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.
Peaceful, action-oriented methods to preserve democracy are insufficient. Letters to Senators may make you feel good, but they rarely sway them. The foes of democracy (although they claim they are its true defenders) are willing, if necessary, to break the law and turn to violence to achieve their goals which include the resortation of the defeated former president by these means. HCR makes that clear. On one side are the lawbreakers and their violent supporters. On the other are the American people, represented by government. In many States the foes of democracy have already taken over the governments, often by democratic means, and they are aiming to do that to the Federal government as well. The Federal government, while it still is in the hands of the people, must quickly defend itself with more meaningful actions, especially by the Department of Justice. If that doesn't succeed, American democracy's last line of defense will have to be the Department of Defense, hoping it doesn't behave against insurrection as General McClelland did before Lincoln got rid of him. Congress and our Judicial system are already compromised. Only the Executive branch remains. It is much, much, later than we think.
"last line of defense will have to be the Department of Defense".
I am not exactly sure how that would work. US Soldiers are unlikely to participate in domestic events and it would be a bad idea to have them get involved.
The US Army members are split just like regular Americans. Also, the largest US Army bases are in the south and 44% of the US Army are born and raised southerners. (wikipidea).
To hope that the US Army would interecede in some form of protection action on domestic streets is to roll the dice big time.
They take an oath ... and would have to follow orders, like they did in the Whiskey Rebellion. If the fear of their refusal to act makes military involvement unlikely, the game is over and democracy by election will have been traded in for democracy by those who shout the loudest (which is what is happening to school boards.)
Can the metro, country, and state police handle the combined miltia's, a coalition of Oath Keepers, 3%'ers, Proud Boys etc? And if they can, will they?
Many HCR readers are finding Robert Hubbell to be a good addition to daily reading:
"See The Economist, “An expert on civil war issues a warning about America—But Barbara Walter Exaggerates.” The Economist writes,
These are all grave problems. But they do not portend civil conflict. Ms Walter mentions only fleetingly some of the reasons why today’s America is not like the former Yugoslavia or other imploding states. No country as sophisticated, modern, liberal and democratic as contemporary America has ever descended into civil war."
Scholars said the same thing about 1920-1932 Germany! At that time Germany was the most educated, most technologically advanced, and most liberal democracy in the world!
True. We'd have to read Walter's book for ourselves. But we already have alarms sounded and the information to take action to prevent a bloody civil war by doing our part to wage the ideological one.
I don't think Robert Hubell read the book yet. He just cut and pasted from The Economist article. Reading the economist article, I doubt they read the whole book either.
First, immediate and agressive prosecution of lawbreakers by the DOJ, including those for which they have evidence of their having instigated the lawbreaking. (Look how long it took for the Oathkeepers leader to be arrested.) And only if that doesn't work, opposing armed insurrectionists with military force, as Washington did with the Whiskey Rebellion might be needed. Actually, the threat of that, or perhaps just one incident, might suffice. The First Amendment's right to protest cannot be combined with the Second Amendment's right to bear arms to permit violent armed groups which support lawbreaking to continue to exist. This might sound like Civil War but it might be the best way of preventing one.
I don't assume that the DOJ was twiddling their thumbs on the Oathkeepers and the countless others they are going after. I don't know if it could have gone faster. Maybe. But I do know that you want the best evidence you can get to try to secure a conviction before you charge someone and we have no idea how long that takes in very complex cases like this.
To your other point: Yes, agreed, that may well be necessary. There will be another attempt in some form, and it may be much more organized and effective.
But what we are talking about here is also necessary: Re-codifying voter protection. Talking here about the silent coup that is going on right now, where military force is not a democratic option.
Nomi, thoughtful. I don’t know how many times it needs to be said but serious widespread prosecutions need to work their way up, solidify the evidence, before prosecuting the ones higher up Who will be preparing sophisticated defenses with some of the best lawyers in this country. This takes time and it seems to be proceeding in that way.
We are barely keeping the lid on an even more widespread violent uprising. So many people in this country and conservative politicians have become untethered from our democracy.
The Capitol police are a good example of a measured response, meaning not firing on the insurrectionists which would have resulted shortly thereafter in an armed, meaning bullets and assault weapons, used by the insurrectionists. I am so very proud of these men and women of the Capitol police Who paid such a dear price for their measured response.
I am so ashamed of the people Particularly the politicians who have stoked the big lie, who objected wholesale to the electoral vote count, and are standing in the way of voter rights legislation like the John Lewis act.
You're wrong. The indictments yesterday of the Oath Keepers and the evidence released show the challenging complexity of DOJ's work. Also, a Trump holdover in the Justice Department had undermined the investigation, making it all the more remarkable that DOJ was able to build a solid seditious conspiracy case. The dominoes are falling. Bigger ones are ahead in relatively short order.
But let the dominoes fall quickly. Every day they continue to be able to sow dissent, spread their lies and organize their supporters is a day closer to the dangerous endgame I fear.
Michael Sherwin. He was leading the DOJ investigation as U.S. attorney for DC, appointed by Barr. His public comments about the investigation, including on 60 Minutes, early last year were interpreted by some as an attempt to sabotage the probe. Thus his departure. The NYT this week reported that he blocked prosecutors who sought a search warrant on Stewart Rhodes, the Oath Keepers leader. Sherwin reportedly cited lack of probable cause and potential violations of Rhodes' civil rights.
Guy's name was John Demers. Fairly high up, requiring Senate approval. Got rid of him in June, 2021. Should have been done much sooner, but Garland could only do so much in his early days on the job.
No. The indictment of the Oath Keepers was based on a DOJ investigation. The AG and his team aren't going anywhere as long as Biden is president. The House J6 committee will be disbanded, assuming the Republicans take the House, but that wouldn't be until the end of the year. The committee plans to make criminal referrals to DOJ and no doubt will turn over all its evidence as well. The committee has vowed to finish this year, as early as summer but definitely before the election.
Partially sarcastic. Trump hasn’t yet showed any fear of DOJ. He and family have ranted against state justice departments in New York and Georgia because he has perceived a real and *imminent* threat from them. To this point he has said nothing about Garland. That, to me, is a tell.
I expect that the usual suspects (Bannon and Stone) will get indicted. But not in a blur of sudden movement.
But I think Garland is too much of an institutionalist to go higher. Reps/Senators will not be charged at all. Or at least until the fever breaks. Those at Meadows’ level will be kicked further down the line. And it’s Inconceivable he’ll charge Trump.
Investigations don’t have to go bottom to top. Two different ones could go on in parallel. If there was any sign that the upper echelons were being investigated, then we would have heard something by now.
Garland could charge Trump based on the Mueller report alone.
Too many ‘i’s to dot and ‘t’s too cross. Too much brutal infighting.
Effectively, the public was thrown a bone yesterday.
We're reading Garland differently. If the DOJ ends up with persuasive evidence that anyone committed crimes involving the coup attempt — including Trump — they will be charged. And the evidence is like an iceberg: the public can see a lot now but the majority of it is out of sight and in the hands of investigators.
Eric you have rebuked Garland and posited his faults based on what have appeared to be your personal feelings for months. When an important breakthrough in terms of indictments for seditious conspiracies transpires, which most legal experts agree is significant, you continue to debunk. You may have have a substantive argument based on your knowledge of the law or reports, which you have not shared. So far, it appears to me that you have the negative on automatic pilot.
Eric, I received your reply in answer to my attempt at understanding your negative opinion of Merrick Garland, and I am eager to continue our exchange. Unfortunately, your rich elaboration about the USA and Garland is not on the forum. I have searched. Do you mind posting it again after my initial post to you. Thank you.
You're probably correct, but now that you mention the Mueller report, couldn't Garland act on what it says, countermanding former AG Bill Barr's refusal to do so? The House Committee investigating January 6 has added considerably more evidence than what Mueller found. Former VP Aaron Burr was tried for treason in 1808 for much less. (and got off.)
As a Canadian watching IMO if GOP get control of Congress in 2022 midterms they will impeach Biden and Harris and install trump illegally. They won't wait til 2024. All rules procedures are off the table with a fascist cult. They are NOT a party They are a dangerous cult. Jan 6 was practice.
Question: How is it that there are no scholars , or elected members of Congress that can make a persuasive argument to Manchin and Sinema? Surely there are enough smarter people than these 2 Senators that could educate them on the risks, history and fascist cults.
Praying for my American friends. The ripple effect across the globe is huge if American democracy falls. "When America gets a cold the world gets a cough"
"How is it that there are no scholars , or elected members of Congress that can make a persuasive argument to Manchin and Sinema?"
I suspect many have tried. It appears greed, money, power and cowardice are directing the Republicans and those like Manchin andSinema. You are correct. This isn't a political party. It's a cult.
I spent time in Toronto a few months ago and I want to live there. Not really my time of life for a major move, but I’m grateful to you and all our Canadian friends for knowing, observing what is happening in the USA. So close! And saying it like it is. Not a party but a cult. And it’s growing.
I disagree with whomever thinks calling and emailing are useless. If we don't tell our representatives what we want, they'll think we're happy with the way things are going right now. "If I were to remain silent, I would be guilty of complicity." Albert Einstein
Yes. Sinema and Manchin may be bought and paid for. But that is not the ONLY pressure that can be put on them. We have power too. They know that money is now coming from EVERYWHERE to support people in races where, at one time, those from out of state could be disregarded.
I'm real tired of people saying "it's too late," "letters don't matter." Both are untrue. Moreover, why discourage ANY kind of pressure, any kind of speech? Yup we're on a precipice. We're late to this party. (I sure am. I did not take things seriously these past 30 freakin' years. Took the election of Trump to wake me up and I have shame about that.) But it is not to late to flood these people with our voices. Nothing is over yet. In fact, nothing is *ever* over.
As always, Thank you Ellie for giving us tools that we can use today to DO SOMETHING! instead of sitting by the woodstove wringing our hands and whimpering to ourselves, "Oh dear, oh dear." Now if I can get myself off my butt and follow through.
Thank you. I am so tired of this schoolyard bullying. And Ted Cruz? Go back to Cancun and don't return. I don't see how any of these morons can face themselves in a mirror. Apparently there is no pride of office left among any member of the House or Senate who believe this dirt. I live in a town where in 2 days...2 days...over 15,000 people fell in battle during the Civil War. Is this what we are heading toward? If you don't remember history, you are doomed to repeat it. And we hear this message often from Dr. Richardson. Keep your eyes open, and your minds and pencils sharp!
Yes, I am so tired of it too. The years of Trump were exhausting and it continues. So sad to see leaders behaving with a total lack of respect for anyone, and, their own offices. It's been brewing for a long time but my feeling is that Trump gave everyone permission to give in to their emotions. Leaders saw that they could get away with it. Everyday people are made to feel more powerful by it. And now our children are watching it.
But have no doubt. McCarthy will kick every Democrat off every committee and definitely impeach Biden. Trump will demand it; in fact, I’ taking bets Trump will demand 3 impeachments of Biden so he won’t be the most impeached President in US history.
Thank you for the information. I just emailed my two senators (OH), thanking Brown for his support of voting rights, and asking Portman to vote for America and democracy rather than for his political party. And I thanked them both for their service. Hopefully our input has some kind of positive effect.
Use a relative’s address, or an apartment address (real apartment building) in Maine to write Collins. I use a burner phone #. Say just moved in—they sometimes check voter registration
Don’t forget Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger. Great that they are working with D’S on the Jan.6 Committee, but we need them to vote for the two voting bills in the a Senate as well
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.
There are three major Democratic Donors (all women) who are so pissed at Sinema they are going to start a long term negative-ad campaign against her and recruit an opponent to knock her off in the 2024 primary (if she hasn't switched parties by then).
The rest of what I have to say about that Green traitor (you can NEVER trust a Green to be anything else) has to be filed under "If my thoughts and dreams could be seen/they'd probably put my head in a guillotine."
Ms. Enema is horrible and will be a one-term candidate. She betrayed the progressives she was supposed to help represent by taking up with the enemy. I will not cry when she is ousted.
Here is a question: Could Schumer punish Manchenema by not letting them serve on any committees? Would that be too dangerous? I just think they have to be curbed somehow.
