Thank you, Dr. Heather, as always, for a concise yet illuminating summary of current events. Rarely ever cheery news but had to laugh at your closing quote of tonight's letter:
"Well, unfortunately, we can’t track down the informant,” Comer said. “We’re hopeful that the informant is still there. The whistleblower knows the informant. The whistleblower is very credible.”
I laughed too, Just Janice! How could Comer ever be considered an authority on the definition of “credible”? Anyway, grateful for a somewhat positive closing to a LFAA filled with frightening, ominous news recaps…
It's been going on for a long time, but was hidden from us. Living in bliss is a lovely thing until the truth is revealed. Maybe the shock value will give rational people a kick start to help them get in gear and take part in the adult world of responsibility.
Thank you for the quiet intensity of your comment, Susan. It brings us to the need for all of us to recognize that we have for too long failed to stand up for democracy in the mistaken belief that it cannot be broken.
Interesting thought. I believe that many of us "failed to stand up for democracy" because as we saw it, it had little to do with our lives and we had too much else to worry about.
I fear, however, that the number of rational people may be insufficient to overcome those motivated by racist, misogynistic and xenophobic impulses. White Christian Nationalism is definitely on the move here in the U.S., throughout the South and the Midwest.
I'm really at a loss here. Wasn't America created by people fleeing religious autocracy? How is it that people here practice what Jesus was against (hypocrisy being #1) in the name of Jesus? How did it come to be that a minority of lunatics dictate what is the correct skin color, what happens to our bodies and in our bedrooms, and what books our kids can't read? Yet, "free speech" is their refrain. What happened to the "melting pot" concept? I'm having a problem digesting....
I am Hoosier born and raised and I just started A Fever in the Heartland about the rise of the KKK in the 1920s especially in Indiana. It was run by a horrible man who would give Santos, Rudy, and death star a run for their money. I knew Indiana had largest number of KKK in the 20s, but was not aware of how awful it was. I am now in Oregon which did not escape the plague either. What bothers me most is that all of it sounds very familiar especially the use of Protestant ministers and churches to spread the word, the number of pols who belonged, and how many in LE also belonged. My own family certainly had all the prejudices although I can't see them belonging to such a group and it also explains some of the nonsense i heard growing up especially about Catholics. The KKK burned a cross at Notre Dame in 1923 on St. Patrick's Day. South Bend was always suspect when I was growing up as it was full of Ds and Catholics. He also describes Indiana as the most southern of northern states, an observation I made long ago.
Rational, informed, and activated people are definitely in the minority . . . Tragically, too many people are activated by their irrational, uninformed, and ultimately self-defeating allegiance to messiahs and their mythologies .
The pandemic was the monkey wrench thrown into the mess. The disaster that is two Trumps, father and son, expanded in New York until Trump, the TV “star” did his beauty contest in Moscow, found a second “daddy,”
decided that building Trump Tower Moscow would be his greatest achievement, then, roasted by Obama, decided to run for president.
Because he knows nothing except autocracy (which is how he got rich), having learned nothing of American history, civics, or tolerance, he used his TV “stardom” as bully pulpit to get the Republican nomination. The rest is recent enough history that, were it not for the pandemic, we might remember Trump-as-president’s misdeeds. Instead, fear of poverty and premature death has addled our collective political brains giving Trumpists and the Republican Party generally, room to expand their anti-people agenda to the point that there is very little middle class left to counter big business (supporting Trump and his doctrine) and support those trying to get SCOTUS back to integrity. (Thinking of John Marshall or Earl Warren and looking at John Roberts.)
Do you know that you can message President Biden? Today I encouraged him to go to the meeting of 7 and to do whatever it takes to pay our bills and protect Social Security, etc. We cannot let the traitors take US over!
(If Heather can end a sentence with a preposition, I can dare to also.)
Oh, golly, while there are a few grammar police here, they've learned that this is not the place for it. (Besides, the thing about not ending in a proposition has nothing to do with English, which has always done that. If it's good enough for Shakespeare, it's good enough for the rest of us.)
