After making it clear that she would run her courtroom in the interests of justice without reference to the 2024 presidential election, U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan has set March 4, 2024, as the start date for former president Trump’s trial on four criminal counts for his efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election.
Steve, such beautiful Karmic payback. Even Shakespeare couldn’t have come up with a more “perfect date”....I hope the Democrats trumpet (pardon the pun) that important fact all over the US. Really.
When thinking about Trump’s legal woes and the fix the Republican Party has managed to get itself into by supporting this miscreant, these words from the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam come to mind:
“The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ, Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line, Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it"
The tab has arrived, folks. Enjoy your just deserts!
'Indicting Hunter Biden Would Make Him Formidable Republican Candidate'
'WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report)—An indictment of Hunter Biden would immediately catapult him to the top tier of the Republican Presidential field, a new poll of likely G.O.P. voters indicates.'
'The poll reveals that, if indicted by the just-appointed special counsel, the President’s son would be in a virtual dead heat with the Republican front-runner, Donald J. Trump.'
'Davis Logsdon, who supervised the poll for the University of Minnesota, noted that Governor Ron DeSantis lags far behind, in third place, because of G.O.P. voters’ queasiness about supporting a candidate who has no indictments.' (Satire, NEWYORKER)
Dead heat for what? trump has the criminal charges sewed up. Hunter's "crimes" are not half as serious: drugs, tax evasion, owning an illegal gun? get real
My husbands’s favorite poem. Republicans have never believed it, and keep trying to cancel their evil for most of my adult life. Rupert’ and Ronnie’s goal. I’m with you, Omar…
Jeri, it is also one of my favorites, too. One of my favorite lines is: "Strange among that earthen lot, some could articulate, and some not. What then, did the hand of the Maker shake?" In Trump's case, the shaking was uncontrollable, resulting in a congentially deformed malignant narcissist.
I think the cheese goes without saying. So he didn't say it.
Don't forget the "thou". And I can't find the quotation, but I am sure Terry Pratchett said in one of his books something about "a loaf of bread, a jug of wine, and thou, or at least a selection of thous."
What we don't have ... YET, is the direct testimony of 1 or more of the 3 or 4 Witnesses that were "in the room" during that "perfect" call. Jack's got it.
Tuesday Update: Confirmed in Court yesterday by an audio recording, one (1) of those Witnesses heard to speak on the audio tape was MARK MEADOWS.
I agree Lynn, clearly MEADOWS is attempting to flee the Fulton County Jury Pool.
Meanwhile, the Judge has NOT ruled yet but, instead has issued an Order asking the parties to brief a highly technical statutory issue that appears to a indicate that the evidence shows MEADOWS was not acting in his "official capacity" on several acts. But, I was not in the Courtroom.
The Trial Judge knows the case is immediately going to 3 Judge Appellate panel & possibly on to SCOTUS & he wants to get it right in the sense of accurately following current law while providing the Appellate Courts with well briefed record on appeal.
I must make a deep dive on the statute cited by the Judge before posting my take from the Cheap Sseats ;)
Well Camilla B in the Peach state, at least one (1) tape of MARK MEADOWS talking to BRAD on the "perfect" call, "What I am hopeful for ... is there some way that we can some form of agreement."
The resonance of the date is perfect, but I'm much more relieved about this chronology:
"Judge Chutkan’s establishment of March 4 for the federal trial over Trump’s attempt to overturn the results of the 2020 election means that Trump-appointed federal judge Aileen Cannon, who is overseeing the Mar-a-Lago documents trial and who seems eager to protect the former president, will have far less power to shape public perceptions of the cases against (tffg)."
I wanted to quote it because anything that takes some of the stress of all this away leaves us more energy to take this mf down.
Somehow I had wished that the trial would start on March 15 - the ides of March. Still, it is so appropriate that a Black female judge now controls much of TFG's fate.
There is the chance that there will be no trial, but instead a complete global settlement of all the cases. Trump agrees to house arrest for the rest of his life, no acceptance of pardons, no broadcasting his BS, no participating in politics of any kind. Fini. It's over and he avoids prison. I think that it's like that this will be discussed and promoted by his attorneys.
And remember, there is still the 14th Amendment section 3
Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment prohibits anyone who has previously taken an oath of office (that is, most current and former public officials) from holding public office if they have “engaged in insurrection or rebellion” against the United States. Send a letter to your state's Secretary of State.
A case has alredy been filed by an attorney in Florida. I have sent requests to the ACLU, NOW and LWV to file suits in various states against the Secretaries of State to compel them to refuse to put Trump's name on the ballot.
I would not like to see a settlement that coddles him just because he was rich and powerful. We saw that happen with Nixon, and I think it contributed to the corruption we see today. Like Jeffery Epstein's settlement of child sex trafficking. "Equal Justice Under Law" is engraved on the SCOTUS building, but way too often, that's not what we see. Mercy yes, but deference to social status is corruption.
The global settlement would only cover Trump. The others could/probably will cut a plea deal. Many cannot afford to pay for their attorneys and Trump, true to form, is not using any of the millions that he is grifting to help them.
I recall a photo of a woman wearing a shirt that said "Trump can grab my pussy". "He loved Big Brother" isn't just fiction. There is often a strange dynamic of fealty by those exploited. I can't help but wonder how many of those are the product of abusive homes.
HCR's last paragraph resonates with what real lawmakers understood about creating a Constitution, laws that guarantee democracy, and the foundation of a country based upon it.
I am all for making things difficult for Loose Cannon. I keep seeing hilarious memes too including the faces of the Kracken and Rudy on the farmer and his wife in Grant's famous painting. It's early here , so hope I have the artist right. And as aside, we had a little rain last night...the first in months.
The nation needs a serious conversation about ethics. No one should judged by a person he or she appointed. No one should be pardoned by his or her former subordinate, nor pardon to accomplish a coverup.
The far right Republicans in the House are trying to save nickels and dimes on the expense side of the budget, but refuse to raise corporate taxes by 3-4% which would more than make up for their penny-ante cuts.
Gym Jordan has spent tens of millions on his various failed witch hunts while his cohorts try to cut support for child care, the IRS, Social Security and the Ukraine war.
Apparently, the MAGAs eat it up or Gym would drop it? Again, what fly by night law school did he attend? He got so little out of it that he didn't attempt to take the Ohio bar exam.
My sister lives in OH. She’s pretty active with post cards, phone calls, door to door and standing in the line in the grocery store to try to persuade people to think about who and what they’re voting for. She’ll love your apt description! Jordan is despised in many parts of OH. The gerrymandering confirms a Republican will never lose his district, unless no one votes for a Republican. Something the cheaters never saw coming. Now it’s staring them down. “Cheaters never win, and winners never cheat”. Halitosis and body odor! Sprinkle in a little Athletes Foot and you have the whole OH Republican Party!
That's the removal of the "administrative state", extreme Republicans rage against the "communist" ambitions of the Democrats; so force it by reducing taxes, the ability to afford policy, and of course, direct assault on social support programs because the State can no longer "afford them", the very result of their own conniving. In any case, it's gonna be the top 20% of income tax payers who finance American federal government. Very little from the lower 50%. Says something about the ongoing drift of income inequality in USA, the destruction of trade unions and hollowing out of the American middle classes which rose to prominence in the 50s. There is a huge economic payback by expanding social support "infrastructure" for everyone involved, including corporate rich.
The modern "GOP" is wholly bought and paid for and has been for at least 40 years. It all boils down to making the rich richer and the rest subservient.
No, I didn’t remember. Was so turned off by him (both Bushes for same and different reasons and out of the country, so missed that stupidity. Thank you for adding to my collection of Bush “memorabilia.”
One thing in yesterdays flood of media jumps out to me but there hasn't seemed to be much focus on it (yet) so, it seems right to bring it up among questions about the Constitution. HCR notes it with just one sentence:
"Trump has told his aides he intends to solve his legal problems by winning the next election."
Think about that. The "person" running for the most powerful post in the world and that would hold the nuclear codes now openly admits this as the real reason. Not to "make America great again", not for any other reason but to save himself....and there's fear that there are enough "deplorable" voters to help him do it.....WTF.
To even try to understand what is going on in this country (and world) to make this bats**t crazy phenomenon even remotely plausible I tend to do deep dives. If you like to do the same, here are two links that make the most sense, going deeper into the polls for answers:
I could make a very long post trying to summarize them but, they are worth the read IMO. But, this one point could be one of the Dems central strategies heading into 2024,....why vote for someone who is not only in significant cognitive decline but, has no ideas, no platform, no concept of doing anything (Good) for the country,.....but only for himself.
I have no doubt she knew and chose this date accordingly. Judge Chutkan is extremely astute and wouldn’t pass up the chance to make a historical statement with this date
"On June 21, 1788, New Hampshire became the critical ninth state to ratify the Constitution. That day, the Constitution was officially adopted, and the new government officially started operating on March 4, 1789."
Thought that was Flip Wilson--"this judge done startin' a war on crime, and everybody here gonna do some time--here come the judge, here come the judge"
I think that Trump's only conceivable defense would be that he had hard evidence (presumably classified) that the election was being stolen from him.
There is a handful of places where discrepancies might enter the vote count. I like this one, quoting from the introduction to "Votescam: The Stealing of America" (originally 1992)
"By means of an unofficial private corporation named News Election Service (NES), the Establishment press has actual physical control of the voting and counting and dissemination of the vote, and it refuses to let the public know how it is done."
Quoting from the footnote to the above quote in the 2015 edition:
"In 1964 it was born National Election Services (NES), a consortium of ABC, CBS, NBC, AP and UPI. In 1994 NES merged with Voter Research and Survey (VRS) to become Voter News Service (VNS), which included CNN and Fox News. In 2002 it morphed again to become News Election Pool (NEP)."
"Votescam" talks about a situation where the tabulating computers "crash" on election night and come back up in the wee hours with skewed numbers.
I witnessed something similar, in the do-or-die (for Hillary) in the North Carolina primary in 2008. I planned to stay up late and watch the results come in.
Around 10 or 11 p.m., Hillary and Obama were neck-and-neck, and the computers crashed, just like "Votescam" talked about.
I waited up, hour after hour, because I wanted to see the moment that results were updated. Around 3:00 the computers came back up: Hillary's total was flat, but Obama had received a big boost, putting the primary (and the nomination) out of reach.
For a couple days, there was talk that Hillary might challenge the results. She didn't, and went on to be Secretary of State. North Carolina Attorney General Ray Cooper went on to br Governor. Charlotte, North Carolina was awarded the next Democratic convention.
p.s. A starting point for Trump's potential supporting argument that the 2020 Democratic nomination was stolen from Bernie Sanders is the eye-popping discrepancies between the exit polls and the computer results in the Massachusetts primary:
...said Mr. Know-it-All, the Expert on How to Dismiss a Source without Reading It.
One of the points of "Votescam" is that there is a secretive private consortium that controls the tabulation and dissemination of election results. If correct, then this is the essence of neo-Fascism. They don't need goon squads to intimidate voters anymore; when they can just adjust the results behind the scenes.
But Votescam's argument can be tested: What, exactly, is the procedure whereby votes and election results are tabulated and disseminated?
"By accident, I became the leading expert on the meaning of the Declaration of Independence," and then he cites to a tweet string his own xTwitter feed for his expertise.
The obvious answer is because more people voted electronically than by paper. And it's supposed to be a secret ballot. Conspiracy theories are just that. Theories. Not True until proven. It shouldn't be hard to prove. But for some reason they just can't. Such a waste of time and energy to make some theory up when the proven truth is staring us right in the face. Just because you don't like the answer doesn't mean it isn't true!
One of the points of "Votescam" is that there is a secretive private consortium that controls the tabulation and dissemination of election results. If correct, then this is the essence of neo-Fascism. They don't need goon squads to intimidate voters anymore, when they can just adjust the results behind the scenes.