I don’t think she’s smart enough to be a mole. She must have been feeling terribly left out with all of the attention on Manchin. Every time I see her she reminds me of a me too, never an original thought, so she took the opportunity yesterday to stick a knife 🔪 in the president, being clueless as to what she was doing and looking for a moment of fame. Timing is everything and her timing for the good of this nation couldn’t have been worse. Insipid!
Unfortunately, Sinema’s speech was well crafted and sounded like a reasonable call to “end the disease of division” to those not aware of the danger. She gives cover to Republican obstruction.
And yes Fern, her preemptive speech before Biden’s was an insult. She and Manchin are true saboteurs.
We keep hearing suggestions that the only reason Democrats like Manchin and Sinema are refusing to help eliminate the filibuster is that they are beholden to special interests from whom they benefit economically. In fact, a lot has already been written about Manchin's (understandable) connection to Big Coal, and it appears the corruption includes members of his family, but what is the hard proof of that? Is there nothing that might be begging for investigation by the Justice Department?
And what about Sinema? On the front page of today's (14 Jan) digital NYT, I read this:
"WASHINGTON — President Biden’s campaign to push new voting rights protections through Congress appeared all but dead on Thursday, after it became clear that he had failed to unite his own party behind his drive to overhaul Senate rules to enact the legislation over Republican opposition.
In an embarrassing setback for Mr. Biden, Senator Kyrsten Sinema, Democrat of Arizona, stunned her colleagues just hours before the president was slated to make his case to them in person at the Capitol by taking the Senate floor to declare that she would not support undermining the filibuster to pass legislation under any circumstances."
I mean, is she just a MAGAmoron who has managed to infiltrate Democratic Party? How did she get the DEM nomination in AZ? Was her position in any way foreseeable? Why would a so-called "free spirit" want anything to do with a GOP all walking in Fascistoid lockstep? It seems to me we must assume the worst and that she has been bought and paid for. But by whom? Names, dates, and numbers are needed. Have I just missed it?
She was running against Karen Fann, a huge cult Republican, who is president of AZ senate currently and was Republican Party of AZ leader. So Democrats were happy to get her to keep Senate Democratic......same as Manchin. Change in attitude towards her now but AZ Democrats need a good opposition candidate.
Says it all. I wonder if she has a clue that she's a national embarrassment and destined to occupy U.S. history's hall of shame. Probably not. Acute self-absorption is a blinding force.
Damn, Fern! Between you and HCR I can rest assured that the arc of justice is moving. Frankly, I think Sinema has a DSM diagnosis: Borderline Personality Disorder, Narcissism, and possibly Bipolar Disorder. And also accepting bribes disorder.
Terribly British and all that...;stiff upper lip and all! What Manchenema needs is a metaphorical knife in the guts. A Corleone proposition "that they can't refuse".....but that's not "nice", is it?
The distinction is perhaps a little too subtle for the Manchenema brigade to comprehend and unfortunately assumes they are sincere and not just blocking for the Republicans sake. Morning Lynell.
I bow to your superior knowledge of military organizations, Fern, but currently Mancheenema have the metaphorical tanks and they are blasting Biden out of the water while making him look weak and unproductive to the voting population. I come back to Stalin's supposed quote "How many divisions has the Pope got?....and Jean Paul 11 saw off the Iron Curtain and the USSR.
No thanks, Fern, we have enough idiots of our own. She might feel at home with many of our "greenish" loonytunes but they are more interested in killing each other for ideological purity than in fighting the good fight to win.
Roger Stone should be terrified, he recruited the Oath Keepers who were there supposedly to protect him but somehow ended up in an insurrection that resembled Stone's Brooks Brothers Riot. I believe a snippet of convo between Stone and Rhodes on Jan. 6th included Rhodes asking .."so are we doing this?" and Stone replying in the affirmative.
I hope his arrogant A$$ gets everything it deserves, such as a prison sentence for life. Alpha maleness is insidious right now...worldwide. No scruples, no compassion, just money, fun ,and games regardless of the suffering of others.
Fern I recall someone speaking of folks having their “15 minutes of glory.” Sinema, who identifies herself as “bisexual and bipartisan,’ has morphed from being a Green supporter of Ralph Nader in 2000 to being a well-frocked loose cannon today. Whatever else occurs, she will become a political footnote before she reaches 50. If her senseless obstructionism contributes to a McConnell Senate in 2023, she will be in a political wasteland. By the 2024 senatorial election, even in Arizona she will be discarded. A psychiatrist would have a full-time challenge with this bright (PhD) but not intelligent butterfly. (Check the Spanish word—mariposa).
Ralph helped give us W, Sinema a Trojan horse - goal to screw Dems again. She is in my sights, and not in a good way. Joe B - They are not your “friends.” Get real
Jeri, I believe that Ralph Nader's contributions to the health and welfare of the USA earned him enduring respect from many Americans. We would have been better off had we adopted more of his positions.
'Ralph Nader American political activist, author, and attorney noted for his involvement in consumer protection, environmentalism, and government reform.
'Nader was first propelled into the national spotlight with the 1965 publication of his journalistic exposé Unsafe at Any Speed. Though he had previously expressed an interest in issues of automobile safety while a law student, Unsafe at Any Speed presented a critical dissection of the automotive industry by claiming that many American automobiles were generally unsafe to operate. Nader researched case files from more than 100 lawsuits then pending against General Motors' Chevrolet Corvair to support his assertions.[15]'
'In the 1970s, Nader turned his attention to environmental activism, becoming a key leader in the antinuclear power movement, described by one observer as the "titular head of opposition to nuclear energy".[26][27] The Critical Mass Energy Project was formed by Nader in 1974 as a national anti-nuclear umbrella group, growing to become the largest national anti-nuclear group in the United States, with several hundred local affiliates and an estimated 200,000 supporters.[28] The organization's main efforts were directed at lobbying activities and providing local groups with scientific and other resources to campaign against nuclear power.[29][30]'
'Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, through his ongoing work with Public Citizen, Nader continued to be involved in issues of consumer rights and public accountability. His work testifying before Congress, drafting model legislation, and organizing citizen letter-writing and protest efforts, earned him direct credit for the enactment of the Freedom of Information Act, Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, Clean Water Act, Consumer Product Safety Act, and Whistleblower Protection Act.' (Wikipedia)
100% true and admirable. In fact, I was a big fan, and he expressed my views better than anyone, back in the day when the environment, wildlife protections, and the nuclear threat were my biggest concerns. Not our very survival from a political party gone rogue. His giant ego helped with this in my humble opinion. W/Dickie should have been squashed like bugs.
To go up the ladder, you eventually end up with the defeated former president. Back in 1807, Aaron Burr, a former vice-president escaped conviction for treason because the plans he was making with his foot soldiers, similar to the Oathkeepers, were just plans and contrary to what happened on January 6, 2021, were never put into action. Chief Justice Marshall did not consider conspiracy without actions sufficient for conviction. But on January 6, there were actions. And any one of those refusing to appear before the House committee, if speaking under oath where they might tell what they know, can tie those actions to the defeated former president. That's why they won't show up.
Jack Chief Justice Marshall, in his circuit court capacity, was trying Aaron Burr for treason. Marshall loathed President Jefferson (for whom Burr was a bete noir) and was a friend of Alexander Hamilton, who Burr had killed in a duel. Marshall, in Marburv Madison, used convoluted judicial interpretation. Whatever his thinking, Marshall acquitted Burr of treason because, in accordance with the Constitution, there were not at least two witnesses of this act.
I saw (for the first time ever) KS speaking and she was wearing a cross around her neck. Has she always been religious? She was talking about wanting to stop divisiveness. But she doesn't apparently want to acknowledge where it's coming from.
After Simena's preemptive strike on President Biden's effort to reform Senate rules and pass the critical voting rights legislation, I found myself reminding myself that we have to views of government, progressive and conservative, at play. That we have two parties, Democrats and Republicans, hides that reality. Sadly for my party, the conservatives within don't incite progressives across parties to move together toward their common progressive agenda forward. Our traditional congressional seating charts don't help either.
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.
not only undermining the President, but destabilizing the economy, education, the medical community, food supply, etc. A destabilized society is apt to make poor choices.
Great, the death rate is down. What about long-term effects? I have a friend who may never be able to work again because of long COVID. She's had it for over 18 months now. I had it in December and neither my ability to concentrate nor my sense of taste/ smell have fully recovered. Repeat infections are becoming more common and anecdotally more severe. I would honestly rather die than lose my ability to work. I really hope that we don't become cavalier just because fewer folks are dying.
Helga, be of good heart! I lost my career at the age of 49. For 3 years I almost never left the house without assistance. I am now 74 and have the most wonderful life I never could have imagined and would never have had if I had kept working.
Today's local paper warns school boards that the new Virginia Republican Governor is expected to end mask mandates when sworn in this week. Tip of the iceberg...
Like you, I thought there was in fact a Supreme Court precedent for Massachusetts' mandate regarding smallpox vaccinations. Upheld by Mass. Supreme Court and affirmed by the U.S. Supreme Court (1905). https://www.mass.gov/info-details/massachusetts-law-about-vaccination-immunization Page down to Case Law, Jacobson v. Massachusetts (1905).
I'd guess the difference is that the recent ruling was specific to OSHA mandating workplace vaccinations rather than a 'global' mandate for all citizens.
I believe the ruling was that the DOL does not have the authority to set or deliver health care policy. At least, health and safety provisions not specific to the workplace. When Biden chose DOL, clever thought doing so was, I wondered why not Commerce as the downside of Covid is the effects it has on businesses and the economy, workers be dammed.
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).
In a world were logic and facts have both become superfluous it is hardly surprising. The worst to me is that the "NYT/WaPo liberally oriented press are seemingly, with a few exceptions, dealing with this at face value rather than attacking it's underlying meaning while much of the other media actors are standing by and waiting to see who will prevail.....while not jeopardizing their advertizing revenues.
“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.
Why would anyone listen to what these losers say? You can’t trust anything that comes out of their mouths. All lies.
All right TC, let’s address your ever-present long dark tunnel. Paying too much attention to the doom and gloom MSM, as usual. Call me a Linzertorte, accuse me of eating cucumber sandwiches and driving a Swedish car, stick me in the same pigeonhole with those horrid Bernie bros, do your worst, but I think things are getting better. For the longest time, it was Kinzinger and Cheney the Younger all alone in their little life raft, bailing away madly. Now we have Larry Hogan, Mike Rounds and (drum roll combined with Darth Vader theme music) Cheney the Elder and Karl Rove jumping on the Eff-Trump bandwagon. And of course we still have Mitch Windsock crouching there in the wings, waiting for public sentiment to change so that he can crawl out of his cowardly box and speak up.
And, another drum roll please, news reports that Orange Crapsickle may have had an ominous conversation with Fani Willis’s team. I have examined the circumstantial evidence, and I do believe that he has been informed that he’s going to have his a$$ indicted.
After a 14 hour work shift, I should have already face-planted into bed but noooo instead I’m here busting TC’s chops (and amusing him in the process).
"Mitch Windsock" Perfect! If the DOJ throws a few sedition charges into the Senate chamber the "Windsock" won't "need a weatherman to see what way the wind blows."
They could start a team, The Windsox, would be catchy.
Roland I can acuse you of many things, but never of eating a cucumber sandwich or driving a Swedish car (or semi). But, maybe the occasional avocado toast and a good Subaru engine? I agree wholeheartedly with you on this: I, too, see so many signs of things getting better, from local to national. And this terrible dark tunnel thing (Thank You, TC) is already catalyzing remarkable and effective political action, thanks to folks like Cathy Learoyd, Ellie Kona and Annette of "Heather"s Herd." Plus, a whole lotta Republicans are waking up and smelling the economy. Why risk the return of more "del Lardos" (what do you call tRump TC?), tanking a good thing.
I saw my paternal Oma a few times a year during my teens, but none of the other three grandparents. My mother was the great baker in our family, especially at Christmas time, like your Oma.
My Oma was a tough, hard, very German lady. She didn’t have the easiest life - my grandparents came here with my dad in 1939, and it was pretty hard to be German here during the war. She was Rh negative and lost all her pregnancies after my dad, and her sister was killed right after the war, which I think she never got over. Her family was in Freiburg, and there were some awfully lean years after the war, while she was here, safe, and feeling guilty.
