While all eyes today are on the fight over the newly combined voting rights bill before the Senate—it is now the “Freedom to Vote: John R. Lewis Act”—there are plenty of stories out there right now that make clear what is at stake if the Republicans are permitted to rig the rules so that they will win the next election.
1. Channel rage by telling so-called moderate and retiring Republican Senators to vote for the Freedom to Vote: John R. Lewis Act. It ain't over til it's over. They reconvene on Tuesday. Flood them with calls, emails, texts, even faxes. Links to Senators:
5. MLK Day: Honor MLK and the legions of civil rights workers who literally shed blood, sweat, and tears for racial justice and the right to vote. Walk your talk!
6. Keep the faith in yourself, your good values, and the fact that you are part of millions more.
Yesterday was not a bad day for those of us that had no expectation that Sinema, Manchin, and any other Democrats hiding behind them, would agree to changes or removal of the filibuster. The Democrats have not been good at dealing with the enemy for a long time and taking up the national voting rights legislation NOW! Who got the jump on the crucial feature of Democracy - free and fair elections?
Most importantly, the Department of Justice indicted 11 Oath Keepers for seditious conspiracy and other charges. It is a paramilitary organization, which recruits people who have served in the military, law enforcement and as first responders. The Department of Justice is at the wheel and its foot on the gas pedal. Going up the ladder or a few more tiers and the charge will be one of treason. DOJ is GOING TO THE HEART OF THE COUP D'ETAT. The U.S. House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th attack on the Capitol is doing a sensational job, and the wheels of justice are moving. Yesterday was a good day, and as long as those wheels of justice keep moving there will be more good days ahead.
P.S. There has got to be payback to Sinema for delivering her coup de grace right before President Biden was to speak. That was low.
I live in Vegas and I went online yesterday and made a complaint to the NV AG about the republicans sending a fake electoral count certificate to the National Archives.
I will be following that up with a letter because their rules are weird and better to make sure.
I do have a question in regards to Presidents Bidens vaccine mandate getting struck down by the SC. Why? I thought their was precedent for mandates when it comes to protecting the people.
All I know is that I'm pretty sick of people not doing all they can to stop covid.
In this searing memoir, Congressman Jamie Raskin tells the story of the forty-five days at the start of 2021 that permanently changed his life—and his family’s—as he confronted the painful loss of his son to suicide, lived through the violent insurrection in our nation’s Capitol, and led the impeachment effort to hold President Trump accountable for inciting the political violence.
On December 31, 2020, Tommy Raskin, the only son of Maryland Congressman Jamie Raskin, tragically took his own life after a long struggle with depression. Seven days later on January 6, Congressman Raskin returned to Congress to help certify the 2020 Presidential election results, when violent insurrectionists led by right wing extremist groups stormed the U.S. Capitol hoping to hand four more years of power to President Donald Trump. As our reeling nation mourned the deaths of numerous people and lamented the injuries of more than 140 police officers hurt in the attack, Congressman Raskin, a Constitutional law professor, was called upon to put aside his overwhelming grief—both personal and professional—and lead the impeachment effort against President Trump for inciting the violence. Together this nine-member team of House impeachment managers riveted a nation still in anguish, putting on an unprecedented Senate trial that produced the most bipartisan Presidential impeachment vote in American history.
Now for the first time, Congressman Raskin discusses this unimaginable convergence of personal and public trauma, detailing how the painful loss of his son and the power of Tommy’s convictions fueled the Congressman’s work in the aftermath of modern democracy’s darkest day. Going inside Congress on January 6, he recounts the horror of that day, a day that he and other Democrats had spent months preparing for under the correct assumption that they would encounter an attempted electoral coup—not against a President but for one. And yet, on January 6, he faced the one thing he had failed to anticipate: mass political violence designed to block Biden’s election. With an inside account of leading the team prosecuting President Trump in the Senate, Congressman Raskin shares never before told stories of just how close we came to losing our democracy that fateful day and lays out the methodical prosecution that convinced Democrats and Republicans alike of Trump’s responsibility for inciting insurrectionary violence against our government.
