"OOOH - The dems will protect Johnson if he brings up the Ukraine spending for a vote. Nice move, Dems."
So what's your problem with that?
Maybe you prefer a Speaker Johnson and no supplemental aid bill? Or maybe a supplemental aid bill and a GOP Speaker food fight - when MAGAs have put government on the brink of a shut down?
That's how Congress works, often, perhaps most of the time. There is lots of "horse trading", deal-making, do a favor now and it gets repaid later. But if you fail to repay later, good luck getting what you want next time. Sometimes it is a complex calculus. When it's a very important matter, the Whip works to make sure everybody is in line and prepared to vote, and they count votes on their side before a vote is taken -- or, rather, if they are smart and experienced and well-led, they count votes ahead of the actual formal vote. We saw the Rs recently bring a matter to a vote, and it appeared that they had failed to count votes ahead of the formal tally and they lost. It looked like inexperienced leadership. Who would have guessed?!
Call me unrealistic but in my idealized imagined world, the deal-making would be in service to an ecology of global thriving. I wonder about Ro Khanna's ability to operate more effectively than what we're accustomed to.
Joan, I tried to avoid injecting any of my personal views into my comment about how Congress -- especially the House -- functions in real life.
My view is that we humans need to get serious about preparing for the long-term future of life on Earth, and pronto. Even if the major powers, the corporations especially, were to get on board with trying to heal the damage to Earth's natural systems and resources, we would all still face the problem of figuring out what we should do, and then hope that we have the resources, and enough time, to solve the problem(s) before it's too late. It's doubly frustrating, or some higher multiplier, to see so many people standing in the way, stubbornly insisting that they want to keep on raking in the billions and trillions of money units in profits, while not only avoiding fixing the problems, but even doubling down and making the problems worse.
First, it warmed my heart to find your reply after awakening in New York City, rolling on steel and rubber wheels, and arriving at a cold house on Cape Cod. Somehow this community draws out people with thoughts worth reading and I appreciate, "doubly frustrating or some higher multiplier", an example of unique word combos. I'm captivated by entanglements like the group immune systems of forests and adaptability of fungi. We humans have alot to learn I need to learn more from people talking about degrowth and from others probing the 'edges of the otherwise'.
Squabbling is only a distraction from what is really going on this week. The idea that the leader of an anti-American and anti-Democracy country is coming to a private home on our soil where an entire stash of stolen Top Secret documents is being held is outrageous. There should already have been a raid of black helicopters to retrieve them.
The possibility if not likelihood that Orban will see them and be given the opportunity to rifle through (and pay for) them should add a whole new level of charges and incarceration to the holder of said documents. This is being given no coverage (like all such things) by MSM and is simply crazy.
I made one mistake in regard to Susan (am assuming you mean Susan Collins) and voted for her in 2014 because I thought she was the more moderate Senator in Maine (in comparison to Olympia Snowe) and I was so wrong.... So, I take everything Collins says with a huge grain of salt. I don't think she has a sincere bone in her body, but I do think that Lisa Murkowski is genuine.
I feel the same. Susan Collins seems to bow with the prevailing wind. Every time I've heard Lisa Murkowski, I've felt grateful to know there's a principled Republican I can count on for some balance in the Senate.
I don't know if Collins is insincere or terminally gullible (read stoopid). I can't listen to her at all, and it's not her speech impediment that makes me reach for the remote. I agree about Murkowski. She's the real deal.
So did I! Maybe it's because social media makes it so easy to use "Hit and run" snark that it's tempting to use it elsewhere as well. I love that most of our conversation here is respectful. And it would be kind of boring if everyone agreed with everything. Disagreeing w/o snark is a challenge - that I believe we are all capable of.
PS I'm so grateful it's now ok to end with a participle - I don't think I could bring myself to write "of which we are all capable." Thank you Mr. Churchill for "Up with which I will not put!"
I'm guilty of snark, although it's rarely directed at people in this conversation and most often directed at the pooh bahs in power. THOSE f-ing guys! They're the miscreants up with which I will not put.
I agree. Susan was not being sarcastic. It is a good move against the the dodos who want to stand in the way of everything except their political shit shows.
It seems like a smart move by the Dems. If Johnson is challenged as speaker, he knows he won't survive a vote without Dem support -- and he also knows if he brings the aid bill up for a vote, it WILL pass. But if he won't bring it up, the Dems won't lift a finger to help him and he'll get challenged anyway pretty soon... The only real question is how much damage he's willing to inflict before he falls, if he doesn't take this lifeline.
And along the lines of your argument, who would be up next in line for a Republican Speaker vote? Could be someone even more extreme. I agree this is a good move.
He maybe quieter but you won’t find someone ‘more extreme’ than speaker Johnson in his beliefs. He just can effect more in his ‘Seven Mountain’ Christian Nationalist agenda by staying in power, so....
I agree with you and SL Weston. Do we want Matt Gaetz in the speaker's chair? More MAGA Mike is a disheartening prospect, but they don't have anyone who can do the job effectively or even appropriately. If they did we wouldn't get this constant brinksmanship.
And who might that be Matt? Boebert? Greene? Goetz? Comer? Jordan? Oops, already tried Jordan.
These are most of the Congresscritters more extreme than Trump's little Johnson. Johnson is a Trump puppet and Trump is a Putin puppet. We are stuck with Johnson which hopefully will hand the Republicans a big defeat in November. If the Republicans can retain the House, we are further gone than I ever imagined.
Unless, Gary, the Dems can make use of Howdy Doody's precarious position to get bills passed for which there is some modicum of bipartisan agreement but withdraw that support around his Christian Nationalist agenda items. Imagine, actual bipartisan voting in a current congress!!
I have this gut feeling that there are so many pissed off women in red states as well as blue and purple states that we could see a Blue Tsunami. Not getting complacent. Just reading the tea leaves. The "embryo as a person" thing could be a "final straw". I could be wrong, it happens all the time. "But beware a woman scorned."
From Morning Joe this morning. At least MSNBC is focusing more and more on Trump's dementia. Even psychologists are diagnosing his dementia. Is this ethical for them to do so?
At this point--who really cares. Ronny Jackson declared Biden as being feeble without examining him and Obama called him out for it.
So, the gloves are off. It's too important.to try to hide the fact that Trump is dangerous to us all.
Well the offer by Dems certainly allows Mike Johnson to further reveal his true colors. If he doesn’t take the offer he really doesn’t want the Ukrainians to survive.
Well heck, if it's Johnson's future as Speaker (in '24) we're talking about, maybe Jeffries should also insist on appropriating the entire amount Congress already approved to spend in this budget, to eliminate more short-term bumps. Don't get me wrong here, ad I like Jeffries, but I'm cynical enough to think that that strategy doesn't align with the Dems' plans to retake the House next year.
lin, this is a respectful, friendly group. Please, let’s not cast doubt on the positive message from Susan. Mine contained a bit of snark not at Susan but at Dems thinking it’s about time we heard of some kind of movement. They have been too silent for too long. I hope they start some combative swinging at the dark party of despair (Government of Putin GOP) after Super Tuesday.
Although Dana, it seems there might be more room for actual horse-trading between parties if Dems swung back and forth between supporting Howdy-Doody when he's allowing votes on bills with bipartisan support, like for keeping the government open for business and sending the long overdue support for Ukraine.
I understood Susan’s post as sincere. Have we all become so accustomed to sarcasm we can’t tell the difference between it and sincerity? I’m afraid so.
Exactly. It’s a demoralizing strategy that R’s deploy. “Create apathy towards the process in our politics. It’s a form of voter suppression. They learned it from Russians.
I believe Susan's comment was sincere Lin. The larger question is why you are attacking another commenter without clarifying what they meant? We need to keep our heads no matter how dire our politics is today.
Lin, some folks are not here everyday. They may be unaware of what “protecting” means in the house. I take it to mean they will vote for Johnson should a radical R try to vote him out as speaker.
Will such a move make him more toxic to more repubs down the line. After all, working with Dems has been the kiss of death for so many lately, ask Kevin. Although, I have to say it was friendly fire that got him. Seems that the nut caucus had better have another clown lined up or keep the one they have with a Dem paw print.
I've often wondered why that is since the Tea Party. Seems that those who used to be ashamed are no more. Idiocy became something to be proud of, shrouded in religious fervor. And boy, did it take off...
Because damaged people follow damaged leaders. Trump has several sociopathic issues. So many that dozens of psychiatrists wrote a 36 chapter book on each one of those malignancies. I’m enjoying ( and terrified) reading The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump edited by Dr Bandy Lee MD, MDiv.
This book should be required reading for democracy 101.
I was thinking too about the issue of “cognitive decline”. Reading the psychiatrist’s descriptions of TFG, cognitive decline should be of lesser concern than sociopathic disorder that crosses into delusions. Trump has not only cognitive decline, he’s totally insane!
I don't believe Susan's sincerity or sarcasm should be the issue. Little Mikey can't be saved by anyone but TFFG if foreign aid gets passed... seems like a win win to me - Ukraine et. al. get what they need, and Mike goes down. Or he keeps the gavel, and R's lose the House decisively. There's too much anger and dismay about the IVF ruling for any district, no matter how red, to be safe this Nov.
Lauren Lundgren: Yes, the sincerity--or lack thereof--in Susan Pate's comment is not a real issue, but clarifying her intention would facilitate a more accurately focused conversation. I'm still not clear about how Susan Collins got into the mix! PS:Given that there is so much confusion, I'm curious about why Susan Pate hasn't made a clarification yet.
Look at Trump's bizarre word salad starting around 4:37 of the video. Is there any doubt Trump is getting worse? Do we really want someone in charge of our military that can't recall who he is running against?
Super Tuesday is tomorrow and hopefully Trump locks up the nomination. The convention will be chaos if Trump's cognitive abilities continue to decline.
And where is the MSM? Why don't we see every single Trump gaffe and slurring of his words?
I don’t disagree. My comment related to the grandpa image of Biden. In general, we don’t want a grandpa of our country. We want a father or mother. But against Trump? He wins. I watched the video. Not any new revelations here. Typical Trump when he goes off script which is often. Frankly, the presenter was just seeking clickbaits.
You are normalizing TFFG's abnormal behavior just like his MAGAnazis and white faux-Christian nationalists.
You think this is click-bait as well?
Donald Trump said something about public schools that got no media coverage, yet it's causing political analysts, ex-prosecutors, and other onlookers to sound the alarm.
Trump began hinting last year that, if he were made the president once again, he would withhold all federal funds from schools that require vaccines or masks.
On Saturday, he doubled down on that promise.
As reported by former Rep. Barbara Comstock (R-VA), "Trump said in Richmond, that he will take all federal funds away from public schools that require vaccines."
"Like most states, Virginia requires MMR vaccine, chickenpox vaccine, polio, etc.," she then added. "So Trump would take millions in federal funds away from all Virginia public schools."
Former federal prosecutor Shan Wu responded to Comstock Sunday, saying, "It's almost like Trump and his advisors want Americans to be sickened from disease..."
The comment further caught the attention of Elizabeth de la Vega, also a former federal prosecutor. She said, "Trump said yesterday that he would take away federal funding from school systems that require vaccines."
"This should be a five-alarm fire," she then added. "In 1955, before the polio vaccine was widely administered, my 13yr old brother spent a year on his back because of polio. My H.S. English teacher, a former football star, walked with arm braces [and] dragged his legs because he'd had polio years before. This is the world Trump wants."
Former "Tea Party" Republican Rep. Denver Riggleman (VA) also chimed in:
"We can only surmise, Trump cares for all children about as much as he cares for his own."
"His ignorance is an infection that needs its own vaccine," the former lawmaker added.
Conservative Rick Wilson called Trump's purported plan "a death sentence for American school kids."
Actor Jon Cryer said it would be "truly psychopathic."
"It's difficult to overstate how disastrous this policy would be if enacted," the former co-star of Two and a Half Men said on Saturday.
I have so many friends who won’t vote for Cheetolinni but they don’t know exactly why. If my friends (mostly 70-90 years) knew about Johnson’s “ debt commission”) and the republicans extreme desire to mess with SS and Medicare, they might be more upset. I work at educating them. Mike johnson is evil and makes it worse by being a pretend Christian. We don’t learn these things because MSM is controlled by his supporters!!
Exactly Sharon. I have the same situation with many of my friends and a few of my family members.
Rick Scott has already indicated he wants SS to be overhauled even after he defrauded Medicare and Medicaid for hundreds of millions of dollars.
And many other Republicans want to cut SS benefits as well.
The MSM depend on clicks to get their advertisers to support them. Fox News fails to kick the My Pillow Guy to the curb because he is one of their leading advertisers.
I didn't know Bill. I will download it and listen to it. Thanks for the clarification. I agree with you that the MSM is "click bait" happy because of their greed. The NYTimes has become shameless in their incessant coverage of everything Trump.
In 1980 (previously wrote 1976, duh) I voted for John Anderson instead of Jimmy Carter (I was rabidly anti-nuclear energy, and disagreed with Carter on that issue.) We got Reagan. Lesson learned.
That was 1980 election John. I remember because it was my first election. But you're right-we got Reagan and the Republican Party has done everything they can to help the richest 1% get richer and the poorest struggle to get by.
Now there you go again Doug. I’m trying to sound like Reagan.I think RFKJR has appeal no other third party candidate has ever had.He is a man of integrity and campaigning on transparency.And very smart and knowledgeable about our politics .He tells historical stories to match HCR.He learned from his dad and uncle and is behaving like them.The Democratic Party is a party of high tech billionaires, unfair nominating rules,and the Republicans can’t work with them.They are refusing secret service protection for RFKJR. It’s very expensive and they hope it will bankrupt him. If I’ve learned anything about elections, it’s that anything can happen.we are long overdue for a third party candidate victory.
I eagerly awaited the NYT's response late Saturday evening, saw none (I subscribe.) I awoke yesterday, and it's headline was of Biden supporters losing faith in his ability to continue due to age issues. -- I was outraged, as I didn't readily see anything about trompy's demented gibberish (and I don't use that description pejoratively.)
Yes, I could cancel my subscription, but I rely on the Times for more than political news, and my subscription plan is not a la carte.
Reagan's dementia didn't bother R's, Gary. Why should or would they care that TFFG can't assemble a thought or enunciate a word? MAGA voters will make sure there's no birth control, IVF, or abortion if it kills them. And if they don't get their way they'll kill everyone else.
I'm sure there are GOP house members ready to vote for that, but this would define a real split in the party. Then again, given Trump is likely to lose November, this might begin a great opportunity for the GOP to calve off its House Maga extremists, however painful the split would be. Trump loses in November, i suspect that's existential for the GOP as it's presently constituted. Downvote losses needed too. Just putting in hopeful thoughts... more likely Reps wont take up Hakkim's offer
It is. We have to work with what we've got, and we need to get things done! Especially Ukraine, Israel and Palestine aid. And the BUDGET! If the idiots remove Johnson, we lose even more time, and you can bet the Repubs won't choose anyone decent. Johnson is horrible, but the GOP is a parade of horribles.
Susan Pate, you got my attention! I hope you are advocating “deal with the devil”. And the Supreme Court will squash the manbaby this morning. And I hope everyone who can will vote blue tomorrow. 🙏🏼💙🎃🤡💩💙 Apple. Pie in the sky??
I think that an ultimatum was presented to MAGA Mike in the Oval Office with Schumer, McCONnell et al. . . Then McCONnell announced he’d step down. (He probably didn’t like taking a stance against MAGAt Mike . . . ? Or, was he also put on the spot? ) Reminds me of the way Lyndon Johnson or Truman used to get things done, and that’s not a bad thing, knowing how to speak speak softly and carry a Big Stick.
The hope is that Dems will protect starving Palestinians, Ukraine, and Taiwan... we can leave Johnson to the tender mercies of his own caucus. I don't know if they'll shy away from McCarthy 2.0 or oust Johnson on "principle," but either way the rest of us can't fail to do the right thing just because the right is entirely dysfunctional.
Yes, "packed with news," though one thing stands out here: our many who often cite humanities.
More do that here than on any other site I know – and the reason others do it less has nothing to do with how many good books, music, film they’ve had.
Citing humanities obliges us to draw also upon something in us. That – the personal – shapes how well we go out of our way to add perspective, to shine light on some issue we care about. It’s this, the personal, that has us draw from some novelist’s issues in his or her writing, from some lyricist’s in song, some film maker’s in film.
Orwell puts it like this. In “Politics and the English Language” he urges we always start with some sensation we have, some “concrete object” out there, some other person’s pain or social predicament. Get that picture. Then, and only then, seek apt words.
Feel, see others first.
Many don’t draw on humanities because school taught them to check at the door anything personal. They may consume novels, films, and songs, but impersonally. Thus, Orwell says, we lack the pictures artists have arranged, and when we write, prefabricated words just “come rushing in.”
One recent example is when a couple fellow commenters here objected to my use of the pronoun “our,” as when I say “our Heather.” They thought me presuming “possession” of her, “ownership.”
Truth is, if you note our best humanities, you see how our best have always used pronouns to widen participation, engagement, community: Woody Guthrie in “This Land is your land, this land is my land,” another classic in “This is my country, land that I love,” another in “My country, Tis of Thee.”
Some of our commenters let abstractions and error take over, as school taught them to chuck the personal in humanities. So they deny themselves the humanities that could check them, as do any so void, whether the lemmings of House Speaker Howdy Doody, or raving theocrats on the Clarence Court.
Hemingway famously said in response to a question about the writing process, that he opens a vein and just lets it bleed. Can't get more personal than that. Walt Whitman said that he "contains multitudes", not being egocentric, but observant about his personal nature and taking a leap of faith that his nature was part of the shared nature of his fellow men and women.
As beautiful and as far reaching as our American language--as Noah Webster would call it---is, other languages always take us further, as I am sure people from other countries might say of English, whether spoken here or in the so called sceptered Isle.
In Spanish, the word for our is "nuestra", as in my hometown, originally known as "La Ciudad de la Nuestra Senora, la Reina de Los Angeles", the City of our Lady, the Queen of the Angels. The Spanish word for "we" is "nosotros", very close to the word for "our". The collective brings the possessive along for a ride, so to speak.
Personal bravery, and skill in describing it -- an amazing record Americans have for that.
I'm just now finishing the Library of America's new, two-volume set of crime novels from the 1960s. Each one (nine different, mostly little-known authors) just surprisingly deft in locating the human with all its nuances in so many varied predicaments.