All that being said, I’ve tried to keep those traditions alive, so I bake Linzertorte, haselnussmakronen, leckerli, and lebkuchen from her recipes (a complete mess of German and English, metric and imperial all mixed up but I treasure them) at Christmas.
We may have lost George Carlton but I’m thanking Roland’s Parents for as good as a stand in. You give me Hope and Humor when it’s needed most. Thank You Roland. I know you sleep well.😂❤️🦋
Thank you Ellie, I needed to remember that. The real work of change is usually hidden until it isn’t. Tipping points seem sudden, but, are the result of sustained effort, often unseen.
TC, "we are looking into the mouth of a long dark tunnel".
Maybe.
But, I have been thinking. I don't want to list all of the ways that our Democracy has underperformed for the mainstream American over the last forty years. But, I do want to state that: American Democracy has underperformed for those who were not blessed to get advanced education and lucky enough to be white.
Now, the folks who have been manipulated by Fox and Friends, OAN, Trump, etc., to believe that they want a "strong man" (if you can somehow swallow Trump as anything but the coward he is). Rank and file Pubs have been conditioned to believe that people like me, like you are not American and don't deserve the jobs they USED to have.
Maybe, TC, we are entering a phase of reaction that is healthy?
Let's say the Republicans manage to overthrow the government and occupy all three branches of government again.
Do you think that inflation is going to go away with Republicans in charge? Republicans have been the main sponsor of deficit spending since 1980.
Do you think that corporations are going to bring back jobs with Republicans in charge?
Do you think that anything is actually going to get better for the poorly educated white folks that are all currently sinking in our econmy?
The probability is almost 1.0 that, when Trump and the Pubs take over the economy will tank, widespread economic chaos will ensue and ...
folks will become unhappy with their newfound autocracy.
Maybe this is what is supposed to happen TC. Maybe what is happening is NEEDED.
Because, even I feel bitter at all of the friends I have seen fired as oursourcing took their jobs and pushed them into hard times for the last forty years.
Even I feel bitter that my taxes always went up while big Republican and Democrat donors taxes always went down.
Even I feel bitter that manufacturing that my friends could have designed very well, and, implemented was handed off to overseas third party "engineers" in India (but, they made it cheap, just don't take too many pharma products, might have rat parts in them).
So, TC, I am choosing to remain optimistic. In 2009 we had a huge opportunity to let the economy collapse after Bush and the Pubs collapsed it.....and let people starve in the streets to see what it is like when Pubs are in charge. Instead, Obama printed money and soft landed the economy to cloak poor Republican policy.
TC. LET THEM HAVE THEIR AUTOCRACY.
Then? Let's see what happens. But, I would bet BIG money that Pubs will convert a fairly tepid econonomy into a complete, bottomless disaster much as Pubs did from 1919 to 1929.
Right?? Trump is the KING of Bankruptcy ..... remember. That is the only thing he has ever been successful at.
So, if that is your long dark tunnel come true, maybe it is needed.
But, humans aren't the only ones caught in the chaos - our biosphere will cop it big time - further reducing the likelihood of our continuing survival on earth - it's a FAR bigger thing than Rethugs vs Democrats. Far Bigger.
Hugh, of course I agree with you that Republicans will not act responsibly in any domain, environment, finance, industry, etc. That is their history.
However, what I am proposing offers (I hypothesize) a path to PEACEFUL resolution of this current crisis in Democracy born out of America's past failures of Democracy.
We cannot solve the current crisis without recognizing its origins.
I don't want to see Americans fighting each other in the streets over a past form of government that, in fact, has been of limited value to many Americans.
I do want to see all of this resolved peacefully EVEN given the Right's desire to burn it down with violence.
So, "let them have their cake" is a well known approach to problem solving.
The problem seems to be to me, that if the Republicans/Trumpians get in, the speed of their dismantling of the environmental constraints (let alone social ones) will be fast - and it will be "Drill, Baby, Drill", "Burn, Baby burn", "Log, Baby, Log" and shoot them varmints. Remember there are a significant proportion of citizens, who would be only too happy to do that, and are waiting for the signal. Perhaps read..... https://www.greenpeace.org/international/story/51904/dont-look-up-climate-change-review/
No kidding. I just watched ‘ Butterfly’s Blueprints ‘ on PBS. Highly recommend . Once they are gone we are not far behind.It is amazing what the Scientist are learning about them that will, if not lost, help us in all areas of life . I’m happy to report from their most recent decline there had been an increase. Also Moths. Fascinating !
Yes, the number of monarchs on my farm where I have a 25 acre field of goldenrod and milkweed to help sustain them, are down every single year.
BUT, that is mostly because of Nicotinide pesticides introduced in the 1970's. Spraying that stuff kills every living thing. And, billions of tons are in the soil.
This is where we need more than the Heart symbol on here. Glad you appreciate and understand how important they are to us. But so 🥲to hear about all the toxins. Do you all still have the What we called the “ Lightning Bugs ? “ In the summer up there we would have so much fun catching them in our jar’s and of course letting them go. Here in FL it used to rain tree frogs back up until the ‘90’s’. Not anymore.
Something that I haven't seen any discussion on yet in my 45 minute perusal of the LFAA and (my guess) half the comments is the SCUMTOUS decision regarding vaccine and mask mandates under OSHA. That decision, right there is what got my brain activated at 0430 this morning and made it unable for me to return to slumber.
Of course, the stolen SCOTUS seats have now made it possible to gut OSHA, Clean water/air/soil acts, and anything else that puts the whiff of restraint on capitalism.
Your recitation of the loss of the middle class through outsourcing and the near collapse of the financial system coupled with a SCUMTOUS that will now decide, in lockstep, to derail any business regulations and wiping out any gains that have been made by people that are not white, Christian, cisgendered, heterosexual men may just be the best description of true anti-democracy that these people seem to want. Let them have it, and see where it goes.
The Supreme Court majority will have death on its hands. Its ruling essentially declares that if a covid-infected employee comes to work, they don't represent an occupational hazard.
The ruling was based in part on the fact that OSHA didn't distinguish between the risk of covid infections based on types of work. Making hundreds of such distinctions is impossible given the number of known and unknown variables. And we would have seen an avalanche of lawsuits regarding the distinctions. Now if states had imposed the same federal mandate that the court shot down, the conservative justices would have said no problem.
With each new ruling, the court is eating away at the federal government's authority. It seems to want not a nation but a collection of 50 countries. (Breaking news: viruses don't recognize state borders.)
Let's remember that the Supreme Court's authority, as now exercised, isn't explicitly granted in the Constitution. It derives from Marbury v. Madison, which in 1803 established the principle of judicial review as well as the power of federal courts to declare legislative and executive acts unconstitutional. What does the court's current majority of constitutional orginalists say to that? Safe bet that Marbury v. Madison is a court precedent that unlike so many others they wouldn't ignore.
"What can you do? Call your Senators and Representatives and tell them that Congress must expand the Supreme Court by passing the Judiciary Act of 2021 as a first step to reestablishing the rule of law and the supremacy of the Constitution. You can reach your congressional representatives by following the links in Chop Wood, Carry Water 12/10 - by Jessica Craven"
I am sick about how far dt’s reach has gone and how bleak the future can look when we consider the racist, homophobic, greedy, hypocritical, characterless, heartless and spineless people who have taken over our federal judicial and legislative branches, as well as those in so many states.
Somehow, Luke, Leia and Han, Gandalf and Frodo, and Harry, Hermione and Ron all beat back the bad guys against impossible odds. We can do this, right? Somehow, we have to do this. Win more seats this year and pass BBB and Voters Rights.
I think it is fairly easy to predict "where it goes" Ally. It might be useful to just let it happen. Now, I am definitely doing what I can with my local stuff here, with my relatives etc.
But, as all of these boards ramp excitement up, I am starting to get an eerie feeling that some are pushing for some militia formation on the left, which, honestly, is warranted given the number of right wing militias' out there.
I am just not sure that "Civil War" is worth it. Was it last time? Here in Penfield the Civil War cemetery is HUGE. So many young men in such a small northeast outpost in 1865.
Last time we fought a giant civil war, freed the slaves, only to have the "free" men systematically terrorized, thrown into jail where slave labor WAS still LEGAL, and on and on.
All those dead young men in my local cemetary? I am just not sure if it was all worthwhile.
We will not only watch, we ALL will suffer. Maybe as it should be. But the money will buy lifeboats and the money will sail away to the private estates, while we struggle to breathe. Long dark tunnels can be long indeed.
Mike, I think you are on to something profound. Systems (and people) don't transform until they hit bottom and become completely dysfunctional. So, yes that is probably what needs to happen for the transformation to come forward. Duane Elgin had this nailed 40 years ago but nobody was listening, see https://duaneelgin.com/the-limits-to-complexity-are-bureaucracies-becoming-unmanageable/
Perhaps. However, I don't want to paint American Democracy as such a bright, shiny, untarnished penny that we get everyone in the streets to start killing each other over it.
If you add up all the people who have been "left behind" by "American Democracy" over its history, well, it is not clear to my data analytics trained brain, that dying for it makes sense.
I am not advocating for a Trump based dynasty mind you. What I am saying is what I learned in Phsysics: For every action, there an equal and opposite reaction.
WITHOUT that equal and opposite reaction, well, the earth would have no natural stability.
So, maybe what we see happening, as repugnant as it is to think of someone like Trump leading that reaction, maybe it is what should NATURALLY occur.
Stopping it legally? Maybe we can.
But, I do not want Americans fighting in the streets killing each other over what has been, historically, an only partially successful form of government. American Democracy.
Just think about all the kids in Cambodia who have been blown up by our buried bombs over the last 60 years. Just that one statement gives you a picture of a big problem in America.
Many thanks for presenting a valuable viewpoint on all this. It matches a strange dream I had this morning: I was being chased and running and running full of fear. I finally turned around to see what/who was chasing me and it was a skinny man. I thought why am I running and tiring myself out for this? So I slowed down and turned around to face him (my fears). I felt very calm suddenly and the dream stopped. Whilst reading comments here this morning, like how scary the Manch-enemas are seemingly thwarting our voting rights, I felt that familiar fear rising again. Slithering past the side of my head like a large, furry snake hissing a deep, sneering sound that it is coming for me, again. I could feel it's stench too near me. That familiar anxiety of the past six years of fighting against the relentless fear of rising fascism and autocracy. It feeds off our fears. When I read Mike S.'s words just now, I felt the fear subside for a second time this morning.
We can either be deer frozen in the headlights of fear and depression, or we can choose to face our fears and use our good energy to do whatever we can from a place of being centered and knowing who really carries the Light and to use it well for the benefit of all, including this beautiful sphere we depend upon for Life. This community of thinkers, soul-searchers and activists use words and actions like Lightsabers (Star Wars fans...is that what they are called?). After taking much needed breaks, pull out your Lightsaber and use it in whatever way works for you— but do it out of LOVE for what we want to create, not out of FEAR of repeating atrocities of the past (dark egos), or the much better Unknown, Yet to Be Created. The dark orange ones depend upon your fear to control you. When faced with these seemingly moronic, reversed-life entities...just look them in the eyes with pity, for they know not what they do ( or maybe their job is to help you see your new kind of power rise up?). Tap them with your Lightsaber. Oh, oh! And maybe as you knight them on both shoulders with your Light, say unto them, "Go out into the world and do unto others as you would have others do unto you!" And walk away and join your Light-giving friends in creating the new world waiting for us. It might be really fun--- and we certainly much higher senses of humor than the dark ones. Do they have any nighttime comedians or Saturday Night Live satirists? If the shadow dweller truly laughed, their faces might shatter into a thousand shards.
For the rest of us who feel compassion and empathy for All The People, it is hard to escape the labor pains of birthing something new and much better. There is a crack in everything. Each of US can shine our Lightsabers into the darkness. Just take turns to re-charge when necessary. We are in this for the long-haul, because deep change will be worth it. Maybe that is why we are all here at this time? To help one another mid-wife The Great Golden Rule Experiment in America? For All the People & the Planet this time?
Thanks, Mike, Ellie and Roland for some good inspiration this morning!