Through it all, he reckons with the loss of his brilliant, remarkable son, a Harvard Law student whose values and memory continually inspired the Congressman to confront the dark impulses unleashed by Donald Trump. At turns, a moving story of a father coping with his pain and a revealing examination of holding President Trump accountable for the violence he fomented, this book is a vital reminder of the ongoing struggle for the soul of American democracy and the perseverance that our Constitution demands from us all.
Sinema’s argument that removing the filibuster would weaken Democracy, ignores the reality that it was the filibuster that was weakened, when Republicans started using it for obstruction, instead of for bipartisanship.
In the name of “bipartisanship”, it seems like Senators Sinema and Manchin are creating a Riechstag moment, by pretending to come to the rescue of something that is no longer there (bipartisanship).
Let's face reality. The Administration has, and so has Senator Schumer. The report tonight released by the White House about the meeting by President Biden with the two traitors Manchin and Sinema (I'm never going to call them Senators again) called the discussion "full and frank." As Kristol said when the report was read, "those are the words used for a meeting between Biden and Putin."
Perfidious silly moron Sinema shot down civil rights with her bullshit little speechlet this morning. She's "defending bipartisan cooperation"???? The damn Republicans have used the filibuster for the eight years of the Obama Administration and the year of the Biden Administration to DESTROY bipartisan cooperation!!! She's living upside-down and backwards!!! After her treason pays off for her next January, maybe she can have an "accident" before she announces she's evolved into being a full-out Trumpkin.
Voting rights reform is dead, killed by Sinema with Manchin kicking the corpse. Manchin killed the BBB. Neither of them are going to be revived. The Quinnipiac poll has Biden at 33% because the country believes the lies of the Washington Press Corpse and doesn't realize that whatever good news they have is due to him.
Face the fact we are looking into the mouth of a long dark tunnel, and there isn't any light visible at the other end.
The American public seems unable to focus. Every headline is wrong for its real proportions, and stories continue to miss the gravity of the events. Impossible to cover the breadth of our hopes and fears, yet we taste their closeness. No one has the words for it.
Except Dr. Richardson. Every time. Always calm, direct, and exactly right in allocating the gravity and proportions to the facts. She states where we stand, and where we need to be.
Tomorrow — more phone calls to my Republican senators. Then I’ll read up on local actions to support fair elections.
Lots of people who want our country to survive are trying to stare into the tea leaves and shout out what they think will go wrong next, instead of actually doing something to make things right. Let’s all push back on that. When we see it, I think we should ask what they are going to do about it.
Wow. Reading this has me literally (viscerally) feeling the incredibly dangerous ride we are on. Appreciating more and more the care and discipline that you are bringing to this project. In following what is actually happening, and writing about it regularly, you are providing readers with a practice of engaging with complexity - the opposite of what has happened to news media/the (so-called) free press. I heard a law historian make the distinction between free speech and bought speech, in reference to right wing reactionary speakers coming to college campuses and the fact that they were being heavily subsidized by parties not visible in the events themselves. And the line from the movie All the President's Men, "follow the money".
See this link (https://groovyhistory.com/follow-the-money-quote-all-the-presidents-men) for an interesting and seemingly well researched piece (which is not attributed to a specific author) about that line, including: "...The line might have been pilfered from the public record. Fred Shapiro, writing for Freakonomics.com, found this statement from Henry J. Peterson in a transcript of a 1974 Senate Judiciary Committee hearings on the nomination of Earl J. Silbert to be United States Attorney: 'I would say, ‘Follow the money, Earl, because that’s where it’s going to be.’ Unfortunately, we did not get it following the money because the records were either nonexistent or were destroyed.'..." AND "...But in the Watergate saga, it wasn't the payments themselves that brought Nixon's presidency down, it was the endless coverup, which became a coverup of a coverup, with associated perjury and unethical behavior..."
"It was not just members of street gangs who were involved in overturning the 2020 election. Last week, a new website called Insurrection Index, published by the voting rights organization Public Wise, established that more than 1000 people in elective office or positions of public trust around the country either spread the Big Lie that the 2020 election was fraudulent or participated in the January 6 insurrection."
