Responding to a tweet from US Representative Alexandria
Ocasio-Cortez, one individual- no doubt meaning well- has tweeted
The public has moved more left for good reason. Things like
canceling student debt, police/prison reform, homes for the homeless, ubi,
being more open and supportive of the lgbt etc. And the government moved more
to the right. Pretty obvious observation imo.
Under a Democratic President, student debt has not been
cancelled. Criminal justice reform negotiations on the federal level ended with
no action taken while some municipalities have enacted police reform and others
have increased law enforcement budgets. Despite
the value experienced of sending checks to people during the pandemic, there
has been no movement on a universal basic income and there still is no federal
law against discrimination against sexual minorities (or "LGBTAIA+, if you
prefer).,
Nor has the federal minimum wage been increased and
reproductive freedom, wiped out in some states and hanging by a thread in some
others, is likely to be eviscerated soon by the US Supreme Court. The Overton Window has moved right and
Ocasio-Cortez has noticed:
Billionaires be like “the extreme far left is taking over” when the “extreme far left” in the US is “medicine shouldn’t bankrupt you,” “wages should cover rent,” & “maybe it’s bad that Wall St companies profit off mass surveillance, manufactured housing crises, and caging people”
Early in the report below. the NBC station in Philadelphia
shows the top three (of four total) candidates for the Democratic nomination for an
open seat in the US Senate in the swing state of Pennsylvania. The report is
lacking journalistically but is telling when we learn that the two leading
candidates. Lieutenant Governor John Fetterman and US Representative Conor Lamb, are stressing that they can attract votes of moderates and conservatives,
independents and Republicans, in the general election.
Neither Fetterman- the more liberal/left of the two- or Lamb professed support for Medicare for All, even after a pandemic in which millions of Americans lost health care
as they lost their job. If they had done so, they might have been identified
with progressive policies, and they didn't want to risk that in a Democratic
primary race. Any interest- in a Democratic primary- in energizing their own party's base is abandoned.
If this is how "the extreme far-left is taking
over," it would be disturbing to see what it would look like if moderates have been taking over. Which, truth be told, they have.
In my last post, I lamented that I had no choice but to
defend US Representative Ilhan Omar, the famous Democrat from Minnesota. It gets worse.
Now it's Bill Donohue of the Catholic League, who a year ago
was credibly accused of
doing more to push people away from and out of the Catholic
Church than any prominent atheist ever could,. We always look forward to
Donohue’s statements. Time and time again, he proves our point: Religious
denial of reality, whether it be about the existence of Christian nationalism
or child abuse, is causing immense harm to our country.”
Now, it's difficult to disagree with Donohue because
During an April 21 interview with far-right Catholic news
organization Church Militant, activist Michael Voris alleged that bishops
receive "enormous sums of money from the federal government, federal
taxpayers, to assist in illegal immigration," prompting Greene to take aim
at Catholic charities that provide funding for causes related to undocumented
immigrants." The Catholic League's Bill Donohue accused me of slandering
Catholics and Catholicism in an interview I gave to Michael Voris at Church
Militant. Nothing could be further from the truth, and he must apologize
promptly and publicly for these words," she said.
"It's the church leadership I was referring to when I
invoked the devil. The bishops know that but had their loyal lapdog pretend I
was being disrespectful about the faith. Just so we're clear, bishops, when I
said 'controlled by Satan,' I wasn't talking about the Catholic Church. I was
talking about you."
"What it is is ... Satan's controlling the church. The
church is not doing its job. It's not adhering to the teachings of Christ. It's
not adhering to what the word of God says we're supposed to do and how we're
supposed to live," she said.
"And what they're doing by saying, ‘Oh, we have to love
these people and take care of these migrants and love one another. This is
loving one another' — yes, we are supposed to love one another, but their
definition of what ‘love one another' means means destroying our laws. It means
completely perverting what our Constitution says. It means taking unreal
advantage of the American taxpayer."
Her inflammatory comments sparked Catholic League President
Bill Donahue to condemn her remarks, asserting that he would be reaching out to
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy regarding the matter.
"Satan is controlling the Catholic Church? She needs to
apologize to Catholics immediately. She is a disgrace," he said in a
statement. "We are contacting House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy about
this matter. He's got a loose cannon on his hands."
If the bishops were reading the Bible and truly preaching
the word of God to their flock and not covering up child sex abuse and
pedophilia, loving one another would have the true meaning and not the
perversion and the twisted lie that they’re making it to be..."
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene says that Christian organizations are working to resettle undocumented immigrants and refugees in the U.S. because "Satan's controlling the church." https://t.co/cbnTrbOjuYpic.twitter.com/3N3X72ZLgc
Donahue demanded an apology, after which Greene demanded one from him.
.That's how it's done these days. Not the
apology but the demand for an apology, which brings no apology, aside from
possibly a statement of regret that the subject of the comment was offended.
And that's no apology at all.
Initially, the Georgia congresswoman had criticized Catholic
Charities for aiding immigrants and, as Donohue charged, "had plenty of
opportunities to make rational criticisms of the agency, but instead she
slandered the entire Catholic Church."
She could have acknowledged that the Church has made some
amends for past pedophilia of its clergy or suggested a means, such as an end
to priestly celibacy, to purge the behavior.
She could have made a distinction between legal and illegal immigration,
arguing that the Church has not. She could have explained what biblical book,
chapter, or verse the Catholic prelate is ignoring.
In a normal environment, one in which Republicans are occasionally held accountable, the congresswoman's incendiary remarks would be a problem for House Republicans.
Promising to contact Speaker Kevin McCarthy, Bill Donahue- at least for now- is
properly assigning responsibility to House leadership. Marjorie Greene traffics
in hatred, bigotry, and dishonesty, otherwise being an upstanding citizen.