Penelope, dang (as they say down south), being chased by skinny man!
Not good!
I defintely don't recommend fear. About anything. It is not hard to train yourself not to ever feel fear. In fact, by the time I left my old farm I only ever felt (feel) either happy, or peeved.
Those are both healthy, action oriented emotions. Fear just paralyzes.
So, next time you start feeling intmidated either smile, or frown and get peeved.
Yes, I know peevishness! Much preferable to fear. But when I feel fear or hear about others, it does tend to tap into my inner angel in wanting to face things squarely and make things right. Fascists are really good at spreading fear and my friends of color, Jewish friends, the elderly and women friends are pretty frightened—and for valid reasons. I think you understand that well. Today, I am feeling uplifted by my dream symbols, your words, our working justice system, and our collective powers to try to solve very old problems in new ways.
I vow to keep speaking quietly (with an occasional rant) and carry a big Lightsaber!
Mike, I agree. There should be no fighting. Democracy was never the unblemished prize that some think it was.
I feel like we've been holding an incredibly heavy box filled with supposedly "better things". Maybe it is time to put it down and let someone else play the game. Maybe they have "better things".
As the adage goes- everything happens for a reason.
Native "removal" (which actually means extermination).
Slavery (including horrors beyond belief that were legal).
Jim Crow
Segregation (formally by Federal "Red Lining")
Preventing some Americans from getting loans for housing.
Vietnam (where we invaded a country that was trying to free itself from Colonial rule and wantonly and with abandon killed innocent humans for 20 years).
Outsourcing, pushing many into poverty that were middle class.
Offshoring of America's manufacturing (now this bites in so many ways).
Afghanistan (where America killed innocent humans for 20 years for the simple goal of enriching military contractors).
Iraq (where America has killed innocent humans for 20 years for the simple goal of enriching military contractors.
btw: I am sure this list of limitations associated with "American Democracy" is very, very partial.
In this time, when everyone in the West is supposed to be upset by Russia's push for a "zone of interest", you might also remind of the US relationship to Latin America.
You speak for me.Did any Repubs give back their Stimulus $ ? How about this . Why don’t they all tell their Boss’s they will work Monday at Reg. Pay ? What really BMA !( Burns My Ass ! ) They being the most Privileged, Whine and Complain the Most ! So Over It !
First thing I do in the morning and the last thing I do at night. I try to keep it to a minimum in between . Half the world lives on less than $5.00 a day. And it doesn’t make me p a Socialist because I have empathy for those less fortunate that I.
The press corps wants a horse race and a lot of melodrama. Meanwhile, 2020 is turning into another Lost Cause. The south has won so many times that it doesn’t understand or recognize losing. Elections end when the loser concedes. If the loser doesn’t concede, what then? It ain’t over til we say it’s over? That will not happen.
Democratic down ballot candidates and election turnout are the things to not just hang onto, but to get our rears in gear to actively support. Walk our talk!
IMO, that’s no port, it’s more storm. We need it anyway, but it only makes these days harder.
We have to coordinate it with the heavy lift of winning more people over to the side of democracy. We can’t punish people into changing their political views, that never works.
I don’t know how, except to quit doubting ourselves.
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..."
Love your phrase "engaging with complexity", for I feel that is what too few humans are willing to do or are capable of. At the moment however, I am finding the complexity of our times utterly overwhelming and am giving in to the conclusion that chaos is going to win this one in the short and long term. The entire planet and all its human systems are being destroyed right before my eyes. And I feel like putting my hands up. But thanks for your turn of phrase!
Glad to hear from you, Margaret! Agree that the chaos feels quite overwhelming. And. Those who would insist that democracy is a poor choice are RELYING on our feeling overwhelmed and giving up AS A STRATEGY to advance an anti-democracy agenda. Which is part of what helps me to push back when I can. And...
Nature is resilient and abundant. A teacher of mine recently said that if/when we do destroy life on this planet, over time it will return. In new form. Kind of a metaphysical framework and maybe too lofty but it helps me to think about how to proceed. Also, as an educator, I have to figure out a way to keep showing up for work (in theory and in practice, haha). Sending you a virtual cup of ginger tea and warm regards, pg
"you [Dr. Richardson] are providing readers with a practice of engaging with complexity - the opposite of what has happened to news media/the (so-called) free press."
"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.
❤️
Thank you for posting peaceful, action oriented methods to preserved Democracy.
Peaceful, action-oriented methods to preserve democracy are insufficient. Letters to Senators may make you feel good, but they rarely sway them. The foes of democracy (although they claim they are its true defenders) are willing, if necessary, to break the law and turn to violence to achieve their goals which include the resortation of the defeated former president by these means. HCR makes that clear. On one side are the lawbreakers and their violent supporters. On the other are the American people, represented by government. In many States the foes of democracy have already taken over the governments, often by democratic means, and they are aiming to do that to the Federal government as well. The Federal government, while it still is in the hands of the people, must quickly defend itself with more meaningful actions, especially by the Department of Justice. If that doesn't succeed, American democracy's last line of defense will have to be the Department of Defense, hoping it doesn't behave against insurrection as General McClelland did before Lincoln got rid of him. Congress and our Judicial system are already compromised. Only the Executive branch remains. It is much, much, later than we think.
"last line of defense will have to be the Department of Defense".
I am not exactly sure how that would work. US Soldiers are unlikely to participate in domestic events and it would be a bad idea to have them get involved.
The US Army members are split just like regular Americans. Also, the largest US Army bases are in the south and 44% of the US Army are born and raised southerners. (wikipidea).
To hope that the US Army would interecede in some form of protection action on domestic streets is to roll the dice big time.
They take an oath ... and would have to follow orders, like they did in the Whiskey Rebellion. If the fear of their refusal to act makes military involvement unlikely, the game is over and democracy by election will have been traded in for democracy by those who shout the loudest (which is what is happening to school boards.)
Exactly.
Can the metro, country, and state police handle the combined miltia's, a coalition of Oath Keepers, 3%'ers, Proud Boys etc? And if they can, will they?
Ted, "who can handle the right wing militia's" (your high level question).
Answer: We Can.
But, should we? I am not sure yet.
Reading this indictment, seems like this is to big a job for local and state cops. https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/leader-oath-keepers-and-10-other-individuals-indicted-federal-court-seditious-conspiracy-and
Jack, Dr. Barbara F. Walter is right there with you.
Thank you for introducing me to her.
My pleasure! I think Dr. Richardson should have Dr Walter on her pod cast. It’s that good of a book and analysis.
Many HCR readers are finding Robert Hubbell to be a good addition to daily reading:
"See The Economist, “An expert on civil war issues a warning about America—But Barbara Walter Exaggerates.” The Economist writes,
These are all grave problems. But they do not portend civil conflict. Ms Walter mentions only fleetingly some of the reasons why today’s America is not like the former Yugoslavia or other imploding states. No country as sophisticated, modern, liberal and democratic as contemporary America has ever descended into civil war."
(sorry--paywall)
https://roberthubbell.substack.com/p/do-not-relent
Scholars said the same thing about 1920-1932 Germany! At that time Germany was the most educated, most technologically advanced, and most liberal democracy in the world!
True. We'd have to read Walter's book for ourselves. But we already have alarms sounded and the information to take action to prevent a bloody civil war by doing our part to wage the ideological one.
I don't think Robert Hubell read the book yet. He just cut and pasted from The Economist article. Reading the economist article, I doubt they read the whole book either.
So what measures do you think would be "sufficient"?
First, immediate and agressive prosecution of lawbreakers by the DOJ, including those for which they have evidence of their having instigated the lawbreaking. (Look how long it took for the Oathkeepers leader to be arrested.) And only if that doesn't work, opposing armed insurrectionists with military force, as Washington did with the Whiskey Rebellion might be needed. Actually, the threat of that, or perhaps just one incident, might suffice. The First Amendment's right to protest cannot be combined with the Second Amendment's right to bear arms to permit violent armed groups which support lawbreaking to continue to exist. This might sound like Civil War but it might be the best way of preventing one.
I don't assume that the DOJ was twiddling their thumbs on the Oathkeepers and the countless others they are going after. I don't know if it could have gone faster. Maybe. But I do know that you want the best evidence you can get to try to secure a conviction before you charge someone and we have no idea how long that takes in very complex cases like this.
To your other point: Yes, agreed, that may well be necessary. There will be another attempt in some form, and it may be much more organized and effective.
But what we are talking about here is also necessary: Re-codifying voter protection. Talking here about the silent coup that is going on right now, where military force is not a democratic option.
Nomi, thoughtful. I don’t know how many times it needs to be said but serious widespread prosecutions need to work their way up, solidify the evidence, before prosecuting the ones higher up Who will be preparing sophisticated defenses with some of the best lawyers in this country. This takes time and it seems to be proceeding in that way.
We are barely keeping the lid on an even more widespread violent uprising. So many people in this country and conservative politicians have become untethered from our democracy.
The Capitol police are a good example of a measured response, meaning not firing on the insurrectionists which would have resulted shortly thereafter in an armed, meaning bullets and assault weapons, used by the insurrectionists. I am so very proud of these men and women of the Capitol police Who paid such a dear price for their measured response.
I am so ashamed of the people Particularly the politicians who have stoked the big lie, who objected wholesale to the electoral vote count, and are standing in the way of voter rights legislation like the John Lewis act.
"with law, our land shall rise, but it will perish with lawlessness" -Njal's Saga ( from The Road to Unfreedom, Tim Snyder
And as we sing in "America, the Beautiful," .... 'confirm thy soul in self-control, thy liberty in law.'
Doubtless the DOJ will connect the Oath Keepers to the real conspirators in a year or so.
You're wrong. The indictments yesterday of the Oath Keepers and the evidence released show the challenging complexity of DOJ's work. Also, a Trump holdover in the Justice Department had undermined the investigation, making it all the more remarkable that DOJ was able to build a solid seditious conspiracy case. The dominoes are falling. Bigger ones are ahead in relatively short order.
But let the dominoes fall quickly. Every day they continue to be able to sow dissent, spread their lies and organize their supporters is a day closer to the dangerous endgame I fear.
Who's the JD holdover? What did they do?
Michael Sherwin. He was leading the DOJ investigation as U.S. attorney for DC, appointed by Barr. His public comments about the investigation, including on 60 Minutes, early last year were interpreted by some as an attempt to sabotage the probe. Thus his departure. The NYT this week reported that he blocked prosecutors who sought a search warrant on Stewart Rhodes, the Oath Keepers leader. Sherwin reportedly cited lack of probable cause and potential violations of Rhodes' civil rights.
https://apnews.com/article/capitol-siege-government-and-politics-85570e719f84e47c6f1b01edcedb58a5
https://www-nytimes-com.cdn.ampproject.org/v/s/www.nytimes.com/2021/04/27/us/politics/justice-department-capitol-riot-investigation.amp.html
Guy's name was John Demers. Fairly high up, requiring Senate approval. Got rid of him in June, 2021. Should have been done much sooner, but Garland could only do so much in his early days on the job.
Lordy! I hope so !
It has to be done while the Democrats still control the House. A year or so, as you sarcastically point out, will be too late.
No. The indictment of the Oath Keepers was based on a DOJ investigation. The AG and his team aren't going anywhere as long as Biden is president. The House J6 committee will be disbanded, assuming the Republicans take the House, but that wouldn't be until the end of the year. The committee plans to make criminal referrals to DOJ and no doubt will turn over all its evidence as well. The committee has vowed to finish this year, as early as summer but definitely before the election.
Partially sarcastic. Trump hasn’t yet showed any fear of DOJ. He and family have ranted against state justice departments in New York and Georgia because he has perceived a real and *imminent* threat from them. To this point he has said nothing about Garland. That, to me, is a tell.
I expect that the usual suspects (Bannon and Stone) will get indicted. But not in a blur of sudden movement.
But I think Garland is too much of an institutionalist to go higher. Reps/Senators will not be charged at all. Or at least until the fever breaks. Those at Meadows’ level will be kicked further down the line. And it’s Inconceivable he’ll charge Trump.
Investigations don’t have to go bottom to top. Two different ones could go on in parallel. If there was any sign that the upper echelons were being investigated, then we would have heard something by now.