I can only hope that the DOJ is building a solid case against each and every one of those traitors/insurrectionists. Trusting that Lady Justice will not let us down in this regard does not suffice, not with this trumpian party at large. Each member of this party who fights to remain in TFG's good graces is, on some level, guilty of treason. We must vote those in Congress and administrative positions out of office!
My thanks, as always, Heather, for another enlightening and informative letter. You keep my hope alive.
With Republicans totally focused on midterms, there will be no legislation passed that doesn’t fit in the budget reconciliation process. The Biden legislative agenda is over for now.
BBB is gasping for breath. Perhaps there is some token number that could give the Dems a sorely needed win before midterms.
There is one huge issue before the Supreme Court that could help some Democrats at midterms; Roe v Wade. If SCOTUS , as suspected, effectively overturns it, there could be enough outrage to win a few House seats for Democrats.
Biden impeached? A certainty. Twice just like Trump. Revenge politics at its worse.
First on the Afghanistan withdrawal, second on the initial mess on the southern border.
It’s going to be a rough ride between now and the next presidential election.
However. Republicans can make voting more difficult in some states but that can’t make it illegal. The key will be Democratic voter turnout in all elections going forward. Overwhelming victories will be very difficult to reverse.
Thank you yet again for this horrifying distillation of the current state of our nation. Tomorrow I’ll rise and gratefully go about my work and day - mindful of the peril and evil bearing down on US. The authors of instigation must be dealt a series of crushing defeats. If not…
Just had an Idea. Could we have a ‘ Thank You President Biden ‘ Text or E-Mail Campaign on Monday, also Happy B-Day for Martin L. Kings Day ? I will contact DNC. But surely we could get it out on Social Media by Monday. Let’s try !
Dear Professor HCR. I’m grateful that you write these letter’s. We all know the long hours you invest and it must be taking a toll not only physically, but also emotionally as well. This one I had to stop and put down and walk away from about 1/2 way through. I don’t know how you keep doing this ? Some days I want to cry, some days I want to scream ! Rod Serling of the Twilight Zone couldn’t have made this up. On June 15,2022 it will be 7 yrs that as slow as a Snake gliding through the grass, an escalator delivered a Baby/man, Coward/Con downward. Who of which over a lifetime of trying to gain a fortune, he had lost his soul. Some Snakes in the grass, we sometimes know the ones that are harmless.But this one was a ‘Snake of a Different color.’ I have heard and read of so many good , decent Republicans and Independent voters that have such regret that they didn’t recognize his true colors. The poison upon our Democracy of it’s constant spitefully bite has proved to them his desperate hunger for wealth = power. No matter who he takes down or how low he has to go. My hope is They/ We of course, support President Biden with understanding that We are in a very dangerous situation and We all need to get behind him because those Snakes have multiplied and We, our Beautiful America, are all their prey. There is people in foreign countries very worried for us. That my friends is a ‘First ‘ in my lifetime.Let’s all try to stay healthy in mind, body and soul. That’s the best normal we can ever hope for. If you’re on Social Media spend more time giving 46 some Atta Boys. Poor guy is trying to move mountains with Human’s and a Virtual Wall’s in front of them.
Pissed off and what's next:
1. Channel rage by telling so-called moderate and retiring Republican Senators to vote for the Freedom to Vote: John R. Lewis Act. It ain't over til it's over. They reconvene on Tuesday. Flood them with calls, emails, texts, even faxes. Links to Senators:
https://www.vote.org/action/?emci=f259ff4b-78b9-eb11-a7ad-501ac57ba3ed&emdi=95f35617-2cba-eb11-a7ad-501ac57b8fa7&ceid=13982010
https://5calls.org/
https://resist.bot/
https://faxzero.com/fax_senate.php
Blast them on Twitter (thanks to Annette D for this list):