Votescam's argument can be tested: What, exactly, is the procedure whereby votes and election results are tabulated and disseminated?
I don't know my history as well as I should, but didn't the Nuremberg trials demolish the argument that those who committed crimes in the performance of their "duties" were absolved of those crimes and that, instead, ruled that such perpetrators must be judged by their actions?
Betsy, Thank you for aptly invoking Nuremberg, wherein judges were tried, who willfully and falsely had condemned, without warranted evidence, perceived enemies of the state. Let that darkness that befell a nation for over a decade be a warning, were the U.S. electorate not to mobilize to defeat the GOP up and down the ballot.
When the law becomes corrupted (nothing Hitler did was illegal), those who made evil legal should be held accountable. The world paid the price for that fiasco. Hope this country can correct itself.
Jeri, Shortly before Hitler’s death, the U.N. War Crimes Commission had issued several indictments against Hitler for actions by the Nazis. As for the convicted judges at Nuremberg, I believe the first time a judge condemned an individual the judge knew to be innocent, that judge bore responsibility for the horrors that ensued. Regarding the States, I imagine most of us here are among the tens of millions galvanizing the electorate to vote out the GOP, who either oppose preserving democracy and the rule of law or are seemingly indifferent to any cause other than pursuing their self-serving impulses.
Actually, plenty of Hitler's doings were illegal by ordinary statute. Take for example his order allowing the "mercy killing" (his words) of the physically and mentally handicapped in 1939.
And let's not forget that Trump wanted the trial to be postponed until April 20, 2026. April 20th is Hitler's birthday (1889). I doubt that date was chosen at random.
Except that we should be looking toward a guilty verdict well before Nov. 5, 2024 in, at minimum, the Jan. 6 obstruction case and it would be great if a similar result comes about for the RICO/Georgia case.
Yes, "just following orders" is not a justifiable offense in terms of determining guilt. Meadows and others are only using the argument at this point to move their cases to federal court. Will be interesting to see what defense they offer if that does happen.
Excellent point. And one which I'm sure Jack Smith is well aware. "I only did these things because my job description required it" is simply a variation of "I did it because I was ordered to do it."
I think that Trump's only conceivable defense would be that he had hard evidence (presumably classified) that the election was being stolen from him.
There is a handful of places where discrepancies might enter the vote count. I like this one, quoting from the introduction to "Votescam: The Stealing of America" (originally 1992)
"By means of an unofficial private corporation named News Election Service (NES), the Establishment press has actual physical control of the voting and counting and dissemination of the vote, and it refuses to let the public know how it is done."
Quoting from the footnote to the above quote in the 2015 edition:
"In 1964 it was born National Election Services (NES), a consortium of ABC, CBS, NBC, AP and UPI. In 1994 NES merged with Voter Research and Survey (VRS) to become Voter News Service (VNS), which included CNN and Fox News. In 2002 it morphed again to become News Election Pool (NEP)."
"Votescam" talks about a situation where the tabulating computers "crash" on election night and come back up in the wee hours with skewed numbers.
I witnessed something similar, in the do-or-die (for Hillary) in the North Carolina primary in 2008. I planned to stay up late and watch the results come in.
Around 10 or 11 p.m., Hillary and Obama were neck-and-neck, and the computers crashed, just like "Votescam" talked about.
I waited up, hour after hour, because I wanted to see the moment that results were updated. Around 3:00 the computers came back up: Hillary's total was flat, but Obama had received a big boost, putting the primary (and the nomination) out of reach.
For a couple days, there was talk that Hillary might challenge the results. She didn't, and went on to be Secretary of State. North Carolina Attorney General Ray Cooper went on to br Governor. Charlotte, North Carolina was awarded the next Democratic convention.
p.s. A starting point for Trump's potential supporting argument that the 2020 Democratic nomination was stolen from Bernie Sanders is the eye-popping discrepancies between the exit polls and the computer results in the Massachusetts primary:
The Biden Bullies are out in force today (all six of them), with their trademark trollish grunting and sneering, dirtcting others to ignore the thought posed by my source that our entire election system (counting the votes) is corrupt
You neglect to mention that the Cyber Ninjas, computer security specialists, took Mariposa County Dominion voting machines off-site to extract their program code and analyze it line by line. They found no code that could alter a person's vote. They analyzed paper ballots, and found more disallowed votes for Joe Biden that should have been counted than those for Donald Trump. That project was supposed to prove the "massive" voting fraud in Arizona, but found inconsequential human errors and no fraud.
Roy Hendrix, what "Votescam" is describing has nothing to do with individual voting machines. That book goes back to 1992(!) and comes from a pair of brothers who decided to run for Congress and write a book about their experience. Little did they imagine...
...said Mr. Know-it-All, the Expert on How to Dismiss a Source without Reading It.
One of the points of "Votescam" is that there is a secretive private consortium that controls the tabulation and dissemination of election results. If correct, then this is the essence of neo-Fascism. They don't need goon squads to intimidate voters anymore; when they can just adjust the results behind the scenes.
But Votescam's argument can be tested: What, exactly, is the procedure whereby votes and election results are tabulated and disseminated?
Ballotpedia (https://ballotpedia.org/National_Election_Pool) explains that, while the National Election Pool is a consortium of ABC, NBC, CBS, and CNN, its purpose is exit polling: collaborating on what questions to ask and how to ask them in which precincts, to get a sense of the direction that actual votes are taking well before the polls even close.
Ballotpedia doesn't have an entry for "national election service" but does have an entry for National Election Pool (NEP), at https://ballotpedia.org/National_Election_Pool: NEP is a consortium of ABC, NBC, CBS, and CNN the purpose of which is to collect and aggregate exit-poll results from a demographically significant set of precincts to help the consortium predict the electoral outcome. This is standard pool reporting, in that only one reporter - or even a stringer, a local hired for the occasion: many fine journalists got their start as stringers - need be stationed at each of the chosen polling places. The questions are standardized in hopes of producing results that will be reliable across precincts (though not necessarily more accurate: see below).
National Election Service was founded in 1964 as a pool-reporting organization to aggregate actual early voting results, at the precinct level where possible or otherwise at the county level. NES was folded into the predecessor of the NEP in 1993 - and became increasingly irrelevant as states began amassing election results in something like real time (thanks to faxing and email) and as ever smaller voting authorities began setting up election webpages on which to post updates. In the meantime, the NES brand passed in the late 1990s to an organization that provided customized tests for teacher certification (this NES was subsequently swallowed up by Pearsons, though the brand remains). But there's no -credible- evidence that the earlier NES ever did anything other than tabulate the results that the pool reporters submitted.
As a sometime poll worker and teacher of topics including civics, the very last question I would have answered honestly on my way out of a polling place is how I voted. Whether I'd simply have refused to answer or concocted a fib would have depended largely upon the importunity of the pool stringer. But this is yet another reason to prefer voting by mail.
Ballotpedia doesn't include "tabulation" as a function of NEP, but Wikipedia does. Apparently, NEP gets all of its vote count results from Edison Research.
According to Edison's website:
"In an effort to improve quality, streamline data collection, and expand election coverage in 2018, ABC News, CBS News, CNN, and NBC News ended their arrangement with the Associated Press for vote tabulation and now exclusively partner with Edison Research for these data.
"Edison Research provides the NEP with a fast and accurate vote count throughout the nation, delivering data for all statewide races and all House races."
‘The irony is almost too rich: While thousands gathered Saturday on the National Mall to mark the 60th anniversary of the March on Washington, a racist White man in Jacksonville, Fla., killed three African Americans for the unforgivable crime of being African American.’
‘Angela Michelle Carr, 52, was shot dead in her car in the parking lot of a Dollar General store in one of Jacksonville’s predominantly Black neighborhoods. A.J. Laguerre, 19, a store employee, was shot dead as he tried to flee from the gunman.’
‘Jerrald Gallion, 29, was shot dead as he walked, unawares, into the store.
Black people being killed for being Black. How many times have we seen this before?’
‘We saw it in May 2022, when a hate-filled White man killed 10 Black shoppers at a Tops supermarket in Buffalo. We saw it in February 2020, when Ahmaud Arbery, a 25-year-old Black man, was cornered and killed by three White assailants for having the temerity to jog through a White neighborhood. We saw it in June 2015, when a White supremacist killed nine Black worshipers at Mother Emanuel A.M.E. Church in Charleston, S.C. We’ve seen it in police shooting after police shooting, where offenses as trivial as a broken taillight have led to encounters that left African Americans dead, their families grieving and their communities enraged.’
‘Clearly, the dream that the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. unforgettably described at the Lincoln Memorial on Aug. 28, 1963 — “that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character” — has not yet come true.’
‘Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) said the right things, albeit awkwardly, at a vigil for the dead on Sunday night, calling the 21-year-old killer a' “major league scumbag” and vowing that’ “we are not going to let people be targeted based on their race.”
‘But the crowd was also right to boo him. DeSantis has weakened gun laws in Florida rather than take steps that might have kept a weapon of war out of the hands of an unbalanced, homicidal young racist. DeSantis has crusaded incessantly against “wokeness,” a term whose original meaning was awareness of the systemic racism that fuels anti-Black discrimination and violence.’
‘And DeSantis has instituted a new curriculum in Florida schools that downplays the long history of African Americans being “targeted” precisely because of their race. When studying the Jim Crow era, students are to be taught about “acts of violence perpetrated against and by African Americans” — as if White people and Black people were equally to blame. The curriculum largely ignores, for example, the “Red Summer” of 1919 — an eruption of scores of anti-Black riots and massacres, in big cities and small towns across the country, that left hundreds of African Americans dead.’ (WAPO) Sorry that I am not be able to provide a gifted link.
‘Residents, church leaders and elected officials remained in shock Sunday — one day after three Black people were gunned down in a racially motivated slaying at a Dollar General store by a white man wearing a mask, bullet-resistant vest and armed with an AR-15-style rifle decorated with swastikas and a handgun.’
‘St. Paul AME Church about three miles from the Dollar General held the first of several prayer vigils Sunday for the victims, their families, the community and elected officials.’
‘Senior Pastor Willie Barnes Jr. described the situation as sad, frustrating and difficult because it keeps happening and seems to be getting worse. The Dollar General shootings isn't the first incident of a racially motivated crime in the nation but now it's in Jacksonville, which makes it feel personal.’
‘Because he feels "so conflicted," Barnes conceded he had been struggling with how to comfort and counsel his congregation.’
"How do you comfort people who feel they are being executed for the color of their skin? How do you comfort people who are angry and they don't really want to hear 'well, let's pray for the victims.' (FloridaTimes-Union)
‘What happened Saturday in Jacksonville, said 79-year-old longtime resident Rodney Hurst, “could have happened anywhere, except it did happen in Jacksonville.”
‘The shooting occurred as the community prepared to commemorate what is known as Ax Handle Saturday, when a white mob used baseball bats and ax handles to club peaceful Black demonstrators protesting segregation at a downtown lunch counter on Aug. 27, 1960. Police initially stood by but joined the white mob when the Black group began fighting back. Newspaper reports at the time said at least 62 people — 48 of them Black — were arrested for fighting and inciting a riot.’
‘Hurst, who was 16 when the violence erupted, has been encouraged by progress following the Civil Rights Movement, but he worries that racism has again become normalized. Hurst blames dog whistles from Republicans, especially former President Donald Trump, who is again riding the politics of white grievance in his bid to return to the White House.’ (AP)
This just crushes my soul. It truly does. On Sunday I read something written by Hanna Rosen in The Atlantic. In a series of literary and arts projects she loves, was this. Read to the end. The end is with me now and forever. ' The last museum or gallery show that I loved: Musical Thinking: New Video Art and Sonic Strategies, at the Smithsonian American Art Museum. I went to this exhibit mostly to see Love Is the Message, The Message Is Death. I’d read a lot about this 2016 video by the cinematographer Arthur Jafa and seen it online, but never in a gallery space. The gentle phrase gallery space makes me wince when I think about the images in the video. It’s a cascading series of video clips about Black culture, Black experience, and violence. It feels like image poetry, the most concise and affecting portrayal of the Back American experience I’ve seen. As the actor Amandla Stenberg asks in the video, “What would America be like if we loved Black people as much as we love Black culture?”