America is deservedly notorious for its many vulgar billionaires, ruining the planet, allying with loathsome dictators, gutting the schools, using their money to corrupt Congress, the Clarence court.
And yet, the arts -- so much in American film, song, writing to which the rest of the world aptly looks.
As an aside, I tried to read a John Grisham novel yesterday. Had to put it down because the writing was so bad. Love Russian authors: try "And Quiet Flows the Don" by Mikhail Sholokhov (legendary life of the Don Cossacks).
HA! HA!HA! I had a writing professor who used Grisham as an example of terrible writing!!! As I recall, he bombards the reader with strings of seemingly unrelated descriptions . . . A spaghetti toss.
I must say that I thought the same about Grisham when he first started. Yet, some of his recent work has been quite good. He wrote a sweet little, non-legal piece called "Playing for Pizza" which was quite charming
It seems to me that the personal is what humanities as a broad category are all about; not necessarily about an individual me as a person, but pertaining to sharing the sensory experience of human experience (not sure of a better way to say that). I experience experience therefore I am. That's sensory and that's conscious, and some of it impactful even when not conscious. There is a whole world of experience within, but we recognize and share this with each other, and even other creatures such as my dog. We recognize it in ancient cave paintings, all kinds of music, dance and gesture, even fanciful abstractions, the same yet different sharing of that light.
How I long for schools around the world that would embrace, center on, building skills for this. More humane literacy. But, sadly, typically the opposite: feigning the neutered, the specialist impersonal, as if we all were meant to be only mutually-reciprocating units in groups, packages, religions, corporate hierarchies, and all the other death trips.
Hello to you dog, from someone off in the mountains of Kyushu, Japan.
Hirsch explains the need for individuals in a society to share a cultural literacy. This book was released in 1988. A follow-up book was a dictionary of many of the items we all should know like who was Shakespeare and many of the quotations from his works.
My daughter is 29 and attended schools in Nebraska, Maine and Florida. I feel like she has a good grasp of our cultural literacy but she is also an avid reader. I wonder about our education system across the US. How are they doing at teaching our children what they need to know to function in society?
In this forceful manifesto Professor E. D. Hirsch, Jr., argues that children in the United States are being deprived of the basic knowledge that would enable them to function in contemporary society. They lack cultural literacy: a grasp of background information that writers and speakers assume their audience already has. Even if a student has a basic competence in the English language, he or she has little chance of entering the American mainstream without knowing what a silicon chip is, or when the Civil War was fought. An important work that has engendered a nationwide debate on our educational standards, Cultural Literacy is a required reading for anyone concerned with our future as a literate nation.
Trouble is, though, Gary, the damage was done by the time Hirsch came around.
The far-right foundations organized after the 1971 Powell memo by the early 1980s had defunded public colleges and universities, reduced tenure, let the banks indebt students, and reduced all to neutered silos, each isolated from all others, each possessed of its own canon, each vigilant lest anything disturb its group safety.
Phil Balla--So true. I was fortunate to take Michigan State U's mandatory year-long freshman course, "American Thought & Literature," before it was eliminated.
Just imagine Donald Trump attempting to read your comment. He no longer has the capacity (if he ever did) to understand the meaning of your words on a literal or philosophical level, but Republicans don't understand how demented he has become.
You know, Gary, Orwell described how the demented get that way.
"Politics and the English Language" says bad language blinds all. That is, language absent aptly-connected humanities, absent the personal, lets people float disconnected, in thrall to sensationalism -- so none is equipped even to see what they are actually doing, worsening the damages their groups do.
That is a fascinating concept, Phil. "...bad language blinds all." Further, "...lets people float disconnected in thrall to sensationalism..." describes the MAGA phenomenon to a freaking "T".
Beyond personal perhaps, is a sensorium of physicality that functions at scale (within which we all live). I mean, as one example, how Earth's Mid-Atlantic Ridge spreads with the oozing surge of magma -- it's like what "Hemingway famously said in response to a question about the writing process, that he opens a vein and just lets it bleed." How do we live in sync with it all?
Phil Balla, thank you, thank you! Couldn’t possibly have described how I “work” if I hadn’t read what you wrote. The closest I could come was to remind (or just tell) people that Aristophanes is still funny. Also that having read that Spike Lee had based “Chitown” on “Lysistrata” I made certain to see it. Remembering the patriotism learned in WWII, I have written and shall continue to write as many GOTV cards as my friends will bring me to keep people voting for i “good guys” in either house of Congress (Have you heard Tom Suozzi who won the seat vacated6 by the imposter Santos?) As a teacher of both French and music, with my liberal arts undergraduate degree, I l
An interesting essay, Phil. Technical, scientific, economic etc educations have risen at the expense of humanities over the past century, moreso the past few generations, but given either my reading or viewing of late, there's still quite a bit of thoughtful, empathetic around. On a tangent, I remember in the 50s reading a book called So Little for the Mind, whose ax was the failure of education to teach critical thinking. Even then reading was indulged in by a minority of people. And... still is.
Yes, Frank -- reading, literacy, a perennial hurt.
Many always seem inclined to follow the easiest path of slogans, abstractions, dead metaphors, and non-active verbs (copulatives, excellent only for labeling).
Trouble compounds now, however, for what the far-right foundations did to neuter academe, to cripple K-12, following the 1971 Powell memo. This, measurable in exactly how much the rich have gotten richer since then, how much they've actively sought to hurt the working classes, to corrupt the court where it's so easy to bribe Clarence.
I'm not so sure we can attribute the increase in wealth inequality to educational systems. For a whole political/social class inequality remains a foundation stone, as in fact it has through most of history when it comes to how elites defined civilization, the modern version being "property". People of property fought against rising democratic ideas for the longest, and democracy itself has been taken over, long since, by organized political parties, funded largely by "property".
Phil Balla: Also, since the '80s, corporations have ensured their profits by forcing schools to operate according to a business model which necessitated the elimination of Humanities in order to produce docile, robotic, workers who will not threaten corporate power.
Interesting comment, Phil. As one who was brought up in the humanities (historian Father, although he was a meteorologist by profession) and writer Mother (who was a teacher and a poet), that concept of human experience was foundational to me. I think it is what made me a good cop, a good negotiator, and a good trainer, and a better person.
Yes. As Churchill stated during the war about cuts to the humanities, what on earth are we fighting for or something to that nature. Conservative minded as he was, he saw humanities as extremely important for society.
The refusal of House Republicans to fund aid for Ukraine, their insistence on pursuing a bogus impeachment scheme hatched by an indicted Russian FBI source in contact with Russian intelligence services and their unfailing loyalty to an anti-democratic demagogue infatuated with Russian President Vladimir Putin will further aggravate the existential threat facing democracy around the globe. MAGA Republicans’ recent conduct will only hasten the dangerous trend toward authoritarianism spelled out in Freedom House’s recent report “Freedom in the World 2024: The Mounting Damage of Flawed Elections and Armed Conflict.”
“Global freedom declined for the 18th consecutive year in 2023,” Freedom House reported. “The breadth and depth of the deterioration were extensive. Political rights and civil liberties were diminished in 52 countries, while only 21 countries made improvements. Flawed elections and armed conflict contributed to the decline, endangering freedom and causing severe human suffering.”
The threat from right-wing groups and ideologies rejecting democratic values such as diversity, the rule of law, free speech, equality and tolerance — the very same values the MAGA movement targets — are at the root of the worldwide phenomenon. “Almost everywhere, the downturn in rights was driven by attacks on pluralism — the peaceful coexistence of people with different political ideas, religions, or ethnic identities — that harmed elections and sowed violence,” Freedom House observed. “These intensifying assaults on a core feature of democracy reinforce the urgent need to support the groups and individuals, including human rights defenders and journalists, who are on the front lines of the struggle for freedom worldwide.”
The role of the United States in bolstering democracies, just as it did in World War II and the Cold War, has never been more critical. “As it has for decades, the United States can play a vital role in the expansion of global freedom,” the report reiterated. “But much depends on whether the November 2024 presidential election reinforces or weakens America’s democratic values, processes, and institutions, along with its will to uphold the cause of democracy around the world.”
The United States remains vulnerable at home, where “harassment and intimidation of federal, state, and local politicians, election administrators, and judges pose a serious challenge to the conduct of November’s presidential election.” Moreover, still “haunted by the January 2021 attack on the Capitol and related court cases, Americans are heading into a decisive election starkly divided, with some questioning the very utility of fundamental democratic institutions.”
As the world’s only true superpower, the only country that can summon a global alliance and the historic exemplar of democratic values, the United States must take the lead in defending democracies against internal and external threats. If “governments, donors, and the private sector” do not “deepen their solidarity with front-line allies, hold dictators accountable for rights abuses and corruption, and invest in democratic institutions at home and abroad,” democracy will continue its downward trajectory, the report said. If the United States sacrifices “core principles for the sake of illusory short-term interests,” then we will lose a “global order in which democratic norms prevail” and that “deliver liberty, prosperity, and security — for those living now and for future generations.”
Military defense of democracies continues to be an essential part of protecting our alliances facing aggression from authoritarian regimes such as “the Kremlin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine [that] continued for a second year, further degrading basic rights in occupied areas and prompting more intense repression in Russia itself.” But the question remains if the United States has the will to do so.
We recently witnessed how perilously close the United States is to frittering away our democratic leadership in the world. When the Republican presidential front-runner espouses fondness for fascist ideas and displays a determination to destroy NATO, and his minions rely on Russian-hatched conspiracies to impeach a president and seem willing to let Ukraine go under, we can imagine the threats to democracy here and abroad reaching the point of no return.
Rep. Mikie Sherrill (D-N.J.), a nine-year veteran of the Navy and three-term congresswoman who recently returned from the Munich Conference, expressed to me her dismay at Republicans’ irresponsibility in defending democracy at a critical moment. She pointed at four-times indicted former president Donald Trump and his party for “undermining and walking away from our alliances.”
She explained, “The rules-based order benefits not just the U.S. but other countries,” yet Republicans “want to blow up the system.” Republicans seem not to care that we depend on an alliance of democratic allies to do everything from protecting the seaways to confronting China’s aggression, she noted. She said there is a military phrase: “We never fight alone.” And yet we will find ourselves isolated, vulnerable and saddled with higher defense costs if Republicans persist in enabling Putin and destroying our democratic alliances.
“We are at an inflection point,” Sherrill said, echoing the Freedom House report and speaking with obvious emotion. “I cannot accept that the country I have given my life to, the country [for which] I cannot count the number of oaths I have taken, the country I have fought for, I cannot accept that we cannot stand with Ukraine.”
And yet if Republicans have their way — denying Ukraine a lifeline, doing the bidding of Putin internationally and lifting a Putin pawn to the presidency — democracy’s backsliding will become an avalanche. Imagine if the only country capable of reinforcing the rules-based order and preventing tyrannical regimes from overwhelming vulnerable countries stands with the authoritarians. Under such circumstances, democracy in the United States and around the world is unlikely to survive.
It’s hard to quibble with the argument that the upcoming election is the most important in our history and in the history of Western democracies. The world will be watching.
The very best art invokes the universal - the cognitive dissonance that arises from finding what we all have in common in the intensely personal. Even non-artists are social animals who need the comfort of the tribe, so no matter how critically we/they think, there's always the personal bias toward membership. I think only artists are comfortable as outsiders, and thankfully they find all human experience in their own. Otherwise how could Iago exist?
Phil Balla--All good points, but please don't blame "the schools" for the lack of humanity--and thus the lack of the Humanities--in contemporary American education. Schools teach what state and local school boards tell them to teach.
Finland, you know, Joanne, got rid of the problem of interfering bureaucrats, politicians.
Finland reformed its schools so teachers have centered everything since. They started hiring only the best graduates from its universities. Kicked out the standardized testers.
And since those reforms Finnish schools have become, in most rubrics, best in the world. (Some Asian schools, and very rich U.S. schools, are also at the top in math and science, but not in any categories where human, personal involvement counts.)
Heather, a LOT is riding on this decision tomorrow from the Supreme Court. My bet is they will side with Trump, although the Constitution is extremely clear. He should not be allowed on any ballot. He should not be allowed to hold any public office ever again.
What he needs to be is in a jail cell. He should have been locked up when he was indicted/arrested the first time, then simply transported from jail to jail on each indictment and arrest.
Trump has the Supreme Court right in the palm of his hand, and they will be the ruination of our Democracy and Constitution. This Supreme Court is a total embarrassment for America!!!
NONE of the justices wanted this case thrown in their lap. They all made that clear in the oral arguments. They seemed to blame Colorado for forcing this on them. When in fact it's Trump AND McConnell.
A good case FOR Colorado was made by Ilya Somin is Professor of Law at George Mason University and the B. Kenneth Simon Chair in Constitutional Studies at the Cato Institute. Of all people. Maybe the Federalist Supremes would've listened to him.
"Trump's attempt to overturn the 2020 election well deserves punishment from the standpoint of both retribution and deterrence," wrote Somin following the four-count indictment filed by Special Counsel Jack Smith in early August. "For the head of state in a democracy, there are few more serious crimes than using fraud to try to stay in power after losing an election."
"One of the points at issue in the Supreme Court case considering whether Trump should be disqualified under Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment is whether the events of that day qualify as an "insurrection." It should be an easy call. The January 6 attack was an insurrection under any plausible definition of that term."
And Judge Lutig is a very conservative Repuplican that was in line for SCOTUS as well, and he is te one that reminded all involved of the clarity of the 14th/section3 .
He mde no comment that I am aware of in that regard. He and Lawrence Tribe did the original analysis of the 14th/3 that made clear that insurrection was cause for non-eligibility.
Absolutely right. Under any plausible definition of that term. Further, a trial was held wherein Trump's lawyers argued, evidence was presented, and the Court found that insurrection had indeed occurred. The fact that the 14th Amendment does not define insurrection is as irrelevant to the clarity of its purpose as the fact that the 2nd Amendment does not define "arms". This Court bent over backwards to issue a series of preposterous decisions interpreting the 2nd Amendment with fulsome embrace of the gun lobby's perspectives, while downplaying commonsense public safety perspectives dating back centuries. Surely, they wouldn't be so inconsistent as to fortify the one that fetishizes guns at the expense of public safety, while minimizing the one that mandates equal protection and due process, would they?!?
I will stop now, as I need to take measures to remove my tongue from my cheek
Well, to me, everything you have said is common sense. It was an insurrection, instigated by 45, we all saw it with our own eyes. The January 6 committee, with under oath testimony is further proof.
You're right lin, NONE of the justices wanted anything to do with that case. To my mind, the pattern emerges again and again that the current crop of gop managers / wanna' be leaders prove by illustration that they are incapable of governing a democracy - only grenade throwing and launching. Was it not just recently McConnel who off handedly admitted that when he had Senate leadership during the impeachments, that he essentially abdicated his sworn duty to all citizens to serve party fealty ? *edit in> It's worth stressing here some contrasts: Biden makes clear that he serves 'all Americans' and his actions show that daily. That's worth crowing about friends.
The amicus brief is a thing of beauty. The one filed by American historians in support of the respondents in Colorado. It's readable and clear, being written by historians and not lawyers so it's understandable by regular people. I urge people to look for it and take a look.
Not that this brief will have any effect on SCOTUS, because they've already made up their minds...
Lol Marlene; Sometimes I in my minds hurry up to my fingers, mis-strike keys that way, ie., HRC v HCR...... Don't feel terrible dear. *edit in > Pardon my nature Marlene; I'm struggling to find my humor in this moment of unhinged rage, post news release from the WCOTUS (Whimsical Court of 'these' United States).
... speaking of Clarity and The Court ... Truth, Justice ... Conscience, Integrity and ... Courage to stand and speak Truth To Power ..., check this out from a true American hero ... to all our weaponized, inflatable patriotic punch-bags, so eager to win at any cost - throwing truth to the winds ... (for what ...?!) Check this out ...:
"December 19 | Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Courts Subcommittee, delivered the twenty-sixth in a series of speeches titled “The Scheme,” exposing the machinations by right-wing donor interests to capture the Supreme Court and achieve through the Court what they cannot through the elected branches of government."
"Whitehouse discusses the Judiciary Committee’s vote last month to authorize Chairman Dick Durbin (D-IL) to issue subpoenas to right-wing billionaire Harlan Crow and court fixer Leonard Leo, two of the central characters in the Supreme Court’s ethics mess. Committee Democrats authorized the subpoenas over a wall of partisan Republican threats and obstruction."
*****
The Scheme 27: The Myth of the Unelected Bureaucrat
"January 24 | Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Courts Subcommittee, delivers the twenty-seventh in a series of speeches titled “The Scheme,” exposing the machinations by right-wing donor interests to capture the Supreme Court and achieve through the Court what they cannot through the elected branches of government.
"Whitehouse discusses Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, a case pending before the Supreme Court that could overturn Chevron deference. That doctrine, a cornerstone of administrative law for nearly 40 years, grants agencies the flexibility they need to issue regulations that protect Americans’ health and safety. Whitehouse details how Loper is the product of a larger, decades-long effort by pro-corporate interests to eviscerate the federal government’s regulatory apparatus, to the detriment of the American people."
"February 8 | Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Courts Subcommittee, delivers the twenty-eighth in a series of speeches titled “The Scheme,” exposing the machinations by right-wing donor interests to capture the Supreme Court and achieve through the Court what they cannot through the elected branches of government.
"Whitehouse breaks down the important role of the Judicial Conference of the United States, a little-known agency within the judicial branch that is well-positioned to improve transparency in the judiciary and strengthen the ethics rules that apply to the Supreme Court justices. Whitehouse recounts the progress he has made in seeking action from the Judicial Conference on issues related to judicial ethics."
The one consistent thread is how bad we Americans are at prevention in every critical issue. From Health, education to politics to everything in between.
I've been arguing since the '70s that it's wise to vote for Democratic Presidents even if you don't much like them, to keep such corruption out of the court.
But JL, there are Dems who have been corrupt also. Look at Melendez who is under scrutiny right now. Joseph Kennedy influenced elections too and he was a real sonofabitch! I mean, the entire Dem party hasn’t become crazed like the Maggots ever, but we do have a chosen few who have rocked the boat.
And nobody is "perfect", but in the measure of the whole person, some people are helpers and/or liberators and others are opportunists, and/or tyrants. Some champion telling testable truth, and others gain by telling lies.