Somebody has to put the pressure on the House GOP and, if it has to be someone
who himself has exhibited limited tolerance for differing viewpoints, we'll take it.
It's awkward enough blogging about something which occurred well over a week ago. It's even more awkward when I have to agree with Ilhan Omar. Awkward, and uncomfortable.
Syndicated columnist Leonard Pitts, who agreed with the Minnesota congresswoman approximately 90%, is even more on target. He wrote
Ilhan Omar was right. In fact, it’s not even close. That will come as heresy and apostasy to those now feigning moral indignation over a tweet the Minnesota congresswoman sent out on Sunday. But that makes it no less true.
In the video Omar shared — about its origin, little is known — a man with a guitar stands in the aisle of a crowded plane singing a Christian worship song. While some passengers sing along, others seem annoyed or studiously ignore the commotion. A little boy plugs his ears. It all moved Omar, a Muslim born in Somalia, to write: “I think my family and I should have a prayer session next time I am on a plane. How do you think it will end?”
The answer, as any honest and intelligent person well knows, is that in a post-9/11 world, it would end with them tackled to the floor and duct taped to their chairs as the pilot radioed ahead to the nearest airfield requesting permission for an emergency landing.
Personally, I think it more likely that there would have been a request and serious attempt to disband the prayer group, which probably would have been successful. Only if it weren't would there have been violence and permission requested for an emergency landing. Still, point well made.
Pitts notes that Omar's comments prompted a torrent of hostile and/or bigoted responses, which
affirms that so-called conservatism remains a doctrine of hate, it also raises a telling question of entitlement, of who gets to do what in the public square.
Take religion out of it for a moment. Imagine a group of rappers held a rap battle in the aisle of a transatlantic flight. Imagine some bickering couple had a loud argument about his infidelity or her infertility. Imagine a troupe of actors performed a scene from Shakespeare.
Imagine, in other words, any scenario in which a group of people is held captive to a disruptive performance they did not choose and cannot escape. Do that, and one word suggests itself with crystalline clarity.
Rude. That’s what every principal in those imagined scenarios would be. And it’s what the singers on that plane were, too.
Exactly. It comes down to courtesy. The singers deny the right of the fare-paying customer to be left in peace to read, sleep, or talk to the individual sitting next to her. As David Doel can be seen remarking here, "all people want you to do on flights is to sit down and shut up for the duration of the flight. That's all the vast majority of people want."
Pitts recognizes
It bespeaks a certain level of social privilege that this seems not to have occurred to them, that they never questioned whether they had the right to commandeer the public square and take hostages, never stopped to think there might be atheists, agnostics, Buddhists, Muslims, Wiccans, Jews or, for that matter, even other Christians on that flight who had no interest in hearing them sing.
It’s unlikely the experience brought any of those people to Christ. If anything, it probably drove some the other way.
It is a matter of privilege and, to Pitts' credit, he doesn't refer to it as "white privilege" or "Christian privilege" or invoke any adjective. It's the perception people increasingly have that they are entitled to do whatever they can get away with.
Emphasizing that the performers demonstrated "a show of their entitlement," Pitts adds "Omar’s tweet was on the relatively narrow issue of a double standard against Muslims. But the larger issue is about the hubris that comes of being at home in every setting, of never having to ask permission."
More reprehensible yet, the behavior prompted me to praise, or at least largely agree with, Ilhan Omar.
I don't know much about cryptocurrency but Bob Dylan's old line applies: "you don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows." You don't have to be an economist to know this is accurate:
Sick of people calling everything in crypto a Ponzi scheme. Some crypto projects are pump and dump schemes, while others are pyramid schemes. Others are just standard issue fraud. Others are just middlemen skimming of the top. Stop glossing over the diversity in the industry.
"When they go low, we go high," Michelle Obama
pompously declared at the 2016 Democratic National Convention. As diagnosis, it
still applies. As prescription, it is awful. This is how you do it:
"Kevin McCarthy is a liar and a traitor,"
Massachusetts senator Elizabeth Warren maintained on Sunday's State of the
Union on CNN. Three things:
1) Bad grammar- she meant "Kevin McCarthy is a liar and
traitor." ("Liar and a traitor" implies two individuals.);
2) The subject is not a traitor because treason is defined in the US Constitution as
"aid and comfort" to the nation's enemies to the enemy" and the USA is not officially at
war with anyone;
The first two points are irrelevant. Kevin McCarthy is a liar, and protesting that he's not
a traitor draws attention to the fact that he is a liar and to provoke
further discussion about whether or not he is a traitor.
It would not be a good look. The Republican Party knows that
and as of this moment, is mum about the accusations leveled by Warren.
This is a rare play run by Democrats, who are rarely on the
offensive and are content with their status as punching bags as long as they're
lauded for occasionally fighting back.
Syndicated columnist Jennifer Rubin, who no longer considers
herself a conservative and supports Joe Biden, lavishly praises Michigan
Democratic State Senator Mallory McMorrow and Missouri state Representative Ian
Mackey. The latter
went viral by denouncing the persecution of LGBTQ Americans. Addressing his Republican colleague Rep. Chuck Basye, who sponsored an amendment to a bill to prohibit transgender girls from participating in sports, Mackey noted that Basye’s gay brother had delayed coming out for fear of Basye’s reaction. Basye began his response with “If I were your brother, I would have been afraid to tell you, too."
When McMorrow was attacked in a fundraising email by a Republican colleague as one who would "groom and sexualize kindergartners," she responded with a statement which included
I know that hate will only win if people like me stand by and let it happen. So I want to be very clear right now: Call me whatever you want. I hope you brought in a few dollars. I hope it made you sleep good last night. I know who I am.
My, "I hope it made you sleep good last night" is going to strike fear into the hearts of Republicans. This passive-aggressive response is more typical of Democrats, as we can glean by reaction to US Representative Madison Cawthorn, a right-wing Republican from North Carolina.