Garland could charge Trump based on the Mueller report alone.
Too many ‘i’s to dot and ‘t’s too cross. Too much brutal infighting.
Effectively, the public was thrown a bone yesterday.
We're reading Garland differently. If the DOJ ends up with persuasive evidence that anyone committed crimes involving the coup attempt — including Trump — they will be charged. And the evidence is like an iceberg: the public can see a lot now but the majority of it is out of sight and in the hands of investigators.
Eric you have rebuked Garland and posited his faults based on what have appeared to be your personal feelings for months. When an important breakthrough in terms of indictments for seditious conspiracies transpires, which most legal experts agree is significant, you continue to debunk. You may have have a substantive argument based on your knowledge of the law or reports, which you have not shared. So far, it appears to me that you have the negative on automatic pilot.
Eric, I received your reply in answer to my attempt at understanding your negative opinion of Merrick Garland, and I am eager to continue our exchange. Unfortunately, your rich elaboration about the USA and Garland is not on the forum. I have searched. Do you mind posting it again after my initial post to you. Thank you.
You're probably correct, but now that you mention the Mueller report, couldn't Garland act on what it says, countermanding former AG Bill Barr's refusal to do so? The House Committee investigating January 6 has added considerably more evidence than what Mueller found. Former VP Aaron Burr was tried for treason in 1808 for much less. (and got off.)
They don’t have a year.
The Justice Department has until Jan. 20, 2025.
Just doing something—anything—helps assuage the helpless feelings.
As a Canadian watching IMO if GOP get control of Congress in 2022 midterms they will impeach Biden and Harris and install trump illegally. They won't wait til 2024. All rules procedures are off the table with a fascist cult. They are NOT a party They are a dangerous cult. Jan 6 was practice.
Question: How is it that there are no scholars , or elected members of Congress that can make a persuasive argument to Manchin and Sinema? Surely there are enough smarter people than these 2 Senators that could educate them on the risks, history and fascist cults.
Praying for my American friends. The ripple effect across the globe is huge if American democracy falls. "When America gets a cold the world gets a cough"
"How is it that there are no scholars , or elected members of Congress that can make a persuasive argument to Manchin and Sinema?"
I suspect many have tried. It appears greed, money, power and cowardice are directing the Republicans and those like Manchin andSinema. You are correct. This isn't a political party. It's a cult.
Can we come live with you if any of this happens? We can be your extended family. I clean very well…
I may have to build that extension I've been dreaming of!
I spent time in Toronto a few months ago and I want to live there. Not really my time of life for a major move, but I’m grateful to you and all our Canadian friends for knowing, observing what is happening in the USA. So close! And saying it like it is. Not a party but a cult. And it’s growing.
Money talks are all they have ears for
Who was it who said , “You cant be sold if you’ve already bought been bought “ ?
Calling and sending letters is not "useless" as some here are saying. It never has been. If Ellie's very good list above is too much for you right now, here is Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez form for people to write Sinema and Manchin telling them to vote for an exception to the filibuster for voting protection. Ocasio-Cortez reaches tens of millions of people. Emails may be easier to ignore. But hundreds of thousands, a million emails? It takes few seconds: https://act.ocasiocortez.com/letter/ads-ea-facebook-manchin-sinema-voting-rights?source=ads_MS_AOC_20220113-EA-FB-FilibusterLetter_ntlfbadslal1-Natl-1865U-MF_a002-AOC-Chyron-stat-1200x1200-Text1&fbclid=IwAR2JEaR9DwFadZOgyYNu5-aziQfvuPfBhGL0BR1HgL2Qiz82q_7CDcX0WcU
EDIT: After you message them, you will get an email with their phone numbers and a script.
I disagree with whomever thinks calling and emailing are useless. If we don't tell our representatives what we want, they'll think we're happy with the way things are going right now. "If I were to remain silent, I would be guilty of complicity." Albert Einstein
The letters and calls and emails are tallied. Numbers do count.
Yes. Sinema and Manchin may be bought and paid for. But that is not the ONLY pressure that can be put on them. We have power too. They know that money is now coming from EVERYWHERE to support people in races where, at one time, those from out of state could be disregarded.
I'm real tired of people saying "it's too late," "letters don't matter." Both are untrue. Moreover, why discourage ANY kind of pressure, any kind of speech? Yup we're on a precipice. We're late to this party. (I sure am. I did not take things seriously these past 30 freakin' years. Took the election of Trump to wake me up and I have shame about that.) But it is not to late to flood these people with our voices. Nothing is over yet. In fact, nothing is *ever* over.
AMEN!
Amen!
Done! Easy-peasy and fast. 💙
As always, Thank you Ellie for giving us tools that we can use today to DO SOMETHING! instead of sitting by the woodstove wringing our hands and whimpering to ourselves, "Oh dear, oh dear." Now if I can get myself off my butt and follow through.
the resistbot is as easy as a click, click....please do it
Thank you. I am so tired of this schoolyard bullying. And Ted Cruz? Go back to Cancun and don't return. I don't see how any of these morons can face themselves in a mirror. Apparently there is no pride of office left among any member of the House or Senate who believe this dirt. I live in a town where in 2 days...2 days...over 15,000 people fell in battle during the Civil War. Is this what we are heading toward? If you don't remember history, you are doomed to repeat it. And we hear this message often from Dr. Richardson. Keep your eyes open, and your minds and pencils sharp!
Yes, I am so tired of it too. The years of Trump were exhausting and it continues. So sad to see leaders behaving with a total lack of respect for anyone, and, their own offices. It's been brewing for a long time but my feeling is that Trump gave everyone permission to give in to their emotions. Leaders saw that they could get away with it. Everyday people are made to feel more powerful by it. And now our children are watching it.
it is only about power, position and money...period.
But have no doubt. McCarthy will kick every Democrat off every committee and definitely impeach Biden. Trump will demand it; in fact, I’ taking bets Trump will demand 3 impeachments of Biden so he won’t be the most impeached President in US history.
Thanks Ellie. I’d also suggest adding Senator Lisa Murkowski to the list. She’s going to be primaried by Trumpists and she’s got some grit.
Good call!
Lisa Mukowski @lisamurkowski
Thank you for the information. I just emailed my two senators (OH), thanking Brown for his support of voting rights, and asking Portman to vote for America and democracy rather than for his political party. And I thanked them both for their service. Hopefully our input has some kind of positive effect.
I found myself doing exactly that this morning, and emailing my democratic senators to thank them for their support.
We cannot let a junta undermine our democracy.
Thank you, Ellie!
They will only listen to their own constituents and if its Susan Collins she won't listen at all. But we try anyway.
Use a relative’s address, or an apartment address (real apartment building) in Maine to write Collins. I use a burner phone #. Say just moved in—they sometimes check voter registration
Brain.
Heart and guts
Thank you for your post, Ellie.
Done, Ellie! Thank you.
Don’t forget Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger. Great that they are working with D’S on the Jan.6 Committee, but we need them to vote for the two voting bills in the a Senate as well
Cheney and Kinzinger are in the House, not the Senate.
Thank
You so much for this post!!
Thank you so much for this. Ellie!!
Thank YOU!
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.
There are three major Democratic Donors (all women) who are so pissed at Sinema they are going to start a long term negative-ad campaign against her and recruit an opponent to knock her off in the 2024 primary (if she hasn't switched parties by then).
The rest of what I have to say about that Green traitor (you can NEVER trust a Green to be anything else) has to be filed under "If my thoughts and dreams could be seen/they'd probably put my head in a guillotine."
Ms. Enema is horrible and will be a one-term candidate. She betrayed the progressives she was supposed to help represent by taking up with the enemy. I will not cry when she is ousted.
Here is a question: Could Schumer punish Manchenema by not letting them serve on any committees? Would that be too dangerous? I just think they have to be curbed somehow.
That moniker for the "senator" from Arizona tickles my junior high humor.
And Senators Manchenema!
I thought Don Quixote already represented La Mancha in the Senate.
I like your moniker for her!
Me too!
Shine on, Marlene!
Unfortunately, "can't live with 'em, can't kill 'em." Do that and they become independent and caucus with Mitch.
😃🙂🙃😃
TC, name names. Better than 3, there looks to be organized moneyed groups:
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/elections/could-sen-kyrsten-sinema-face-primary-these-progressives-are-trying-n1280392
That came from an article in Puck News - Teddy Schlieffer knows who is who but he said he wasn't mentioning names and hasn't.
Okay, that's something, TC, but not ENOUGH!
Re-read the additional. :-)
What a delight!
If you want more of TC’s sizzlin’ comments on this topic, see his essay on Substack today. Especially if you feel the need to spit on Sen Sinema’s fan club. The one in Russia. https://tcinla757.substack.com/p/god-damn-kyrsten-sinema-all-to-hell?r=l2aa7&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&utm_source=direct.
Can't go to jail for thinking. I hope
She is as low as any “republican.” And she is deliberate. A mole it seems
I don’t think she’s smart enough to be a mole. She must have been feeling terribly left out with all of the attention on Manchin. Every time I see her she reminds me of a me too, never an original thought, so she took the opportunity yesterday to stick a knife 🔪 in the president, being clueless as to what she was doing and looking for a moment of fame. Timing is everything and her timing for the good of this nation couldn’t have been worse. Insipid!
I think her timing is determined by when the checks cash.
Better off playing poker with them first. Gives you the lay of their hand.
I'm sure that she is "owned". I doubt she has the ability to be a good mole.
Unfortunately, Sinema’s speech was well crafted and sounded like a reasonable call to “end the disease of division” to those not aware of the danger. She gives cover to Republican obstruction.
And yes Fern, her preemptive speech before Biden’s was an insult. She and Manchin are true saboteurs.
Sinema's hypocrisy, while not at the level of Mitch McConnell's, was on full display. https://twitter.com/Lawrence/status/1481688417293398017?s=20
Were the tears an act? I don’t understand the crying. One could imagine she had a gun to her head? What the heck?
Tears FOR the Dems….$$$ FROM the Repubs…look at her donors
Her words didn’t seem like she was feeling any “tears” for the Dems to me though? I thought I was hearing GOP talking points thru and thru?
Exactly, they were crocodile tears..
We keep hearing suggestions that the only reason Democrats like Manchin and Sinema are refusing to help eliminate the filibuster is that they are beholden to special interests from whom they benefit economically. In fact, a lot has already been written about Manchin's (understandable) connection to Big Coal, and it appears the corruption includes members of his family, but what is the hard proof of that? Is there nothing that might be begging for investigation by the Justice Department?
And what about Sinema? On the front page of today's (14 Jan) digital NYT, I read this:
"WASHINGTON — President Biden’s campaign to push new voting rights protections through Congress appeared all but dead on Thursday, after it became clear that he had failed to unite his own party behind his drive to overhaul Senate rules to enact the legislation over Republican opposition.
In an embarrassing setback for Mr. Biden, Senator Kyrsten Sinema, Democrat of Arizona, stunned her colleagues just hours before the president was slated to make his case to them in person at the Capitol by taking the Senate floor to declare that she would not support undermining the filibuster to pass legislation under any circumstances."
I mean, is she just a MAGAmoron who has managed to infiltrate Democratic Party? How did she get the DEM nomination in AZ? Was her position in any way foreseeable? Why would a so-called "free spirit" want anything to do with a GOP all walking in Fascistoid lockstep? It seems to me we must assume the worst and that she has been bought and paid for. But by whom? Names, dates, and numbers are needed. Have I just missed it?
her financial worth has risen dramatically since winning election and now her greatest fund raisers are republican donors.
🤬🤬🤬
She was running against Karen Fann, a huge cult Republican, who is president of AZ senate currently and was Republican Party of AZ leader. So Democrats were happy to get her to keep Senate Democratic......same as Manchin. Change in attitude towards her now but AZ Democrats need a good opposition candidate.
Video of her from 2010 flopping the other direction. https://briantylercohen.com/videos/
And this is beyond disgusting. It’s like she crapped all over something sacred to me. She really is despicable. https://mobile.twitter.com/SenatorSinema/status/1284497057365950464
Interesting... but why? Who is pulling her strings and what's in it for her?
YUP.