The political party of a candidate is only one factor of many that should determine how people vote. But honestly....I am not sure how we can be absolutely sure. Teddy Roosevelt...as HCR discussed, appeared to be right leaning toward corporations and then he held them responsible. Which was the right thing to do.
I think Teddy's family were admirers of Lincoln. Not that Lincoln walked on water, but he took government by and for the people seriously. I think they who would be kings thought they would control Teddy, but were wrong. And, as Lincoln said, public sentiment is everything, and I think the nation was ready for a reformer.
Two decisions of SCOTUS stand out at the moment:Citizens United and the weakening of the voting act. Both prepared the mess they’re in now. Can the three women (the fourth is just a clueless teenager) straighten out enough men to get some decent decisions and “save” the Roberts court? Doubt it.
I’m learning more about these Opus Dei sycophants! They have a long history of corruption and radicalism. Remember how President Kennedy was attacked for being Catholic? But he was not what his accusers said about him. That radicalism was present only in the conservative party. The Pope needs to, and I think he has begun this, to condemn the radicalism of Opus Dei.
Opus Dei used to be the crazed anti Vatican2 crew. But they are being outdone by the reactionary Conference of American Bishops who are wholly owned by the racist right wing religious extremist Leonard Leo politics and big money schemers.
I'm gonna' jump out on another limb here, and speculate that McConnel's retirement message, was Not a coincidence. He got the insider's tip - like how the stock market 'actually works' and 'knew' he would get the suspicious fingers for abrogating his duty, and oath of office, along with a gop majority of co-conspirators, to serve "all" citizens in their states: repulsican, dumbocrat, independent, and undeclared - with intent, plan, and execution. The next question to see is if this self serving Kangaroo court will make Joe Biden, their dictator ~ *edit in > Apologies if I'm sounding unhinged, but I am ! I don't ever in my life recall ever being such a ball of unhinged fury ! *edit in > As I surmise, we'll soon see 'their' banners and standard flags - News just starting, leading with opponents to Sherrod Brown wagging their anti-choice banners. ? Are unalienable rights just too much like "color your own" child's coloring book - and with this regulation, "color your own, but only by 'my' number chart. Yet another "Holy Crusade and kristian Warriors" ~
The thing I think is hard to get one's mind around is the fact - in my opinion, that this has been a brilliant, long plotted out scheme involving a coalition with some common interests that have all agreed that the enemy of our enemy, is our friend for now; Secretly, each believe they will prevail over former uncomfortable 'allies,' once their end is served. ? What could that 'common interest' be ? What 'wants, needs, demands' could birth such a unity in our world ? What demanding forces are the antithesis of liberty by nature ? You have your list, and I certainly have mine that I've been watching keenly since the '80's. ? Who are we...... ( Who...who, Who who )
And they have no rights either. Why has the Catholic Church never allowed women to be priests but only nun's who must be subservient to every priest?
The patriarchy within the Catholic Church, the Southern Baptist conference, the Methodist Church and others allows their leaders to commit sexual assault against children and women and even some men-- most often with impunity.
How many hundreds of times has the Catholic Church just shuffled a priest off to another parish when they have committed sexual abuse? And most localities won't touch these cases most often refusing to investigate.
Why do they still get away with it? Why is there a movement among cardinals to undermine Pope Francis? Why did we not learn, until after his death, that the parish church priest in our town was sexually abusing young boys? I am reading, "Playing God" by Mary Jo McConahay. Getting some answers. They are not holy..
As it turns out, all four women voted together, likely thinking ultimately of Dobbs. But how do we get the White House to understand the danger of leaving November to the voters given the Heritage Foundation, Vlad and Victor, and Speaker Johnson, ALEC, and all the other Fifth Columnists?
It was interesting to me that one of the liberal members of the Supreme Court (I think it was Sotomayor) brought up during questioning that a state should not be allowed to decide whether a person is qualified to run for president. She stated that should probably be a federal matter. This was something that Trump’s lawyers had not even mentioned as a possible argument in their favor.🤷🏻♀️
I was about to write something else, but after thinking it through, I think Sotomayor is right. Afterall, if Colorado is allowed to do the right thing, then Florida (or pick pretty much any state in the US South) would be allowed to do the wrong thing with the current makeup of the US Supreme Court.
There is a protection to 14th abuse by the states. 60% or so of Congress votes to override that state.The justices didn’t address that protection. I’m still wondering about that fact.
But states often keep people off the ballot for various reasons. Lisa Murkowski was left off the ballot in Alaska but still won as a write-in.
If someone runs for President, Senator or Congressman and they don't qualify because of their age, they will be disqualified from running even if they met the other qualifications. So, it is Congress's responsibility to disqualify them from appearing on the ballot?
I disagree with the court especially when you read the amendment. It says nothing about Congress deciding and essentially SCOTUS decided that Trump wasn't guilty of being involved in an insurrection.
That question drove me crazy. It was nuts. To me, it was a lie. If the Court allowed the Colorado decision to stand, it would be law only in Colorado. That’s how our system works. That blew my mind, to hear that said from the bench by several of the judges , but especially a liberal. — b.rad
Interesting, so Sotomayor was saying that a state did not have the right to decide that a candidate was not qualified to run for federal office in their state, that federal law superseded state law? So is this the old states rights vs federal rights argument?
Thanks for weighing in, but I'm not going to give the benefit of a doubt in a case that's so important and consequential. And today it just got a million times worse, with a 'concurrence' that reads like a dissent. Twilight Zone, all over again. best luck to US, b.rad
And or she suggested that one state should not be able to set the outcome for the rest of the states (hence likely that Supreme Court will be in favor of Trump
And let him stay on ballot). I figure they will
allow him to run but then what, no ‘hold office’?!!!?! That’s insanity!
I am beginning to believe as someone else mentioned, the court is waiting out the other judgments. Ironic that the Supreme Court is waiting for lower courts to see if Donnie can make the bonds or deposit enough cash, if he can, SCOTUS will rule in his favor. If he can not make bond they can rule him out? And some in between like “how” he makes bond. If he makes the bond from foreign investments in his business, could that spark a new emoluments case against him? One possibility, and there seems to be many, is another bankruptcy!
Ted, I don’t believe that declaration of bankruptcy will help him out of these judgements. It will just bury him that much deeper in 💩💩💩💩!
I may be wrong, and this is strictly my opinion, but I don’t believe there’s anyone going to “loan” him enough to buy a stick of gum, let alone millions to foot these bonds he has to pay. He can’t put up any property because he now has the two sets of court ordered eyes watching everything going on. So, doing his shenanigans as he’s done since the 1970s won’t work now.
As for the Supreme Court. Frumpy has stacked it with ‘his people’ just as he’s done with every court system in this country. I think, and I’m pulling this from memory having heard it someplace, that when he was in office he assigned over 250 to judgeship in various positions around the country. This includes the 4 he put on the Supreme Court, and of course, Judge Cannon in Ft. Pierce Federal Court.
I expect this court is going to give Frumpy all they can give to him. I just hope they all realize they have, and are, set preference for all criminals across this country.
Ted, this is Frumpy’s style. It’s how he duds things. He uses people to do all of his ‘dirty work’. They go to jail, he doesn’t care. He’s free as a bird and these sheep 🐑 he’s thrown under the bus are loyal to the point that they will sit in prison to do his time.
I think it’s forced liquidation, bankruptcy or sketchy foreign loans… maybe all three? I just can’t wait till our county is rid of this sociopathic malignant narcissist.
You forgot m….. rapist, scammer, liar. Just to add a few (only because I’m just waking up and my mind is still asleep).
Something rise that expecting. With his actions of late, his speech impairment, and his appearance changes, I look for him to be declared “incompetent to stand trial” at some point. His actions while in the courtroom in New York will add to that judgement. His outburst, getting up and walking out, all of it.
We have to remember, this 🍓🍊💩🤡😊🤮 is an actor, or so he thinks, and he’s going to extreme lengths to get out of paying these bills, and especially staying out of jail.
Tfg has so many personality disorders and character flaws its hard to always list them isnt it?
That is a purposeful as his daily chaos agenda. He learned it several ways. Growing up unloved by his parents, abused by his father, learning from Roy Cohn. It is all about constant chaos and shock and awe to keep people off balance and processing what just happened so they are distracted from the next outrageous fireworks/shiny objects. Abused and damaged people are drawn to his saviorhood.
I am really enjoying this book, "The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump" edited by Dr Bandy Lee
Oh, so totally agree Nickie, yet we must stay alert and pay close attention lest they slip a “fast one” by us…..no matter how tiring (and cringey) it is. Hang tight all!!!✌🏼
Viktor Orbán is visiting Trump at Mar-a-Lago next week. Does anyone have any thoughts on what he and Trump would be up to? Could he be a go-between for Putin? If Trump needs $, could they funnel it to him, or are fund transfers so well monitored that that would be impossible?
Have asked whether Trump is in constant touch with Vlad from Mal-a-Largo—another reason to jail him. Orban may be there to buck him up or may be bringing bond money. Meanwhile there are Americans who instead of thinking about the Texas fires will be yelling about the price of a hamburger, so maybe Orban is just making sure Trump can afford his.
Why not? Trump needs bond money and Vlad will pay him back. C’mon, everybody, start thinking how easy it is for those who want to destroy US to help those who want to do it!
I am trying to stay optimistic, since every "traditional" sign would say Biden will prevail in the general election. The economy is doing well; record stock prices & job numbers. He's passed signifcant legislation - such that this coming decade will be one of investment in our infrastructure. And the CHIPS Act. The PACT Act. Yet - Biden's approval is at an all-time low. And the GOP offers us ....nothing, and takes away our rights. The House has passed NOTHING - and even when the Senate comes up with bipartisan legislation on the border, Trump forces the GOP not to even vote on it. Ukraine is suffering; the GOP won't even take the vote. And Trump is sounding crazier & crazier (and litterly demented) on the stump. AND YET -- the corrupt, broke, adjudicated sexual assaulter (rapist, according to the judge's definition) who is in thrall to Putin is leading in the polls. 4-5 points up on Biden in the poll just released by NYT/Siena. I can't belive it.
It’s the incessant bleating about President Biden’s age (it’s the only “negative” thing that can be picked on) especially by the New York Times, that has created doubt in the citizenry. It seems sometimes that there is some grand plan afoot that we know nothing about. I’m quite sure that Trump doesn’t have the support to win. After all, he lost in 2020, and lots of supporters have left since then. And I guess the polling business is pretty lucrative—every media outlet likes to use them. No need for investigation. No need to find out how folks are really feeling. Lazy lazy. I’m not sure if this is very coherent. It’s odd too, that the Times has nothing to say about Trump’s foolish incoherent speeches. Perhaps they are standing by to be the Authoritarian Newspaper of Record.
Alexandra, I canceled mine about two weeks ago, and was also very clear. Either they learned nothing from 2016 (Biden’s age = Clinton’s emails, much ado about nothing or at least very little) or they actively want a second Trump presidency. I think the latter, so I canceled.
Update: I read this Salon article from the point of view of someone who may have a "loved one" who is experiencing the symptoms that tfg is exhibiting. If it's true that his brain is literally being eaten away by this disease, his supporters are doing him no favors by hiding this fact. If he ends up winning the presidency, it will be in name only while the country will be run by the likes of Mike Flynn, Stephen Miller, Roger Stone, and Steve Bannon, to name a few.
Wow, Lynell! As an RN, recently retired from working in mental health and aging, I concur with this dementia assessment of Trump. This should be covered on every news outlet and political forum, as well as the real terror of a Flynn/Stone/Bannon presidency that would end American democracy. Shared. Thank You.
Thanks for sharing, MaryPat! I personally would not like to see it used as a "weapon" against Trump. But at the same time, if this psychologist's assessment is correct, voters need to know what they'll be getting by having him as our president. After all, it's our future that needs to be taken into account as much as his.
Like before. It seemed to me that 45 never stopped campaigning. His preference was entertaining an adoring crowd rather than staying in the White House, which he openly criticized as dated, ( not enough gold faucets!) and being an honorable and respected POTUS. The prospect of a return by Flynn, Miller, Stone, and Bannon to the executive branch gives me serious willies,
I personally have not seen any news coverage that showed the extreme symptoms that the psychologist in this article talked about. I don't have cable, nor do I stream. I only have antenna TV! When I read the interview in Slate, I did not see it as a lambasting of tfg. More a stark realization of his personal future delivered by a dispassionate medical practitioner.
The New York Times is venerable and edited but very biased. It tried to compensate with op-eds but the op is now the ed. They do not want Biden but they do want their reputation. So age is the new fault but only over 80 to start.
NYT Loves to skew polls that will rile up their readership. I have put them in the “Full of 💩” spectrum in their coverage of the 2024 election. They need to fill pages w this tripe, because they mistakenly think they need to stay “relevant”.
I don’t care about covering the liberal/conservative debate towards government, but since the R Party began to disintegrate into the Trump Party, the NYT sees its role to prop it this banana republic as part of their role of staying indifferent, and it NOT EQUAL! They aren’t serving anybody!
It seems likely that polls are “tainted” either by our Fifth Column (which is omnipresent) or by the use of landlines. May I add here that “our” is the most important pronoun for US presently. It could put US back together enough to begin to mend the tears Trump and Russia have brought and are still bringing about. Thank you, all of you, who embrace “our Heather” and recognize that “objectivity” is for weighing and is only half of our “job” as humans. Best Hemingway quote in this context. Where would we be without the arts which take us to nature and make us human.
That poll has been pretty well picked apart, by Simon Rosenberg, Jay Kuo, and Threads, that I've seen. People's antennae went up when it showed trump winning with women in the post-Dobbs era; Democrats have pretty much won everything since that decision.
There's both partisan and statistical bias in poll taking, i also heard of another, begins with Q, which had Biden up by the same amount. I suspect opinions right now are emotionally febrile, and subject to re-examination as time moves along, depending too on the latest public sensation. People like Lawrence O'donnell would say good polling is too soon. And... polls sometimes end up being skewed even to the very end, with surprise upsets if you had just followed the polls. 2024 might well be just that kind of year, given all the pyrotechnics going on.
I don't get it either. But there is a problem of affordability for younger folks. Housing is super expensive, and owning your own home even more so with interest rates rising more than 4% on top of home prices refusing to come down. College is more expensive than ever. But that doesn't explain all of those younger folks maybe supporting Trump instead.
With recent trends in the electoral college, Biden needs to beat Trump by 5% to win. So if Trump is 5% ahead now, he is really more like 10% ahead. So Biden's poll numbers are definitely bad news.
Do not get riled out over these polls!! They’re early, they’re skewed, they’re always always alt-right leaning. Biden will win. Say this over and over and let it be your mantra. Biden Will Win! BIDEN WILL WIN!
He sat for years without saying much. Like a mole embedded in our government, just waiting for the right moment. And boy, did he spring into action. Likely with Ginni yanking his chain, having paved the way.
All the points you brought up—housing affordability, college costs, rent costs are true everywhere in the western world. Unfortunately no one seems able to fix that. Certainly not Trump!
SF, in my little Facebook world (with 1450 "friends", with close to 200 that I interact with regularly, made up of schoolmates, motorcyclists, tuba players, cops, musicians, and some "friends of those friends") there is not a strong weight to either political side. That said, I am guessing that more than 60% are displeased with the current situation in the House, and dismayed at who the Republican party is putting forward to run against Biden. Admittedly (and to my absolute amazement) a huge percentage, although not all of the "cops" branch are behind fpotus, in spite of his lawbreaking. They checked their brains at the door.
Yes, the economy is doing very well and Biden has done a great job, but that's NOT what they're saying on Fox so-called News. It's an alternative universe over there. I can't watch it, but my husband checks their website every so often to stay abreast of the crapola they are -- and are NOT -- reporting.
JUST THINK ABOUT THIS, Nicholas Kristof, New York Times Opinion Columnist, warned:
'When he was challenged about the bloodshed in Gaza on “Face the Nation” last weekend, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel responded, “What would America do” after something like the Oct. 7 Hamas attack? “Would you not be doing what Israel is doing? You’d be doing a hell of a lot more.”
'in less than five months of Israel’s current war in Gaza, the health authorities there report more than 12,500 children killed.'
'Some of the most incisive critics of Israel’s actions are from the very U.N. agencies and human rights groups whose staffs are risking their lives in the field to save lives in Sudan, Ethiopia and other countries.'
'In any case, there is a reason to focus on Gaza today, for it is not just one more place of pain among many contenders but, in the judgment of Unicef, the world’s most dangerous place to be a child.'
'Consider that in the first 18 months of Russia’s current war in Ukraine, at least 545 children were killed. Or that in 2022, by a United Nations count, 2,985 children were killed in all wars worldwide. In contrast, in less than five months of Israel’s current war in Gaza, the health authorities there report more than 12,500 children killed.'
'Among them were 250 infants less than 1 year old. I can’t think of any conflict in this century that has killed babies at such a pace.'
'Of course Israel had the right to respond militarily to the Oct. 7 attacks. Of course Hamas leaders should give up their hostages. But none of this excuses Israel’s “indiscriminate” bombing, in the words of President Biden, and restrictions on food and other assistance.'
'Because of America’s support for Israel’s invasion and diplomatic protection for it at the United Nations, this blood is on our hands, and that surely justifies increased scrutiny.'
'Yet here’s another double standard: We Americans condemn Russia, China or Venezuela for their violations of human rights, but the United States supports Israel and protects it diplomatically even as it has engaged in what President Biden has called an “over the top” military campaign.'
“How can the U.S. condemn Russia’s bombing of civilians in Ukraine as a war crime but fund Netanyahu’s war machine, which has killed thousands?” 'Senator Bernie Sanders asked.'
'So it’s fair to talk about double standards. They are real. They run in many directions, shielding Israel as well as condemning it. And in a world where we are all connected by our shared humanity, I believe we should never let our very human tangles of double standards and hypocrisies be harnessed to deflect from the tragedy unfolding today for the children of Gaza, or America’s complicity in it.' (NYTimes, By Nicholas Kristof) See gifted link below.
"So is there a double standard in global attention? Absolutely. Defenders of Israel have every right to point all this out, and sometimes it does reflect antisemitism. Yet — now we get to the other side — it also strikes me as unconscionable to use the world’s hypocrisy, however invidious, to justify the deaths of thousands of children in Gaza."
Marlene, the children! It is impossible not to internalize what is happening to the people in Gaza, Ukraine, Sudan...and to children here as well. What are the effects of this country's addiction to guns on the health of Americans, including children! I am grateful for you, sister.