Upon standing in 2020 as a 25-year-old for election to the House, former classmates of the dropout from Patrick Henry College circulated a letter noting
Cawthorn’s time at PHC was marked by gross misconduct towards our female peers, public misrepresentation of his past, disorderly conduct that was against the school’s student honor code, and self-admitted academic failings. During his brief time at the college, Cawthorn established a reputation for predatory behavior. … We urge the voters of North Carolina to seriously reevaluate Madison Cawthorn’s candidacy in light of who he really is.
The sexual perversion that goes on in Washington, I mean—being kind of a young guy in Washington, where the average age is probably 60 or 70 and I look at all of these people, a lot of them I’ve looked up to through my life … then all of a sudden you get invited to, ‘Oh, hey, we’re going to have kind of a sexual get-together at one of our homes, you should come!’ And I’m like, ‘What did you just ask me to come to?’ And then you realize they’re asking you to come to an orgy.
Or the fact that, you know, there’s some of the people that are leading on the movement to try and remove addiction in our country, and then you watch them do a key bump of cocaine in front of you.
And now, this:
This, too:
Dude has been a sexual predator, apparently drives with a revoked license, allegedly runs an office with more liquor bottles than water bottles and illegally fires a female staffer, and now
New photos show Republican Rep. Madison Cawthorn dressed in women's lingerie, chugging wine and surrounded by women - just weeks after he accused his GOP colleagues of inviting him to cocaine-fueled orgies.
The photos obtained by Politico how the 26-year-old Republican with a vacant look in his eyes, wearing women's hoop earrings and a woman's necklace along with a bra and lingerie set.
Screenshots of the photos were provided to the outlet by someone who used to be close to Cawthorn and his campaign. A second former confidante of Cawthorn verified the photos. It's unclear when they were taken, but he appears to be sitting in his wheelchair, indicating they were taken after the car accident that left him paralyzed in 2014.
If this were a Democrat, Republicans already would make sure Americans believed the Democratic Party were infested with liars, rapists, drug addicts, and perverts. The GOP wants Americans to think of Democrats as "groomers.". Christina Pushaw, press secretary to Florida governor Ron DeSantis, has responded to Democratic opposition to the state legislature's "Don't Say Gay" bill by charging "If you’re against the Anti-Grooming Bill, you are probably a
groomer or at least you don’t denounce the grooming of 4-8 year old children.
Silence is complicity. This is how it works, Democrats, and I didn’t make the
rules..."
But this is what leading Democrats have had to say about Madison Cawthorn:
Crickets. Their mouths are shut. Notwithstanding Senator Warren, relatively few Democrats have denounced Kevin McCarthy. Even fewer have even mentioned Madison Cawthorn.
In the latter's case, that may be in part because the LGBTQIA+-friendly Party probably is loathe to criticize a man who enjoys wearing sexy woman's clothing, But this isn't a case of sexual preference, generally determined at birth and beyond personal choice. It's personal choice, and one the vast majority of voters would find odd, were Democrats even to mention it. Additionally, it's Madison Cawthorn, and his behavior has been atrocious at every turn. He is- or should be- a poster boy for hideousness. News flash: he's a bad seed, or at least as much as is imaginable.
This is a case for political behaviorists or even social psychologists. Democrats rag on President Trump or his enablers, Steve Bannon, Steve Miller, Mark Meadows, Rudy Giuliani, and the whole roster of rogues. But they are unable or unwilling even to question their colleagues in the House of Representatives or the Senate. It shouldn't be up to Elizabeth Warren to save the country from the likes of Kevin McCarthy and Michael Bloomberg. Her colleagues need to step up, go low, and save this nation's democratic institutions.
More than 100 new laws passed during the 2021 legislative
session will hit the books this week, ranging from a record $100 billion state
budget to a ban on COVID-19 vaccine “passports” and an expansion of school
vouchers.
Also taking effect are two measures from the 2020 session,
including a law that will allow college athletes to make money off the field
based on their names, images and likenesses.
Most of this year’s new laws take effect Thursday, which
also is the start of the state’s 2021-2022 fiscal year. But about 40 bills
passed this year have already gone into place, and another 20 will take effect
later this year.
The legislation covered these 17 areas: budget, tax breaks, online tax collections,
social media, ballot initiatives, school vouchers, moment of silence, civics
education, intellectual freedom, transgender athletes, right to farm, Covid-19
passports, alcohol to go, property insurance, toll roads, gun regulations, and
foreign influence.
Those initiatives went into effect fairly promptly. Without a
moment's hesitation, this year the Florida Senate and House
passed a bill that
would dissolve Disney World’s Reedy Creek Improvement District, which
essentially allows Disney World to act as its own county, and now, the bill has
taken another step forward.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis has signed the bill to
dissolve the Reedy Creek Improvement District, according to the Associated
Press....
The law eliminates the 55-year-old district as well as a few
other similar districts in Florida by June of 2023. The districts can be
reestablished in the future, though.
The measure eliminates improvement districts created before ratification in November 1968 of the state's constitution. Most were established after
1968 but Reedy Creek was not, and therefore is to be
dissolved, according to text of the law- yet not until June 1, 2023.
For those keeping score at home, that wouldn't take place
until more than 13 months from now. The
legislation reportedly has improved the standing of Governor DeSantis at home,
but he has been a favorite to win re-election nonetheless.
However, it gives Disney, evidently the seat of decadence in
the modern world, plenty of time to negotiate with the governor and the
legislature. It gives the corporate behemoth a great deal of time to decide to
restrict its giving to Republicans or to find an effective means to support
actively the presidential candidacy of Ron DeSantis. And in return, the
law can be rescinded, possibly replaced by legislation which would
further enrich and empower Disney.