Gailee, what an apt sentence: "It crushes my soul." If that hatred of other is so strong that someone is moved to kill them, I worry for the soul of humankind. The other apt senetence is your Amadla Stenberg quote.
I read all of that, Fern, while crying. I remember the lunch counter incident as I was born snd raised in NC. I just scratch my eyes out that we have not progressed to this day! It hurts.
If it had not been for cellphones and the bravery of one young woman to video the murder of Floyd, we would still be in the dark! I lived through the “riots” in the 60’s, the assassinations of JFK RFK & MLK, Jr. and I can tell you that yes, we have made progress but women and people of color keep getting mercilessly beaten up in Congress.
Fern, thank you for sharing Eugene Robinson’s words. He’s right. A black/Hispanic/LGBTQ person going about their daily life is more in danger from a person enflamed by TFG’s words of white grievance than anyone at a TFG rally is in danger from someone who disagrees with their ideology or skin color. As the FBI has reported, “ there have been more domestic terrorism subjects disrupted by arrest and more deaths caused by domestic terrorists than international terrorists in recent years…. Individuals adhering to racially motivated violent extremism ideology have been responsible for the most lethal incidents among domestic terrorists in recent years…”
This is the latest in an endless series of shootings in America , this time in Jacksonville, which usually involve the use of the AR15, a weapon intended for use in war. I believe that Biden and the Democrats will win the control of the House and Senate and it would be wonderful if the first legislation signed by Biden in his second term is a permanent ban on the sale of assault style rifles. It won’t stop the killings, but it would greatly reduce the number of victims. There should also be a government buy back of these weapons for those who wish to sell such weapons.
Of course the gun manufacturers and gun nuts will let out howls about how their second amendment rights are being violated. Let them protest, they will get over it eventually. They will have to satisfy their need for firearms with rifles, hand guns and shotguns. The carnage must stop.
Hard to "like" this one. We need an alternative response. Like a heart being hit with a sledge hammer to indicate the pain that this kind of hate persists and infects.
Pastor Barnes uses the correct verb to describe the murder of 3 black people in Jacksonville as well as the murders of so many other black people over the years. They are, in reality, executions. Executed because of the color of their skin.
Heather, another terrific Letter. My favorite paragraph was this: “He [Meadows] claimed that it was his job as chief of staff to address anything that might distract Trump or divert his attention, and therefore his work to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election fell within his job description. If so, his case belongs in federal court because federal officials are protected from state prosecution over things they did as part of their official duties. But working for a political campaign is explicitly not part of an officer’s duties: the Hatch Act prohibits federal officials from engaging in partisan activities while on duty. “
That darn Hatch Act. Oh, Fani, you are too cool for school!! Overthrowing the government is SOME “job description”. 🤣
I recall that Cassidy Hutchinson testified to the Jan. 6 Committee that Meadows wanted to go over to the "War Room" but she persuaded him to participate only by phone.
I just saw virtually the same comment above that I did not "read" yet, but in my visual field. Did it register or is it just so obvious that these crooks are violating the terms of their employment? Maybe both.
I totally agree with your comment, but have gotten stuck on the line, “anything that might distract Trump or divert his attention “. Divert his attention from his TV screen or phone? Never was a person less qualified or able to do a job. That there is a portion of this country eager for him to resume his destruction of this country terrifies me.
HCR writes: "House Republicans also are moving forward on impeaching President Joe Biden, although there is no evidence that there are any grounds for such a proceeding."
Is this an example of head-in-the sand dishonest spin? Biden appears to be stonewalling a congressional investigation. Is that a sufficient ground for an impeachment inquiry?
Honest people will want to know what the other side has to say about the Biden family's alleged foreign bribery scheme. Quoting Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy:
"The thing that holds up whether we do impeachment inquiry, provide us the documents we’re asking. The whole determination here is how the Bidens handled this."
“If they provide us the documents, there wouldn’t be a need for impeachment inquiry. But if they withhold the documents and fight like they have now to not provide to the American public what they deserve to know, we will move forward with impeachment inquiry when we come back into session."
“The bank statements, the credit card statements and others. Show us where the money went, show us were you taking money from outside sources? And that would clear most of this up, but they seem to fight it every step of the way."
The general principle here is, "Know what the other side is saying. In this particular case, Sputnik News quotrd the U.S. Speaker of the House of Representatives.
The source you quote, John, is clearly Russian propaganda, and which engages in demeaning President Biden's and the West's accomplishments in opposing Vladimir Putin's desire to rebuild a the Soviet empire that collapsed in 1990.
Are you actually saying that Sputnik News MIS-quoted the Speaker of the House??
If not, why do you focus on the publisher, if not to direct attention away from Biden's caught-with-his-hand-in-the-cookie-jar stonewalling?
Once again, the general principle is "Know what the other side has to say," and with my earlier quote I got the Russians and the Republicans, both at once.
Every day we should make the MSM broadcast what the Biden/Harris Administration is doing to help the American people, and indeed, the entire planet.
Anyone who denies the climate crisis is unfit for leadership.
If the MSM wants to cover the twice impeached, four times indicted, wannabe dictator with a literal golden idol image of himself, it should be to impress upon everyone that his total time and interest are and will be attempts to keep from going to prison, and he has NO real interest in the needs of anyone else. What "billionaire" begs for donations to pay for his legal team(s)? The reason his indictments are so "unprecedented" is exactly because no other President has engaged in such criminal actions!
Yesterday I saw Dana Bash interview George Conway and among her inane questions was that the mugshot has gone VIRAL. Was it a bad thing to do? I wish he had answered Gosh who made it go viral, Dana?
MSM is a long way from broadcasting news responsibly. They need to feature Heather, Joyce Vance, Rachel Maddow, Glenn Kirschner, Lawrence O'Donnell and others who are all about the truth. Randy Rainbow is more factual than most of the msm.
I know a lot of dodgy stuff has taken place in US political history, though I know little of the detail; but it seems to me that the overall behavior modern "Republican" Party is pretty much unprecedented as well. If they dropped all the lies and "dirty tricks", what would they have left?
JL, if you want to hear some interesting "dodgy stuff" listen to Rachel Maddow's new podcast, "Deja News". I'm only a couple episodes in, but so far, the situations she's featured are all 20th century. One is drawing parallels between what happened in France in 1934 on February 6, one has detailed what happened in Florida in the 1950/1960's with their first run at destroying homosexuality, and the third that I have listened to is an addendum to her "Bag Man" podcast which rings eerily familiar today. Good stuff so far.
To answer your last question, "nothing of substance".
I fervently hope that having the trials relatively early in the year may finally bring relief to those Americans who still believe that justice can be served and that all are equal before the law. It can prove the system still works.
Tonight on NCIS, LL Cool J talked about a classmate named "Heather Richardson" who used to pass him notes hidden in computer disks. Someone remarked how smart that was and asked how it worked out and he responded "She's a genius, so it didn't work out with me." Loved it!!
Heather, thank you for sharing your insights with us. Today's letter has a winners glow. If the Supreme Court doesn't do its job, at least it had a chance to follow in the footsteps of a great judge
I never dreamed I'd be so lucky as to find the best guy in the world for a husband. He was 95% perfect. Some time later he died and I didn't know what to do with my life. Then djt pirated the 2016 election and my friend Suds turned me on to HRC's Letters, and made life worthwhile once again. My life expectancy status is thatvim living on borrowed time, but just by turning folks on to HCR, I'm making the best use of my space here. God bless America.
William, I am so grateful to you for this reminder. Here is a particularly transporting rendition by Judy Collins. Sondheim’s poetry shine through with every note.
If the various state GOP party officials think that judicial proceedings are interfering with the candidacy of their front-runner, they could move their primary dates to avoid the judicial schedules. There's lots of time between May and November. The insanity here is on the political side, of course, not on the judicial side. tfg's teams of attorneys are attempting to game the judicial system to political advantage, rather than the other way around. We're already in uncharted waters, with a leading candidate for president carrying 4 criminal indictments on his shoulders. How is that so different than a nominee facing trial? I think what most of the public wants is a timely beginning and end to the trials. The guy will either be acquitted or convicted. If acquitted, he deserves the right to run for office like any other schmuck; if he's convicted, then the whole constitutional scholarly class will have to contend with the possibility of the elected leader of the country attempting to run the government from behind bars. If the mafia can do it, the perhaps the White House can do so as well. The fact is, his political fate is not in his own hands or that of his political party; it's in the hands of the Democrats and independents who have to decide if it's worth getting off of their hind-parts and registering, then showing up to vote for sanity rather than insanity. the 2024 presidential election won't be a vote about different views on policy; it'll be a choice between facts and lies, sanity and insanity, stability and the systematic dismantling of our liberal democracy.
I would like to say that Sept. 6th is my birthday and I can think of no better way to celebrate it than to be able to see the trial of 19 defendants who tried to take over America.
Marlene, Happy birthday early! I think that is Arraignment Day for the Fulton 19. They will all plead “not guilty”, but still a great day to celebrate on your birthday!
Thanks, Elisabeth! Yep, I know what their plea will be but hey, how often does one get to witness 19 thugs all together in one room pleas their cases?!
No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any state, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability."
Those who have the responsibility for “curating” the candidates for the next presidential election must at least try to eliminate theLump. It’s as plain as day that he gave aid and comfort to the insurrectionists. I’m glad to hear that some secretaries of state are talking about taking action against the traitor.
I am concerned that setting the election conspiracy trial date the day before Super Tuesday will bring out Trump supporters in droves and he will wind up during the trial as the presumptive nominee. That will put tremendous pressure on the jurors.
In retrospect I really wish that Garland had appointed Smith at least 6 months prior so we could be in the trial now before the first primary vote was cast.
Justice must be done and there is no crying over spilled milk as my Mom used to say. But this looks like it is setting up to be one of the most significant instances of woulda, shoulda, coulda in US history.
The whole frickin' "Republican" Party has endorsed the insurrection. They really should be out of the game. It's no good to have one party rule, no matter what party; we need dialectic to keep us awake and honest. But not a party that is trying to sabotage democracy. That's a deal breaker.
That’s a deal breaker. For sure. They are the Trojan Horse working from the inside to destroy. Call them out, MSM. Every lying louse, every rich provocateur, every self-righteous Pharisee, every racist Nazi-loving idiot, and every fearful, scaredy cat who sees our diversity as a threat. Call them what they are. And give Dems credit for not losing their humanity.
JL, this is precisely why we need a “third party”. If the Republicans who dropped out early (e.g., Reed Galen’s www.LincolnProject.us ) Had focused early on to establish an opposition party to Trump’s bastardized Republican Party, they might have derailed him then and there by taking a ton of moderate Republicans with them and begun to rebuild your wished for counterpoise. I haven’t followed The Project closely, but it seems like a start. Some claim we can’t afford three or more parties under our system as it would create chaos. I think three or four parties would be a great move toward a better democracy if combined with the removal of the Electoral College and the establishment of a publicly funded campaign financing system and a national ranked choice voting scheme. (Then, of course, we could have ham and eggs and toast and jam if only we had ham or eggs or toast or jam….;-)
I’ve never understood the Electoral College to begin with, and I’m 71 years old! What’s wrong with the people’s vote count showing the winner. Who we the people elect. The way the Electoral College is working, a lot of elections, our President is named long before the polls out west even close! This isn’t right! Then there’s times when the popular vote is debunked by the Electoral College count, and the winner of the popular vote is the loser. Case in point, the election of 2016. Hillary Clinton best Trump in actual vote count, but the Electoral College vote she lost.