Yep..... we might want to pay some attention to the fact the majority of gun killings are suicides, not mass shootings, a significant number of whom are white older males. Rural is the worst i hear. We stereotypically apply our maternal feelings on infants and children.... but really...
Frank, with reference to gun use and violence in the US, I I focus on reality and on the facts reported by Pew Research, Brady United, IHME (INSTITUTE FOR HEALTH METRICS AND EVALUATION), Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, RAND, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, etc.
Frank, thank you. As indicated, I am familiar with gun use and gun violence in the US and other developed as well as less developed countries:
'Gun deaths among U.S. children and teens rose 50% in two years according to a Pew Research Center analysis of the latest annual mortality statistics from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).'
'Firearm injuries and deaths in the United States have increased in recent years and adversely affect many children and adolescents. Firearms now kill more children and adolescents than any other cause, surpassing motor vehicle crashes. Additionally, the U.S. has by far the highest rate of child and teen firearm mortality compared to peer countries. Beyond deaths, there are many more youth who survive gunshot wounds or are otherwise exposed to gun violence. These exposures can lead to negative behavioral health outcomes among youth and their family members. This brief explores the impacts of gun violence on children and adolescents (ages 17 and below) by answering the following key questions:'
'How have firearm deaths changed in recent years among children and adolescents and how do these deaths vary by demographic characteristics?
What is known about nonfatal firearm injury and gun exposure among children and adolescents?'
'How does gun violence affect the mental health and well-being of children and adolescents?
'What policies are in place to address youth exposure to gun violence?'
'How have firearm deaths changed in recent years among children and adolescents?'
'Firearm-related deaths have increased among children and adolescents since the pandemic began, with seven children per day dying by firearm in 2022. From 2012 to 2022, nearly 19,700 children ages 17 and younger died by firearm.1 During this period, firearm death rates gradually rose until 2017, then slowed through 2019, before sharply rising with the onset of the pandemic and holding steady in 2022 (Figure 1). From 2019 to 2022, the firearm death rate among children and adolescents increased by 46% (from 2.4 to 3.5 per 100,000). This translates to seven children per day dying by firearm in 2022.'(KFF) See link below
'Study Finds That Dropping Training Requirement to Obtain Concealed Carry Permit Leads to Significant Increase in Gun Assaults'
'Study comes as last year’s Bruen Supreme Court decision forces several states to loosen concealed carry permitting laws.'
An analysis of 11 states that removed concealed carry licensing that mandated firearm training or proficiency requirements suggests that rates of violent gun assaults increase 32 percent, according to a new study led by researchers at the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Violence Solutions at the Bloomberg School of Public Health.
The study examined 11 states that moved from requiring purchasers to demonstrate a need for a permit for a concealed weapon–known as shall issue laws–to permitless concealed laws. In some states, shall issue laws require permittees to undergo live firearm training, minimum hours at a firing range, or proficiency (e.g. hitting a designated target with 70 percent of their shots). Some shall issue states also prohibit those with violent misdemeanor convictions from obtaining permits.
When the 11 states with shall issue licensing laws that require safety training for obtaining a concealed carry permit went to permitless concealed carry, the annual rate of assaults with guns increased by 21 per 100,000. Some statistical models also found significant increases in assaults with guns when states dropped provisions that prohibited those convicted of violent misdemeanors from obtaining concealed carry permits.
The findings were published September 19, 2023 in Criminology and Public Policy.
“When states made it easier for potentially untrained gun owners to carry their weapons in public, assaults with guns increased,” said Cassandra Crifasi, PhD, co-director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Violence Solutions at the Bloomberg School. “While the Supreme Court’s Bruen decision is forcing some states to weaken their concealed carry permitting systems, this study shows that states can reduce the expected increase in gun assault rates by including training requirements.” (Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health) See link below.
lot to think about, but remember Hamas set this up for exactly this kind of response. It's playing out "well" for them so far? Remember, too, the population voted an existentially anti-Israeli party in to lead them politically. I agree, much better to have a more moderate Israeli government to figure out a less destructive response, instead of what is transpiring.
Netanyahu was seeing to it that Hamas run Gaza because he favored keeping the PLO weak. It important to know Netanyahu behavior and Israeli's policies towards Gaza and the West Bank prior to the war. This is not to excuse HAMA, which needs to be quashed as much as possible. However, the complicity of Netanyahu and other Israelis before the war contributes to our understanding of these twisted and tragic circumstances.
Many of the Palestinians are intimidated by Hamas as much as Israel. Hamas allows NO dissent. “There can be no successful appeal from the bullet to the ballet.” Abraham Lincoln
I suspect the support / coercion divide is complex. For sure, no elections since they took power in 2006. We can also remember for the most part Hamas membership is drawn from the Gazan population generally. There were running gun battles in 2006, bullets more than ballots.
The similarities with Ukraine are the only thing clear to me. The surrounding monarchies use the Israel and Palestinian conflict as a strategy of control over their populations to protect their own power. I think the two state solution is the way forward. Security is guaranteed only with an equal rule of law applied to both sides. Peace and protection could provide a space towards prosperity. Violence is not sustainable to viability of either state. It’s just so sad and demoralizing that this conflict has gone on for so long.
Thanks Fern; I've been and continue to be a huge fan of Nich Kristof. Even his side gig, running an orchard is highly relatable and attractive to me, as at one time, I worked a full time j_o_b and maintained an orchard; from planting, pruning, spraying, picking, storage, etc., etc. I look back and wonder 'how' quite often, but especially when I get his posts.
That is SO true.... I find it hard to be it's been 8 years since i started picking up a renewed interest in following American politics, many thanks to the unbelievable, statistically flukey way Trump won the election.
Love Mr Balla’s comment that explains why we honor OUR Heather: “how well we (Heather!) go (es) out of our (her) way to add perspective, to shine light on some issue we (all) care about.” We honor Heather as a member of our family of (philosophical) choice.
Yes, tired thinking about it. Like watching Cirque du Soleil on a pyramid of chairs twirling plates at the end of sticks and wondering which moving part will come apart first. I'm thinking I need to cover my eyes.
Don’t cover your eyes. Get out and do something or stay home and write GOTV postcards! It’s good for the soul. There are primaries through 19 March and after.
Would love to be a fly on the wall in FL when Orban and the former guy talk. What do two tryants talk about? How to make the most money possible exploiting their country's natural resources and their fellow citizens? How to stay in power for life? How to destroy all democratic norms, laws, and government structures? How to get the most pleasure out of harming people? How to most effectively threaten, intimidate, and strike fear in your fellow citizens. Will they share the direct line phone numbers to other like-minded world tyrant leaders that they can collude with? How will Orban be compensated for giving his masterclass on being an effective tyrant and killing democracy as quickly as possible? Will the former guy takes notes? No, I doubt it. I wonder who will? Would like to see a copy of that transcript.
Probably the FBI bugged the place on their raid for obtaining classified materials. Well I'm not sure if the FBI would do that, but maybe they brought along CIA who would.
Only Trump invited him. It’s rude diplomatically, so I hope the CIA is tracking everything and x-raying his luggage. How about eavesdropping? Do we wonder about the Secret Service with Trump? Will they be present with the two of them. Will Orban offer Trump exile in Hungary? A castle on the Danube?
Thank you, so hard to find humor in this mess. But I'm as serious as a heart attack (as a cop friend used to say to me)... Chump is not reluctant to use and abuse anybody.
Wow! You’re right. I doubt the former guy will be giving Orban golf tips. May I borrow your questions with your permission? Wonderful talking points for discussion.
Joan (TX>DE), right, I don't think he's coming to golf, either. Yes, of course, use my questions with as much wild abandon as you want. I hope they are helpful.
Professor, thank you for giving us a solid outline for my (our?) minds to grasp. I am more interested in the SCOTUS decision and the State of the Union than Super Tuesday. Or anything the chump does. Or polls. Or talking heads.
I find that it is easier to get through a week like this when I can keep the Main Thing the Main Thing.
You don't have that luxury, so I will be thinking of you often, with gratitude and encouragement...
lol i spent parts of the overnight listening to an audible Dune, getting ready to take in Part 2, which one friend has hugely enjoyed. How can i sneak in my own popcorn???
Can't explain why so many timed it for the same, but primaries are dominated by minority activists in both parties. Elections are generally won by pluralities, since usually 60% or fewer voters actually turn out.
We knew this was going to be a difficult year. And it already is.
My nails are down to the quick.
We all need to remember mental health breaks.
The biggest concerns now are Ukraine and the SCOTUS delaying the DC Trump trial till it is too late to do before the election. And, of course, both defeating Trump and taking back the house, while extending the slim majority in the senate. No biggy, right?
LOL…Annabel…I was just chewing my nails while reading this, so had to pause and do a hat tip to you for nailing it (sorry for the pun)…nervous habit when stressed!
Annabel, remember the concept of "stagger breathing" as utillized by choirs/choruses and all low brass players confronted with 10 measures of tied whole notes to be played fortissimo: work with your section and figure out when you can breathe. Stop your note, breathe, then come back in. My section mate and I are "even" (him) and "odd" (me, in more ways than one); I know that I can breathe in all odd numbered measures, and he'll be playing while he breathes in all even numbered measures while I am playing. The other two in our section are both younger and breathe when they need to, which is about a quarter of when I need to! This allows for a constant sound to be made, even as each player/singer takes time to breathe when they need to.
Do the same with your political news consumption/activism. Act when you can, rest when you must.
Ally, Connie Shultz wrote a beautiful article on this very theme, I think she called it “breathe.” It has stayed with me years after I first read it. It’s a wonderful analogy.
There was a time (12-15 years ago) when I went to a tuba masterclass, a peer support training, and a physical skills/use of force class in the same week. Every single one of them discussed breathing as a foundational part of that discipline, along with mental imagery. Fascinating to me.
lol on the nails... say, sip a nice hot coffee during your read and write, a comfortable location with nice morning sun, such as I have right now. Even kitty taking over lap. All good for "mental health"... also,put on something soothing from youtube. There's tons.
OOOH - The dems will protect Johnson if he brings up the Ukraine spending for a vote. Nice move, Dems.
"OOOH - The dems will protect Johnson if he brings up the Ukraine spending for a vote. Nice move, Dems."
So what's your problem with that?
Maybe you prefer a Speaker Johnson and no supplemental aid bill? Or maybe a supplemental aid bill and a GOP Speaker food fight - when MAGAs have put government on the brink of a shut down?
Because that's the choice.
Until we vote in a Democratic House majority.
Call me stupid but I took Susan’s comment as sincere.
Same here.
That's how Congress works, often, perhaps most of the time. There is lots of "horse trading", deal-making, do a favor now and it gets repaid later. But if you fail to repay later, good luck getting what you want next time. Sometimes it is a complex calculus. When it's a very important matter, the Whip works to make sure everybody is in line and prepared to vote, and they count votes on their side before a vote is taken -- or, rather, if they are smart and experienced and well-led, they count votes ahead of the actual formal vote. We saw the Rs recently bring a matter to a vote, and it appeared that they had failed to count votes ahead of the formal tally and they lost. It looked like inexperienced leadership. Who would have guessed?!
Call me unrealistic but in my idealized imagined world, the deal-making would be in service to an ecology of global thriving. I wonder about Ro Khanna's ability to operate more effectively than what we're accustomed to.
Joan, I tried to avoid injecting any of my personal views into my comment about how Congress -- especially the House -- functions in real life.
My view is that we humans need to get serious about preparing for the long-term future of life on Earth, and pronto. Even if the major powers, the corporations especially, were to get on board with trying to heal the damage to Earth's natural systems and resources, we would all still face the problem of figuring out what we should do, and then hope that we have the resources, and enough time, to solve the problem(s) before it's too late. It's doubly frustrating, or some higher multiplier, to see so many people standing in the way, stubbornly insisting that they want to keep on raking in the billions and trillions of money units in profits, while not only avoiding fixing the problems, but even doubling down and making the problems worse.
First, it warmed my heart to find your reply after awakening in New York City, rolling on steel and rubber wheels, and arriving at a cold house on Cape Cod. Somehow this community draws out people with thoughts worth reading and I appreciate, "doubly frustrating or some higher multiplier", an example of unique word combos. I'm captivated by entanglements like the group immune systems of forests and adaptability of fungi. We humans have alot to learn I need to learn more from people talking about degrowth and from others probing the 'edges of the otherwise'.
If I call you stupid I stand equally self-accused. My "like" on Susan's comment is is No 38. How dangerously easy it is to squabble about nothing.
Trump wants us to squabble. Divide and conquer.
Squabbling is only a distraction from what is really going on this week. The idea that the leader of an anti-American and anti-Democracy country is coming to a private home on our soil where an entire stash of stolen Top Secret documents is being held is outrageous. There should already have been a raid of black helicopters to retrieve them.
The possibility if not likelihood that Orban will see them and be given the opportunity to rifle through (and pay for) them should add a whole new level of charges and incarceration to the holder of said documents. This is being given no coverage (like all such things) by MSM and is simply crazy.
"rifle through": https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/riflethrough#:
I thought they already confiscated the stolen classified documents from trump's lavatory reading room. (?)
Imaginary conversation: "Heh, heh, they thought they'd got me! Now I'm gonna show you something - look! look at this! and this!"
Thanks. And I didn’t giv4 it a like, because I didn’t know how to take it.
I made one mistake in regard to Susan (am assuming you mean Susan Collins) and voted for her in 2014 because I thought she was the more moderate Senator in Maine (in comparison to Olympia Snowe) and I was so wrong.... So, I take everything Collins says with a huge grain of salt. I don't think she has a sincere bone in her body, but I do think that Lisa Murkowski is genuine.
I feel the same. Susan Collins seems to bow with the prevailing wind. Every time I've heard Lisa Murkowski, I've felt grateful to know there's a principled Republican I can count on for some balance in the Senate.
Thanks Terry! I agree totally!
Susie Q is all talk and no walk.
I don't know if Collins is insincere or terminally gullible (read stoopid). I can't listen to her at all, and it's not her speech impediment that makes me reach for the remote. I agree about Murkowski. She's the real deal.
So did I! Maybe it's because social media makes it so easy to use "Hit and run" snark that it's tempting to use it elsewhere as well. I love that most of our conversation here is respectful. And it would be kind of boring if everyone agreed with everything. Disagreeing w/o snark is a challenge - that I believe we are all capable of.
PS I'm so grateful it's now ok to end with a participle - I don't think I could bring myself to write "of which we are all capable." Thank you Mr. Churchill for "Up with which I will not put!"
I'm guilty of snark, although it's rarely directed at people in this conversation and most often directed at the pooh bahs in power. THOSE f-ing guys! They're the miscreants up with which I will not put.
Referring to miscreants, I think it should be "up with whom I will not put".
I sit corrected.
So did I.
I agree. Susan was not being sarcastic. It is a good move against the the dodos who want to stand in the way of everything except their political shit shows.
I did too, and it's a move that is long overdue.
I agree. I thought it was a nice move too. A little old fashioned log rolling…
Me too
It seems like a smart move by the Dems. If Johnson is challenged as speaker, he knows he won't survive a vote without Dem support -- and he also knows if he brings the aid bill up for a vote, it WILL pass. But if he won't bring it up, the Dems won't lift a finger to help him and he'll get challenged anyway pretty soon... The only real question is how much damage he's willing to inflict before he falls, if he doesn't take this lifeline.
And along the lines of your argument, who would be up next in line for a Republican Speaker vote? Could be someone even more extreme. I agree this is a good move.
He maybe quieter but you won’t find someone ‘more extreme’ than speaker Johnson in his beliefs. He just can effect more in his ‘Seven Mountain’ Christian Nationalist agenda by staying in power, so....
Exactly, Heather.
Speaker Johnson’s a scary dude. He’s also bumbling.
Still, a brilliant Dem maneuver.
I agree with you and SL Weston. Do we want Matt Gaetz in the speaker's chair? More MAGA Mike is a disheartening prospect, but they don't have anyone who can do the job effectively or even appropriately. If they did we wouldn't get this constant brinksmanship.
And who might that be Matt? Boebert? Greene? Goetz? Comer? Jordan? Oops, already tried Jordan.
These are most of the Congresscritters more extreme than Trump's little Johnson. Johnson is a Trump puppet and Trump is a Putin puppet. We are stuck with Johnson which hopefully will hand the Republicans a big defeat in November. If the Republicans can retain the House, we are further gone than I ever imagined.
Unless, Gary, the Dems can make use of Howdy Doody's precarious position to get bills passed for which there is some modicum of bipartisan agreement but withdraw that support around his Christian Nationalist agenda items. Imagine, actual bipartisan voting in a current congress!!
With states redder or bluer than ever, there are fewer competitive districts, unless we get a few blow outs. Can Dems get 2018 back? Let's hope
I have this gut feeling that there are so many pissed off women in red states as well as blue and purple states that we could see a Blue Tsunami. Not getting complacent. Just reading the tea leaves. The "embryo as a person" thing could be a "final straw". I could be wrong, it happens all the time. "But beware a woman scorned."
https://www.msnbc.com/morning-joe/watch/-he-looks-lost-trump-has-gaffe-filled-weekend-on-the-campaign-trail-205385285533
From Morning Joe this morning. At least MSNBC is focusing more and more on Trump's dementia. Even psychologists are diagnosing his dementia. Is this ethical for them to do so?
At this point--who really cares. Ronny Jackson declared Biden as being feeble without examining him and Obama called him out for it.
So, the gloves are off. It's too important.to try to hide the fact that Trump is dangerous to us all.
My question is, is Orban another daddy for tofg to solve his debt problem since his other daddy is tied up in a war???
That. Or is Orban the go-between?
Let's do all we can to deny Emperor Tang another term, and let him stiff Orban as if he were a brown-skinned laborer. It would serve them both right.
Very very true!!It’s a mess!Trumpie is definitely Puttie’s puppet and Johnson is Trumpie’s!!!!!
Is there a Republican who is not pro-Putin -- or, to put it more plainly, anti-Ukrainian and anti-democracy.
Well the offer by Dems certainly allows Mike Johnson to further reveal his true colors. If he doesn’t take the offer he really doesn’t want the Ukrainians to survive.