Krysten Sinema: @SenatorSinema
Richard Burr @SenatorBurr
Pat Toomey @SenToomey
Rob Portman @senrobportman
Richard Shelby @SenShelby
Roy Blunt @RoyBlunt
Mitt Romney @SenatorRomney
Mitch McConnell @LeaderMcConnell
Chuck Grassley @ChuckGrassley
Mike Crapo @MikeCrapo
Susan Collins @SenatorCollins
Jim Inhofe @JimInhofe
Lindsey Graham @LindseyGrahamSC
John Thune @SenJohnThune
John Cornyn @JohnCornyn
Marsha Blackburn @MarshaBlackburn
John Boozman @JohnBoozman
Shelly Moore Capito @SenCapito
Jerry Moran @JerryMoran
Roger Wicker @SenatorWicker
2. Pivot to support Democrats in down-ballot races so filibuster is not a roadblock.
https://runforsomething.net
3. Badger Congress to expand the Supreme Court by passing the Judiciary Act of 2021:
https://roberthubbell.substack.com/p/a-hard-day
4. Know thy enemy. Read the links posted by Heather on who the OathKeepers are and who the seditionists are:
https://twitter.com/threadreaderapp/status/1481726508897083393?s=20
https://twitter.com/TonyHussein4/status/1480348870404096003?s=20
5. MLK Day: Honor MLK and the legions of civil rights workers who literally shed blood, sweat, and tears for racial justice and the right to vote. Walk your talk!
6. Keep the faith in yourself, your good values, and the fact that you are part of millions more.
❤️
Yesterday was not a bad day for those of us that had no expectation that Sinema, Manchin, and any other Democrats hiding behind them, would agree to changes or removal of the filibuster. The Democrats have not been good at dealing with the enemy for a long time and taking up the national voting rights legislation NOW! Who got the jump on the crucial feature of Democracy - free and fair elections?
Most importantly, the Department of Justice indicted 11 Oath Keepers for seditious conspiracy and other charges. It is a paramilitary organization, which recruits people who have served in the military, law enforcement and as first responders. The Department of Justice is at the wheel and its foot on the gas pedal. Going up the ladder or a few more tiers and the charge will be one of treason. DOJ is GOING TO THE HEART OF THE COUP D'ETAT. The U.S. House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th attack on the Capitol is doing a sensational job, and the wheels of justice are moving. Yesterday was a good day, and as long as those wheels of justice keep moving there will be more good days ahead.
P.S. There has got to be payback to Sinema for delivering her coup de grace right before President Biden was to speak. That was low.
I live in Vegas and I went online yesterday and made a complaint to the NV AG about the republicans sending a fake electoral count certificate to the National Archives.
I will be following that up with a letter because their rules are weird and better to make sure.
I do have a question in regards to Presidents Bidens vaccine mandate getting struck down by the SC. Why? I thought their was precedent for mandates when it comes to protecting the people.
All I know is that I'm pretty sick of people not doing all they can to stop covid.
Unthinkable: Trauma, Truth, and the Trials of American Democracy
Jamie Raskin (Author)
Book: https://bookshop.org/books/unthinkable-trauma-truth-and-the-trials-of-american-democracy-9798200879892/9780063209787
Audible: https://www.audiobooksnow.com/audiobook/unthinkable/5822620/
Synopsis
In this searing memoir, Congressman Jamie Raskin tells the story of the forty-five days at the start of 2021 that permanently changed his life—and his family’s—as he confronted the painful loss of his son to suicide, lived through the violent insurrection in our nation’s Capitol, and led the impeachment effort to hold President Trump accountable for inciting the political violence.
On December 31, 2020, Tommy Raskin, the only son of Maryland Congressman Jamie Raskin, tragically took his own life after a long struggle with depression. Seven days later on January 6, Congressman Raskin returned to Congress to help certify the 2020 Presidential election results, when violent insurrectionists led by right wing extremist groups stormed the U.S. Capitol hoping to hand four more years of power to President Donald Trump. As our reeling nation mourned the deaths of numerous people and lamented the injuries of more than 140 police officers hurt in the attack, Congressman Raskin, a Constitutional law professor, was called upon to put aside his overwhelming grief—both personal and professional—and lead the impeachment effort against President Trump for inciting the violence. Together this nine-member team of House impeachment managers riveted a nation still in anguish, putting on an unprecedented Senate trial that produced the most bipartisan Presidential impeachment vote in American history.