I recall being told about the Electoral College is middle school and thinking something along the lines of "Wait a minute; WTF?". It did not seem to square with what I had heretofore been told about the power of the vote. Back in the day, we celebrated Lincoln's Birthday as a national holiday, and there was accompanying curricular buzz about Washington and Lincoln prior to their special days from maybe fourth grade on. We had to memorize the Gettysburg Address, with special attention and discussion of the " government of the people, by the people, for the people" part. That's still my yardstick (though when I think of most of the crap I learned in elementary school, it's a wonder I can think at all). Essentially all Americans can vote for president and all are constituents. One person, one vote, no more, no less.
"As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. This expresses my idea of democracy. Whatever differs from this, to the extent of the difference, is no democracy."
I have mixed feelings about third parties, but other successful nations have a multi-party system. I need to know more about it than I do, but I was alarmed by the reign of Stephen Harper (sort of the GWB of the North) who dominated Canada for nine years. According to my very political Canadian son-in-law, Harper was supported by a minority of Canadians, but the other two major parties would not ally close enough to pry him out (My son-in-law himself has run for local office under the smaller minority "Green" party).
I think any third party, barring unusual circumstances, has a long row to hoe to build legitimacy and momentum. I thought that Ralph Nader said some things worth listening to [, but not a realistically actionable plan for taking the presidency. He only helped elect Bush, and was buried in the backlash. Had he backed Gore after demonstrating a degree of support for his plans, he might have built a toe hold from which to build a stronger movement; and it would have to be a much stronger movement to reasonably shoot the moon. Even then, defeating Bush needed to be the priority. When we make poor choices when voting or by not voting, we hurt others as well, commonly more than we hurt ourselves. Those least advantaged suffer most. Posterity has no vote, yet will inherit our follies. Our decisions and our extended responsibilities are a huge matter.
I guess to be realistic we have to acknowledge that "politics" is too complex a topic for the average person to wrap his/her head around. Even a two party system boggles the mind. Maybe that's why the Founders seem to have envisioned a system dominated by a landed gentry. Should we come back and discuss this again in 5,000 years? And you're right; the shit we were fed in the primary grades was not helpful in the least.
I'll add, incidentally that I barely grasp the nuances of a parliamentary system. Could there theoretically be a Canadian Tuberville who could face off against their whole Armed Force up there for his hobby issue? I don't know.
About Garland appointment of Smith. According to the Wikipedia.org article about Jack Smith, he was not available.
"On May 7, 2018, Smith was named to a four-year term as chief prosecutor for the Kosovo Specialist Chambers in The Hague, investigating war crimes in the Kosovo War, including the case of Salih Mustafa. He took up the post on September 11, 2018, and was appointed to a second term on May 8, 2022, before stepping down on November 18, 2022."
Judith. That was my suspicion too. Garland was not being slow, careful (although he is - and those are not bad traits for a lawyer). He was waiting for the right man for job. Jack Smith worked for the DOJ before and his reputation and experience made him Garland's best choice for special prosecution.
My Mom used to say that often, it hasn’t always held back the tears. But clean up the mess and move on. Dems, it’s up to you to support justice. Republicans will keep spilling…
Thank you Dr. Richardson, when I read that Judge Chutkin had set March 4 as the start date for the most significant charges - all felonies, I was elated. March 4, 1933 was the day Franklin Delano Roosevelt was inaugurated for the first of his four inaugurations as President of the United States. He was also the last President to be inaugurated March 4. It also happens to be the day I was born, so the trial will begin March 4, 2023 will also be my 91st birthday - what a great present! As Dr. Richardson pointed March 4, 1789, was the day the Constitution went into effect. In the late 18th and the first half of the 19th century travel was slow. John Adams is said to have walked from his home in Massachusetts to Washington DC for his inauguration. While the Presidents from Virginia would not have had so arduous a travel; until the days of air travel (mostly post WW2) it took days, not hours to go even from Ohio to Washington DC. It was not only the President who had to get to DC it was all the Congressmen and Senators too.
The 6 week trial will be over in April, hopefully with conviction; but Trump probably won't be imprisoned until all four trials are completed. Then there will probably be some appeals, but I expect eventually he will be behind bars. I suppose his loyal MAGA's could gather outside the prison to hear their hero's rabble about his mistreatment, poor, baby, Donnie, who never in his life has had to face the consequences of his toddlerish behavior.
I wonder if Chutkan realized the significance of March 4, 2024, being 235 years to the day when the US Constitution became the law of the land.
Steve, such beautiful Karmic payback. Even Shakespeare couldn’t have come up with a more “perfect date”....I hope the Democrats trumpet (pardon the pun) that important fact all over the US. Really.
When thinking about Trump’s legal woes and the fix the Republican Party has managed to get itself into by supporting this miscreant, these words from the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam come to mind:
“The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ, Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line, Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it"
The tab has arrived, folks. Enjoy your just deserts!
'Indicting Hunter Biden Would Make Him Formidable Republican Candidate'
'WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report)—An indictment of Hunter Biden would immediately catapult him to the top tier of the Republican Presidential field, a new poll of likely G.O.P. voters indicates.'
'The poll reveals that, if indicted by the just-appointed special counsel, the President’s son would be in a virtual dead heat with the Republican front-runner, Donald J. Trump.'
'Davis Logsdon, who supervised the poll for the University of Minnesota, noted that Governor Ron DeSantis lags far behind, in third place, because of G.O.P. voters’ queasiness about supporting a candidate who has no indictments.' (Satire, NEWYORKER)
Thank you, Fern McBride! This can go with the Onion headline when Obama won.
Dead heat for what? trump has the criminal charges sewed up. Hunter's "crimes" are not half as serious: drugs, tax evasion, owning an illegal gun? get real
It's satire, but it must have worked, if 20% of the audience missed it.
It's an Andy Borowitz column. He is hilarious, you can sign up for free. But perhaps not needed here.
Thanks, Fern! An unexpected laugh is very good!
I met a traveller from an antique land,
Who said—“Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. . . . Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed;
And on the pedestal, these words appear:
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.”
Ozymandias, Percy Bysshe Shelley
The orange horror wouldn’t know Shelley from a shell-company.
So apt as he enters the vast & wasting desert of his open mouth:
‘....a shattered image visage lies whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold
Command’ etc...
Bravo you Lynn!
The "colossal Wreck" part is apt, too. Shelley couldn't possibly have known, but man, was he prescient!
Bad quote: xx image xx line 5
Another great one. I thought of Ozzy many times when Trump was hawking his "big, beautiful" Great Wall.
And a lot more lone and level sands (maybe a dune here and there) are likely to stretch is we don't get more serious about protecting climate.
My husbands’s favorite poem. Republicans have never believed it, and keep trying to cancel their evil for most of my adult life. Rupert’ and Ronnie’s goal. I’m with you, Omar…
Jeri, it is also one of my favorites, too. One of my favorite lines is: "Strange among that earthen lot, some could articulate, and some not. What then, did the hand of the Maker shake?" In Trump's case, the shaking was uncontrollable, resulting in a congentially deformed malignant narcissist.
Yeats' The Second Coming is what ran through my mind when Trump became president in 2016.
Me too, Marycat.
You can't beat a little bread beneath the bough. Not forgetting the flask of wine.
This is a little more risque´than I anticipated.
But needs cheese.
I think the cheese goes without saying. So he didn't say it.
Don't forget the "thou". And I can't find the quotation, but I am sure Terry Pratchett said in one of his books something about "a loaf of bread, a jug of wine, and thou, or at least a selection of thous."
Good cheese for sure.
Thank you LeMoine
TAMAM SHUD?
A perfect date...
Somehow, the appropriate opposite to a certain perfect phone call we keep hearing mentioned.
What we don't have ... YET, is the direct testimony of 1 or more of the 3 or 4 Witnesses that were "in the room" during that "perfect" call. Jack's got it.
Tuesday Update: Confirmed in Court yesterday by an audio recording, one (1) of those Witnesses heard to speak on the audio tape was MARK MEADOWS.
You know, Bryan, I'm just incredulous that Meadows testified. I really don't get the strategy behind it. And I hope the entire transcript is released.
I agree Lynn, clearly MEADOWS is attempting to flee the Fulton County Jury Pool.
Meanwhile, the Judge has NOT ruled yet but, instead has issued an Order asking the parties to brief a highly technical statutory issue that appears to a indicate that the evidence shows MEADOWS was not acting in his "official capacity" on several acts. But, I was not in the Courtroom.
The Trial Judge knows the case is immediately going to 3 Judge Appellate panel & possibly on to SCOTUS & he wants to get it right in the sense of accurately following current law while providing the Appellate Courts with well briefed record on appeal.
I must make a deep dive on the statute cited by the Judge before posting my take from the Cheap Sseats ;)
Bryan.
Do you have a citation to the statute?
Ya know????? 😂 😂 😂
“Lordy, I hope there are tapes!”
Well, whaddya know!! 😂
Well Camilla B in the Peach state, at least one (1) tape of MARK MEADOWS talking to BRAD on the "perfect" call, "What I am hopeful for ... is there some way that we can some form of agreement."
And the campaign is willing to $upport
That’s right! He offered remuneration for the effort from campaign coffers. That’s a gotcha. A big ‘un!
Exactly.
The resonance of the date is perfect, but I'm much more relieved about this chronology:
"Judge Chutkan’s establishment of March 4 for the federal trial over Trump’s attempt to overturn the results of the 2020 election means that Trump-appointed federal judge Aileen Cannon, who is overseeing the Mar-a-Lago documents trial and who seems eager to protect the former president, will have far less power to shape public perceptions of the cases against (tffg)."
I wanted to quote it because anything that takes some of the stress of all this away leaves us more energy to take this mf down.
Somehow I had wished that the trial would start on March 15 - the ides of March. Still, it is so appropriate that a Black female judge now controls much of TFG's fate.
Richard, you crack me up. Yeah, the Ides of March is right. And right on, Black Lady Justice, too.
It would be nice to see death star having to mutter et tu lots of times.
Well, we know they're brutes, even if he doesn't yet.
Intent on making life on this planet nasty, brutish and short; along with the Taliban.
To those turning state's evidence.
March fourth is also the only sentence in the calendar. As in events unfold, we all march forth, hopefully toward the correct conclusion.
There is the chance that there will be no trial, but instead a complete global settlement of all the cases. Trump agrees to house arrest for the rest of his life, no acceptance of pardons, no broadcasting his BS, no participating in politics of any kind. Fini. It's over and he avoids prison. I think that it's like that this will be discussed and promoted by his attorneys.
And remember, there is still the 14th Amendment section 3
Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment prohibits anyone who has previously taken an oath of office (that is, most current and former public officials) from holding public office if they have “engaged in insurrection or rebellion” against the United States. Send a letter to your state's Secretary of State.
A case has alredy been filed by an attorney in Florida. I have sent requests to the ACLU, NOW and LWV to file suits in various states against the Secretaries of State to compel them to refuse to put Trump's name on the ballot.
It's not just a good idea, it's the law.
One can hope. And that the settlement includes severe consequences should he violate any part of it. Because, well, you know he will.
I would not like to see a settlement that coddles him just because he was rich and powerful. We saw that happen with Nixon, and I think it contributed to the corruption we see today. Like Jeffery Epstein's settlement of child sex trafficking. "Equal Justice Under Law" is engraved on the SCOTUS building, but way too often, that's not what we see. Mercy yes, but deference to social status is corruption.
Richard, that has been my thought from the beginning. No nonsense.
Perhaps that will be the date on which the guilty verdict comes down.
Et tu Rudi?