Well heck, if it's Johnson's future as Speaker (in '24) we're talking about, maybe Jeffries should also insist on appropriating the entire amount Congress already approved to spend in this budget, to eliminate more short-term bumps. Don't get me wrong here, ad I like Jeffries, but I'm cynical enough to think that that strategy doesn't align with the Dems' plans to retake the House next year.
lin, this is a respectful, friendly group. Please, let’s not cast doubt on the positive message from Susan. Mine contained a bit of snark not at Susan but at Dems thinking it’s about time we heard of some kind of movement. They have been too silent for too long. I hope they start some combative swinging at the dark party of despair (Government of Putin GOP) after Super Tuesday.
Although Dana, it seems there might be more room for actual horse-trading between parties if Dems swung back and forth between supporting Howdy-Doody when he's allowing votes on bills with bipartisan support, like for keeping the government open for business and sending the long overdue support for Ukraine.
I think you misunderstood Susan's post.
I understood Susan’s post as sincere. Have we all become so accustomed to sarcasm we can’t tell the difference between it and sincerity? I’m afraid so.
Exactly. It’s a demoralizing strategy that R’s deploy. “Create apathy towards the process in our politics. It’s a form of voter suppression. They learned it from Russians.
I believe Susan's comment was sincere Lin. The larger question is why you are attacking another commenter without clarifying what they meant? We need to keep our heads no matter how dire our politics is today.
Lin, some folks are not here everyday. They may be unaware of what “protecting” means in the house. I take it to mean they will vote for Johnson should a radical R try to vote him out as speaker.
We are all on edge, and we are one, tough audience! Save it for the rapacious trolls serving MAGA out of sheer ego and ignorance.
She sounded happy that they would do that!
I’m with you on that!
Will such a move make him more toxic to more repubs down the line. After all, working with Dems has been the kiss of death for so many lately, ask Kevin. Although, I have to say it was friendly fire that got him. Seems that the nut caucus had better have another clown lined up or keep the one they have with a Dem paw print.
Never seems to be a shortage of sycophants.
I've often wondered why that is since the Tea Party. Seems that those who used to be ashamed are no more. Idiocy became something to be proud of, shrouded in religious fervor. And boy, did it take off...
Because damaged people follow damaged leaders. Trump has several sociopathic issues. So many that dozens of psychiatrists wrote a 36 chapter book on each one of those malignancies. I’m enjoying ( and terrified) reading The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump edited by Dr Bandy Lee MD, MDiv.
This book should be required reading for democracy 101.
For any who are still confused about the degree of his depravity…
I was thinking too about the issue of “cognitive decline”. Reading the psychiatrist’s descriptions of TFG, cognitive decline should be of lesser concern than sociopathic disorder that crosses into delusions. Trump has not only cognitive decline, he’s totally insane!
Ted: "Because damaged people follow damaged leaders." So true--but the followers aren't all "damaged." Some are just inherently deficient.
“Abusive personalities seek out submissive people who are willing to be controlled and manipulated.” Dr Bandy Lee MD, MDiv
Jeri Chilcutt: Yes, exactly. "Shrouded in religious fervor" worked for the Crusades . . .
Still does
Susan Pate--Please clarify whether your comment is sincere or sarcasm. Thx
I don't believe Susan's sincerity or sarcasm should be the issue. Little Mikey can't be saved by anyone but TFFG if foreign aid gets passed... seems like a win win to me - Ukraine et. al. get what they need, and Mike goes down. Or he keeps the gavel, and R's lose the House decisively. There's too much anger and dismay about the IVF ruling for any district, no matter how red, to be safe this Nov.
Lauren Lundgren: Yes, the sincerity--or lack thereof--in Susan Pate's comment is not a real issue, but clarifying her intention would facilitate a more accurately focused conversation. I'm still not clear about how Susan Collins got into the mix! PS:Given that there is so much confusion, I'm curious about why Susan Pate hasn't made a clarification yet.
Don’t look for him to deny up the vote. Trump doesn’t want bc anything going to the other countries, and Johnson is listening to Trump.
In my opinion, keeping Trump in as nominee is necessary for a Biden victory.
David Packman pointing out several signs of what a.psychiatrists says are signs of gross dementia - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kJgsSi96uqk
Look at Trump's bizarre word salad starting around 4:37 of the video. Is there any doubt Trump is getting worse? Do we really want someone in charge of our military that can't recall who he is running against?
Super Tuesday is tomorrow and hopefully Trump locks up the nomination. The convention will be chaos if Trump's cognitive abilities continue to decline.
And where is the MSM? Why don't we see every single Trump gaffe and slurring of his words?
I don’t disagree. My comment related to the grandpa image of Biden. In general, we don’t want a grandpa of our country. We want a father or mother. But against Trump? He wins. I watched the video. Not any new revelations here. Typical Trump when he goes off script which is often. Frankly, the presenter was just seeking clickbaits.
Bill- "Not any new revelations here."?
You are normalizing TFFG's abnormal behavior just like his MAGAnazis and white faux-Christian nationalists.
You think this is click-bait as well?
Donald Trump said something about public schools that got no media coverage, yet it's causing political analysts, ex-prosecutors, and other onlookers to sound the alarm.
Trump began hinting last year that, if he were made the president once again, he would withhold all federal funds from schools that require vaccines or masks.
On Saturday, he doubled down on that promise.
As reported by former Rep. Barbara Comstock (R-VA), "Trump said in Richmond, that he will take all federal funds away from public schools that require vaccines."
"Like most states, Virginia requires MMR vaccine, chickenpox vaccine, polio, etc.," she then added. "So Trump would take millions in federal funds away from all Virginia public schools."
Former federal prosecutor Shan Wu responded to Comstock Sunday, saying, "It's almost like Trump and his advisors want Americans to be sickened from disease..."
The comment further caught the attention of Elizabeth de la Vega, also a former federal prosecutor. She said, "Trump said yesterday that he would take away federal funding from school systems that require vaccines."
"This should be a five-alarm fire," she then added. "In 1955, before the polio vaccine was widely administered, my 13yr old brother spent a year on his back because of polio. My H.S. English teacher, a former football star, walked with arm braces [and] dragged his legs because he'd had polio years before. This is the world Trump wants."
Former "Tea Party" Republican Rep. Denver Riggleman (VA) also chimed in:
"We can only surmise, Trump cares for all children about as much as he cares for his own."
"His ignorance is an infection that needs its own vaccine," the former lawmaker added.
Conservative Rick Wilson called Trump's purported plan "a death sentence for American school kids."
Actor Jon Cryer said it would be "truly psychopathic."
"It's difficult to overstate how disastrous this policy would be if enacted," the former co-star of Two and a Half Men said on Saturday.
https://www.rawstory.com/trump-public-school-threat-vaccines/
Normalizing TFFG's hate speech is what he's counting on.
I have so many friends who won’t vote for Cheetolinni but they don’t know exactly why. If my friends (mostly 70-90 years) knew about Johnson’s “ debt commission”) and the republicans extreme desire to mess with SS and Medicare, they might be more upset. I work at educating them. Mike johnson is evil and makes it worse by being a pretend Christian. We don’t learn these things because MSM is controlled by his supporters!!
Exactly Sharon. I have the same situation with many of my friends and a few of my family members.
Rick Scott has already indicated he wants SS to be overhauled even after he defrauded Medicare and Medicaid for hundreds of millions of dollars.
And many other Republicans want to cut SS benefits as well.
The MSM depend on clicks to get their advertisers to support them. Fox News fails to kick the My Pillow Guy to the curb because he is one of their leading advertisers.
You do know you are preaching to the choir right? Read my book, “Donald’s Vanity Tantrums.”
I didn't know Bill. I will download it and listen to it. Thanks for the clarification. I agree with you that the MSM is "click bait" happy because of their greed. The NYTimes has become shameless in their incessant coverage of everything Trump.
He has a teleprompter. He goes off script because he has trouble reading and fancies himself a great improviser.
I understand. Look, I spent 3 years writing a book about the bastard. I get it.
I want RFKJR- batman
In 1980 (previously wrote 1976, duh) I voted for John Anderson instead of Jimmy Carter (I was rabidly anti-nuclear energy, and disagreed with Carter on that issue.) We got Reagan. Lesson learned.
That was 1980 election John. I remember because it was my first election. But you're right-we got Reagan and the Republican Party has done everything they can to help the richest 1% get richer and the poorest struggle to get by.
Wish others could learn from our mistakes.
Now there you go again Doug. I’m trying to sound like Reagan.I think RFKJR has appeal no other third party candidate has ever had.He is a man of integrity and campaigning on transparency.And very smart and knowledgeable about our politics .He tells historical stories to match HCR.He learned from his dad and uncle and is behaving like them.The Democratic Party is a party of high tech billionaires, unfair nominating rules,and the Republicans can’t work with them.They are refusing secret service protection for RFKJR. It’s very expensive and they hope it will bankrupt him. If I’ve learned anything about elections, it’s that anything can happen.we are long overdue for a third party candidate victory.
You can have him. Please keep him to yourself. He won't be good for the country - ask his family who knows him better than any of us.
He has other family members working for his campaign. And he goes surfing with his son! Like to see old Joe do that.
No, you don't.
It’s “Catman” and don’t you forget it. And please, don’t get vaccinated.
Voters sure would benefit from psychology and psychiatry weighing in. Why isn’t this happening?
Piling on: https://x.com/meiselasb/status/1764326002954809744?s=20
I eagerly awaited the NYT's response late Saturday evening, saw none (I subscribe.) I awoke yesterday, and it's headline was of Biden supporters losing faith in his ability to continue due to age issues. -- I was outraged, as I didn't readily see anything about trompy's demented gibberish (and I don't use that description pejoratively.)
Yes, I could cancel my subscription, but I rely on the Times for more than political news, and my subscription plan is not a la carte.
In Texas, chump would win, hands down
Florida, too. I just shake my head, Jeri. The brainwashing is complete.
Complete and done by those who know better. But that greed/power thing rules... chump gave them a road map.
I think Reagan gave them the road map and Gingrich fine tuned it.
Trump doesn't have the brains to do anything but spew hate and lies.
And now his dementia has progressed to a point he is a danger to us all.
Reagan's dementia didn't bother R's, Gary. Why should or would they care that TFFG can't assemble a thought or enunciate a word? MAGA voters will make sure there's no birth control, IVF, or abortion if it kills them. And if they don't get their way they'll kill everyone else.
He has been a danger, demented or not. I am familiar with dementia. If he is demented, he is also evil.
Read above.
I did, thanks
Go figure, Jeri that on Saturday the Missouri caucus gave 45 a straight up, total vote--Haley didn’t register a SINGLE vote 🤯!
I'm sure there are GOP house members ready to vote for that, but this would define a real split in the party. Then again, given Trump is likely to lose November, this might begin a great opportunity for the GOP to calve off its House Maga extremists, however painful the split would be. Trump loses in November, i suspect that's existential for the GOP as it's presently constituted. Downvote losses needed too. Just putting in hopeful thoughts... more likely Reps wont take up Hakkim's offer
It is. We have to work with what we've got, and we need to get things done! Especially Ukraine, Israel and Palestine aid. And the BUDGET! If the idiots remove Johnson, we lose even more time, and you can bet the Repubs won't choose anyone decent. Johnson is horrible, but the GOP is a parade of horribles.
Susan Pate, you got my attention! I hope you are advocating “deal with the devil”. And the Supreme Court will squash the manbaby this morning. And I hope everyone who can will vote blue tomorrow. 🙏🏼💙🎃🤡💩💙 Apple. Pie in the sky??
It’s tomorrow, and they didn’t.
And finally…some movement of any kind!
I think that an ultimatum was presented to MAGA Mike in the Oval Office with Schumer, McCONnell et al. . . Then McCONnell announced he’d step down. (He probably didn’t like taking a stance against MAGAt Mike . . . ? Or, was he also put on the spot? ) Reminds me of the way Lyndon Johnson or Truman used to get things done, and that’s not a bad thing, knowing how to speak speak softly and carry a Big Stick.
Is that sarcasm?
Take the win.
Politics sure do make for strange bedfellows.
The hope is that Dems will protect starving Palestinians, Ukraine, and Taiwan... we can leave Johnson to the tender mercies of his own caucus. I don't know if they'll shy away from McCarthy 2.0 or oust Johnson on "principle," but either way the rest of us can't fail to do the right thing just because the right is entirely dysfunctional.
Don’t be alarmed; we are all on edge and we are a tough audience . . .
I agree!!! Finally - a tiny ray of the bi-partisan efforts that are the way our government is supposed to work.
Re: Putin and Orban fanboy Trump.
As Woody Guthrie said of Hitler fanboy Charles Lindbergh:
So I'm a gonna tell you people: If Hitler's gonna be beat
The common workin' people has got to take the seat
In Washington, Washington
And I'm gonna tell you workers, 'fore you cash in your checks
They say "America First, " but they mean "America Next!"
In Washington, Washington
https://youtu.be/Mw9qJhvxytg?si=5c8FXudwxU4d7PNv
Excellent lyrics for our time, lin. Thanks!
The money trickles up, while the costs trickle down.
Thanks for the link, lin. Love some Woody Guthrie.
Listened to the whole song…thanks! Wake up America!!!
Excellent!
Wow! Thank you for this.
I'd gladly pay you Tuesday for a bond reduction today.
Wimpy!
You can say that again.
Hamberders!
Cofefee
Ha!
Wimpy rides again!
LOSER by any measure
😂
🤣🤣🤣
🔥🔥🔥
Well done, JL
Ha! More hamburgers to buy then, if indirectly.
With an extra side of ketchup.
Hamburders, Matt!
Haven't you heard? Biden banned hamburgers. At least that was the Word from Lord MumbleMush last year. He's never wrong, right?
Didn’t he ban Christmas as well?
And what ever happened to our "FREEDOM FRIES"!
Maybe they stole the hamburgers from the hambuglar!-Mickie Dees
And Ketchum bottles hitting the wall. No ketchup bottle or wall will be safe.
lol
Nice reference. Treat yourself to a tasty hamburger
Yes, "packed with news," though one thing stands out here: our many who often cite humanities.
More do that here than on any other site I know – and the reason others do it less has nothing to do with how many good books, music, film they’ve had.
Citing humanities obliges us to draw also upon something in us. That – the personal – shapes how well we go out of our way to add perspective, to shine light on some issue we care about. It’s this, the personal, that has us draw from some novelist’s issues in his or her writing, from some lyricist’s in song, some film maker’s in film.
Orwell puts it like this. In “Politics and the English Language” he urges we always start with some sensation we have, some “concrete object” out there, some other person’s pain or social predicament. Get that picture. Then, and only then, seek apt words.
Feel, see others first.
Many don’t draw on humanities because school taught them to check at the door anything personal. They may consume novels, films, and songs, but impersonally. Thus, Orwell says, we lack the pictures artists have arranged, and when we write, prefabricated words just “come rushing in.”
One recent example is when a couple fellow commenters here objected to my use of the pronoun “our,” as when I say “our Heather.” They thought me presuming “possession” of her, “ownership.”
Truth is, if you note our best humanities, you see how our best have always used pronouns to widen participation, engagement, community: Woody Guthrie in “This Land is your land, this land is my land,” another classic in “This is my country, land that I love,” another in “My country, Tis of Thee.”
Some of our commenters let abstractions and error take over, as school taught them to chuck the personal in humanities. So they deny themselves the humanities that could check them, as do any so void, whether the lemmings of House Speaker Howdy Doody, or raving theocrats on the Clarence Court.
Right on, Phil!
Hemingway famously said in response to a question about the writing process, that he opens a vein and just lets it bleed. Can't get more personal than that. Walt Whitman said that he "contains multitudes", not being egocentric, but observant about his personal nature and taking a leap of faith that his nature was part of the shared nature of his fellow men and women.
As beautiful and as far reaching as our American language--as Noah Webster would call it---is, other languages always take us further, as I am sure people from other countries might say of English, whether spoken here or in the so called sceptered Isle.
In Spanish, the word for our is "nuestra", as in my hometown, originally known as "La Ciudad de la Nuestra Senora, la Reina de Los Angeles", the City of our Lady, the Queen of the Angels. The Spanish word for "we" is "nosotros", very close to the word for "our". The collective brings the possessive along for a ride, so to speak.
Our Heather, indeed.
Personal bravery, and skill in describing it -- an amazing record Americans have for that.
I'm just now finishing the Library of America's new, two-volume set of crime novels from the 1960s. Each one (nine different, mostly little-known authors) just surprisingly deft in locating the human with all its nuances in so many varied predicaments.
America is deservedly notorious for its many vulgar billionaires, ruining the planet, allying with loathsome dictators, gutting the schools, using their money to corrupt Congress, the Clarence court.
And yet, the arts -- so much in American film, song, writing to which the rest of the world aptly looks.
As an aside, I tried to read a John Grisham novel yesterday. Had to put it down because the writing was so bad. Love Russian authors: try "And Quiet Flows the Don" by Mikhail Sholokhov (legendary life of the Don Cossacks).
HA! HA!HA! I had a writing professor who used Grisham as an example of terrible writing!!! As I recall, he bombards the reader with strings of seemingly unrelated descriptions . . . A spaghetti toss.
Ha!
I must say that I thought the same about Grisham when he first started. Yet, some of his recent work has been quite good. He wrote a sweet little, non-legal piece called "Playing for Pizza" which was quite charming
But then, too, Kathy, many of his books the basis for gripping, scary movies.
It seems to me that the personal is what humanities as a broad category are all about; not necessarily about an individual me as a person, but pertaining to sharing the sensory experience of human experience (not sure of a better way to say that). I experience experience therefore I am. That's sensory and that's conscious, and some of it impactful even when not conscious. There is a whole world of experience within, but we recognize and share this with each other, and even other creatures such as my dog. We recognize it in ancient cave paintings, all kinds of music, dance and gesture, even fanciful abstractions, the same yet different sharing of that light.
Absolutely, J L -- sharing.
How I long for schools around the world that would embrace, center on, building skills for this. More humane literacy. But, sadly, typically the opposite: feigning the neutered, the specialist impersonal, as if we all were meant to be only mutually-reciprocating units in groups, packages, religions, corporate hierarchies, and all the other death trips.
Hello to you dog, from someone off in the mountains of Kyushu, Japan.
Hirsch explains the need for individuals in a society to share a cultural literacy. This book was released in 1988. A follow-up book was a dictionary of many of the items we all should know like who was Shakespeare and many of the quotations from his works.