Republicans were prompted to cancel the Reedy Creek Improvement District because of Disney's opposition to the "Don't Say Gay" bill, itself an attack upon public schools. But coverage focused almost entirely on the sexual preference aspect because conservatives are well-versed in passing off
moral outrage as a cover to divert attention from ulterior motives.
Diana Reddy, a Doctoral Fellow at the Law, Economics, and
Politics Center at UC Berkeley Law, explained in December
Christopher Rufo—who a recent New Yorker article named as
the “inventor” of the anti-CRT panic—is a senior fellow at the Manhattan
Institute, “a leading voice of free-market ideas.” And while the Manhattan
Institute currently devotes an entire section of its website to the “problem”
of critical race theory, its education advocacy has long focused on privatized
school choice.
Another pundit from the Manhattan Institute, Jason Riley,
recently laid out a strategic vision in the Wall Street Journal for how
conservatives might use the current crises in public education as a political
wedge-issue. Backlash against both critical race theory and COVID-19
restrictions, he claimed, could bring in midterm wins for Republican
candidates: “Republicans ought to embrace the opportunity to explain to voters
why the best response—to everything from racial propaganda and incompetent
education bureaucrats to mask mandates and learning gaps—is more school choice"....
The prolific Christopher Rufo concluded another recent
article decrying public education by quoting an anonymous teacher at a
Philadelphia elementary school. According to Rufo, this teacher confided that
they had “come to realize that no policy hurts African-Americans more than the
public school system and the teachers’ union.”
The media has assumed for almost two years that the opponents of critical race theory are targeting discussion of America's
racially damaging past and/or anti-racism training. However, the objective is
broader than that, encompassing an effort to eliminate pubic education in favor
of profit-based education.
Similarly, Ron DeSantis' perceived urgency about the horrors
of Disney anti-wokeism is in large part subterfuge. The values Disney promotes with opposition to
the "Don't Say Gay" bill are such a threat to Floridians that the
company must be punished- in another year or so. While the cultural warfare the GOP seems to
be waging plays well with its voter base, their goals are broader and even more
dangerous than readily apparent.
A newly released recording shows House Minority Leader Kevin
McCarthy
preparing to formally break from Trump in the aftermath of
the deadly riot, just as House Democrats started drawing up an impeachment
resolution.
“Again, the only discussion I would have with him is that I
think this will pass, and it would be my recommendation you should resign,”
McCarthy said of the impeachment resolution. “Um, I mean that would be my take,
but I don’t think he would take it. But I don’t know.”
McCarthy also suggested he was concerned Trump would ask him
about obtaining a pardon from Mike Pence, who would have ascended to the
presidency if Trump resigned. Joining McCarthy on the call was Rep. Liz Cheney
(R-Wyo.), who was then the third-ranking Republican, along with other
Republican leaders. They briefly discussed the prospect of Trump’s Cabinet
invoking the 25th Amendment, which would allow Trump to be immediately removed
from office, and McCarthy revealed he had spoken to Trump within the previous
“couple days.”
“I would be highly surprised if President Trump allowed
these left-of-center journalists and pundits to gain a victory by engaging in
this warfare,” Jason Miller, a former Trump spokesman, told POLITICO.
If this is "warfare," the bullets, bombs, and
missiles are missing. So was release of
the information when it would have had an impact, determinative or otherwise,
on President Trump. President 45 was impeached, for the second time, on
January 13, 2020 and was acquitted by the Senate on February 13 after a trial
which began on February 9.
Neither release of the audio nor the conversation it
captures casts any further light on the ex-president, who probably will forgive
McCarthy once the latter pledges further allegiance to Donald the King. Predictably, no one has taken credit for
leaking the audio to New York Times reporters Jonathan Martin or Alexander
Burns. It never hurts, however, to look to motive and the third highest-ranking
House Republican is the obvious suspect:
After talking to some smart people in DC and elsewhere, the case that @Liz_Cheney leaked the @gopleader tape is weak.
The breadcrumbs lead back to a surprising quarter.
As displayed at the beginning of the recent Young Turks
video below, three months ago Tucker Carlson wailed
The left and all the gatekeepers on Twitter become literally
hysterical if you use the term "replacement," if you suggest the
Democratic Party is trying to replace the current electorate, the voters now
casting ballots....
The Democratic Party is not trying to replace or reduce the
electorate, but instead to expand the electorate. Tucker continues
... with new people more obedient, voters from the third
world. But they become hysterical because that's what's happening, actually.
Let's just say if that's true. So this matters on a bunch of different levels
but on the most basic level, it's a voting rights question. If you change the
population you dilute the political power of the people who live there so every
time they import more voters, I become disenfranchised as a current voter....
Carlson does not lose the right to vote. His followers don't
lose the right to vote. And what is happening is not importing more voters but
allowing individuals constitutionally and legally eligible to vote to continue
to vote.
In case you thought that Tucker was referring to race when
he said "import" and "Third World," he wants you to know
So I don't understand why you don't understand this. I mean,
everyone wants to make a racial issue out of it. Oh, you know, the white
replacement there- no, no, this is a voting rights question.
Carlson uses not a dog whistle but a blow to the head when
he invokes "replacement" theory, a term and concept reinvigorated by
author Renaud Camus in his 2011 book “Le Grand Remplacement.” The French news
network France 24 last year explained that.
Rooted in racist nationalist views, the great replacement
theory purports that an elitist group is colluding against white French and
European people to eventually replace them with non-Europeans from Africa and
the Middle East, the majority of whom are Muslim. Renaud Camus often refers to
this as “genocide by substitution”.
Notions of the theory date as far back as 1900, when the
father of French nationalism Maurice Barrès spoke about a new population that
would take over, triumph and “ruin our homeland”.