The global settlement would only cover Trump. The others could/probably will cut a plea deal. Many cannot afford to pay for their attorneys and Trump, true to form, is not using any of the millions that he is grifting to help them.
I recall a photo of a woman wearing a shirt that said "Trump can grab my pussy". "He loved Big Brother" isn't just fiction. There is often a strange dynamic of fealty by those exploited. I can't help but wonder how many of those are the product of abusive homes.
How about the day WWII ended, and the powers of authoritarian government crumbles. I just looked up the date in May. Too late.
HCR's last paragraph resonates with what real lawmakers understood about creating a Constitution, laws that guarantee democracy, and the foundation of a country based upon it.
“Because power corrupts, society’s demands for moral authority and character increase as the importance of the position increases.” - John Adams
I am all for making things difficult for Loose Cannon. I keep seeing hilarious memes too including the faces of the Kracken and Rudy on the farmer and his wife in Grant's famous painting. It's early here , so hope I have the artist right. And as aside, we had a little rain last night...the first in months.
Yep, Grant Wood
thanks....couldn't quite remember....it was before 6 am and I hadn't had much coffee.
☕️👍
Wood’s sister, the woman in the painting, lived in Menlo Park CA when I did. It made the news when she passed some years ago.
Interesting. I didn't know that.
The nation needs a serious conversation about ethics. No one should judged by a person he or she appointed. No one should be pardoned by his or her former subordinate, nor pardon to accomplish a coverup.
JL, Right? I'd say that's Ethics 101.
I feel you!
The far right Republicans in the House are trying to save nickels and dimes on the expense side of the budget, but refuse to raise corporate taxes by 3-4% which would more than make up for their penny-ante cuts.
Gym Jordan has spent tens of millions on his various failed witch hunts while his cohorts try to cut support for child care, the IRS, Social Security and the Ukraine war.
Apparently, the MAGAs eat it up or Gym would drop it? Again, what fly by night law school did he attend? He got so little out of it that he didn't attempt to take the Ohio bar exam.
Jim Jordan is a particularly reprehensible loud mouth. I will take great joy in writing postcards in support of whoever runs against him.
He's an ugly man.
If halitosis and body odor were combined in one face.....
Good one Barbara!
My sister lives in OH. She’s pretty active with post cards, phone calls, door to door and standing in the line in the grocery store to try to persuade people to think about who and what they’re voting for. She’ll love your apt description! Jordan is despised in many parts of OH. The gerrymandering confirms a Republican will never lose his district, unless no one votes for a Republican. Something the cheaters never saw coming. Now it’s staring them down. “Cheaters never win, and winners never cheat”. Halitosis and body odor! Sprinkle in a little Athletes Foot and you have the whole OH Republican Party!
One look, and you'd wait for the next elevator.
He should be indicted along with many other repugs that participated in the in !!
That's the removal of the "administrative state", extreme Republicans rage against the "communist" ambitions of the Democrats; so force it by reducing taxes, the ability to afford policy, and of course, direct assault on social support programs because the State can no longer "afford them", the very result of their own conniving. In any case, it's gonna be the top 20% of income tax payers who finance American federal government. Very little from the lower 50%. Says something about the ongoing drift of income inequality in USA, the destruction of trade unions and hollowing out of the American middle classes which rose to prominence in the 50s. There is a huge economic payback by expanding social support "infrastructure" for everyone involved, including corporate rich.
Law school?!!!! it must really have been flying by night and hs missed it.
Twenty five dollars to an Internet address.
The modern "GOP" is wholly bought and paid for and has been for at least 40 years. It all boils down to making the rich richer and the rest subservient.
I just read today that House Republicans are trying to defund the Department of Justice so it can't follow through with the trials. https://www.cnn.com/2023/05/04/politics/house-republicans-doj-fbi-funding-divisions/index.html
Yeah, they will transfer authority to the Ministry of Love.
The US Constitution? What's that? Never heard of it.
LOL
Just a scrap of sheepskin with some invisible treasure map on the back perhaps...
oh, that was the Declaration in a fictional movie about (gasp!) conspiracy theories.
Thus spakesth Zarathustra, I mean TFG. Remember Bush, Jr., proclaiming that the Constitution ". . . is nothing but a G..D......d piece of paper?"
Richard Sutherland - Remember Bush, Jr., proclaiming that the Constitution ". . . is nothing but a G..D......d piece of paper?"
Q: Did President Bush call the Constitution a “goddamned piece of paper”?
A: Extremely unlikely. The Web site that reported those words has a history of quoting phony sources and retracting bogus stories.
The report that Bush “screamed” those words at Republican congressional leaders in November 2005 is unsubstantiated, to put it charitably.
Update, Feb. 21, 2011: The author of the Capitol Hill Blue story has now withdrawn it. Doug Thompson messaged us to say:
Doug Thompson: This is to let you know that the piece on Bush and the Constitution has been changed and reads:
“𝘛𝘩𝘪𝘴 𝘢𝘳𝘵𝘪𝘤𝘭𝘦 𝘸𝘢𝘴 𝘣𝘢𝘴𝘦𝘥 𝘰𝘯 𝘴𝘰𝘶𝘳𝘤𝘦𝘴 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘸𝘦 𝘵𝘩𝘰𝘶𝘨𝘩𝘵, 𝘢𝘵 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘵𝘪𝘮𝘦, 𝘸𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘳𝘦𝘭𝘪𝘢𝘣𝘭𝘦. 𝘞𝘦 𝘩𝘢𝘷𝘦 𝘴𝘪𝘯𝘤𝘦 𝘥𝘪𝘴𝘤𝘰𝘷𝘦𝘳𝘦𝘥 𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘴𝘰𝘯𝘴 𝘵𝘰 𝘥𝘰𝘶𝘣𝘵 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘪𝘳 𝘷𝘦𝘳𝘢𝘤𝘪𝘵𝘺. 𝘍𝘰𝘳 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘴𝘰𝘯, 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘴 𝘢𝘳𝘵𝘪𝘤𝘭𝘦 𝘩𝘢𝘴 𝘣𝘦𝘦𝘯 𝘳𝘦𝘮𝘰𝘷𝘦𝘥 𝘧𝘳𝘰𝘮 𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘥𝘢𝘵𝘢𝘣𝘢𝘴𝘦.”
I no longer stand behind that article or its conclusions ...
https://www.factcheck.org/2007/12/bush-the-constitution-a-goddamned-piece-of-paper/
No, I didn’t remember. Was so turned off by him (both Bushes for same and different reasons and out of the country, so missed that stupidity. Thank you for adding to my collection of Bush “memorabilia.”
I view the Bushes as a crime family, but I have to say, they are rank amateurs in the face of the death star crime family.
Well, there is ultra right wing edition
One thing in yesterdays flood of media jumps out to me but there hasn't seemed to be much focus on it (yet) so, it seems right to bring it up among questions about the Constitution. HCR notes it with just one sentence:
"Trump has told his aides he intends to solve his legal problems by winning the next election."
Think about that. The "person" running for the most powerful post in the world and that would hold the nuclear codes now openly admits this as the real reason. Not to "make America great again", not for any other reason but to save himself....and there's fear that there are enough "deplorable" voters to help him do it.....WTF.
To even try to understand what is going on in this country (and world) to make this bats**t crazy phenomenon even remotely plausible I tend to do deep dives. If you like to do the same, here are two links that make the most sense, going deeper into the polls for answers:
https://www.salon.com/2023/08/22/new-polls-prove-obama-and-clinton-were-right-the-base-are-deplorable-bitter-clingers/
https://www.vox.com/2023/8/4/23818817/trump-support-david-brooks-economic-anxiety
I could make a very long post trying to summarize them but, they are worth the read IMO. But, this one point could be one of the Dems central strategies heading into 2024,....why vote for someone who is not only in significant cognitive decline but, has no ideas, no platform, no concept of doing anything (Good) for the country,.....but only for himself.
I have no doubt she knew and chose this date accordingly. Judge Chutkan is extremely astute and wouldn’t pass up the chance to make a historical statement with this date
Correction -see:
https://constitutioncenter.org/blog/the-day-the-constitution-was-adopted
"On June 21, 1788, New Hampshire became the critical ninth state to ratify the Constitution. That day, the Constitution was officially adopted, and the new government officially started operating on March 4, 1789."
FYI, a law becomes "the law of the land" on its effective date, not on its date of passage. What needs correcting?
I am sure she does.
“Here come Da Judge”!!
🤣 Been waiting for this! Perfect! All the humor we can get in this moment. Also a tribute to Sammy Davis, Jr.’s memorable shtick.
Thought that was Flip Wilson--"this judge done startin' a war on crime, and everybody here gonna do some time--here come the judge, here come the judge"
If you mean “Here come de judge,” that was definitely Sammy Davis, Jr. Saw the clip more than once. He was priceless.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uGqTZUcemrU
I stand corrected. Appears that FW , as guest host, introduced the sketch, so perhaps that is why I confused it
No apology needed. I wasn’t much of a TV watcher before 45, so some few moments are indelible.
Chutkan perhaps hears the echoes of Martin Luther King Jr. proclaiming, “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice."
I think that Trump's only conceivable defense would be that he had hard evidence (presumably classified) that the election was being stolen from him.
There is a handful of places where discrepancies might enter the vote count. I like this one, quoting from the introduction to "Votescam: The Stealing of America" (originally 1992)
https://books.google.com/books/about/Votescam.html?id=ZxpZCgAAQBAJ#v=onepage&q&f=false
"By means of an unofficial private corporation named News Election Service (NES), the Establishment press has actual physical control of the voting and counting and dissemination of the vote, and it refuses to let the public know how it is done."
Quoting from the footnote to the above quote in the 2015 edition:
"In 1964 it was born National Election Services (NES), a consortium of ABC, CBS, NBC, AP and UPI. In 1994 NES merged with Voter Research and Survey (VRS) to become Voter News Service (VNS), which included CNN and Fox News. In 2002 it morphed again to become News Election Pool (NEP)."
"Votescam" talks about a situation where the tabulating computers "crash" on election night and come back up in the wee hours with skewed numbers.
I witnessed something similar, in the do-or-die (for Hillary) in the North Carolina primary in 2008. I planned to stay up late and watch the results come in.
Around 10 or 11 p.m., Hillary and Obama were neck-and-neck, and the computers crashed, just like "Votescam" talked about.
I waited up, hour after hour, because I wanted to see the moment that results were updated. Around 3:00 the computers came back up: Hillary's total was flat, but Obama had received a big boost, putting the primary (and the nomination) out of reach.
For a couple days, there was talk that Hillary might challenge the results. She didn't, and went on to be Secretary of State. North Carolina Attorney General Ray Cooper went on to br Governor. Charlotte, North Carolina was awarded the next Democratic convention.
p.s. A starting point for Trump's potential supporting argument that the 2020 Democratic nomination was stolen from Bernie Sanders is the eye-popping discrepancies between the exit polls and the computer results in the Massachusetts primary:
https://tdmsresearch.com/2020/03/04/massachusetts-2020-democratic-party-primary/
That's the thing about "belief" John. Stuff you dream up can be real in belief space.
But, not in reality space.
Unfortunately, for the mentally ill and the truly dumb, there is no separation between belief space and reality space.
Hence, this post.
In other words, "DON'T LOOK BEHIND THAT CURTAIN!"
No, in other words, don't buy into conspiracy theories based on guesses and assumptions, like the "Votescam" piece you linked.
...said Mr. Know-it-All, the Expert on How to Dismiss a Source without Reading It.
One of the points of "Votescam" is that there is a secretive private consortium that controls the tabulation and dissemination of election results. If correct, then this is the essence of neo-Fascism. They don't need goon squads to intimidate voters anymore; when they can just adjust the results behind the scenes.
But Votescam's argument can be tested: What, exactly, is the procedure whereby votes and election results are tabulated and disseminated?