My daughter is 29 and attended schools in Nebraska, Maine and Florida. I feel like she has a good grasp of our cultural literacy but she is also an avid reader. I wonder about our education system across the US. How are they doing at teaching our children what they need to know to function in society?
https://www.amazon.com/Cultural-Literacy-Every-American-Needs/dp/0394758439
In this forceful manifesto Professor E. D. Hirsch, Jr., argues that children in the United States are being deprived of the basic knowledge that would enable them to function in contemporary society. They lack cultural literacy: a grasp of background information that writers and speakers assume their audience already has. Even if a student has a basic competence in the English language, he or she has little chance of entering the American mainstream without knowing what a silicon chip is, or when the Civil War was fought. An important work that has engendered a nationwide debate on our educational standards, Cultural Literacy is a required reading for anyone concerned with our future as a literate nation.
Trouble is, though, Gary, the damage was done by the time Hirsch came around.
The far-right foundations organized after the 1971 Powell memo by the early 1980s had defunded public colleges and universities, reduced tenure, let the banks indebt students, and reduced all to neutered silos, each isolated from all others, each possessed of its own canon, each vigilant lest anything disturb its group safety.
Phil Balla--So true. I was fortunate to take Michigan State U's mandatory year-long freshman course, "American Thought & Literature," before it was eliminated.
J.L. - Thank you for your insight.
Just imagine Donald Trump attempting to read your comment. He no longer has the capacity (if he ever did) to understand the meaning of your words on a literal or philosophical level, but Republicans don't understand how demented he has become.
You know, Gary, Orwell described how the demented get that way.
"Politics and the English Language" says bad language blinds all. That is, language absent aptly-connected humanities, absent the personal, lets people float disconnected, in thrall to sensationalism -- so none is equipped even to see what they are actually doing, worsening the damages their groups do.
That is a fascinating concept, Phil. "...bad language blinds all." Further, "...lets people float disconnected in thrall to sensationalism..." describes the MAGA phenomenon to a freaking "T".
Gary, the Republicans understand. They just don't care.
Beyond personal perhaps, is a sensorium of physicality that functions at scale (within which we all live). I mean, as one example, how Earth's Mid-Atlantic Ridge spreads with the oozing surge of magma -- it's like what "Hemingway famously said in response to a question about the writing process, that he opens a vein and just lets it bleed." How do we live in sync with it all?
Yes, sure, Joan.
Love your "sensorium of physicality," as if you've located something necessary for any haiku, or anything western, metered, and rhyming.
"...the same yet different sharing of the light."
Phil Balla, thank you, thank you! Couldn’t possibly have described how I “work” if I hadn’t read what you wrote. The closest I could come was to remind (or just tell) people that Aristophanes is still funny. Also that having read that Spike Lee had based “Chitown” on “Lysistrata” I made certain to see it. Remembering the patriotism learned in WWII, I have written and shall continue to write as many GOTV cards as my friends will bring me to keep people voting for i “good guys” in either house of Congress (Have you heard Tom Suozzi who won the seat vacated6 by the imposter Santos?) As a teacher of both French and music, with my liberal arts undergraduate degree, I l
An interesting essay, Phil. Technical, scientific, economic etc educations have risen at the expense of humanities over the past century, moreso the past few generations, but given either my reading or viewing of late, there's still quite a bit of thoughtful, empathetic around. On a tangent, I remember in the 50s reading a book called So Little for the Mind, whose ax was the failure of education to teach critical thinking. Even then reading was indulged in by a minority of people. And... still is.
Yes, Frank -- reading, literacy, a perennial hurt.
Many always seem inclined to follow the easiest path of slogans, abstractions, dead metaphors, and non-active verbs (copulatives, excellent only for labeling).
Trouble compounds now, however, for what the far-right foundations did to neuter academe, to cripple K-12, following the 1971 Powell memo. This, measurable in exactly how much the rich have gotten richer since then, how much they've actively sought to hurt the working classes, to corrupt the court where it's so easy to bribe Clarence.
I'm not so sure we can attribute the increase in wealth inequality to educational systems. For a whole political/social class inequality remains a foundation stone, as in fact it has through most of history when it comes to how elites defined civilization, the modern version being "property". People of property fought against rising democratic ideas for the longest, and democracy itself has been taken over, long since, by organized political parties, funded largely by "property".
Phil Balla: Also, since the '80s, corporations have ensured their profits by forcing schools to operate according to a business model which necessitated the elimination of Humanities in order to produce docile, robotic, workers who will not threaten corporate power.
When I went to college (San Francisco State 1985), Critical Thinking was a required general education course.
If that can get into the wider social stream, so much the better.
I'd rather it apply to all other courses, Tina, not isolated in its own silo.
Interesting comment, Phil. As one who was brought up in the humanities (historian Father, although he was a meteorologist by profession) and writer Mother (who was a teacher and a poet), that concept of human experience was foundational to me. I think it is what made me a good cop, a good negotiator, and a good trainer, and a better person.
Thanks, Phil.
Yes. As Churchill stated during the war about cuts to the humanities, what on earth are we fighting for or something to that nature. Conservative minded as he was, he saw humanities as extremely important for society.
Here is Jennifer Rubin's column from this morning's WAPO-
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/03/04/democracy-freedom-house-republicans/?utm_campaign=wp_follow_jennifer_rubin&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&wpisrc=nl-jenniferrubin&carta-url=https%3A%2F%2Fs2.washingtonpost.com%2Fcar-ln-tr%2F3cf3ea0%2F65e5c4b86f877752dd42aa1e%2F59726e379bbc0f1cdce42b51%2F6%2F23%2F65e5c4b86f877752dd42aa1e
The refusal of House Republicans to fund aid for Ukraine, their insistence on pursuing a bogus impeachment scheme hatched by an indicted Russian FBI source in contact with Russian intelligence services and their unfailing loyalty to an anti-democratic demagogue infatuated with Russian President Vladimir Putin will further aggravate the existential threat facing democracy around the globe. MAGA Republicans’ recent conduct will only hasten the dangerous trend toward authoritarianism spelled out in Freedom House’s recent report “Freedom in the World 2024: The Mounting Damage of Flawed Elections and Armed Conflict.”
“Global freedom declined for the 18th consecutive year in 2023,” Freedom House reported. “The breadth and depth of the deterioration were extensive. Political rights and civil liberties were diminished in 52 countries, while only 21 countries made improvements. Flawed elections and armed conflict contributed to the decline, endangering freedom and causing severe human suffering.”
The threat from right-wing groups and ideologies rejecting democratic values such as diversity, the rule of law, free speech, equality and tolerance — the very same values the MAGA movement targets — are at the root of the worldwide phenomenon. “Almost everywhere, the downturn in rights was driven by attacks on pluralism — the peaceful coexistence of people with different political ideas, religions, or ethnic identities — that harmed elections and sowed violence,” Freedom House observed. “These intensifying assaults on a core feature of democracy reinforce the urgent need to support the groups and individuals, including human rights defenders and journalists, who are on the front lines of the struggle for freedom worldwide.”
The role of the United States in bolstering democracies, just as it did in World War II and the Cold War, has never been more critical. “As it has for decades, the United States can play a vital role in the expansion of global freedom,” the report reiterated. “But much depends on whether the November 2024 presidential election reinforces or weakens America’s democratic values, processes, and institutions, along with its will to uphold the cause of democracy around the world.”
The United States remains vulnerable at home, where “harassment and intimidation of federal, state, and local politicians, election administrators, and judges pose a serious challenge to the conduct of November’s presidential election.” Moreover, still “haunted by the January 2021 attack on the Capitol and related court cases, Americans are heading into a decisive election starkly divided, with some questioning the very utility of fundamental democratic institutions.”
As the world’s only true superpower, the only country that can summon a global alliance and the historic exemplar of democratic values, the United States must take the lead in defending democracies against internal and external threats. If “governments, donors, and the private sector” do not “deepen their solidarity with front-line allies, hold dictators accountable for rights abuses and corruption, and invest in democratic institutions at home and abroad,” democracy will continue its downward trajectory, the report said. If the United States sacrifices “core principles for the sake of illusory short-term interests,” then we will lose a “global order in which democratic norms prevail” and that “deliver liberty, prosperity, and security — for those living now and for future generations.”
Military defense of democracies continues to be an essential part of protecting our alliances facing aggression from authoritarian regimes such as “the Kremlin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine [that] continued for a second year, further degrading basic rights in occupied areas and prompting more intense repression in Russia itself.” But the question remains if the United States has the will to do so.
We recently witnessed how perilously close the United States is to frittering away our democratic leadership in the world. When the Republican presidential front-runner espouses fondness for fascist ideas and displays a determination to destroy NATO, and his minions rely on Russian-hatched conspiracies to impeach a president and seem willing to let Ukraine go under, we can imagine the threats to democracy here and abroad reaching the point of no return.
Rep. Mikie Sherrill (D-N.J.), a nine-year veteran of the Navy and three-term congresswoman who recently returned from the Munich Conference, expressed to me her dismay at Republicans’ irresponsibility in defending democracy at a critical moment. She pointed at four-times indicted former president Donald Trump and his party for “undermining and walking away from our alliances.”
She explained, “The rules-based order benefits not just the U.S. but other countries,” yet Republicans “want to blow up the system.” Republicans seem not to care that we depend on an alliance of democratic allies to do everything from protecting the seaways to confronting China’s aggression, she noted. She said there is a military phrase: “We never fight alone.” And yet we will find ourselves isolated, vulnerable and saddled with higher defense costs if Republicans persist in enabling Putin and destroying our democratic alliances.
“We are at an inflection point,” Sherrill said, echoing the Freedom House report and speaking with obvious emotion. “I cannot accept that the country I have given my life to, the country [for which] I cannot count the number of oaths I have taken, the country I have fought for, I cannot accept that we cannot stand with Ukraine.”
And yet if Republicans have their way — denying Ukraine a lifeline, doing the bidding of Putin internationally and lifting a Putin pawn to the presidency — democracy’s backsliding will become an avalanche. Imagine if the only country capable of reinforcing the rules-based order and preventing tyrannical regimes from overwhelming vulnerable countries stands with the authoritarians. Under such circumstances, democracy in the United States and around the world is unlikely to survive.
It’s hard to quibble with the argument that the upcoming election is the most important in our history and in the history of Western democracies. The world will be watching.
The very best art invokes the universal - the cognitive dissonance that arises from finding what we all have in common in the intensely personal. Even non-artists are social animals who need the comfort of the tribe, so no matter how critically we/they think, there's always the personal bias toward membership. I think only artists are comfortable as outsiders, and thankfully they find all human experience in their own. Otherwise how could Iago exist?
Really curious to know your definition of “humanities”
Phil Balla--All good points, but please don't blame "the schools" for the lack of humanity--and thus the lack of the Humanities--in contemporary American education. Schools teach what state and local school boards tell them to teach.
Finland, you know, Joanne, got rid of the problem of interfering bureaucrats, politicians.
Finland reformed its schools so teachers have centered everything since. They started hiring only the best graduates from its universities. Kicked out the standardized testers.
And since those reforms Finnish schools have become, in most rubrics, best in the world. (Some Asian schools, and very rich U.S. schools, are also at the top in math and science, but not in any categories where human, personal involvement counts.)
Heather, a LOT is riding on this decision tomorrow from the Supreme Court. My bet is they will side with Trump, although the Constitution is extremely clear. He should not be allowed on any ballot. He should not be allowed to hold any public office ever again.
What he needs to be is in a jail cell. He should have been locked up when he was indicted/arrested the first time, then simply transported from jail to jail on each indictment and arrest.
Trump has the Supreme Court right in the palm of his hand, and they will be the ruination of our Democracy and Constitution. This Supreme Court is a total embarrassment for America!!!
NONE of the justices wanted this case thrown in their lap. They all made that clear in the oral arguments. They seemed to blame Colorado for forcing this on them. When in fact it's Trump AND McConnell.
A good case FOR Colorado was made by Ilya Somin is Professor of Law at George Mason University and the B. Kenneth Simon Chair in Constitutional Studies at the Cato Institute. Of all people. Maybe the Federalist Supremes would've listened to him.
"Trump's attempt to overturn the 2020 election well deserves punishment from the standpoint of both retribution and deterrence," wrote Somin following the four-count indictment filed by Special Counsel Jack Smith in early August. "For the head of state in a democracy, there are few more serious crimes than using fraud to try to stay in power after losing an election."
"One of the points at issue in the Supreme Court case considering whether Trump should be disqualified under Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment is whether the events of that day qualify as an "insurrection." It should be an easy call. The January 6 attack was an insurrection under any plausible definition of that term."
https://www.c-span.org/video/?533247-3/ilya-somin-josh-blackman-trump-14th-amendment-election-disqualification-case
https://reason.com/volokh/2024/01/06/the-january-6-attack-was-an-insurrection/
And Judge Lutig is a very conservative Repuplican that was in line for SCOTUS as well, and he is te one that reminded all involved of the clarity of the 14th/section3 .
I don't recall any of Judge Lutig comments about the how the Supreme Court should decide a case....being on the mark. I hope I am wrong.
He mde no comment that I am aware of in that regard. He and Lawrence Tribe did the original analysis of the 14th/3 that made clear that insurrection was cause for non-eligibility.
Absolutely right. Under any plausible definition of that term. Further, a trial was held wherein Trump's lawyers argued, evidence was presented, and the Court found that insurrection had indeed occurred. The fact that the 14th Amendment does not define insurrection is as irrelevant to the clarity of its purpose as the fact that the 2nd Amendment does not define "arms". This Court bent over backwards to issue a series of preposterous decisions interpreting the 2nd Amendment with fulsome embrace of the gun lobby's perspectives, while downplaying commonsense public safety perspectives dating back centuries. Surely, they wouldn't be so inconsistent as to fortify the one that fetishizes guns at the expense of public safety, while minimizing the one that mandates equal protection and due process, would they?!?
I will stop now, as I need to take measures to remove my tongue from my cheek
As usual, on the mark Daniel. Kudo's friend
Thanks much for your kind words, D4N!
“Shirley??!! Don’t call them Shirley!!! Alito will freak
🤣
Maybe they'll decide its past time they quit sniffin' glue.
Dave and Ally, you're cracking me up!
"Tell me everything from the beginning!"
"Well, first the Earth cooled. Then, the dinosaurs got big and fat!"
Well, to me, everything you have said is common sense. It was an insurrection, instigated by 45, we all saw it with our own eyes. The January 6 committee, with under oath testimony is further proof.
You're right lin, NONE of the justices wanted anything to do with that case. To my mind, the pattern emerges again and again that the current crop of gop managers / wanna' be leaders prove by illustration that they are incapable of governing a democracy - only grenade throwing and launching. Was it not just recently McConnel who off handedly admitted that when he had Senate leadership during the impeachments, that he essentially abdicated his sworn duty to all citizens to serve party fealty ? *edit in> It's worth stressing here some contrasts: Biden makes clear that he serves 'all Americans' and his actions show that daily. That's worth crowing about friends.
Not to mention all of our noted historians (including HRC) and constitutional lawyers wrote to Scotus reiterating the same thing!
The amicus brief is a thing of beauty. The one filed by American historians in support of the respondents in Colorado. It's readable and clear, being written by historians and not lawyers so it's understandable by regular people. I urge people to look for it and take a look.
Not that this brief will have any effect on SCOTUS, because they've already made up their minds...
Correct, Marla! That’s why this ruling by the Court is so infuriating.
Lol Marlene; Sometimes I in my minds hurry up to my fingers, mis-strike keys that way, ie., HRC v HCR...... Don't feel terrible dear. *edit in > Pardon my nature Marlene; I'm struggling to find my humor in this moment of unhinged rage, post news release from the WCOTUS (Whimsical Court of 'these' United States).
JFC, D4N! I am losing it! 😳🤪😝
... speaking of Clarity and The Court ... Truth, Justice ... Conscience, Integrity and ... Courage to stand and speak Truth To Power ..., check this out from a true American hero ... to all our weaponized, inflatable patriotic punch-bags, so eager to win at any cost - throwing truth to the winds ... (for what ...?!) Check this out ...:
SHELDON WHITEHOUSE
https://m.youtube.com/@SenatorWhitehouse
*****
The Scheme 26: The Judiciary Committee Votes for Subpoenas
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Z07Qjcp9l9Q
"December 19 | Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Courts Subcommittee, delivered the twenty-sixth in a series of speeches titled “The Scheme,” exposing the machinations by right-wing donor interests to capture the Supreme Court and achieve through the Court what they cannot through the elected branches of government."
"Whitehouse discusses the Judiciary Committee’s vote last month to authorize Chairman Dick Durbin (D-IL) to issue subpoenas to right-wing billionaire Harlan Crow and court fixer Leonard Leo, two of the central characters in the Supreme Court’s ethics mess. Committee Democrats authorized the subpoenas over a wall of partisan Republican threats and obstruction."
*****
The Scheme 27: The Myth of the Unelected Bureaucrat
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=q9uf_25BiPc
"January 24 | Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Courts Subcommittee, delivers the twenty-seventh in a series of speeches titled “The Scheme,” exposing the machinations by right-wing donor interests to capture the Supreme Court and achieve through the Court what they cannot through the elected branches of government.
"Whitehouse discusses Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, a case pending before the Supreme Court that could overturn Chevron deference. That doctrine, a cornerstone of administrative law for nearly 40 years, grants agencies the flexibility they need to issue regulations that protect Americans’ health and safety. Whitehouse details how Loper is the product of a larger, decades-long effort by pro-corporate interests to eviscerate the federal government’s regulatory apparatus, to the detriment of the American people."
*****
The Scheme 28: The Judicial Conference
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=pWUr-rOBKxw
"February 8 | Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Courts Subcommittee, delivers the twenty-eighth in a series of speeches titled “The Scheme,” exposing the machinations by right-wing donor interests to capture the Supreme Court and achieve through the Court what they cannot through the elected branches of government.
"Whitehouse breaks down the important role of the Judicial Conference of the United States, a little-known agency within the judicial branch that is well-positioned to improve transparency in the judiciary and strengthen the ethics rules that apply to the Supreme Court justices. Whitehouse recounts the progress he has made in seeking action from the Judicial Conference on issues related to judicial ethics."
*****
I've known this to be truth before Whitehouse's revelations - and it gives me zero satisfaction !!!
Sub-Zero satisfaction ... what rules in the long run ... money, or love ...?
Ah Kat; You are obviously on the same 'wavelength' I am.
This
Thank You, lin.
The one consistent thread is how bad we Americans are at prevention in every critical issue. From Health, education to politics to everything in between.