Now for the first time, Congressman Raskin discusses this unimaginable convergence of personal and public trauma, detailing how the painful loss of his son and the power of Tommy’s convictions fueled the Congressman’s work in the aftermath of modern democracy’s darkest day. Going inside Congress on January 6, he recounts the horror of that day, a day that he and other Democrats had spent months preparing for under the correct assumption that they would encounter an attempted electoral coup—not against a President but for one. And yet, on January 6, he faced the one thing he had failed to anticipate: mass political violence designed to block Biden’s election. With an inside account of leading the team prosecuting President Trump in the Senate, Congressman Raskin shares never before told stories of just how close we came to losing our democracy that fateful day and lays out the methodical prosecution that convinced Democrats and Republicans alike of Trump’s responsibility for inciting insurrectionary violence against our government.
Through it all, he reckons with the loss of his brilliant, remarkable son, a Harvard Law student whose values and memory continually inspired the Congressman to confront the dark impulses unleashed by Donald Trump. At turns, a moving story of a father coping with his pain and a revealing examination of holding President Trump accountable for the violence he fomented, this book is a vital reminder of the ongoing struggle for the soul of American democracy and the perseverance that our Constitution demands from us all.
Sinema’s argument that removing the filibuster would weaken Democracy, ignores the reality that it was the filibuster that was weakened, when Republicans started using it for obstruction, instead of for bipartisanship.
In the name of “bipartisanship”, it seems like Senators Sinema and Manchin are creating a Riechstag moment, by pretending to come to the rescue of something that is no longer there (bipartisanship).
Let's face reality. The Administration has, and so has Senator Schumer. The report tonight released by the White House about the meeting by President Biden with the two traitors Manchin and Sinema (I'm never going to call them Senators again) called the discussion "full and frank." As Kristol said when the report was read, "those are the words used for a meeting between Biden and Putin."
Perfidious silly moron Sinema shot down civil rights with her bullshit little speechlet this morning. She's "defending bipartisan cooperation"???? The damn Republicans have used the filibuster for the eight years of the Obama Administration and the year of the Biden Administration to DESTROY bipartisan cooperation!!! She's living upside-down and backwards!!! After her treason pays off for her next January, maybe she can have an "accident" before she announces she's evolved into being a full-out Trumpkin.
Voting rights reform is dead, killed by Sinema with Manchin kicking the corpse. Manchin killed the BBB. Neither of them are going to be revived. The Quinnipiac poll has Biden at 33% because the country believes the lies of the Washington Press Corpse and doesn't realize that whatever good news they have is due to him.
Face the fact we are looking into the mouth of a long dark tunnel, and there isn't any light visible at the other end.
The American public seems unable to focus. Every headline is wrong for its real proportions, and stories continue to miss the gravity of the events. Impossible to cover the breadth of our hopes and fears, yet we taste their closeness. No one has the words for it.
Except Dr. Richardson. Every time. Always calm, direct, and exactly right in allocating the gravity and proportions to the facts. She states where we stand, and where we need to be.
Tomorrow — more phone calls to my Republican senators. Then I’ll read up on local actions to support fair elections.
Lots of people who want our country to survive are trying to stare into the tea leaves and shout out what they think will go wrong next, instead of actually doing something to make things right. Let’s all push back on that. When we see it, I think we should ask what they are going to do about it.
Thank you, Dr. Richardson.
Wow. Reading this has me literally (viscerally) feeling the incredibly dangerous ride we are on. Appreciating more and more the care and discipline that you are bringing to this project. In following what is actually happening, and writing about it regularly, you are providing readers with a practice of engaging with complexity - the opposite of what has happened to news media/the (so-called) free press. I heard a law historian make the distinction between free speech and bought speech, in reference to right wing reactionary speakers coming to college campuses and the fact that they were being heavily subsidized by parties not visible in the events themselves. And the line from the movie All the President's Men, "follow the money".
See this link (https://groovyhistory.com/follow-the-money-quote-all-the-presidents-men) for an interesting and seemingly well researched piece (which is not attributed to a specific author) about that line, including: "...The line might have been pilfered from the public record. Fred Shapiro, writing for Freakonomics.com, found this statement from Henry J. Peterson in a transcript of a 1974 Senate Judiciary Committee hearings on the nomination of Earl J. Silbert to be United States Attorney: 'I would say, ‘Follow the money, Earl, because that’s where it’s going to be.’ Unfortunately, we did not get it following the money because the records were either nonexistent or were destroyed.'..." AND "...But in the Watergate saga, it wasn't the payments themselves that brought Nixon's presidency down, it was the endless coverup, which became a coverup of a coverup, with associated perjury and unethical behavior..."