Here is a quick-and-dirty introduction to the organization that Votescam identifies as the Great Corruptor of our election process: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Election_Pool
I hope that you and others have the spirit of honest inquiry, instead of being neo-Fascist minions.
Operative word: "IF". What a waste of mind and time.
I blocked Schmeeckle.
This is his claim in his Substack bio:
"By accident, I became the leading expert on the meaning of the Declaration of Independence," and then he cites to a tweet string his own xTwitter feed for his expertise.
A historian's expertise is never an accident.
Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha.
Butt hurt Bernie boy.
Hahahahahahahahahahhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha.
Beth Cobb the fascist troll gleefully relishes the pain of others.
TDMS Research is really loopy.
Theodore de Macedo Soares assumes - with no proof - that exit polls are more accurate than actual ballot counts.
Not a good look on the thread of a historian like Prof. Cox Richardson who takes pride in authentic research.
Um. Perhaps if you actually read de Macedo Soares's discussion of the two, you wouldn't make such a silly statement.
The obvious answer is because more people voted electronically than by paper. And it's supposed to be a secret ballot. Conspiracy theories are just that. Theories. Not True until proven. It shouldn't be hard to prove. But for some reason they just can't. Such a waste of time and energy to make some theory up when the proven truth is staring us right in the face. Just because you don't like the answer doesn't mean it isn't true!
One of the points of "Votescam" is that there is a secretive private consortium that controls the tabulation and dissemination of election results. If correct, then this is the essence of neo-Fascism. They don't need goon squads to intimidate voters anymore, when they can just adjust the results behind the scenes.
Votescam's argument can be tested: What, exactly, is the procedure whereby votes and election results are tabulated and disseminated?
Here is a quick-and-dirty introduction to the organization that Votescam identifies as the Great Corruptor of our election process: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Election_Pool
I hope that you and others have the spirit of honest inquiry, instead of being neo-Fascist minions.
I was thinking the same. Fitting to trump's traitorous ways.
I knew March 4 used to be inauguration day, but I didn't know why until I read this Letter.
I don't know my history as well as I should, but didn't the Nuremberg trials demolish the argument that those who committed crimes in the performance of their "duties" were absolved of those crimes and that, instead, ruled that such perpetrators must be judged by their actions?
Betsy, Thank you for aptly invoking Nuremberg, wherein judges were tried, who willfully and falsely had condemned, without warranted evidence, perceived enemies of the state. Let that darkness that befell a nation for over a decade be a warning, were the U.S. electorate not to mobilize to defeat the GOP up and down the ballot.
When the law becomes corrupted (nothing Hitler did was illegal), those who made evil legal should be held accountable. The world paid the price for that fiasco. Hope this country can correct itself.
Jeri, Shortly before Hitler’s death, the U.N. War Crimes Commission had issued several indictments against Hitler for actions by the Nazis. As for the convicted judges at Nuremberg, I believe the first time a judge condemned an individual the judge knew to be innocent, that judge bore responsibility for the horrors that ensued. Regarding the States, I imagine most of us here are among the tens of millions galvanizing the electorate to vote out the GOP, who either oppose preserving democracy and the rule of law or are seemingly indifferent to any cause other than pursuing their self-serving impulses.
Actually, plenty of Hitler's doings were illegal by ordinary statute. Take for example his order allowing the "mercy killing" (his words) of the physically and mentally handicapped in 1939.
Oh, and burning down the Reichstag, too?
Unfortunately, we lack direct proof that he ordered that.
Wasn’t his own sister one of those?
And let's not forget that Trump wanted the trial to be postponed until April 20, 2026. April 20th is Hitler's birthday (1889). I doubt that date was chosen at random.
Just WOW!
Wow.
That would also be a good day for a guilty verdict to be handed down.
Except that we should be looking toward a guilty verdict well before Nov. 5, 2024 in, at minimum, the Jan. 6 obstruction case and it would be great if a similar result comes about for the RICO/Georgia case.
Lets make it so.
Yes, you are correct.
Yes, "just following orders" is not a justifiable offense in terms of determining guilt. Meadows and others are only using the argument at this point to move their cases to federal court. Will be interesting to see what defense they offer if that does happen.
My reaction too. Since when do any official duties include conspiring to implement a plan to sidestep Constitutional transfer of Office?
Implementing the coup was based on the speculation of non-government Lawyers who now vow they never intended to be implemented.
Excellent point. And one which I'm sure Jack Smith is well aware. "I only did these things because my job description required it" is simply a variation of "I did it because I was ordered to do it."
I think that Trump's only conceivable defense would be that he had hard evidence (presumably classified) that the election was being stolen from him.
There is a handful of places where discrepancies might enter the vote count. I like this one, quoting from the introduction to "Votescam: The Stealing of America" (originally 1992)
https://books.google.com/books/about/Votescam.html?id=ZxpZCgAAQBAJ#v=onepage&q&f=false
"By means of an unofficial private corporation named News Election Service (NES), the Establishment press has actual physical control of the voting and counting and dissemination of the vote, and it refuses to let the public know how it is done."
Quoting from the footnote to the above quote in the 2015 edition:
"In 1964 it was born National Election Services (NES), a consortium of ABC, CBS, NBC, AP and UPI. In 1994 NES merged with Voter Research and Survey (VRS) to become Voter News Service (VNS), which included CNN and Fox News. In 2002 it morphed again to become News Election Pool (NEP)."
"Votescam" talks about a situation where the tabulating computers "crash" on election night and come back up in the wee hours with skewed numbers.
I witnessed something similar, in the do-or-die (for Hillary) in the North Carolina primary in 2008. I planned to stay up late and watch the results come in.
Around 10 or 11 p.m., Hillary and Obama were neck-and-neck, and the computers crashed, just like "Votescam" talked about.
I waited up, hour after hour, because I wanted to see the moment that results were updated. Around 3:00 the computers came back up: Hillary's total was flat, but Obama had received a big boost, putting the primary (and the nomination) out of reach.
For a couple days, there was talk that Hillary might challenge the results. She didn't, and went on to be Secretary of State. North Carolina Attorney General Ray Cooper went on to br Governor. Charlotte, North Carolina was awarded the next Democratic convention.
p.s. A starting point for Trump's potential supporting argument that the 2020 Democratic nomination was stolen from Bernie Sanders is the eye-popping discrepancies between the exit polls and the computer results in the Massachusetts primary:
https://tdmsresearch.com/2020/03/04/massachusetts-2020-democratic-party-primary/
Damn Mr repeat is back, just keep repeating again and again, I am sure it will make it true.
I know don't feel the troll.
Amen, brother!!
Report the repetitious troll. Otherwise, ignore and scroll on past.
Reported with Terms of Use violations to "LFAA"admins."
Thank you for this information. Done.
Exactly. Report and ignore.
The Biden Bullies are out in force today (all six of them), with their trademark trollish grunting and sneering, dirtcting others to ignore the thought posed by my source that our entire election system (counting the votes) is corrupt
You neglect to mention that the Cyber Ninjas, computer security specialists, took Mariposa County Dominion voting machines off-site to extract their program code and analyze it line by line. They found no code that could alter a person's vote. They analyzed paper ballots, and found more disallowed votes for Joe Biden that should have been counted than those for Donald Trump. That project was supposed to prove the "massive" voting fraud in Arizona, but found inconsequential human errors and no fraud.
Roy Hendrix, what "Votescam" is describing has nothing to do with individual voting machines. That book goes back to 1992(!) and comes from a pair of brothers who decided to run for Congress and write a book about their experience. Little did they imagine...
It's because your single source is pretty low quality.
Choose better sources, have better thoughts.
...said Mr. Know-it-All, the Expert on How to Dismiss a Source without Reading It.
One of the points of "Votescam" is that there is a secretive private consortium that controls the tabulation and dissemination of election results. If correct, then this is the essence of neo-Fascism. They don't need goon squads to intimidate voters anymore; when they can just adjust the results behind the scenes.
But Votescam's argument can be tested: What, exactly, is the procedure whereby votes and election results are tabulated and disseminated?
Here is a quick-and-dirty introduction to the organization that Votescam identifies as the Great Corruptor of our election process: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Election_Pool
I hope that you and others have the spirit of honest inquiry, instead of being neo-Fascist minions.
Ballotpedia (https://ballotpedia.org/National_Election_Pool) explains that, while the National Election Pool is a consortium of ABC, NBC, CBS, and CNN, its purpose is exit polling: collaborating on what questions to ask and how to ask them in which precincts, to get a sense of the direction that actual votes are taking well before the polls even close.
Ballotpedia doesn't have an entry for "national election service" but does have an entry for National Election Pool (NEP), at https://ballotpedia.org/National_Election_Pool: NEP is a consortium of ABC, NBC, CBS, and CNN the purpose of which is to collect and aggregate exit-poll results from a demographically significant set of precincts to help the consortium predict the electoral outcome. This is standard pool reporting, in that only one reporter - or even a stringer, a local hired for the occasion: many fine journalists got their start as stringers - need be stationed at each of the chosen polling places. The questions are standardized in hopes of producing results that will be reliable across precincts (though not necessarily more accurate: see below).
National Election Service was founded in 1964 as a pool-reporting organization to aggregate actual early voting results, at the precinct level where possible or otherwise at the county level. NES was folded into the predecessor of the NEP in 1993 - and became increasingly irrelevant as states began amassing election results in something like real time (thanks to faxing and email) and as ever smaller voting authorities began setting up election webpages on which to post updates. In the meantime, the NES brand passed in the late 1990s to an organization that provided customized tests for teacher certification (this NES was subsequently swallowed up by Pearsons, though the brand remains). But there's no -credible- evidence that the earlier NES ever did anything other than tabulate the results that the pool reporters submitted.
As a sometime poll worker and teacher of topics including civics, the very last question I would have answered honestly on my way out of a polling place is how I voted. Whether I'd simply have refused to answer or concocted a fib would have depended largely upon the importunity of the pool stringer. But this is yet another reason to prefer voting by mail.
Ballotpedia doesn't include "tabulation" as a function of NEP, but Wikipedia does. Apparently, NEP gets all of its vote count results from Edison Research.
According to Edison's website:
"In an effort to improve quality, streamline data collection, and expand election coverage in 2018, ABC News, CBS News, CNN, and NBC News ended their arrangement with the Associated Press for vote tabulation and now exclusively partner with Edison Research for these data.
"Edison Research provides the NEP with a fast and accurate vote count throughout the nation, delivering data for all statewide races and all House races."
https://www.edisonresearch.com/election-polling-2/
'Black people are killed for being Black. Again.'
Opinion by Eugene Robinson (excerpts)
‘The irony is almost too rich: While thousands gathered Saturday on the National Mall to mark the 60th anniversary of the March on Washington, a racist White man in Jacksonville, Fla., killed three African Americans for the unforgivable crime of being African American.’
‘Angela Michelle Carr, 52, was shot dead in her car in the parking lot of a Dollar General store in one of Jacksonville’s predominantly Black neighborhoods. A.J. Laguerre, 19, a store employee, was shot dead as he tried to flee from the gunman.’
‘Jerrald Gallion, 29, was shot dead as he walked, unawares, into the store.
Black people being killed for being Black. How many times have we seen this before?’
‘We saw it in May 2022, when a hate-filled White man killed 10 Black shoppers at a Tops supermarket in Buffalo. We saw it in February 2020, when Ahmaud Arbery, a 25-year-old Black man, was cornered and killed by three White assailants for having the temerity to jog through a White neighborhood. We saw it in June 2015, when a White supremacist killed nine Black worshipers at Mother Emanuel A.M.E. Church in Charleston, S.C. We’ve seen it in police shooting after police shooting, where offenses as trivial as a broken taillight have led to encounters that left African Americans dead, their families grieving and their communities enraged.’