Here's TCinLA's take on Sinema from his Substack piece, "Another Fine Mess.": 1-13-22
https://tcinla757.substack.com/p/god-damn-kyrsten-sinema-all-to-hell?r=7ygy0&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email
https://www.opensecrets.org/members-of-congress/kyrsten-sinema/summary?cid=N00033983
Welsh, Carson et al….donates to National Repub Senatorial Comm,McConnell +++
Another source about her donors: https://www.forbes.com/sites/michelatindera/2021/12/07/more-than-50-billionaires-including-a-couple-of-trump-supporters-have-donated-to-senator-kyrsten-sinema/?sh=5348281c3a4d
Sinema:
https://mobile.twitter.com/goRubenRuben/status/1481783205237706752/photo/1
Says it all. I wonder if she has a clue that she's a national embarrassment and destined to occupy U.S. history's hall of shame. Probably not. Acute self-absorption is a blinding force.
Michael, ii found this interesting about her. First thing I’ve read that makes sense to me. https://mobile.twitter.com/Amy_Siskind/status/1481731676669632516
a source about the Sinema antidote:
https://www.primarysinema.com/
Damn, Fern! Between you and HCR I can rest assured that the arc of justice is moving. Frankly, I think Sinema has a DSM diagnosis: Borderline Personality Disorder, Narcissism, and possibly Bipolar Disorder. And also accepting bribes disorder.
Definately ABD. Gotta add "Accepting Bribes Disorder to the DSM-5!!
Get me past the idea of reviving the talking filibuster. In my mind, it doesn't change or remove it, but returns it to its original form.
Watch out for the green snakes who had a 'frank and full' conversation with Biden before Sinema beat him out.
I'm raising a glass of wine to Biden for his courage in the face of betrayal.
Terribly British and all that...;stiff upper lip and all! What Manchenema needs is a metaphorical knife in the guts. A Corleone proposition "that they can't refuse".....but that's not "nice", is it?
It has a cutting edge to it.
HA!
It may not be nice but it sure would be sweet.
But needed
🙂🙃😃😜
My Biden/Harris coffee mug is on overtime, kim!
For sure, Fern!
The distinction is perhaps a little too subtle for the Manchenema brigade to comprehend and unfortunately assumes they are sincere and not just blocking for the Republicans sake. Morning Lynell.
Sincere, surely you jest
Is it possible? Perhaps😂
What are you talking about, Stuart? There cannot be 3,000 to 5,000 'Manchenemas'! Where did you see them?
I bow to your superior knowledge of military organizations, Fern, but currently Mancheenema have the metaphorical tanks and they are blasting Biden out of the water while making him look weak and unproductive to the voting population. I come back to Stalin's supposed quote "How many divisions has the Pope got?....and Jean Paul 11 saw off the Iron Curtain and the USSR.
With a simple phrase. Without mentioning the USSR he said to a large gathering at an outdoor mass, “Do not be afraid.”
Don't Look Up
Stuart, Sinema is going to be blast out of her seat and land in your lap.
No thanks, Fern, we have enough idiots of our own. She might feel at home with many of our "greenish" loonytunes but they are more interested in killing each other for ideological purity than in fighting the good fight to win.
Yes they are, with deliberation and malice. Trojan Horses from the git go. And Joe still calls them friends???
He's known and "worked with" the front legs of the horse for a very long time.
I am so naive. Morning, Stuart.
ah Lynell, the ways of the world are often a little devious. A reading of Macchiaveli and Klauswitz is never superfluous.
Roger Stone should be terrified, he recruited the Oath Keepers who were there supposedly to protect him but somehow ended up in an insurrection that resembled Stone's Brooks Brothers Riot. I believe a snippet of convo between Stone and Rhodes on Jan. 6th included Rhodes asking .."so are we doing this?" and Stone replying in the affirmative.
I hope his arrogant A$$ gets everything it deserves, such as a prison sentence for life. Alpha maleness is insidious right now...worldwide. No scruples, no compassion, just money, fun ,and games regardless of the suffering of others.
you are so right on, as usual, dear Fern!
Great to see you, Kim. Of course, I'm going say, 'go to sleep'. without sleep and you still shine!
May I just say that you are wondrous, sleep or not...and I'm on pacific time and you are three hours away.
"There has got to be payback to Sinema"....
Well put Fern. Yes there should be.
Payback to Sinema, and money talks:
https://www.primarysinema.com/
Focus of my donations
Fern I recall someone speaking of folks having their “15 minutes of glory.” Sinema, who identifies herself as “bisexual and bipartisan,’ has morphed from being a Green supporter of Ralph Nader in 2000 to being a well-frocked loose cannon today. Whatever else occurs, she will become a political footnote before she reaches 50. If her senseless obstructionism contributes to a McConnell Senate in 2023, she will be in a political wasteland. By the 2024 senatorial election, even in Arizona she will be discarded. A psychiatrist would have a full-time challenge with this bright (PhD) but not intelligent butterfly. (Check the Spanish word—mariposa).
Nice, Keith! "Well-frocked loose cannon". Kyrsten Sinema in a NUTshell.
Ralph helped give us W, Sinema a Trojan horse - goal to screw Dems again. She is in my sights, and not in a good way. Joe B - They are not your “friends.” Get real
Jeri, I believe that Ralph Nader's contributions to the health and welfare of the USA earned him enduring respect from many Americans. We would have been better off had we adopted more of his positions.
'Ralph Nader American political activist, author, and attorney noted for his involvement in consumer protection, environmentalism, and government reform.
'Nader was first propelled into the national spotlight with the 1965 publication of his journalistic exposé Unsafe at Any Speed. Though he had previously expressed an interest in issues of automobile safety while a law student, Unsafe at Any Speed presented a critical dissection of the automotive industry by claiming that many American automobiles were generally unsafe to operate. Nader researched case files from more than 100 lawsuits then pending against General Motors' Chevrolet Corvair to support his assertions.[15]'
'In the 1970s, Nader turned his attention to environmental activism, becoming a key leader in the antinuclear power movement, described by one observer as the "titular head of opposition to nuclear energy".[26][27] The Critical Mass Energy Project was formed by Nader in 1974 as a national anti-nuclear umbrella group, growing to become the largest national anti-nuclear group in the United States, with several hundred local affiliates and an estimated 200,000 supporters.[28] The organization's main efforts were directed at lobbying activities and providing local groups with scientific and other resources to campaign against nuclear power.[29][30]'
'Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, through his ongoing work with Public Citizen, Nader continued to be involved in issues of consumer rights and public accountability. His work testifying before Congress, drafting model legislation, and organizing citizen letter-writing and protest efforts, earned him direct credit for the enactment of the Freedom of Information Act, Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, Clean Water Act, Consumer Product Safety Act, and Whistleblower Protection Act.' (Wikipedia)
100% true and admirable. In fact, I was a big fan, and he expressed my views better than anyone, back in the day when the environment, wildlife protections, and the nuclear threat were my biggest concerns. Not our very survival from a political party gone rogue. His giant ego helped with this in my humble opinion. W/Dickie should have been squashed like bugs.
Keith, I prefer the word 'piñata' for her before she turns into a footnote. Piñatas Sinema for Christmas! What say you?
To go up the ladder, you eventually end up with the defeated former president. Back in 1807, Aaron Burr, a former vice-president escaped conviction for treason because the plans he was making with his foot soldiers, similar to the Oathkeepers, were just plans and contrary to what happened on January 6, 2021, were never put into action. Chief Justice Marshall did not consider conspiracy without actions sufficient for conviction. But on January 6, there were actions. And any one of those refusing to appear before the House committee, if speaking under oath where they might tell what they know, can tie those actions to the defeated former president. That's why they won't show up.
Jack Chief Justice Marshall, in his circuit court capacity, was trying Aaron Burr for treason. Marshall loathed President Jefferson (for whom Burr was a bete noir) and was a friend of Alexander Hamilton, who Burr had killed in a duel. Marshall, in Marburv Madison, used convoluted judicial interpretation. Whatever his thinking, Marshall acquitted Burr of treason because, in accordance with the Constitution, there were not at least two witnesses of this act.
I saw (for the first time ever) KS speaking and she was wearing a cross around her neck. Has she always been religious? She was talking about wanting to stop divisiveness. But she doesn't apparently want to acknowledge where it's coming from.
Costume jewelry for Sinema. I’d like 5 minutes with her. Puta.
https://twitter.com/StevenBeschloss/status/1481862115933650946?s=20
Right on, dear Fern! We cannot, must not, stop believing and doing whatever we can!!
Agree 1000% about the DOJ. That in itself will be payback. As far as Sinema? I hope the Select Committee finds something to ask her to come testify.
After Simena's preemptive strike on President Biden's effort to reform Senate rules and pass the critical voting rights legislation, I found myself reminding myself that we have to views of government, progressive and conservative, at play. That we have two parties, Democrats and Republicans, hides that reality. Sadly for my party, the conservatives within don't incite progressives across parties to move together toward their common progressive agenda forward. Our traditional congressional seating charts don't help either.
Morning Fern. I, too, though yesterday a win for the Good Guys.
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.
Covid is their friend, until it kills them
I have...had a cousin who met that fate.
😔
they support Covid to make Biden look weak...undermining a political opponent at the cost of the lives of their constituents
not only undermining the President, but destabilizing the economy, education, the medical community, food supply, etc. A destabilized society is apt to make poor choices.
Take heart. The infection rate is up, yes, hospitals are packed with the unvaccinated, yes, but the actual death rate is down.
:-)
Great, the death rate is down. What about long-term effects? I have a friend who may never be able to work again because of long COVID. She's had it for over 18 months now. I had it in December and neither my ability to concentrate nor my sense of taste/ smell have fully recovered. Repeat infections are becoming more common and anecdotally more severe. I would honestly rather die than lose my ability to work. I really hope that we don't become cavalier just because fewer folks are dying.
Helga, be of good heart! I lost my career at the age of 49. For 3 years I almost never left the house without assistance. I am now 74 and have the most wonderful life I never could have imagined and would never have had if I had kept working.
846,488 dead Americans and counting https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/map.html
Here's some good news on the fake certificates. Hopefully all of the fake electoral certificates will soon be added to the U.S. AG's To Do list. https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2022/1/17/2075238/-Some-of-those-Fraudulent-Documents-make-their-way-to-the-DOJ
Today's local paper warns school boards that the new Virginia Republican Governor is expected to end mask mandates when sworn in this week. Tip of the iceberg...
Tapered tip, just wait idiot Virginians
Like you, I thought there was in fact a Supreme Court precedent for Massachusetts' mandate regarding smallpox vaccinations. Upheld by Mass. Supreme Court and affirmed by the U.S. Supreme Court (1905). https://www.mass.gov/info-details/massachusetts-law-about-vaccination-immunization Page down to Case Law, Jacobson v. Massachusetts (1905).
I'd guess the difference is that the recent ruling was specific to OSHA mandating workplace vaccinations rather than a 'global' mandate for all citizens.
I believe the ruling was that the DOL does not have the authority to set or deliver health care policy. At least, health and safety provisions not specific to the workplace. When Biden chose DOL, clever thought doing so was, I wondered why not Commerce as the downside of Covid is the effects it has on businesses and the economy, workers be dammed.
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.
What a leader...a hero for our times!
Tommy said that there are “justice” politicians and “power” politicians. I agree, and I think the concept can easily be extended to voters.
Oh. To voters. Yes.
Got the book on Monday, my neighbor borrowed it on Tuesday. Spreading the word (and hopefully will get a chance to read it soon!)
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).
In a world were logic and facts have both become superfluous it is hardly surprising. The worst to me is that the "NYT/WaPo liberally oriented press are seemingly, with a few exceptions, dealing with this at face value rather than attacking it's underlying meaning while much of the other media actors are standing by and waiting to see who will prevail.....while not jeopardizing their advertizing revenues.
Yes, even just the headlines piss me off.
The MSM media is tanking Biden focusing on what he hasn’t done
😠
This:
“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.
Why would anyone listen to what these losers say? You can’t trust anything that comes out of their mouths. All lies.
