing the prospects for a Trump prosecution, the authors noted that Trump “would have a powerful argument about his mental state” against a claim that he pressured former Vice President Pence to violate his legal duties under the Electoral Count Act – i.e., that Trump “sincerely thought he was asking Mr. Pence to do something lawful” because of the “advice” he received from lawyer John Eastman, who concocted a baseless rationale for Pence to ignore the law. Likewise, in a second piece, the Times quoted a law professor for the proposition that “[t]he problem with Trump is defining his state of mind when it is so changeable. He believes whatever he wants to think and it doesn’t necessarily have to be grounded in reality. That’s a tough argument to a jury, to say he knew a particular thing.”
Click through for full article. This article was recommended by Glenn Kirschner, and it is very thorough – so thorough that I didn’t even try for a quote which summarized all the points. So I recommend you either read the whole article or skip it. Or you could, of course, save it for when you have more time.
Food For Thought
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.)
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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)
Glenn Kirschner – Federal Judge Finds, by a Preponderance of the Evidence, that Trump Committed Crimes Against the US
Lincoln Project – Last Week in the Republican PArty
MSNBC – Sen. Whitehouse: Three New Supreme Court Justices Being Told What To Do By Donor Front Groups
Robert Reich – The Oligarchy’s Ultimate Political Weapon
Al Franken – Critical Race Theory – An ACTUAL Explanation
Liberal Redneck – Trump’s January 6th Burner Phones
Beau – Let’s talk about Trump, a judge, DOJ, and a ruling…..