I've been arguing since the '70s that it's wise to vote for Democratic Presidents even if you don't much like them, to keep such corruption out of the court.
But JL, there are Dems who have been corrupt also. Look at Melendez who is under scrutiny right now. Joseph Kennedy influenced elections too and he was a real sonofabitch! I mean, the entire Dem party hasn’t become crazed like the Maggots ever, but we do have a chosen few who have rocked the boat.
You mean Menendez, right, Marlene? (My proof-reading skills always get in the way!)
Psst, Lynell - thanks for taking me off the hook.... shh Lol !
😉
OMG YES!! Thank you for catching that my friend!!
But no MAGAts unless RFKJ and his disciples qualify.
Might be worse.
Yes, Dems have a big tent that sometimes springs leaks
And nobody is "perfect", but in the measure of the whole person, some people are helpers and/or liberators and others are opportunists, and/or tyrants. Some champion telling testable truth, and others gain by telling lies.
DINO big time.
And Manchin is another plutocrat.
The political party of a candidate is only one factor of many that should determine how people vote. But honestly....I am not sure how we can be absolutely sure. Teddy Roosevelt...as HCR discussed, appeared to be right leaning toward corporations and then he held them responsible. Which was the right thing to do.
Ideas?
I think Teddy's family were admirers of Lincoln. Not that Lincoln walked on water, but he took government by and for the people seriously. I think they who would be kings thought they would control Teddy, but were wrong. And, as Lincoln said, public sentiment is everything, and I think the nation was ready for a reformer.
Two decisions of SCOTUS stand out at the moment:Citizens United and the weakening of the voting act. Both prepared the mess they’re in now. Can the three women (the fourth is just a clueless teenager) straighten out enough men to get some decent decisions and “save” the Roberts court? Doubt it.
Yes. "A clueless teenager" is how the Catholic Church's evangelical arm grooms them.
I’m learning more about these Opus Dei sycophants! They have a long history of corruption and radicalism. Remember how President Kennedy was attacked for being Catholic? But he was not what his accusers said about him. That radicalism was present only in the conservative party. The Pope needs to, and I think he has begun this, to condemn the radicalism of Opus Dei.
Opus Dei used to be the crazed anti Vatican2 crew. But they are being outdone by the reactionary Conference of American Bishops who are wholly owned by the racist right wing religious extremist Leonard Leo politics and big money schemers.
https://www.ncronline.org/vatican/vatican-news/pope-francis-blasts-reactionary-american-catholics-who-oppose-church-reform
I'm gonna' jump out on another limb here, and speculate that McConnel's retirement message, was Not a coincidence. He got the insider's tip - like how the stock market 'actually works' and 'knew' he would get the suspicious fingers for abrogating his duty, and oath of office, along with a gop majority of co-conspirators, to serve "all" citizens in their states: repulsican, dumbocrat, independent, and undeclared - with intent, plan, and execution. The next question to see is if this self serving Kangaroo court will make Joe Biden, their dictator ~ *edit in > Apologies if I'm sounding unhinged, but I am ! I don't ever in my life recall ever being such a ball of unhinged fury ! *edit in > As I surmise, we'll soon see 'their' banners and standard flags - News just starting, leading with opponents to Sherrod Brown wagging their anti-choice banners. ? Are unalienable rights just too much like "color your own" child's coloring book - and with this regulation, "color your own, but only by 'my' number chart. Yet another "Holy Crusade and kristian Warriors" ~
The thing I think is hard to get one's mind around is the fact - in my opinion, that this has been a brilliant, long plotted out scheme involving a coalition with some common interests that have all agreed that the enemy of our enemy, is our friend for now; Secretly, each believe they will prevail over former uncomfortable 'allies,' once their end is served. ? What could that 'common interest' be ? What 'wants, needs, demands' could birth such a unity in our world ? What demanding forces are the antithesis of liberty by nature ? You have your list, and I certainly have mine that I've been watching keenly since the '80's. ? Who are we...... ( Who...who, Who who )
Ahhh now that makes sense. Thank you Lin!
Pope Francis also is cognizant of climate change!
How awesome is that! He is an educated man. A self reflective person almost always makes a good leader.
Yes. Yes. Yes. YES.
And they have no rights either. Why has the Catholic Church never allowed women to be priests but only nun's who must be subservient to every priest?
The patriarchy within the Catholic Church, the Southern Baptist conference, the Methodist Church and others allows their leaders to commit sexual assault against children and women and even some men-- most often with impunity.
How many hundreds of times has the Catholic Church just shuffled a priest off to another parish when they have committed sexual abuse? And most localities won't touch these cases most often refusing to investigate.
Why do they still get away with it? Why is there a movement among cardinals to undermine Pope Francis? Why did we not learn, until after his death, that the parish church priest in our town was sexually abusing young boys? I am reading, "Playing God" by Mary Jo McConahay. Getting some answers. They are not holy..
Please do not demean teenagers or discount Coney Barrett. She was made in a test tube for this clerical fascist moment.
True. And cut her teeth on Gore v. Bush.
Don’t forget Dobbs.
As it turns out, all four women voted together, likely thinking ultimately of Dobbs. But how do we get the White House to understand the danger of leaving November to the voters given the Heritage Foundation, Vlad and Victor, and Speaker Johnson, ALEC, and all the other Fifth Columnists?
It was interesting to me that one of the liberal members of the Supreme Court (I think it was Sotomayor) brought up during questioning that a state should not be allowed to decide whether a person is qualified to run for president. She stated that should probably be a federal matter. This was something that Trump’s lawyers had not even mentioned as a possible argument in their favor.🤷🏻♀️
I was about to write something else, but after thinking it through, I think Sotomayor is right. Afterall, if Colorado is allowed to do the right thing, then Florida (or pick pretty much any state in the US South) would be allowed to do the wrong thing with the current makeup of the US Supreme Court.
I agree. She was speaking to the Constitutional controls on how we elect presidents & how they qualify for office.
Colorado is the Centennial State, admitted to the Union in 1876. How appropriate they reed up this case.
Now you got me thinking, Matt.
There is a protection to 14th abuse by the states. 60% or so of Congress votes to override that state.The justices didn’t address that protection. I’m still wondering about that fact.
But states often keep people off the ballot for various reasons. Lisa Murkowski was left off the ballot in Alaska but still won as a write-in.
If someone runs for President, Senator or Congressman and they don't qualify because of their age, they will be disqualified from running even if they met the other qualifications. So, it is Congress's responsibility to disqualify them from appearing on the ballot?
I disagree with the court especially when you read the amendment. It says nothing about Congress deciding and essentially SCOTUS decided that Trump wasn't guilty of being involved in an insurrection.
SCOTUS still has to decide whether Trump is guilty of insurrection.
This too
That question drove me crazy. It was nuts. To me, it was a lie. If the Court allowed the Colorado decision to stand, it would be law only in Colorado. That’s how our system works. That blew my mind, to hear that said from the bench by several of the judges , but especially a liberal. — b.rad
It drove me crazy, too, brad. Especially on the heels of Dobbs where they said effectively, "return the question of abortion to the states!"
Interesting, so Sotomayor was saying that a state did not have the right to decide that a candidate was not qualified to run for federal office in their state, that federal law superseded state law? So is this the old states rights vs federal rights argument?
I think so.
yep
I felt like she was indicating that it would skew the possible electoral college results. That’s all that makes sense to me.
Thanks for weighing in, but I'm not going to give the benefit of a doubt in a case that's so important and consequential. And today it just got a million times worse, with a 'concurrence' that reads like a dissent. Twilight Zone, all over again. best luck to US, b.rad
And or she suggested that one state should not be able to set the outcome for the rest of the states (hence likely that Supreme Court will be in favor of Trump
And let him stay on ballot). I figure they will
allow him to run but then what, no ‘hold office’?!!!?! That’s insanity!
The Supreme Court is a total THREAT to America.
I hope at least a couple of them read ALFAA.
I am beginning to believe as someone else mentioned, the court is waiting out the other judgments. Ironic that the Supreme Court is waiting for lower courts to see if Donnie can make the bonds or deposit enough cash, if he can, SCOTUS will rule in his favor. If he can not make bond they can rule him out? And some in between like “how” he makes bond. If he makes the bond from foreign investments in his business, could that spark a new emoluments case against him? One possibility, and there seems to be many, is another bankruptcy!
Ted, I don’t believe that declaration of bankruptcy will help him out of these judgements. It will just bury him that much deeper in 💩💩💩💩!
I may be wrong, and this is strictly my opinion, but I don’t believe there’s anyone going to “loan” him enough to buy a stick of gum, let alone millions to foot these bonds he has to pay. He can’t put up any property because he now has the two sets of court ordered eyes watching everything going on. So, doing his shenanigans as he’s done since the 1970s won’t work now.
As for the Supreme Court. Frumpy has stacked it with ‘his people’ just as he’s done with every court system in this country. I think, and I’m pulling this from memory having heard it someplace, that when he was in office he assigned over 250 to judgeship in various positions around the country. This includes the 4 he put on the Supreme Court, and of course, Judge Cannon in Ft. Pierce Federal Court.
I expect this court is going to give Frumpy all they can give to him. I just hope they all realize they have, and are, set preference for all criminals across this country.
And we learned tonight his longtime controller/CFO is headed to Rikers ( again) for perjury related to the fraud.
Frumpy’s done this since the 70s that I know of. Investigating him back then we learned the same thing. And many people went to prison for him.
Ted, this is Frumpy’s style. It’s how he duds things. He uses people to do all of his ‘dirty work’. They go to jail, he doesn’t care. He’s free as a bird and these sheep 🐑 he’s thrown under the bus are loyal to the point that they will sit in prison to do his time.
I think it’s forced liquidation, bankruptcy or sketchy foreign loans… maybe all three? I just can’t wait till our county is rid of this sociopathic malignant narcissist.
You forgot m….. rapist, scammer, liar. Just to add a few (only because I’m just waking up and my mind is still asleep).
Something rise that expecting. With his actions of late, his speech impairment, and his appearance changes, I look for him to be declared “incompetent to stand trial” at some point. His actions while in the courtroom in New York will add to that judgement. His outburst, getting up and walking out, all of it.
We have to remember, this 🍓🍊💩🤡😊🤮 is an actor, or so he thinks, and he’s going to extreme lengths to get out of paying these bills, and especially staying out of jail.
Reality TV "actor".
Tfg has so many personality disorders and character flaws its hard to always list them isnt it?
That is a purposeful as his daily chaos agenda. He learned it several ways. Growing up unloved by his parents, abused by his father, learning from Roy Cohn. It is all about constant chaos and shock and awe to keep people off balance and processing what just happened so they are distracted from the next outrageous fireworks/shiny objects. Abused and damaged people are drawn to his saviorhood.
I am really enjoying this book, "The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump" edited by Dr Bandy Lee
Hang in there (for us, please ). We are ALL so tired of all of the crap.
Oh, so totally agree Nickie, yet we must stay alert and pay close attention lest they slip a “fast one” by us…..no matter how tiring (and cringey) it is. Hang tight all!!!✌🏼
Sadly, true
Viktor Orbán is visiting Trump at Mar-a-Lago next week. Does anyone have any thoughts on what he and Trump would be up to? Could he be a go-between for Putin? If Trump needs $, could they funnel it to him, or are fund transfers so well monitored that that would be impossible?
Trump could pass out souvenir secrets.
I never heard what happened to the documents behind the locked door.
Certainly not all that went missing has been found.
lol
Could be any and/or all of those, Lanna.
Or, it could just be two fat dictators bellying up to the buffet table!
🤣🤣👏🏼👏🏼
Demagogues are magnetically attracted to each other.
Have asked whether Trump is in constant touch with Vlad from Mal-a-Largo—another reason to jail him. Orban may be there to buck him up or may be bringing bond money. Meanwhile there are Americans who instead of thinking about the Texas fires will be yelling about the price of a hamburger, so maybe Orban is just making sure Trump can afford his.
There's a thought: bond money?
That was the first thing I thought of!!!!
Why not? Trump needs bond money and Vlad will pay him back. C’mon, everybody, start thinking how easy it is for those who want to destroy US to help those who want to do it!
Hm. Carrier-pigeon Carlson?
Secrets for money....I thought there was some discussion that he still had some top secret documents the FBI did not find.
I am trying to stay optimistic, since every "traditional" sign would say Biden will prevail in the general election. The economy is doing well; record stock prices & job numbers. He's passed signifcant legislation - such that this coming decade will be one of investment in our infrastructure. And the CHIPS Act. The PACT Act. Yet - Biden's approval is at an all-time low. And the GOP offers us ....nothing, and takes away our rights. The House has passed NOTHING - and even when the Senate comes up with bipartisan legislation on the border, Trump forces the GOP not to even vote on it. Ukraine is suffering; the GOP won't even take the vote. And Trump is sounding crazier & crazier (and litterly demented) on the stump. AND YET -- the corrupt, broke, adjudicated sexual assaulter (rapist, according to the judge's definition) who is in thrall to Putin is leading in the polls. 4-5 points up on Biden in the poll just released by NYT/Siena. I can't belive it.
It’s the incessant bleating about President Biden’s age (it’s the only “negative” thing that can be picked on) especially by the New York Times, that has created doubt in the citizenry. It seems sometimes that there is some grand plan afoot that we know nothing about. I’m quite sure that Trump doesn’t have the support to win. After all, he lost in 2020, and lots of supporters have left since then. And I guess the polling business is pretty lucrative—every media outlet likes to use them. No need for investigation. No need to find out how folks are really feeling. Lazy lazy. I’m not sure if this is very coherent. It’s odd too, that the Times has nothing to say about Trump’s foolish incoherent speeches. Perhaps they are standing by to be the Authoritarian Newspaper of Record.
I've written to the Times about this before. Today I canceled my subscription and was very clear why.
Well done.
Alexandra, I canceled mine about two weeks ago, and was also very clear. Either they learned nothing from 2016 (Biden’s age = Clinton’s emails, much ado about nothing or at least very little) or they actively want a second Trump presidency. I think the latter, so I canceled.
KR, that is exactly my feeling. It's grotesque and I'm not going to support it.
This right here, Annie: "Perhaps they are standing by to be the Authoritarian Newspaper of Record."
As to incoherent speeches: https://www.salon.com/2024/03/01/like-someone-pulled-the-metaphorical-plug-dr-john-gartner-on-accelerating-dementia/
Update: I read this Salon article from the point of view of someone who may have a "loved one" who is experiencing the symptoms that tfg is exhibiting. If it's true that his brain is literally being eaten away by this disease, his supporters are doing him no favors by hiding this fact. If he ends up winning the presidency, it will be in name only while the country will be run by the likes of Mike Flynn, Stephen Miller, Roger Stone, and Steve Bannon, to name a few.
Wow, Lynell! As an RN, recently retired from working in mental health and aging, I concur with this dementia assessment of Trump. This should be covered on every news outlet and political forum, as well as the real terror of a Flynn/Stone/Bannon presidency that would end American democracy. Shared. Thank You.
Thanks for sharing, MaryPat! I personally would not like to see it used as a "weapon" against Trump. But at the same time, if this psychologist's assessment is correct, voters need to know what they'll be getting by having him as our president. After all, it's our future that needs to be taken into account as much as his.
Like before. It seemed to me that 45 never stopped campaigning. His preference was entertaining an adoring crowd rather than staying in the White House, which he openly criticized as dated, ( not enough gold faucets!) and being an honorable and respected POTUS. The prospect of a return by Flynn, Miller, Stone, and Bannon to the executive branch gives me serious willies,
"45 never stopped campaigning." You got that right, Joan!
Morning, Lynell!
Thanks for the link, and for taking that dementia to its logical and terrifying conclusion.
Morning, Ally!
I personally have not seen any news coverage that showed the extreme symptoms that the psychologist in this article talked about. I don't have cable, nor do I stream. I only have antenna TV! When I read the interview in Slate, I did not see it as a lambasting of tfg. More a stark realization of his personal future delivered by a dispassionate medical practitioner.
I have watched a couple of them. The signs described in the written posts/comments/articles are definitely there.
Wow!, thx for the Salon link!!
Terrifying!
"Terrifying" says it all, Susan.
The New York Times is venerable and edited but very biased. It tried to compensate with op-eds but the op is now the ed. They do not want Biden but they do want their reputation. So age is the new fault but only over 80 to start.
*mention (not ‘mean till’)
NYT Loves to skew polls that will rile up their readership. I have put them in the “Full of 💩” spectrum in their coverage of the 2024 election. They need to fill pages w this tripe, because they mistakenly think they need to stay “relevant”.
I stopped subscribing recently after YEARS! I can't take their right sided B.S.
I don’t care about covering the liberal/conservative debate towards government, but since the R Party began to disintegrate into the Trump Party, the NYT sees its role to prop it this banana republic as part of their role of staying indifferent, and it NOT EQUAL! They aren’t serving anybody!
SFHaine, please read Simon Rosenberg’s column critiquing the NYT poll before you despair. Yes, we need all hands on deck, but it’s doable.
https://www.hopiumchronicles.com/?utm_source=navbar&utm_medium=web&r=3kkhg
Tom C, (TCinLA) put it down clearly also. Just look at the sample. Meaningless.
I’ve seen Simon Rosenberg on MSNBC. As a “reader” of faces (while I listen), thinking he’s to be believed.
SFHaine, Also read Jay Kip’s column on this poll. https://www.facebook.com/share/p/3gwXF5WqLzGLzEMt/?mibextid=WC7FNe
"Nobody ever lost money underestimating the intelligence of the American people"
H.L. Mencken
Luv HL Menken!
The NYT/Siena poll is based on a very flawed sample and they put it out anyway. There is nothing there that anyone can claim as reliable.
Polls! They're as reliable as reading tealeaves.
Less so.
It seems likely that polls are “tainted” either by our Fifth Column (which is omnipresent) or by the use of landlines. May I add here that “our” is the most important pronoun for US presently. It could put US back together enough to begin to mend the tears Trump and Russia have brought and are still bringing about. Thank you, all of you, who embrace “our Heather” and recognize that “objectivity” is for weighing and is only half of our “job” as humans. Best Hemingway quote in this context. Where would we be without the arts which take us to nature and make us human.
That poll has been pretty well picked apart, by Simon Rosenberg, Jay Kuo, and Threads, that I've seen. People's antennae went up when it showed trump winning with women in the post-Dobbs era; Democrats have pretty much won everything since that decision.