All right TC, let’s address your ever-present long dark tunnel. Paying too much attention to the doom and gloom MSM, as usual. Call me a Linzertorte, accuse me of eating cucumber sandwiches and driving a Swedish car, stick me in the same pigeonhole with those horrid Bernie bros, do your worst, but I think things are getting better. For the longest time, it was Kinzinger and Cheney the Younger all alone in their little life raft, bailing away madly. Now we have Larry Hogan, Mike Rounds and (drum roll combined with Darth Vader theme music) Cheney the Elder and Karl Rove jumping on the Eff-Trump bandwagon. And of course we still have Mitch Windsock crouching there in the wings, waiting for public sentiment to change so that he can crawl out of his cowardly box and speak up.
And, another drum roll please, news reports that Orange Crapsickle may have had an ominous conversation with Fani Willis’s team. I have examined the circumstantial evidence, and I do believe that he has been informed that he’s going to have his a$$ indicted.
After a 14 hour work shift, I should have already face-planted into bed but noooo instead I’m here busting TC’s chops (and amusing him in the process).
NOW I’m going to face-plant. Nighty night All. 🛌
"Mitch Windsock" Perfect! If the DOJ throws a few sedition charges into the Senate chamber the "Windsock" won't "need a weatherman to see what way the wind blows."
They could start a team, The Windsox, would be catchy.
Moscow Mitch Windsock
😂
"Never, never, never give up," that's Our Roland!
Cannot wait to read your book one day, Roland! Love your writings...Love your positivity as well....Sorry, TC.
❤️❤️❤️❤️
"Orange Crapsickle.........is going to have his a$$ indicted.
I certainly hope you are correct Roland. I will lose a pretty big bet with a friend though. Let us see what reality brings.
Get ready to open your wallet and pay up that bet.
It must be exhausting sustaining optimism as you do Roland. You've earned your ZZZs.
Roland I can acuse you of many things, but never of eating a cucumber sandwich or driving a Swedish car (or semi). But, maybe the occasional avocado toast and a good Subaru engine? I agree wholeheartedly with you on this: I, too, see so many signs of things getting better, from local to national. And this terrible dark tunnel thing (Thank You, TC) is already catalyzing remarkable and effective political action, thanks to folks like Cathy Learoyd, Ellie Kona and Annette of "Heather"s Herd." Plus, a whole lotta Republicans are waking up and smelling the economy. Why risk the return of more "del Lardos" (what do you call tRump TC?), tanking a good thing.
👍
Hey I love Linzertorte. We still have 1/4 of one left from Christmas that we are still nibbling on. I make a damn good Linzertorte.
I substituted “Linzertorte“ for marshmallow fluff, my original thought. My mother loved Linzertorte too, so it’s an homage to her.
It's my homage to my Oma. She was a great baker, especially at Christmas time.
I saw my paternal Oma a few times a year during my teens, but none of the other three grandparents. My mother was the great baker in our family, especially at Christmas time, like your Oma.
My Oma was a tough, hard, very German lady. She didn’t have the easiest life - my grandparents came here with my dad in 1939, and it was pretty hard to be German here during the war. She was Rh negative and lost all her pregnancies after my dad, and her sister was killed right after the war, which I think she never got over. Her family was in Freiburg, and there were some awfully lean years after the war, while she was here, safe, and feeling guilty.
All that being said, I’ve tried to keep those traditions alive, so I bake Linzertorte, haselnussmakronen, leckerli, and lebkuchen from her recipes (a complete mess of German and English, metric and imperial all mixed up but I treasure them) at Christmas.
Moms are Always right🤣
That’s impressive
😂
Love you, Roland. Sleep well.
❤️❤️❤️❤️
Things ARE getting better, which is what is so frustrating - since they're not being REPORTED as getting better, which creates the "long dark tunnel."
I’m glad you’re saying that. The problem is not reality, as you point out, the problem is the Curse of the MSM.
Yes.
Chaney the elder and Rove, wow. The “original” architects of our distress. Get Frank Luntz and we might have a chance. Don’t bother with Gingrich…
We may have lost George Carlton but I’m thanking Roland’s Parents for as good as a stand in. You give me Hope and Humor when it’s needed most. Thank You Roland. I know you sleep well.😂❤️🦋
Wow, George Carlin, high praise. 🙏
"Failure is success in progress."
~ Albert Einstein
Thank you Ellie, I needed to remember that. The real work of change is usually hidden until it isn’t. Tipping points seem sudden, but, are the result of sustained effort, often unseen.
You keep chipping away at the stone wall with a rock hammer until the wall starts to crack.
Love This! Thanks Ellie!
Manchin and Sinema make my blood boil! Is there any chance we can get Murkowski and Rounds to step into the breach?
Not. Even.
Dangit. S-n-M negated our Warnock and Ossoff victories. 🙁
Better chance than our traitors
Well seeing as how they are both are occupying the Sewer. I hear they are finding CoVid in Wastewater Sewer plants. We can hope they get thirsty ?
TC, "we are looking into the mouth of a long dark tunnel".
Maybe.
But, I have been thinking. I don't want to list all of the ways that our Democracy has underperformed for the mainstream American over the last forty years. But, I do want to state that: American Democracy has underperformed for those who were not blessed to get advanced education and lucky enough to be white.
Now, the folks who have been manipulated by Fox and Friends, OAN, Trump, etc., to believe that they want a "strong man" (if you can somehow swallow Trump as anything but the coward he is). Rank and file Pubs have been conditioned to believe that people like me, like you are not American and don't deserve the jobs they USED to have.
Maybe, TC, we are entering a phase of reaction that is healthy?
Let's say the Republicans manage to overthrow the government and occupy all three branches of government again.
Do you think that inflation is going to go away with Republicans in charge? Republicans have been the main sponsor of deficit spending since 1980.
Do you think that corporations are going to bring back jobs with Republicans in charge?
Do you think that anything is actually going to get better for the poorly educated white folks that are all currently sinking in our econmy?
The probability is almost 1.0 that, when Trump and the Pubs take over the economy will tank, widespread economic chaos will ensue and ...
folks will become unhappy with their newfound autocracy.
Maybe this is what is supposed to happen TC. Maybe what is happening is NEEDED.
Because, even I feel bitter at all of the friends I have seen fired as oursourcing took their jobs and pushed them into hard times for the last forty years.
Even I feel bitter that my taxes always went up while big Republican and Democrat donors taxes always went down.
Even I feel bitter that manufacturing that my friends could have designed very well, and, implemented was handed off to overseas third party "engineers" in India (but, they made it cheap, just don't take too many pharma products, might have rat parts in them).
So, TC, I am choosing to remain optimistic. In 2009 we had a huge opportunity to let the economy collapse after Bush and the Pubs collapsed it.....and let people starve in the streets to see what it is like when Pubs are in charge. Instead, Obama printed money and soft landed the economy to cloak poor Republican policy.
TC. LET THEM HAVE THEIR AUTOCRACY.
Then? Let's see what happens. But, I would bet BIG money that Pubs will convert a fairly tepid econonomy into a complete, bottomless disaster much as Pubs did from 1919 to 1929.
Right?? Trump is the KING of Bankruptcy ..... remember. That is the only thing he has ever been successful at.
So, if that is your long dark tunnel come true, maybe it is needed.
Let them do it TC. Stand back and watch.
But, humans aren't the only ones caught in the chaos - our biosphere will cop it big time - further reducing the likelihood of our continuing survival on earth - it's a FAR bigger thing than Rethugs vs Democrats. Far Bigger.
Hugh, of course I agree with you that Republicans will not act responsibly in any domain, environment, finance, industry, etc. That is their history.
However, what I am proposing offers (I hypothesize) a path to PEACEFUL resolution of this current crisis in Democracy born out of America's past failures of Democracy.
We cannot solve the current crisis without recognizing its origins.
I don't want to see Americans fighting each other in the streets over a past form of government that, in fact, has been of limited value to many Americans.
I do want to see all of this resolved peacefully EVEN given the Right's desire to burn it down with violence.
So, "let them have their cake" is a well known approach to problem solving.
(well, the actual quote is "let them eat cake".
The problem seems to be to me, that if the Republicans/Trumpians get in, the speed of their dismantling of the environmental constraints (let alone social ones) will be fast - and it will be "Drill, Baby, Drill", "Burn, Baby burn", "Log, Baby, Log" and shoot them varmints. Remember there are a significant proportion of citizens, who would be only too happy to do that, and are waiting for the signal. Perhaps read..... https://www.greenpeace.org/international/story/51904/dont-look-up-climate-change-review/
Lots more general introspection is needed!
Introspection is good. I like the posts here that push us to peaceful action.
In the example you gave, it took ten years to turn things back around. I might be dead before that. I don’t think our Earth has ten years.
No kidding. I just watched ‘ Butterfly’s Blueprints ‘ on PBS. Highly recommend . Once they are gone we are not far behind.It is amazing what the Scientist are learning about them that will, if not lost, help us in all areas of life . I’m happy to report from their most recent decline there had been an increase. Also Moths. Fascinating !
Yes, the number of monarchs on my farm where I have a 25 acre field of goldenrod and milkweed to help sustain them, are down every single year.
BUT, that is mostly because of Nicotinide pesticides introduced in the 1970's. Spraying that stuff kills every living thing. And, billions of tons are in the soil.
May the spirit of Rachel Carson revive and permeate the land
This is where we need more than the Heart symbol on here. Glad you appreciate and understand how important they are to us. But so 🥲to hear about all the toxins. Do you all still have the What we called the “ Lightning Bugs ? “ In the summer up there we would have so much fun catching them in our jar’s and of course letting them go. Here in FL it used to rain tree frogs back up until the ‘90’s’. Not anymore.
Something that I haven't seen any discussion on yet in my 45 minute perusal of the LFAA and (my guess) half the comments is the SCUMTOUS decision regarding vaccine and mask mandates under OSHA. That decision, right there is what got my brain activated at 0430 this morning and made it unable for me to return to slumber.
Of course, the stolen SCOTUS seats have now made it possible to gut OSHA, Clean water/air/soil acts, and anything else that puts the whiff of restraint on capitalism.
Your recitation of the loss of the middle class through outsourcing and the near collapse of the financial system coupled with a SCUMTOUS that will now decide, in lockstep, to derail any business regulations and wiping out any gains that have been made by people that are not white, Christian, cisgendered, heterosexual men may just be the best description of true anti-democracy that these people seem to want. Let them have it, and see where it goes.
The Supreme Court majority will have death on its hands. Its ruling essentially declares that if a covid-infected employee comes to work, they don't represent an occupational hazard.
The ruling was based in part on the fact that OSHA didn't distinguish between the risk of covid infections based on types of work. Making hundreds of such distinctions is impossible given the number of known and unknown variables. And we would have seen an avalanche of lawsuits regarding the distinctions. Now if states had imposed the same federal mandate that the court shot down, the conservative justices would have said no problem.
With each new ruling, the court is eating away at the federal government's authority. It seems to want not a nation but a collection of 50 countries. (Breaking news: viruses don't recognize state borders.)
Let's remember that the Supreme Court's authority, as now exercised, isn't explicitly granted in the Constitution. It derives from Marbury v. Madison, which in 1803 established the principle of judicial review as well as the power of federal courts to declare legislative and executive acts unconstitutional. What does the court's current majority of constitutional orginalists say to that? Safe bet that Marbury v. Madison is a court precedent that unlike so many others they wouldn't ignore.
Good follow up reading to HCR is Robert Hubbell:
"What can you do? Call your Senators and Representatives and tell them that Congress must expand the Supreme Court by passing the Judiciary Act of 2021 as a first step to reestablishing the rule of law and the supremacy of the Constitution. You can reach your congressional representatives by following the links in Chop Wood, Carry Water 12/10 - by Jessica Craven"
https://roberthubbell.substack.com/p/a-hard-day
I am sick about how far dt’s reach has gone and how bleak the future can look when we consider the racist, homophobic, greedy, hypocritical, characterless, heartless and spineless people who have taken over our federal judicial and legislative branches, as well as those in so many states.
Somehow, Luke, Leia and Han, Gandalf and Frodo, and Harry, Hermione and Ron all beat back the bad guys against impossible odds. We can do this, right? Somehow, we have to do this. Win more seats this year and pass BBB and Voters Rights.