In an article for daily newspaper Le Journal, he wrote: “The
name of France might well survive; the special character of our country would,
however, be destroyed, and the people settled in our name and on our territory
would be heading towards destinies contradictory to the destinies and needs of
our land and our dead."
At the time Barrès was writing, “anti-Semitism was extremely
mainstream”, says Dr. Aurelien Mondon, a senior lecturer of politics at Bath
University in an interview with FRANCE 24. “Barrès spoke about the idea of
racial purity,” he says, which is why the theory of population replacement
became so popular among the Nazis, for example.
But after World War II, the French far right needed a new
discourse to move back into the mainstream. Shifting away from biological
racism towards cultural racism, the replacement theory gained ground in the
1970s and 1980s.
“The Nouvelle Droite (New Right) and some French
intellectuals were trying to find ways to move away from the margins,” Mondon
says. Over the years, these ideas spread among the far right, which was becoming
more and more mainstream in France, eventually paving the way for Camus to
publish his book on the topic without being disregarded as too radical.
“Camus didn’t invent anything,” Mondon explains. “He put
concepts together and coined the phrase, but his theory is part of a much
broader context that contributed to the reshaping of the far right [in France.”
With the far-right Marie Le Pen currently posing a serious
threat to Emmanuel Macron and democracy in France, the movement has newly taken
on added importance. However, it helps make clearer the self-deception engaged
in by Trump supporters who believe their hero won the 2020 presidential
election. Sarah Longwell writes
I regularly host focus groups to better understand how
voters are thinking about key political topics. Recently, I decided to find out
why Trump 2020 voters hold so strongly to the Big Lie.
For many of Trump’s voters, the belief that the election was
stolen is not a fully formed thought. It’s more of an attitude, or a tribal
pose. They know something nefarious occurred but can’t easily explain how or
why.
The anti-Trump Republican Longwell concludes
These voters aren’t bad or unintelligent people. The problem
is that the Big Lie is embedded in their daily life. They hear from Trump-aligned
politicians, their like-minded peers, and MAGA-friendly media outlets—and from
these sources they hear the same false claims repeated ad infinitum.
Now we are at the point where to be a Republican means to
believe the Big Lie. And as long as Republicans leading the party keep
promoting and indulging the Big Lie, that will continue to be the case. If I’ve
learned anything from my focus groups, it’s that something doesn’t have to make
sense for voters to believe it’s true.
As Longwell notes, the GOP does promote and indulge the
"Big Lie" and these voters aren't unintelligent. Yet, they claim "flipped" votes overnight after polls closed; mail-in ballots as a
"crock;" a "fixed" election; or "something just doesn't feel
right." Scorned (or so they
believe) for being Trump voters- and maybe for being racist- they won't be as
forthright as Tucker Carlson, who has his own reasons for peddling racially
divisive ideas.
Longwell concedes the Trump voters hear "false claims
repeated ad infinitum" from "Trump-aligned politicians, their
like-minded peers, and MAGA-friendly media outlets." Nonetheless, she maintains "these
voters aren't bad or unintelligent people," and she's right about the
latter.
But something is at work, and if it's not stupidity,
Longwell needs to recognize that a person doesn't have to be a flat-out racist
to be at least somewhat malevolent. If asked if liberals voted twice, immigrants voted illegally, or blacks were pressured by
Democrats, many of her interviewees would have sounded a lot like Tucker Carlson. They are not helpless
pawns, but have found a like-minded spokesman for their
electoral interests.
"The airline pilot establishment still has not grappled with the damage it's done to its reputation by failing to respect the fact that members of the public have different ideas about how to fly the plane, or to place any value on the individual freedom of amateur ideas..." https://t.co/gZqBOTX70g
Also, "The physics establishment still has not grappled w the
damage it's done to its reputation by failing to respect the fact that members
of the public have different ideas on how to walk off buildings and bridges, or
to place any value on the individual freedom of amateur ideas..."
And "The firefighters establishment still has not grappled
with the damage it's done to its reputation by failing to respect the fact that
members of the public have different ideas about how to fight forest fires, or
to place any value on the individual freedom of amateur ideas..."
For flight attendants, pilots and others in the business,
the mask mandate had become a source of frustration even as they acknowledged
that it protected them during their extensive exposure to strangers. Flight
crews had to enforce proper face coverings — a dangerous job in polarizing
times. Some passengers refused to comply and became belligerent; in extreme
cases, they even punched, kicked and bloodied flight attendants.
“They don’t like being policemen on airplanes,” said David
Neeleman, the founder of JetBlue Airways and now chief executive of a new
company, Breeze Airways. “It’s not something that they signed up for, and I
think it creates more agitation with customers"....
However, if we're tempted to believe they're welcoming the change
for largely altruistic or humanistic reasons
Airlines, which spent months calling for an end to the mask
requirement, were quick to jettison enforcement of the rule on Monday — some
crews even announced during flights that passengers were free to take off their
masks. The industry is clearly hoping that the change will benefit it by
allowing it to focus more again on selling customers premium services.
They'll be making more money and that's the bottom line, as
it invariably is. With resumption of alcohol sales by American Airlines, all airlines now have removed the prohibition, suspended early in the pandemic, because, well, fights
are merely the cost of doing business.
However, the most ridiculous aspect of the court order
overturning the airline mask mandate is that it took effect immediately. A great many people had purchased tickets on the premise that masks would be required. Children, immunocompromised individuals,
and elderly patrons already in flight were treated to the announcement that
masks could be discarded. There are a lot of people who deserve refunds or
other significant considerations but won't get them.
The cost of doing business in this country has been
increased death. There could have been greater use of vaccine requirements-
slimed as "vaccine passports"- on airlines and elsewhere, but no. The public officials (called "Democrats") uneasy with death were long ago intimidated by the smearing of vaccination
measures by popularization of the term "passport." Republicans, aided as they often are by the "liberal media," gained the clear
and decisive upper hand in messaging, and that has driven the direction of public
health policy.