There's both partisan and statistical bias in poll taking, i also heard of another, begins with Q, which had Biden up by the same amount. I suspect opinions right now are emotionally febrile, and subject to re-examination as time moves along, depending too on the latest public sensation. People like Lawrence O'donnell would say good polling is too soon. And... polls sometimes end up being skewed even to the very end, with surprise upsets if you had just followed the polls. 2024 might well be just that kind of year, given all the pyrotechnics going on.
I don't get it either. But there is a problem of affordability for younger folks. Housing is super expensive, and owning your own home even more so with interest rates rising more than 4% on top of home prices refusing to come down. College is more expensive than ever. But that doesn't explain all of those younger folks maybe supporting Trump instead.
With recent trends in the electoral college, Biden needs to beat Trump by 5% to win. So if Trump is 5% ahead now, he is really more like 10% ahead. So Biden's poll numbers are definitely bad news.
Do not get riled out over these polls!! They’re early, they’re skewed, they’re always always alt-right leaning. Biden will win. Say this over and over and let it be your mantra. Biden Will Win! BIDEN WILL WIN!
They are just meant to demoralize, over and over. A tactic tried and true
Especially with letting Clarence weigh in…
He sat for years without saying much. Like a mole embedded in our government, just waiting for the right moment. And boy, did he spring into action. Likely with Ginni yanking his chain, having paved the way.
All the points you brought up—housing affordability, college costs, rent costs are true everywhere in the western world. Unfortunately no one seems able to fix that. Certainly not Trump!
Counterpoints: College is free in many parts of Europe, same with health care.
SF, in my little Facebook world (with 1450 "friends", with close to 200 that I interact with regularly, made up of schoolmates, motorcyclists, tuba players, cops, musicians, and some "friends of those friends") there is not a strong weight to either political side. That said, I am guessing that more than 60% are displeased with the current situation in the House, and dismayed at who the Republican party is putting forward to run against Biden. Admittedly (and to my absolute amazement) a huge percentage, although not all of the "cops" branch are behind fpotus, in spite of his lawbreaking. They checked their brains at the door.
SFHaine you are indeed wise to not believe it!
It is a POLL!
...and just WHO is responding to political polls these days?!
The only poll which matters is run through a ballot box.
Don't let the polls get you down....time and time again, they have been proven wrong.
Yes, the economy is doing very well and Biden has done a great job, but that's NOT what they're saying on Fox so-called News. It's an alternative universe over there. I can't watch it, but my husband checks their website every so often to stay abreast of the crapola they are -- and are NOT -- reporting.
JUST THINK ABOUT THIS, Nicholas Kristof, New York Times Opinion Columnist, warned:
'When he was challenged about the bloodshed in Gaza on “Face the Nation” last weekend, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel responded, “What would America do” after something like the Oct. 7 Hamas attack? “Would you not be doing what Israel is doing? You’d be doing a hell of a lot more.”
'in less than five months of Israel’s current war in Gaza, the health authorities there report more than 12,500 children killed.'
'Some of the most incisive critics of Israel’s actions are from the very U.N. agencies and human rights groups whose staffs are risking their lives in the field to save lives in Sudan, Ethiopia and other countries.'
'In any case, there is a reason to focus on Gaza today, for it is not just one more place of pain among many contenders but, in the judgment of Unicef, the world’s most dangerous place to be a child.'
'Consider that in the first 18 months of Russia’s current war in Ukraine, at least 545 children were killed. Or that in 2022, by a United Nations count, 2,985 children were killed in all wars worldwide. In contrast, in less than five months of Israel’s current war in Gaza, the health authorities there report more than 12,500 children killed.'
'Among them were 250 infants less than 1 year old. I can’t think of any conflict in this century that has killed babies at such a pace.'
'Of course Israel had the right to respond militarily to the Oct. 7 attacks. Of course Hamas leaders should give up their hostages. But none of this excuses Israel’s “indiscriminate” bombing, in the words of President Biden, and restrictions on food and other assistance.'
'Because of America’s support for Israel’s invasion and diplomatic protection for it at the United Nations, this blood is on our hands, and that surely justifies increased scrutiny.'
'Yet here’s another double standard: We Americans condemn Russia, China or Venezuela for their violations of human rights, but the United States supports Israel and protects it diplomatically even as it has engaged in what President Biden has called an “over the top” military campaign.'
“How can the U.S. condemn Russia’s bombing of civilians in Ukraine as a war crime but fund Netanyahu’s war machine, which has killed thousands?” 'Senator Bernie Sanders asked.'
'So it’s fair to talk about double standards. They are real. They run in many directions, shielding Israel as well as condemning it. And in a world where we are all connected by our shared humanity, I believe we should never let our very human tangles of double standards and hypocrisies be harnessed to deflect from the tragedy unfolding today for the children of Gaza, or America’s complicity in it.' (NYTimes, By Nicholas Kristof) See gifted link below.
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/03/02/opinion/israel-gaza-double-standard.html?unlocked_article_code=1.aE0.yFZK.Kv0VxNTBKIQ8&smid=url-share
Thank you for sharing that with us Fern. I haven't had time to read the NYT today.
Thank You Fern.
"So is there a double standard in global attention? Absolutely. Defenders of Israel have every right to point all this out, and sometimes it does reflect antisemitism. Yet — now we get to the other side — it also strikes me as unconscionable to use the world’s hypocrisy, however invidious, to justify the deaths of thousands of children in Gaza."
Yes, amen.
Care to comment on the mass bombings of cities esp by the Allies during WW2?
That was excellent, Fern. Thank you! I really and truly like Nicholas Kristoff.
Marlene, the children! It is impossible not to internalize what is happening to the people in Gaza, Ukraine, Sudan...and to children here as well. What are the effects of this country's addiction to guns on the health of Americans, including children! I am grateful for you, sister.
You’re so right, Fern. Many hearts ache so much for them all! So grateful for you, also!!💜
Yep..... we might want to pay some attention to the fact the majority of gun killings are suicides, not mass shootings, a significant number of whom are white older males. Rural is the worst i hear. We stereotypically apply our maternal feelings on infants and children.... but really...
Frank, with reference to gun use and violence in the US, I I focus on reality and on the facts reported by Pew Research, Brady United, IHME (INSTITUTE FOR HEALTH METRICS AND EVALUATION), Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, RAND, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, etc.
I agree there should be gun control, more than most Americans would like to see, but google deaths by guns and you'll see the stats bare me out. I've seen these for years. Roughly speaking, fewer guns, fewer death. PEW , for example, on statistical breakdown. https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2023/04/26/what-the-data-says-about-gun-deaths-in-the-u-s/
Frank, thank you. As indicated, I am familiar with gun use and gun violence in the US and other developed as well as less developed countries:
'Gun deaths among U.S. children and teens rose 50% in two years according to a Pew Research Center analysis of the latest annual mortality statistics from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).'
'Firearm injuries and deaths in the United States have increased in recent years and adversely affect many children and adolescents. Firearms now kill more children and adolescents than any other cause, surpassing motor vehicle crashes. Additionally, the U.S. has by far the highest rate of child and teen firearm mortality compared to peer countries. Beyond deaths, there are many more youth who survive gunshot wounds or are otherwise exposed to gun violence. These exposures can lead to negative behavioral health outcomes among youth and their family members. This brief explores the impacts of gun violence on children and adolescents (ages 17 and below) by answering the following key questions:'
'How have firearm deaths changed in recent years among children and adolescents and how do these deaths vary by demographic characteristics?
What is known about nonfatal firearm injury and gun exposure among children and adolescents?'
'How does gun violence affect the mental health and well-being of children and adolescents?
'What policies are in place to address youth exposure to gun violence?'
'How have firearm deaths changed in recent years among children and adolescents?'
'Firearm-related deaths have increased among children and adolescents since the pandemic began, with seven children per day dying by firearm in 2022. From 2012 to 2022, nearly 19,700 children ages 17 and younger died by firearm.1 During this period, firearm death rates gradually rose until 2017, then slowed through 2019, before sharply rising with the onset of the pandemic and holding steady in 2022 (Figure 1). From 2019 to 2022, the firearm death rate among children and adolescents increased by 46% (from 2.4 to 3.5 per 100,000). This translates to seven children per day dying by firearm in 2022.'(KFF) See link below
https://www.kff.org/mental-health/issue-brief/the-impact-of-gun-violence-on-children-and-adolescents/
'Study Finds That Dropping Training Requirement to Obtain Concealed Carry Permit Leads to Significant Increase in Gun Assaults'
'Study comes as last year’s Bruen Supreme Court decision forces several states to loosen concealed carry permitting laws.'
An analysis of 11 states that removed concealed carry licensing that mandated firearm training or proficiency requirements suggests that rates of violent gun assaults increase 32 percent, according to a new study led by researchers at the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Violence Solutions at the Bloomberg School of Public Health.
The study examined 11 states that moved from requiring purchasers to demonstrate a need for a permit for a concealed weapon–known as shall issue laws–to permitless concealed laws. In some states, shall issue laws require permittees to undergo live firearm training, minimum hours at a firing range, or proficiency (e.g. hitting a designated target with 70 percent of their shots). Some shall issue states also prohibit those with violent misdemeanor convictions from obtaining permits.
When the 11 states with shall issue licensing laws that require safety training for obtaining a concealed carry permit went to permitless concealed carry, the annual rate of assaults with guns increased by 21 per 100,000. Some statistical models also found significant increases in assaults with guns when states dropped provisions that prohibited those convicted of violent misdemeanors from obtaining concealed carry permits.
The findings were published September 19, 2023 in Criminology and Public Policy.
“When states made it easier for potentially untrained gun owners to carry their weapons in public, assaults with guns increased,” said Cassandra Crifasi, PhD, co-director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Violence Solutions at the Bloomberg School. “While the Supreme Court’s Bruen decision is forcing some states to weaken their concealed carry permitting systems, this study shows that states can reduce the expected increase in gun assault rates by including training requirements.” (Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health) See link below.
https://publichealth.jhu.edu/center-for-gun-violence-solutions
#i also - big time.
D4N, I always feel a smile inside and out when you stop by. Thank you!
Thank you; I consider that high praise Fern.
From my heart, D4N. Here's to the apples!
lot to think about, but remember Hamas set this up for exactly this kind of response. It's playing out "well" for them so far? Remember, too, the population voted an existentially anti-Israeli party in to lead them politically. I agree, much better to have a more moderate Israeli government to figure out a less destructive response, instead of what is transpiring.
Netanyahu was seeing to it that Hamas run Gaza because he favored keeping the PLO weak. It important to know Netanyahu behavior and Israeli's policies towards Gaza and the West Bank prior to the war. This is not to excuse HAMA, which needs to be quashed as much as possible. However, the complicity of Netanyahu and other Israelis before the war contributes to our understanding of these twisted and tragic circumstances.
👍🏼👍🏼
Many of the Palestinians are intimidated by Hamas as much as Israel. Hamas allows NO dissent. “There can be no successful appeal from the bullet to the ballet.” Abraham Lincoln
I suspect the support / coercion divide is complex. For sure, no elections since they took power in 2006. We can also remember for the most part Hamas membership is drawn from the Gazan population generally. There were running gun battles in 2006, bullets more than ballots.
The similarities with Ukraine are the only thing clear to me. The surrounding monarchies use the Israel and Palestinian conflict as a strategy of control over their populations to protect their own power. I think the two state solution is the way forward. Security is guaranteed only with an equal rule of law applied to both sides. Peace and protection could provide a space towards prosperity. Violence is not sustainable to viability of either state. It’s just so sad and demoralizing that this conflict has gone on for so long.
Thanks Fern; I've been and continue to be a huge fan of Nich Kristof. Even his side gig, running an orchard is highly relatable and attractive to me, as at one time, I worked a full time j_o_b and maintained an orchard; from planting, pruning, spraying, picking, storage, etc., etc. I look back and wonder 'how' quite often, but especially when I get his posts.
This is our most important issue now:
Stop the destruction of Palestine that America is aiding. Thank you, Fern
We’ve all been tired since November 2016. How little we understood then; we thought it was the worst of times.
I see encouraging signs of hope, but also the precipice of disaster.
That is SO true.... I find it hard to be it's been 8 years since i started picking up a renewed interest in following American politics, many thanks to the unbelievable, statistically flukey way Trump won the election.
Love Mr Balla’s comment that explains why we honor OUR Heather: “how well we (Heather!) go (es) out of our (her) way to add perspective, to shine light on some issue we (all) care about.” We honor Heather as a member of our family of (philosophical) choice.
Yes. Phil's pronoun is quite correct.
Yes, tired thinking about it. Like watching Cirque du Soleil on a pyramid of chairs twirling plates at the end of sticks and wondering which moving part will come apart first. I'm thinking I need to cover my eyes.
Don’t cover your eyes. Get out and do something or stay home and write GOTV postcards! It’s good for the soul. There are primaries through 19 March and after.
At least the professional in Cirque actual know what they are doing.
Exactly how I feel.
Would love to be a fly on the wall in FL when Orban and the former guy talk. What do two tryants talk about? How to make the most money possible exploiting their country's natural resources and their fellow citizens? How to stay in power for life? How to destroy all democratic norms, laws, and government structures? How to get the most pleasure out of harming people? How to most effectively threaten, intimidate, and strike fear in your fellow citizens. Will they share the direct line phone numbers to other like-minded world tyrant leaders that they can collude with? How will Orban be compensated for giving his masterclass on being an effective tyrant and killing democracy as quickly as possible? Will the former guy takes notes? No, I doubt it. I wonder who will? Would like to see a copy of that transcript.
And is Orban going to pay the former guy's debt in exchange for America and her foreign policies and assets?
Yes this visit is highly troublesome.
Matt Fulkerson, I sure hope intelligence services are infiltrating and bugging profusely. What a national security risk, corruption is.
Probably the FBI bugged the place on their raid for obtaining classified materials. Well I'm not sure if the FBI would do that, but maybe they brought along CIA who would.
Only Trump invited him. It’s rude diplomatically, so I hope the CIA is tracking everything and x-raying his luggage. How about eavesdropping? Do we wonder about the Secret Service with Trump? Will they be present with the two of them. Will Orban offer Trump exile in Hungary? A castle on the Danube?
Headlines should read: 2 Weakmen, with Little Minds, and Little Morals Collude at FL Resort.
Reminds me of the famous Helsinki meeting. I wonder if that interpreter is still alive and well.
Has never left my mind. Dems check it out…
Anne-Louise Luccarini, oh geez, never thought about that. I suspect he/she was never heard from again.
Just need a billion or two, I’ll pay it back. Promise…
I’m truly laughing out loud, Jeri!
Thank you, so hard to find humor in this mess. But I'm as serious as a heart attack (as a cop friend used to say to me)... Chump is not reluctant to use and abuse anybody.
A thorough description of the activities of entitled, privileged, rich, white, male psychopaths.
The Hungarian tyrant will be talking about what exactly the American tyrant will owe him in return for paying off trump's judgements.
Big recent scandal in Hungary: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/feb/17/hungary-viktor-orban-scandal-president-resign?fbclid=IwAR2scBuH_dLcljH8TqeMrKN6OVXBCVQ6Yw3Q6e_FMwuj__aZ4WlrDW8iJS8 involved pardons for people convicted of sexual abuse of children in orphanages. Suspect Orban and Trump have a lot in common with issuing pardons and connections to pedophiles. Orban ally President Katalin Novak resigned over this scandal.
cameron mcconnell, thanks. Our crazy ones and theirs speak the same language, power by any means necessary.
Wow! You’re right. I doubt the former guy will be giving Orban golf tips. May I borrow your questions with your permission? Wonderful talking points for discussion.
Joan (TX>DE), right, I don't think he's coming to golf, either. Yes, of course, use my questions with as much wild abandon as you want. I hope they are helpful.
Professor, thank you for giving us a solid outline for my (our?) minds to grasp. I am more interested in the SCOTUS decision and the State of the Union than Super Tuesday. Or anything the chump does. Or polls. Or talking heads.
I find that it is easier to get through a week like this when I can keep the Main Thing the Main Thing.
You don't have that luxury, so I will be thinking of you often, with gratitude and encouragement...
And you are right, Gus. I suggested a good night's sleep.
lol i spent parts of the overnight listening to an audible Dune, getting ready to take in Part 2, which one friend has hugely enjoyed. How can i sneak in my own popcorn???
Super Tuesday. Can anyone explain this latest American electoral bizarrerie to me? Is this just fun, or does it carry some weight?
Can't explain why so many timed it for the same, but primaries are dominated by minority activists in both parties. Elections are generally won by pluralities, since usually 60% or fewer voters actually turn out.
We knew this was going to be a difficult year. And it already is.
My nails are down to the quick.
We all need to remember mental health breaks.
The biggest concerns now are Ukraine and the SCOTUS delaying the DC Trump trial till it is too late to do before the election. And, of course, both defeating Trump and taking back the house, while extending the slim majority in the senate. No biggy, right?
LOL…Annabel…I was just chewing my nails while reading this, so had to pause and do a hat tip to you for nailing it (sorry for the pun)…nervous habit when stressed!
Annabel, remember the concept of "stagger breathing" as utillized by choirs/choruses and all low brass players confronted with 10 measures of tied whole notes to be played fortissimo: work with your section and figure out when you can breathe. Stop your note, breathe, then come back in. My section mate and I are "even" (him) and "odd" (me, in more ways than one); I know that I can breathe in all odd numbered measures, and he'll be playing while he breathes in all even numbered measures while I am playing. The other two in our section are both younger and breathe when they need to, which is about a quarter of when I need to! This allows for a constant sound to be made, even as each player/singer takes time to breathe when they need to.
Do the same with your political news consumption/activism. Act when you can, rest when you must.
Ally, Connie Shultz wrote a beautiful article on this very theme, I think she called it “breathe.” It has stayed with me years after I first read it. It’s a wonderful analogy.
I’ll go look for that.
There was a time (12-15 years ago) when I went to a tuba masterclass, a peer support training, and a physical skills/use of force class in the same week. Every single one of them discussed breathing as a foundational part of that discipline, along with mental imagery. Fascinating to me.
lol on the nails... say, sip a nice hot coffee during your read and write, a comfortable location with nice morning sun, such as I have right now. Even kitty taking over lap. All good for "mental health"... also,put on something soothing from youtube. There's tons.
I think you guys will find that all Trump's financial debts with the courts will be mere chicken feed for Viktor Orban.
Mobsters unite against the law.
Yep, chump knows where his salvation lies…