‘Clearly, the dream that the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. unforgettably described at the Lincoln Memorial on Aug. 28, 1963 — “that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character” — has not yet come true.’
‘Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) said the right things, albeit awkwardly, at a vigil for the dead on Sunday night, calling the 21-year-old killer a' “major league scumbag” and vowing that’ “we are not going to let people be targeted based on their race.”
‘But the crowd was also right to boo him. DeSantis has weakened gun laws in Florida rather than take steps that might have kept a weapon of war out of the hands of an unbalanced, homicidal young racist. DeSantis has crusaded incessantly against “wokeness,” a term whose original meaning was awareness of the systemic racism that fuels anti-Black discrimination and violence.’
‘And DeSantis has instituted a new curriculum in Florida schools that downplays the long history of African Americans being “targeted” precisely because of their race. When studying the Jim Crow era, students are to be taught about “acts of violence perpetrated against and by African Americans” — as if White people and Black people were equally to blame. The curriculum largely ignores, for example, the “Red Summer” of 1919 — an eruption of scores of anti-Black riots and massacres, in big cities and small towns across the country, that left hundreds of African Americans dead.’ (WAPO) Sorry that I am not be able to provide a gifted link.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/08/28/jacksonville-shootings-racism-discrimination-opinion/
‘Anger. Frustration. Disbelief. Grief’
‘Residents, church leaders and elected officials remained in shock Sunday — one day after three Black people were gunned down in a racially motivated slaying at a Dollar General store by a white man wearing a mask, bullet-resistant vest and armed with an AR-15-style rifle decorated with swastikas and a handgun.’
‘St. Paul AME Church about three miles from the Dollar General held the first of several prayer vigils Sunday for the victims, their families, the community and elected officials.’
‘Senior Pastor Willie Barnes Jr. described the situation as sad, frustrating and difficult because it keeps happening and seems to be getting worse. The Dollar General shootings isn't the first incident of a racially motivated crime in the nation but now it's in Jacksonville, which makes it feel personal.’
‘Because he feels "so conflicted," Barnes conceded he had been struggling with how to comfort and counsel his congregation.’
"How do you comfort people who feel they are being executed for the color of their skin? How do you comfort people who are angry and they don't really want to hear 'well, let's pray for the victims.' (FloridaTimes-Union)
https://www.jacksonville.com/story/news/crime/2023/08/27/jacksonville-residents-officials-church-leaders-denounce-racist-shooting/70693634007/
‘What happened Saturday in Jacksonville, said 79-year-old longtime resident Rodney Hurst, “could have happened anywhere, except it did happen in Jacksonville.”
‘The shooting occurred as the community prepared to commemorate what is known as Ax Handle Saturday, when a white mob used baseball bats and ax handles to club peaceful Black demonstrators protesting segregation at a downtown lunch counter on Aug. 27, 1960. Police initially stood by but joined the white mob when the Black group began fighting back. Newspaper reports at the time said at least 62 people — 48 of them Black — were arrested for fighting and inciting a riot.’
‘Hurst, who was 16 when the violence erupted, has been encouraged by progress following the Civil Rights Movement, but he worries that racism has again become normalized. Hurst blames dog whistles from Republicans, especially former President Donald Trump, who is again riding the politics of white grievance in his bid to return to the White House.’ (AP)
https://apnews.com/article/jacksonville-florida-racism-black-shooting-89deb39815e7f319a19cf71536042010
***
This just crushes my soul. It truly does. On Sunday I read something written by Hanna Rosen in The Atlantic. In a series of literary and arts projects she loves, was this. Read to the end. The end is with me now and forever. ' The last museum or gallery show that I loved: Musical Thinking: New Video Art and Sonic Strategies, at the Smithsonian American Art Museum. I went to this exhibit mostly to see Love Is the Message, The Message Is Death. I’d read a lot about this 2016 video by the cinematographer Arthur Jafa and seen it online, but never in a gallery space. The gentle phrase gallery space makes me wince when I think about the images in the video. It’s a cascading series of video clips about Black culture, Black experience, and violence. It feels like image poetry, the most concise and affecting portrayal of the Back American experience I’ve seen. As the actor Amandla Stenberg asks in the video, “What would America be like if we loved Black people as much as we love Black culture?”
Gailee, what an apt sentence: "It crushes my soul." If that hatred of other is so strong that someone is moved to kill them, I worry for the soul of humankind. The other apt senetence is your Amadla Stenberg quote.
Ally, It really does. I´m not sure why I feel things so strongly. Too strongly. It hurts so big.
Wow!
I read all of that, Fern, while crying. I remember the lunch counter incident as I was born snd raised in NC. I just scratch my eyes out that we have not progressed to this day! It hurts.
Marlene, we have progressed a bit. Just contrast the amount of diversity in the Freedom Marches with the very diverse George Floyd protests.
If it had not been for cellphones and the bravery of one young woman to video the murder of Floyd, we would still be in the dark! I lived through the “riots” in the 60’s, the assassinations of JFK RFK & MLK, Jr. and I can tell you that yes, we have made progress but women and people of color keep getting mercilessly beaten up in Congress.
Too true—two steps forward and one step back.
...and by the Supreme Court.
Hope floats.
Fern, thank you for sharing Eugene Robinson’s words. He’s right. A black/Hispanic/LGBTQ person going about their daily life is more in danger from a person enflamed by TFG’s words of white grievance than anyone at a TFG rally is in danger from someone who disagrees with their ideology or skin color. As the FBI has reported, “ there have been more domestic terrorism subjects disrupted by arrest and more deaths caused by domestic terrorists than international terrorists in recent years…. Individuals adhering to racially motivated violent extremism ideology have been responsible for the most lethal incidents among domestic terrorists in recent years…”
https://www.fbi.gov/news/testimony/confronting-white-supremacy
"Homegrown terrorism" is a thing. A dangerous thing.
This is the latest in an endless series of shootings in America , this time in Jacksonville, which usually involve the use of the AR15, a weapon intended for use in war. I believe that Biden and the Democrats will win the control of the House and Senate and it would be wonderful if the first legislation signed by Biden in his second term is a permanent ban on the sale of assault style rifles. It won’t stop the killings, but it would greatly reduce the number of victims. There should also be a government buy back of these weapons for those who wish to sell such weapons.
Of course the gun manufacturers and gun nuts will let out howls about how their second amendment rights are being violated. Let them protest, they will get over it eventually. They will have to satisfy their need for firearms with rifles, hand guns and shotguns. The carnage must stop.
Hard to "like" this, Fern. Can I *Grieve* this?
Thank you Fern
Hard to "like" this one. We need an alternative response. Like a heart being hit with a sledge hammer to indicate the pain that this kind of hate persists and infects.
Pastor Barnes uses the correct verb to describe the murder of 3 black people in Jacksonville as well as the murders of so many other black people over the years. They are, in reality, executions. Executed because of the color of their skin.
Heather, another terrific Letter. My favorite paragraph was this: “He [Meadows] claimed that it was his job as chief of staff to address anything that might distract Trump or divert his attention, and therefore his work to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election fell within his job description. If so, his case belongs in federal court because federal officials are protected from state prosecution over things they did as part of their official duties. But working for a political campaign is explicitly not part of an officer’s duties: the Hatch Act prohibits federal officials from engaging in partisan activities while on duty. “
That darn Hatch Act. Oh, Fani, you are too cool for school!! Overthrowing the government is SOME “job description”. 🤣
Was Meadows on the phone with the Willard Hotel "War Room" on January 5th? Definitely not a Presidential / Government activity.
I recall that Cassidy Hutchinson testified to the Jan. 6 Committee that Meadows wanted to go over to the "War Room" but she persuaded him to participate only by phone.
Not in the job description I'll wager.
I just saw virtually the same comment above that I did not "read" yet, but in my visual field. Did it register or is it just so obvious that these crooks are violating the terms of their employment? Maybe both.
On instruction of Fearless Leader.
I totally agree with your comment, but have gotten stuck on the line, “anything that might distract Trump or divert his attention “. Divert his attention from his TV screen or phone? Never was a person less qualified or able to do a job. That there is a portion of this country eager for him to resume his destruction of this country terrifies me.
HCR writes: "House Republicans also are moving forward on impeaching President Joe Biden, although there is no evidence that there are any grounds for such a proceeding."
Is this an example of head-in-the sand dishonest spin? Biden appears to be stonewalling a congressional investigation. Is that a sufficient ground for an impeachment inquiry?
Honest people will want to know what the other side has to say about the Biden family's alleged foreign bribery scheme. Quoting Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy:
"The thing that holds up whether we do impeachment inquiry, provide us the documents we’re asking. The whole determination here is how the Bidens handled this."
“If they provide us the documents, there wouldn’t be a need for impeachment inquiry. But if they withhold the documents and fight like they have now to not provide to the American public what they deserve to know, we will move forward with impeachment inquiry when we come back into session."
“The bank statements, the credit card statements and others. Show us where the money went, show us were you taking money from outside sources? And that would clear most of this up, but they seem to fight it every step of the way."
https://sputnikglobe.com/20230823/mccarthy-vows-to-launch-september-impeachment-if-biden-fails-to-provide-requested-docs-1112804647.html
Boring troll, try better.
Boring Troll should try “not”
What is WTH Scmeckle the Schmucky Schmeeckle??????
You twist my name into an insult to mock me.
https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/august-28-2023/comment/39233127
That is correct, you creepy scmeeckly….
Elisabeth Iler trolls me, with no thought beyond contempt.
"Habitual contempt breeds cockroaches in the soul."
https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/august-28-2023/comment/39232034
Quoting McCarthy won’t get you two cents here. There are no grounds for impeachment. End of statement and any blowback from you.
https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/august-28-2023/comment/39233127
Look at the source, Sputnik Globe, Putin’s “News” agency. Nuff said.
The general principle here is, "Know what the other side is saying. In this particular case, Sputnik News quotrd the U.S. Speaker of the House of Representatives.
Nuff said.
The source you quote, John, is clearly Russian propaganda, and which engages in demeaning President Biden's and the West's accomplishments in opposing Vladimir Putin's desire to rebuild a the Soviet empire that collapsed in 1990.
Are you actually saying that Sputnik News MIS-quoted the Speaker of the House??
If not, why do you focus on the publisher, if not to direct attention away from Biden's caught-with-his-hand-in-the-cookie-jar stonewalling?
Once again, the general principle is "Know what the other side has to say," and with my earlier quote I got the Russians and the Republicans, both at once.
Every day we should make the MSM broadcast what the Biden/Harris Administration is doing to help the American people, and indeed, the entire planet.
Anyone who denies the climate crisis is unfit for leadership.
If the MSM wants to cover the twice impeached, four times indicted, wannabe dictator with a literal golden idol image of himself, it should be to impress upon everyone that his total time and interest are and will be attempts to keep from going to prison, and he has NO real interest in the needs of anyone else. What "billionaire" begs for donations to pay for his legal team(s)? The reason his indictments are so "unprecedented" is exactly because no other President has engaged in such criminal actions!
Yesterday I saw Dana Bash interview George Conway and among her inane questions was that the mugshot has gone VIRAL. Was it a bad thing to do? I wish he had answered Gosh who made it go viral, Dana?
MSM is a long way from broadcasting news responsibly. They need to feature Heather, Joyce Vance, Rachel Maddow, Glenn Kirschner, Lawrence O'Donnell and others who are all about the truth. Randy Rainbow is more factual than most of the msm.
Randy is my favorite newscaster these days 👍❣️
I know a lot of dodgy stuff has taken place in US political history, though I know little of the detail; but it seems to me that the overall behavior modern "Republican" Party is pretty much unprecedented as well. If they dropped all the lies and "dirty tricks", what would they have left?