Vaccination would have been most helpful for schools, in which
guidelines have fluctuated from period to period, state to state, town to town. It could have been added to the five shots against disease mandated in at least 44 states for kindergartners. Though not a cinch to enforce, it would have been much easier than the "masks
required if not vaccinated" nonsense. There, individuals sufficiently
cavalier not to be vaccinated are admonished to wear masks which most obviously won't
wear.
With considerable validity, people have said that luck is
more important than talent. And sometimes, luck is more important than common
sense and so at some point, the pandemic will end, leaving in its wake death
both unavoidable and avoidable.
Elie Mystal of The Nation, a contributor to MSNBC, notes
that Herschel Walker, a candidate for the Republican nomination to face incumbent Georgia senator Raphael Warnock, "displays a level of ignorance that
would embarrass most sixth graders," He possesses credentials which "include lying
about being a class valedictorian, claiming to own businesses that do not
exist, and having a restraining order taken out on him by his ex-wife, who has
accused him of being physically and verbally abusive." Mystal argues
Herschel Walker, the football star turned Georgia Senate
candidate, is an animated caricature of a Black person drawn by white
conservatives. Walker is what they think of us, and they think we’re big,
ignorant, and easily manipulated. They think we’re shady or criminal. They
think we’re tools to be used. The Walker campaign exists as a political minstrel
show: a splashy rendition of what white Republicans think Black people look and
sound like.
There is no doubt that Walker, currently leading in the
Republican primary for Senate in Georgia, has been promoted by conservative
forces because he is Black. Georgia Republicans aren’t in the habit of
nominating Black people for the US Senate. The state’s Grand Old Party didn’t
even nominate a Black person for the Senate during Reconstruction—when
Republicans were progressives and Confederates were barred from government. Not
a single Black person was elected to the Senate in Georgia from either party,
ever, until Reverend Raphael Warnock ran as a Democrat—and won—in 2020. It is
in direct response to Warnock and the emerging power of the Black vote in that
state that Republicans dredged up Walker.
Nor is Georgia in the habit of electing football players who
starred at the University of Georgia.... The “it’s the football, not the
racism” argument fails its first contact with reality.
Mystal is correct in ascribing much of the motivation to
race, though I think he underplays the role of the returning football hero in
this drama. However, this did not in recent decades start with the Republican Party.
When presidential candidate Barack Obama improbably vowed “this was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet
began to heal ...," few of us Democrats, drunk on the "hope and
change" mantra impelled by the possibility of the first black President,
questioned his vision. And when President Obama failed to deliver on the hope
and change promised, few liberals or centrists ever suggested that it may have been
foolish to invest so much faith in a leader simply because his election would
be historic.
Facing elimination in the presidential
race, Joe Biden assured South Carolina Democratic primary voters in January, 2020 that he would
nominate for the US Supreme Court someone remarkably qualified, who has
demonstrated dedication to social and economic equality, and young enough to
serve for many years to come. Just kidding; Biden promised merely to nominate a black woman, whereupon he surged to an impressive victory in South Carolina and
sailed onto the nomination.
In August, 2020 more than 100 black men signed an open
letter to the nominee nearly demanding he pick a Black woman as his vice
president because "'failing to select a Black woman in 2020 means you will
lose the election.'"
This had nothing to do with winning the election, given that
vice presidents rarely have such an impact on a presidential race, especially the case in the election which was upcoming. Nonetheless, there was hardly a peep of protest
about excluding from consideration individuals unlucky enough to have a chance
of being a heartbeat from the presidency because they were born male, white,
Latino, or Asian.
Kamala Harris had in an early presidential debate weaponized race, much to the justified displeasure of Jill Biden, in order to
characterize Joe Biden as a racial bigot. Democrats cheered her selection.
For many years and especially in the last fifteen, Democrats have rejected
class-based interests in favor of a racial narrative. Borrowing from them,
Republicans have learned the
value of promoting candidates on the basis of their black skin while the Party has become more ideologically radical. Now they are
boosting the senatorial candidacy of a clearly unqualified black man probably
suffering from Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE).
It's a dirty business, leaning into racial preference,one Republicans have joined, as Elie Mystal has noticed. In
Georgia and elsewhere, it looks an awfully lot like racial prejudice.
Last Wednesday, Presidential press spokesperson Jen Psaki
deftly defended President Biden against implied criticism for soaring
inflation:
Q Yeah, the
producer price index on inflation came out at the highest level that they’ve
had in the history of recording these events.
This is the price that companies are paying for the materials that they
need to make the stuff that they sell, right?
So, with the last two days — the inflation reports — does the White
House believe that inflation has now peaked and we’re coming back down? Or because of these reports, do you think
we’re going to see even worse numbers in the future?
MS. PSAKI: We’ll let
the Federal Reserve make projections about that; they have the purview over
those projections.
What I will say is that while we — and we talked about this
over the last couple of days, as it relates to the CPI data — consumer price
index — as opposed to producer price index, for others — and what we saw: While
energy accounted for 70 percent of the monthly inflation in March on CPI data,
it counted for a substantial portion of PPI inflation as well.
And PPI measures things like the cost of wood, metal,
plastics — kind of, materials like that.
So it’s not necessarily — it’s not a surprise to us that energy is
having an impact — is a driver of these numbers.
Obviously, what we’re trying to do is mitigate the energy
impact and take steps to do exactly that: release from the Strategic Petroleum
Reserve and other actions working to get more supply out into the
marketplace.
But, you know, again, projections of a — of when we’re
hitting a high and where it will look, we will leave that to the Federal
Reserve.