I think it is fairly easy to predict "where it goes" Ally. It might be useful to just let it happen. Now, I am definitely doing what I can with my local stuff here, with my relatives etc.
But, as all of these boards ramp excitement up, I am starting to get an eerie feeling that some are pushing for some militia formation on the left, which, honestly, is warranted given the number of right wing militias' out there.
I am just not sure that "Civil War" is worth it. Was it last time? Here in Penfield the Civil War cemetery is HUGE. So many young men in such a small northeast outpost in 1865.
Last time we fought a giant civil war, freed the slaves, only to have the "free" men systematically terrorized, thrown into jail where slave labor WAS still LEGAL, and on and on.
All those dead young men in my local cemetary? I am just not sure if it was all worthwhile.
Maybe division makes some sense, despite the million reasons why not. United we are not likely to be in my daughter’s lifetime.
Ally with just a Science Fact based approach and some of the Crumbs off the Top of the Trillionaire investments ‘ Cake ‘ they could have both.
We will not only watch, we ALL will suffer. Maybe as it should be. But the money will buy lifeboats and the money will sail away to the private estates, while we struggle to breathe. Long dark tunnels can be long indeed.
we only have ourselves, as a people to blame
“The probability is almost 1.0 that, when Trump and the Pubs take over the economy will tank, widespread economic chaos will ensue”
Very likely, and also that they’ll blame Democrats for the Republican-created chaos.
Yes. However, that will only work for a while. Then, as time passes, it will not be so easy to hide. As more time passes, people will want change.
My proposal assumes that the US Military also becomes unhappy with the miscreant tyrant takeover after a while.
I do hope that your proposal comes true, Mike!
Mike, I think you are on to something profound. Systems (and people) don't transform until they hit bottom and become completely dysfunctional. So, yes that is probably what needs to happen for the transformation to come forward. Duane Elgin had this nailed 40 years ago but nobody was listening, see https://duaneelgin.com/the-limits-to-complexity-are-bureaucracies-becoming-unmanageable/
.... a "Seldon Crisis".
Mike, I don't disagree. Let them eat cake. They will anyway.
The fine point being, once they are in, they aren't leaving regardless of the will of the people.
Perhaps. However, I don't want to paint American Democracy as such a bright, shiny, untarnished penny that we get everyone in the streets to start killing each other over it.
If you add up all the people who have been "left behind" by "American Democracy" over its history, well, it is not clear to my data analytics trained brain, that dying for it makes sense.
I am not advocating for a Trump based dynasty mind you. What I am saying is what I learned in Phsysics: For every action, there an equal and opposite reaction.
WITHOUT that equal and opposite reaction, well, the earth would have no natural stability.
So, maybe what we see happening, as repugnant as it is to think of someone like Trump leading that reaction, maybe it is what should NATURALLY occur.
Stopping it legally? Maybe we can.
But, I do not want Americans fighting in the streets killing each other over what has been, historically, an only partially successful form of government. American Democracy.
Just think about all the kids in Cambodia who have been blown up by our buried bombs over the last 60 years. Just that one statement gives you a picture of a big problem in America.
Many thanks for presenting a valuable viewpoint on all this. It matches a strange dream I had this morning: I was being chased and running and running full of fear. I finally turned around to see what/who was chasing me and it was a skinny man. I thought why am I running and tiring myself out for this? So I slowed down and turned around to face him (my fears). I felt very calm suddenly and the dream stopped. Whilst reading comments here this morning, like how scary the Manch-enemas are seemingly thwarting our voting rights, I felt that familiar fear rising again. Slithering past the side of my head like a large, furry snake hissing a deep, sneering sound that it is coming for me, again. I could feel it's stench too near me. That familiar anxiety of the past six years of fighting against the relentless fear of rising fascism and autocracy. It feeds off our fears. When I read Mike S.'s words just now, I felt the fear subside for a second time this morning.
We can either be deer frozen in the headlights of fear and depression, or we can choose to face our fears and use our good energy to do whatever we can from a place of being centered and knowing who really carries the Light and to use it well for the benefit of all, including this beautiful sphere we depend upon for Life. This community of thinkers, soul-searchers and activists use words and actions like Lightsabers (Star Wars fans...is that what they are called?). After taking much needed breaks, pull out your Lightsaber and use it in whatever way works for you— but do it out of LOVE for what we want to create, not out of FEAR of repeating atrocities of the past (dark egos), or the much better Unknown, Yet to Be Created. The dark orange ones depend upon your fear to control you. When faced with these seemingly moronic, reversed-life entities...just look them in the eyes with pity, for they know not what they do ( or maybe their job is to help you see your new kind of power rise up?). Tap them with your Lightsaber. Oh, oh! And maybe as you knight them on both shoulders with your Light, say unto them, "Go out into the world and do unto others as you would have others do unto you!" And walk away and join your Light-giving friends in creating the new world waiting for us. It might be really fun--- and we certainly much higher senses of humor than the dark ones. Do they have any nighttime comedians or Saturday Night Live satirists? If the shadow dweller truly laughed, their faces might shatter into a thousand shards.
For the rest of us who feel compassion and empathy for All The People, it is hard to escape the labor pains of birthing something new and much better. There is a crack in everything. Each of US can shine our Lightsabers into the darkness. Just take turns to re-charge when necessary. We are in this for the long-haul, because deep change will be worth it. Maybe that is why we are all here at this time? To help one another mid-wife The Great Golden Rule Experiment in America? For All the People & the Planet this time?
Thanks, Mike, Ellie and Roland for some good inspiration this morning!
Penelope, dang (as they say down south), being chased by skinny man!
Not good!
I defintely don't recommend fear. About anything. It is not hard to train yourself not to ever feel fear. In fact, by the time I left my old farm I only ever felt (feel) either happy, or peeved.
Those are both healthy, action oriented emotions. Fear just paralyzes.
So, next time you start feeling intmidated either smile, or frown and get peeved.
:-)
Yes, I know peevishness! Much preferable to fear. But when I feel fear or hear about others, it does tend to tap into my inner angel in wanting to face things squarely and make things right. Fascists are really good at spreading fear and my friends of color, Jewish friends, the elderly and women friends are pretty frightened—and for valid reasons. I think you understand that well. Today, I am feeling uplifted by my dream symbols, your words, our working justice system, and our collective powers to try to solve very old problems in new ways.
I vow to keep speaking quietly (with an occasional rant) and carry a big Lightsaber!
Mike, I agree. There should be no fighting. Democracy was never the unblemished prize that some think it was.
I feel like we've been holding an incredibly heavy box filled with supposedly "better things". Maybe it is time to put it down and let someone else play the game. Maybe they have "better things".
As the adage goes- everything happens for a reason.
American Democracy has supported:
Native "removal" (which actually means extermination).
Slavery (including horrors beyond belief that were legal).
Jim Crow
Segregation (formally by Federal "Red Lining")
Preventing some Americans from getting loans for housing.
Vietnam (where we invaded a country that was trying to free itself from Colonial rule and wantonly and with abandon killed innocent humans for 20 years).
Outsourcing, pushing many into poverty that were middle class.
Offshoring of America's manufacturing (now this bites in so many ways).
Afghanistan (where America killed innocent humans for 20 years for the simple goal of enriching military contractors).
Iraq (where America has killed innocent humans for 20 years for the simple goal of enriching military contractors.
btw: I am sure this list of limitations associated with "American Democracy" is very, very partial.
Mike, you are spot on.
In this time, when everyone in the West is supposed to be upset by Russia's push for a "zone of interest", you might also remind of the US relationship to Latin America.
You speak for me.Did any Repubs give back their Stimulus $ ? How about this . Why don’t they all tell their Boss’s they will work Monday at Reg. Pay ? What really BMA !( Burns My Ass ! ) They being the most Privileged, Whine and Complain the Most ! So Over It !
BMA, BMA, BMA. Finally a descriptor that fits
😂 👍
Grievance is a modern American hobby, yes, you are right.
nobody just sits down and says, dang, I am the luckiest guy I ever met.
except, I do that just about every day......recommend it.
First thing I do in the morning and the last thing I do at night. I try to keep it to a minimum in between . Half the world lives on less than $5.00 a day. And it doesn’t make me p a Socialist because I have empathy for those less fortunate that I.
This was deliberate and an inside job. Wake up Dems
The press corps wants a horse race and a lot of melodrama. Meanwhile, 2020 is turning into another Lost Cause. The south has won so many times that it doesn’t understand or recognize losing. Elections end when the loser concedes. If the loser doesn’t concede, what then? It ain’t over til we say it’s over? That will not happen.
Well,
If I run for the President of local Library board, which, I am doing, and, I lose I am not going to concede!! I am going to storm the library!!
Please get a flashlight before you start anew!
dead in the water, we are, and who or what will pull us out?
The arrest of the seditionists and the evidence that DOJ is moving "up the chain" is the only thing we have to hang onto now. Any port in a storm!
Democratic down ballot candidates and election turnout are the things to not just hang onto, but to get our rears in gear to actively support. Walk our talk!
Exactly. My narrow focus this year is registering voters, local elections and local affordable housing.
IMPORTANT focus! Yay, Diane!
Show up and run for any office possible. Increase voice and visibility
IMO, that’s no port, it’s more storm. We need it anyway, but it only makes these days harder.
We have to coordinate it with the heavy lift of winning more people over to the side of democracy. We can’t punish people into changing their political views, that never works.
I don’t know how, except to quit doubting ourselves.
Perhaps the only port in the storm.
Overwhelming Democratic turnout at midterms is the answer. Not throwing in the towel.
and Brother, are we ever going to work on that!
There won't be enough voters to overcome the new GOP rules in 19 + States. Our votes will be negated.
They may. Overwhelm them with votes anyway
The Little Dem. Engine That Could !
Ourselves!!
Maybe those full and frank discussions WERE with Putin - ette$$.
Miami, FL, Opening the first Putinette in the USA, with dictator fries that cannot be beat outside of Russia.
Right. And Sinema is a puta looking to get one of the franchises.
If the GOP had made all these changes back in 2010 it’s doubtful She and Manchin would have ever been Elected . Fools !
😂🤣😅😂🤣😅😆!! Thanks Fern! I needed that!! Still laughing!
Oncoming train…
The irony with those 2 if the ‘R ‘ were doing back when they were running for the Senate they wouldn’t even have been elected.
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..."
Love your phrase "engaging with complexity", for I feel that is what too few humans are willing to do or are capable of. At the moment however, I am finding the complexity of our times utterly overwhelming and am giving in to the conclusion that chaos is going to win this one in the short and long term. The entire planet and all its human systems are being destroyed right before my eyes. And I feel like putting my hands up. But thanks for your turn of phrase!
Glad to hear from you, Margaret! Agree that the chaos feels quite overwhelming. And. Those who would insist that democracy is a poor choice are RELYING on our feeling overwhelmed and giving up AS A STRATEGY to advance an anti-democracy agenda. Which is part of what helps me to push back when I can. And...
Nature is resilient and abundant. A teacher of mine recently said that if/when we do destroy life on this planet, over time it will return. In new form. Kind of a metaphysical framework and maybe too lofty but it helps me to think about how to proceed. Also, as an educator, I have to figure out a way to keep showing up for work (in theory and in practice, haha). Sending you a virtual cup of ginger tea and warm regards, pg
Thank You PG for this!
"you [Dr. Richardson] are providing readers with a practice of engaging with complexity - the opposite of what has happened to news media/the (so-called) free press."
"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.
https://insurrectionindex.org/
List of 1,011 individuals: https://insurrectionindex.org/records/?_record_type=persons&_paged=2
Thank you, Ron!
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.
There is a second issue before SCOTUS: will they refuse certiorari to trg so that the National Archives can release his records.
Who are we that Kirsten Synema speaks and has the ability to cancel our truths? Her ludicrous words despoil the chamber. And our future.
It works the other way as well: Who is Kirsten Sinema, that she speaks etc etc as above.
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 !
Great idea
Thanks Jeri. Maybe it will give a boost to those Poll #’s
Love this idea. I’m in!
👍
Yes, let's do this!!
Love this!!
Whatever happens in Congress, our main job is to vote, vote, vote, and help get out the vote, whatever the headlines!
And run for offices locally. Too many of the kleptocrats run unopposed.
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.