JL, if you want to hear some interesting "dodgy stuff" listen to Rachel Maddow's new podcast, "Deja News". I'm only a couple episodes in, but so far, the situations she's featured are all 20th century. One is drawing parallels between what happened in France in 1934 on February 6, one has detailed what happened in Florida in the 1950/1960's with their first run at destroying homosexuality, and the third that I have listened to is an addendum to her "Bag Man" podcast which rings eerily familiar today. Good stuff so far.
To answer your last question, "nothing of substance".
"Good stuff so far." All of it good stuff 😉
And deeply researched before recording & releasing publicly.
Ike and Everett Dirksen are about all I can think of for my long life. And yet, their lying blather rules the fools, and taints our very existence
J. L. Graham. As my granny liked to say: "Kabobkiss!"
I fervently hope that having the trials relatively early in the year may finally bring relief to those Americans who still believe that justice can be served and that all are equal before the law. It can prove the system still works.
Tonight on NCIS, LL Cool J talked about a classmate named "Heather Richardson" who used to pass him notes hidden in computer disks. Someone remarked how smart that was and asked how it worked out and he responded "She's a genius, so it didn't work out with me." Loved it!!
Heather, thank you for sharing your insights with us. Today's letter has a winners glow. If the Supreme Court doesn't do its job, at least it had a chance to follow in the footsteps of a great judge
I never dreamed I'd be so lucky as to find the best guy in the world for a husband. He was 95% perfect. Some time later he died and I didn't know what to do with my life. Then djt pirated the 2016 election and my friend Suds turned me on to HRC's Letters, and made life worthwhile once again. My life expectancy status is thatvim living on borrowed time, but just by turning folks on to HCR, I'm making the best use of my space here. God bless America.
E PLURIBUS UNUM
Send in the clowns. There ought to be clowns. Don’t bother they’re here.
-Sondheim
Oh, the memes...
"It's not a witch hunt, it's an exorcism."
"It's hard to claim it's a witch hunt when it's your flying monkeys giving the testimony."
...and so on, and so on, and so on...
OK, those are good!
William, I am so grateful to you for this reminder. Here is a particularly transporting rendition by Judy Collins. Sondheim’s poetry shine through with every note.
https://youtu.be/8L6KGuTr9TI?si=AvFNrOhbE2slQs3f
Also Judi Dench
OMG...such a beautiful rendition and blast from the past. She's amazing.
⚖️ Music, Maestro, please 🎼
Apt
If the various state GOP party officials think that judicial proceedings are interfering with the candidacy of their front-runner, they could move their primary dates to avoid the judicial schedules. There's lots of time between May and November. The insanity here is on the political side, of course, not on the judicial side. tfg's teams of attorneys are attempting to game the judicial system to political advantage, rather than the other way around. We're already in uncharted waters, with a leading candidate for president carrying 4 criminal indictments on his shoulders. How is that so different than a nominee facing trial? I think what most of the public wants is a timely beginning and end to the trials. The guy will either be acquitted or convicted. If acquitted, he deserves the right to run for office like any other schmuck; if he's convicted, then the whole constitutional scholarly class will have to contend with the possibility of the elected leader of the country attempting to run the government from behind bars. If the mafia can do it, the perhaps the White House can do so as well. The fact is, his political fate is not in his own hands or that of his political party; it's in the hands of the Democrats and independents who have to decide if it's worth getting off of their hind-parts and registering, then showing up to vote for sanity rather than insanity. the 2024 presidential election won't be a vote about different views on policy; it'll be a choice between facts and lies, sanity and insanity, stability and the systematic dismantling of our liberal democracy.
Well said, JS.
"The insanity here is on the political side, of course, not on the judicial side." ✅
I would like to say that Sept. 6th is my birthday and I can think of no better way to celebrate it than to be able to see the trial of 19 defendants who tried to take over America.
Marlene, Happy birthday early! I think that is Arraignment Day for the Fulton 19. They will all plead “not guilty”, but still a great day to celebrate on your birthday!
Thanks, Elisabeth! Yep, I know what their plea will be but hey, how often does one get to witness 19 thugs all together in one room pleas their cases?!
Dang it! *plea*
Make questions about the 2024 election moot
Invoke the Fourteenth Amendment!
No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any state, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability."
In other words, enforce the Constitution.
👍
Good idea, but not as easy as all that. See Jennifer Rubin's column in the WaPo (gifted) https://wapo.st/3sxytwU
Those who have the responsibility for “curating” the candidates for the next presidential election must at least try to eliminate theLump. It’s as plain as day that he gave aid and comfort to the insurrectionists. I’m glad to hear that some secretaries of state are talking about taking action against the traitor.
I am concerned that setting the election conspiracy trial date the day before Super Tuesday will bring out Trump supporters in droves and he will wind up during the trial as the presumptive nominee. That will put tremendous pressure on the jurors.
In retrospect I really wish that Garland had appointed Smith at least 6 months prior so we could be in the trial now before the first primary vote was cast.
Justice must be done and there is no crying over spilled milk as my Mom used to say. But this looks like it is setting up to be one of the most significant instances of woulda, shoulda, coulda in US history.
This just shows us all we must defy the Republicans their nominee the pleasure of going back to the White House.
The whole frickin' "Republican" Party has endorsed the insurrection. They really should be out of the game. It's no good to have one party rule, no matter what party; we need dialectic to keep us awake and honest. But not a party that is trying to sabotage democracy. That's a deal breaker.
That’s a deal breaker. For sure. They are the Trojan Horse working from the inside to destroy. Call them out, MSM. Every lying louse, every rich provocateur, every self-righteous Pharisee, every racist Nazi-loving idiot, and every fearful, scaredy cat who sees our diversity as a threat. Call them what they are. And give Dems credit for not losing their humanity.
JL, this is precisely why we need a “third party”. If the Republicans who dropped out early (e.g., Reed Galen’s www.LincolnProject.us ) Had focused early on to establish an opposition party to Trump’s bastardized Republican Party, they might have derailed him then and there by taking a ton of moderate Republicans with them and begun to rebuild your wished for counterpoise. I haven’t followed The Project closely, but it seems like a start. Some claim we can’t afford three or more parties under our system as it would create chaos. I think three or four parties would be a great move toward a better democracy if combined with the removal of the Electoral College and the establishment of a publicly funded campaign financing system and a national ranked choice voting scheme. (Then, of course, we could have ham and eggs and toast and jam if only we had ham or eggs or toast or jam….;-)
I’ve never understood the Electoral College to begin with, and I’m 71 years old! What’s wrong with the people’s vote count showing the winner. Who we the people elect. The way the Electoral College is working, a lot of elections, our President is named long before the polls out west even close! This isn’t right! Then there’s times when the popular vote is debunked by the Electoral College count, and the winner of the popular vote is the loser. Case in point, the election of 2016. Hillary Clinton best Trump in actual vote count, but the Electoral College vote she lost.
This isn’t right.
I recall being told about the Electoral College is middle school and thinking something along the lines of "Wait a minute; WTF?". It did not seem to square with what I had heretofore been told about the power of the vote. Back in the day, we celebrated Lincoln's Birthday as a national holiday, and there was accompanying curricular buzz about Washington and Lincoln prior to their special days from maybe fourth grade on. We had to memorize the Gettysburg Address, with special attention and discussion of the " government of the people, by the people, for the people" part. That's still my yardstick (though when I think of most of the crap I learned in elementary school, it's a wonder I can think at all). Essentially all Americans can vote for president and all are constituents. One person, one vote, no more, no less.
"As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. This expresses my idea of democracy. Whatever differs from this, to the extent of the difference, is no democracy."
- Lincoln
I have mixed feelings about third parties, but other successful nations have a multi-party system. I need to know more about it than I do, but I was alarmed by the reign of Stephen Harper (sort of the GWB of the North) who dominated Canada for nine years. According to my very political Canadian son-in-law, Harper was supported by a minority of Canadians, but the other two major parties would not ally close enough to pry him out (My son-in-law himself has run for local office under the smaller minority "Green" party).
I think any third party, barring unusual circumstances, has a long row to hoe to build legitimacy and momentum. I thought that Ralph Nader said some things worth listening to [, but not a realistically actionable plan for taking the presidency. He only helped elect Bush, and was buried in the backlash. Had he backed Gore after demonstrating a degree of support for his plans, he might have built a toe hold from which to build a stronger movement; and it would have to be a much stronger movement to reasonably shoot the moon. Even then, defeating Bush needed to be the priority. When we make poor choices when voting or by not voting, we hurt others as well, commonly more than we hurt ourselves. Those least advantaged suffer most. Posterity has no vote, yet will inherit our follies. Our decisions and our extended responsibilities are a huge matter.
I guess to be realistic we have to acknowledge that "politics" is too complex a topic for the average person to wrap his/her head around. Even a two party system boggles the mind. Maybe that's why the Founders seem to have envisioned a system dominated by a landed gentry. Should we come back and discuss this again in 5,000 years? And you're right; the shit we were fed in the primary grades was not helpful in the least.
I'll add, incidentally that I barely grasp the nuances of a parliamentary system. Could there theoretically be a Canadian Tuberville who could face off against their whole Armed Force up there for his hobby issue? I don't know.
Take a look at Andrew Yang’s Forward Party. Leaders are Democrats and Republicans.
About Garland appointment of Smith. According to the Wikipedia.org article about Jack Smith, he was not available.
"On May 7, 2018, Smith was named to a four-year term as chief prosecutor for the Kosovo Specialist Chambers in The Hague, investigating war crimes in the Kosovo War, including the case of Salih Mustafa. He took up the post on September 11, 2018, and was appointed to a second term on May 8, 2022, before stepping down on November 18, 2022."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Smith_(lawyer)
I think he was convinced that the crimes committed in the USA were more pressing that the crimes committed in the Kosovo War.
Yes, it has been my belief that Merrick Garland wanted Jack Smith as Special Prosecutor but could not appoint him until Smith wrapped up his responsibilities for the Kosovo trials he had long been instrumental in pursuing. https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/16/politics/kosovo-war-crimes-tribunal-jack-smith/index.html
Judith. That was my suspicion too. Garland was not being slow, careful (although he is - and those are not bad traits for a lawyer). He was waiting for the right man for job. Jack Smith worked for the DOJ before and his reputation and experience made him Garland's best choice for special prosecution.
My Mom used to say that often, it hasn’t always held back the tears. But clean up the mess and move on. Dems, it’s up to you to support justice. Republicans will keep spilling…
Accept what is.
Thank you Dr. Richardson, when I read that Judge Chutkin had set March 4 as the start date for the most significant charges - all felonies, I was elated. March 4, 1933 was the day Franklin Delano Roosevelt was inaugurated for the first of his four inaugurations as President of the United States. He was also the last President to be inaugurated March 4. It also happens to be the day I was born, so the trial will begin March 4, 2023 will also be my 91st birthday - what a great present! As Dr. Richardson pointed March 4, 1789, was the day the Constitution went into effect. In the late 18th and the first half of the 19th century travel was slow. John Adams is said to have walked from his home in Massachusetts to Washington DC for his inauguration. While the Presidents from Virginia would not have had so arduous a travel; until the days of air travel (mostly post WW2) it took days, not hours to go even from Ohio to Washington DC. It was not only the President who had to get to DC it was all the Congressmen and Senators too.
The 6 week trial will be over in April, hopefully with conviction; but Trump probably won't be imprisoned until all four trials are completed. Then there will probably be some appeals, but I expect eventually he will be behind bars. I suppose his loyal MAGA's could gather outside the prison to hear their hero's rabble about his mistreatment, poor, baby, Donnie, who never in his life has had to face the consequences of his toddlerish behavior.
Happy 91st Birthday!
Thank you. Love the little snippet of history in the closing. I'm always learning when I read your missives. Much appreciated.
Great ending paragraph!
Seriously awesome!!!!!