Q And one last
one. So, does the President then
acknowledge any responsibility for the inflation that we’re seeing now based on
the decisions that he’s made when he came into office?
MS. PSAKI: Well, I
would say, as the President has talked about quite a bit, there are a range of
factors, including the pandemic, the impact on the supply chains.
And our effort and what we’ve tried to do from the beginning
is take steps to address that — address the supply chains. And we’ve had a lot of success moving more
equipment and goods, through — through ports, et cetera.
We’ve also seen, given energy is such a significant driver
of this data, an increase in energy prices over the last month-plus — since the
invasion of Ukraine. That’s
factual. That’s based on data that we
have seen out there.
So, our effort and our focus has been to try to address it
and take mitigation measures when we can.
While the media generally ignores rising wages and
plummeting unemployment, Psaki needed to remind the press and the public of the
impact on supply chains of the pandemic and the effect of Russia's invasion of
Ukraine upon gasoline prices. She did, however, leave out one thing.
The flexibility of the public, also known as a tolerance for
getting ripped off, seems to be working for companies. Megan Leonhardt notes
Consumers, however, are somewhat tolerant of price increases
during emergencies, research shows. Less than half of U.S. consumers, for
example, thought the price increase in hand sanitizer at the beginning of the
pandemic was unfair, according to a recent working paper by Columbia
researchers. “Consumer norms about fairness seem pretty flexible. So what
people think is fair can be highly context dependent,” Christopher Buccafusco,
coauthor and professor at the Cardozo School of Law, tells Fortune.
Corporations know how to exploit that. Economist Michael
Meeropol explains
Companies always want to maximize profits, right? In the
current context, they suddenly cannot deliver as much anymore as they used to.
And this creates an opening where they can say, well, we are facing increasing
costs. We are facing all these issues. So we can explain to our customers that
we are raising our prices. No one knows how much exactly these prices should be
increased. And everybody has some sort of an understanding that, oh, yeah,
there are issues, so, yes, of course companies are increasing prices in ways in
which they could not justify in normal times.
But this does not mean that the actual amount of price
increase is justified by the increase in costs. And as a matter of fact, what
we have seen is that profits are skyrocketing, which means that companies have
increased prices by more than cost. In the earnings reports, companies have
bragged about how they have managed to be ahead of the inflation curve, how
they have managed to jack up prices more than their costs and as a result have
delivered these record profits.
So Jen Psaki neglected to attribute any portion of inflation
to profiteering, nor did she mention the creeping influence of monopolistic business models. But she did push back on the
persistent narrative that the President is responsible for surging price
increases. Assuming she soon leaves her
position as expected, the Administration is likely to suffer a significant loss.
Every natural person has the right to be let alone and free
from governmental intrusion into the person’s private life except as otherwise
provided herein. This section shall not be construed to limit the public’s
right of access to public records and meetings as provided by law.
So reads Article 1, Section 12 of the Florida Constitution,
a mere inconvenience- at most- to Republican governor Ron DeSantis, who
has publicly signed into law a 15-week abortion ban that
shortens by more than two months the current window available to legally
terminate a pregnancy.
Within minutes of his office announcing that he had received
the bill (HB 5), approved by the Legislature in March, DeSantis held a bill
signing ceremony and rally at an evangelical church in Kissimmee.
The new law, which goes into effect July 1, significantly
reduces access to late-term abortions in the southeast — North Carolina will
become the only southern state to permit an abortion after 15 weeks.
Republican lawmakers in both the House and Senate had
defeated amendments that would have made exceptions for rape, incest, human
trafficking and mental health. The only exceptions allowed are cases where the
mother is at risk of death, "irreversible physical impairment" or if
the fetus has a fatal abnormality.....
At a normal time, establishment of a political party as
pro-rape and incest would be counter-productive, perhaps even politically
fatal. Pro-human trafficking also would
be unhelpful, though this is, after all, the party of Matt Gaetz.
But these aren't normal times. If they were, it would matter
that the bill signed by the man aiming to replace President Biden plainly
violates a state constitution guaranteeing "the right to be let alone
and free from governmental intrusion into the person's private life...."
The clause also explicitly note the exception, "the public's right of
access to public records and meetings as provided by law," and does not
include "abortion" or "childbirth."
What is left out of a law or constitutional provision may be
critically important. The state's "Constitutional Right to Privacy"
makes no mention of abortion or childbirth. While that may or may not have been
intentional, surely it was intentional that
If a physician violates provisions of the abortion ban, they
would be guilty of a third-degree felony, punishable by up to five years in
prison and a $5,000 fine.
The physician is solicited to take a human life, as the
forced-birth legislators and governor (allegedly) see it. He or she would face
the possibility of serious prison time. The woman, who decided to approach the
doctor and offer him or her considerable money to (allegedly) kill, is held
blameless. Punishment of a perpetrator while allowing a mastermind to go
scot-free occurs nowhere else in society.
Neither should be prosecuted for what in a normal universe
would be a woman's choice. But as in all anti-reproductive choice legislation
in the USA, the doctor alone is targeted. If both parties were prosecuted, the
cruelty already present in the forced-birth movement would be present and
clear. Political repercussions would
ensue as the dirty little secret no longer would be secret.
The cowardice is not unique to Florida lawmakers, but
instead a prime characteristic of the anti-choice movement. Nor is the
violation of Roe v. Wade, which may be overturned when the US Supreme Court
considers Mississippi's radical anti-abortion rights law. Rather, it is that
the man who would be President, Ron DeSantis, has spit on his own state's
constitution. And he probably will be held far less accountable than he would
hold a physician who provides health care requested by a patient.
No answers here; only questions. The Detroit Free Pressreports
Grand Rapids police released video footage Wednesday of the
fatal shooting of Patrick Lyoya, a Black man, by an officer. The video includes
footage from the officer's body camera, which was deactivated shortly after the
officer told the suspect to "let go of the Taser."