"It was not just members of street gangs who were involved in overturning the 2020 election. Last week, a new website called Insurrection Index, published by the voting rights organization Public Wise, established that more than 1000 people in elective office or positions of public trust around the country either spread the Big Lie that the 2020 election was fraudulent or participated in the January 6 insurrection."
I can only hope that the DOJ is building a solid case against each and every one of those traitors/insurrectionists. Trusting that Lady Justice will not let us down in this regard does not suffice, not with this trumpian party at large. Each member of this party who fights to remain in TFG's good graces is, on some level, guilty of treason. We must vote those in Congress and administrative positions out of office!
My thanks, as always, Heather, for another enlightening and informative letter. You keep my hope alive.
With Republicans totally focused on midterms, there will be no legislation passed that doesn’t fit in the budget reconciliation process. The Biden legislative agenda is over for now.
BBB is gasping for breath. Perhaps there is some token number that could give the Dems a sorely needed win before midterms.
There is one huge issue before the Supreme Court that could help some Democrats at midterms; Roe v Wade. If SCOTUS , as suspected, effectively overturns it, there could be enough outrage to win a few House seats for Democrats.
Biden impeached? A certainty. Twice just like Trump. Revenge politics at its worse.
First on the Afghanistan withdrawal, second on the initial mess on the southern border.
It’s going to be a rough ride between now and the next presidential election.
However. Republicans can make voting more difficult in some states but that can’t make it illegal. The key will be Democratic voter turnout in all elections going forward. Overwhelming victories will be very difficult to reverse.
Vote, vote, vote.
Who are we that Kirsten Synema speaks and has the ability to cancel our truths? Her ludicrous words despoil the chamber. And our future.
Dear Heather -
Thank you yet again for this horrifying distillation of the current state of our nation. Tomorrow I’ll rise and gratefully go about my work and day - mindful of the peril and evil bearing down on US. The authors of instigation must be dealt a series of crushing defeats. If not…
Just had an Idea. Could we have a ‘ Thank You President Biden ‘ Text or E-Mail Campaign on Monday, also Happy B-Day for Martin L. Kings Day ? I will contact DNC. But surely we could get it out on Social Media by Monday. Let’s try !
Whatever happens in Congress, our main job is to vote, vote, vote, and help get out the vote, whatever the headlines!
To quote the good Doctor: “Jesus Christ, What a (bunch of) morons!💥
Dear Professor HCR. I’m grateful that you write these letter’s. We all know the long hours you invest and it must be taking a toll not only physically, but also emotionally as well. This one I had to stop and put down and walk away from about 1/2 way through. I don’t know how you keep doing this ? Some days I want to cry, some days I want to scream ! Rod Serling of the Twilight Zone couldn’t have made this up. On June 15,2022 it will be 7 yrs that as slow as a Snake gliding through the grass, an escalator delivered a Baby/man, Coward/Con downward. Who of which over a lifetime of trying to gain a fortune, he had lost his soul. Some Snakes in the grass, we sometimes know the ones that are harmless.But this one was a ‘Snake of a Different color.’ I have heard and read of so many good , decent Republicans and Independent voters that have such regret that they didn’t recognize his true colors. The poison upon our Democracy of it’s constant spitefully bite has proved to them his desperate hunger for wealth = power. No matter who he takes down or how low he has to go. My hope is They/ We of course, support President Biden with understanding that We are in a very dangerous situation and We all need to get behind him because those Snakes have multiplied and We, our Beautiful America, are all their prey. There is people in foreign countries very worried for us. That my friends is a ‘First ‘ in my lifetime.Let’s all try to stay healthy in mind, body and soul. That’s the best normal we can ever hope for. If you’re on Social Media spend more time giving 46 some Atta Boys. Poor guy is trying to move mountains with Human’s and a Virtual Wall’s in front of them.