Lyoya was shot in the head, police Chief Eric Winstrom
confirmed.
The video, a collection of dashcam footage, body cam
footage, a home security camera, and a cellphone video, depicts an unnamed
police officer pulling over Lyoya and a passenger for a "license plate
that doesn't match the car."
Lyoya gets out of the car, so the officer gets out and tells
him to get back in the car. The officer asks for his driver's license and then
proceeds to ask if Lyoya speaks English due to a possible language barrier.
Police officers have a thing about this. When a cop pulls a
driver over, they want him to remain in the car. If he gets out, they yell for
him to get back into the car, as this officer did. Lyoya did not do so and it's
not unreasonable to ask why. Nonetheless, the most obvious question pertains as
to why the victim's license plate did not match his car, which may have
something trivial, or not. And further: did a language barrier play any role?
In an instance in which "run around" does a lot of
work
Lyoya then appears to run around the car, and the officer
chases and tackles him to the ground on the front lawn of a house.
They struggle, and the officer can be heard telling Lyoya to
"stop" and to "let go of the Taser."
Police officers are trained not to draw their gun unless
they would be willing, if circumstances worsen, to fire it. In this case, the officer did not maintain
control of one of his weapons, a laser. Allowing a suspect the opportunity to
wrest control of any weapon seems rather counter-productive. Thereafter
After about 90 seconds, the officer is lying on top of
Lyoya, who is face down on the ground, still yelling for him to "let go of
the Taser," and proceeds to shoot him.
This raises an interesting issue which the public will be
discouraged from considering.. The victim was resisting and the officer appears
to have had no choice but to shoot Lyoya in order to subdue him. Yet, whether
he had an alternative to a kill shot is an open question. Police officers rarely shoot to injure, a
procedure or policy rarely explored by media.
Nonetheless, race will shape the perception of the left and
much of the center while knee-jerk support of police will shape the perception
of the right and other centrists. And we'll learn nothing more relevant about
criminal justice, race and policing than we have during the last two years.
Two weeks ago, the Huffington Post noted that Supreme Court
Justice Clarence
Thomas is currently under fire for failing to recuse himself
from cases related to the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection after text messages from
his wife, Virginia (Ginni) Thomas, to then-White House chief of staff Mark Meadows
revealed her active participation in the effort to overturn the results of the
2020 election.
Initially, Meadows voluntarily disclosed the messages to the
House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol. Later, on Dec.
7, 2021, he stopped cooperating with the committee and claimed executive
privilege to prevent further disclosures.....
The Supreme Court ruled 8-1 against assertions of executive
privilege by ex-President Donald Trump and his ex-aides, including Meadows.
Thomas cast the lone vote of dissent in the case. Now, it’s clear that the
disclosures in question could have provided more evidence of his wife’s
involvement in the plot to overthrow the results of the 2020 election.
Since 1993, Thomas has recused himself at least 19 times
from 18 different cases for either being named in the petition, having
previously heard the case as an appeals court judge, or because his former
employer was named as a party.
In 1995, Thomas recused himself at multiple stages during the
Virginia v. U.S. case challenging Virginia Military Institute’s male-only
admission policy. Thomas’ son attended the institute at the time.
Thomas also recused himself from six cases involving the
bank Wachovia from 2004-2007 because his son worked at Wachovia Securities.
“The Wachovia cases, those are the real interesting ones,”
said Gabe Roth, executive director of Fix The Court, “because he is recusing
due to an interest of a family member. That’s textbook Supreme Court recusal.”
Of course, as Anita Hill and Angela Wright learned, Clarence
Thomas is a skilled liar who will do whatever he chooses to do. That's why it
was surprising when on the third day of questioning of Kentanji Brown Jackson
In response to a question from Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas,
Jackson said she would recuse herself from an upcoming challenge to Harvard
University’s race-conscious admissions policy. Jackson, who attended Harvard as
both an undergraduate and a law student, is a member of Harvard’s board of
overseers. Her term on the board expires this spring.
“That is my plan, senator,” Jackson said when asked by Cruz
if she would recuse from the case.
Every nominee for the Supreme Court has learned the lesson
of Judge Robert Bork, who didn't know enough to hide his extreme right-wing
views from his inquisitors on the Senate Judiciary Committee. Consequently, Judge Jackson wisely dodged
many questions, deftly avoiding alienating any Senator who was not already
determined to vote against her.
Admittedly, she did say recusal is "my plan"
rather than "I will recuse myself." Nevertheless, that was a relatively
definitive reply, one more so than anyone- including Cruz- could have expected,
and more than could have been demanded.
This may have been a wise response to ensure her
confirmation. But it was at best only of marginal assistance. The proper reply
would have been "I plan to follow the lead of my esteemed
colleagues." That would have thrown Republicans on the defense. Six Justices including Thomas are Republican and conservative and
Jackson's critics on the committee would have been extremely hard-pressed to
attack her while she was defending her future colleagues. Additionally, they are
"esteemed."
This answer would have allowed the Judge maximum flexibility on the Court.. It also would have added a little fuel to the arguments of
Democrats who have suggested that Justice Thomas recuse himself from matters
involving his wife. However, that would
have at least slightly helped the members of Ketanji Brown Jackson's party and possibly exposed Republicans to charges of hypocrisy. Democrats simply
don't do that sort of thing.
Full disclosure: I don't agree with Harvard University's
admissions policy. Still, I know a cave
when I see one, and this brings to mind a comment made by Wright about the
Hill-Thomas hearings of 1989. In a sentiment since commonly expressed by the left in only
slightly different terms, she noted "to me, having worked on both sides of
the aisle — Republican and Democratic — what I know for sure, Republicans are
like bare-fisted street brawlers, Democrats do pillow fights.”