It certainly was hidden from me as a child. As a Baby Boomer with a lengthening lens for history now, I see how little I knew at all. One of my children took two classes from HCR in 1999. I found her then. I bought a couple of her books and found them almost impossible to understand because I still knew so little. You know, that learning curve thing. I'm wide awake and on fire now, but the "not knowing" I had in the past helps me interact with others who still don't really know. I can admit my own journey of discovery and appeal to the goodness of the still uninformed or ignorant. It makes my skin crawl to see how I accepted much that wasn't true at all. I was missing the visceral sense of what systemic racism is, for example. So, I keep speaking up (and writing) and finding different ways to bring a few more people here and there across the finish line. History is replete with awful stories. They've always been there. Power mongers, cheats, and users. I figure, let's make a difference now while we are here, each of us. Heather is a godsend.
Hence my reason. & they would go through research material 8 times as fast, AND their ink would come in quite handy if they learned to write ! 🐙🦑 Great, I made myself hungry for calamari.....
Thank you professor for leading off with the wonderful message of President Biden on Saturday, because after that it all went downhill with the constant reporting noise on the increasing neo nazi/fascism violence growing in this country. Why oh why did I not hear anything on the multiple sources I read or listen to about our Presidents speech and only the constant barrage of neo nazi BS spewing from the mouths of the GOP masking as conservatism. It is my experience the more you hear something the more to start buying into it if you get only one sided information, excuse me mis and disinformation. I am so grateful to be able to have you sharing so succinctly the events and potential effects. Please stay healthy..
Totally agree the media needs to stop seeing the political situation as two parties disagreeing and giving credence to both sides. The Republicans, whether they're the Gosar types or the one's not saying anything, want the end of our democratic government.
Of course, right-wing media (e.g. Maria Bartiromo) is spinning this "missing" informant as possibly being silenced/kidnapped/killed by Biden's operatives. Expect more of this in the future. Who needs proof, or even basic competence, when you can spin like that?
The story is rife with conspiratorial possibilities. Could the missing person have been Antifa all along? A plant? And now he has been spirited away to one of George Soros’ alpine redoubts. All a plot by vile Dems to discredit the “investigation”?
How did you know that Chelsea is one of the deadliest assassins working for the CIA-LWW (CIA-Liberal WetWork) division? That she trained with Army Rangers, spent a couple of years at a Shaolin monastery honing her stealth skills, and now is one of the most formidable members of the GSWD (George Soros World Domination) group? That she was the inspiration for Jennifer Garner's character in "Alias?"
If that were really the fact (and I'm hoping you were just being sarcastic here), do you honestly think they would leave as many enemies around as there are???
Sometimes I honestly do wish that they were the efficient death merchants crazy-ass right-wingers seem to (illogically) think they are!!
Sorry, I don't know you well enough to pick up the sarcasm (although I hope I will in the future). It's very odd how the crap right-wingers spout in deadly seriousness now used to be the laugh lines on Saturday Night Live 10 years ago. Thanks for the clarification (and for letting me admire my memories of Jennifer Garner).
And she and Bill are as patriotic Americans as I ever hope to see (I saw them together in Capitol Square in Richmond, VA, 1992 and have followed them closely ever since).
Enjoy the inexpensive eggs while you can. Climate change is hard on wheat and other grain crops that chickens eat. Not making this up. Have seen the evidence.
True enough about climate change. But that's at the level of mega farming and factory chickens. In many places, small diversified farms are returning, even in urban areas, so we will be eating food grown closer to our homes, including chickens and eggs. Chickens don't need wheat: they eat all kinds of things. (There are also the ubiquitous backyard flocks).
I think we will see some changes that actually are already happening: dry land grain farming will make a return. Some lands that should not have ever been tilled will be returned to it's natural state. Indigenous people in the SW, whose cultural memory includes past droughts, are retrieving old food-ways and practices that are better suited to their conditions than "modern" farming. There is already a trend toward eating seasonally and locally.
The more interest we take in where our food comes from, and the more aware we become to how we can produce food that is suited to where we live, the more able we will be to adjust to climate changes. After all, the various ethnic foods grew out of this very kind of circumstance: using food plants that were adapted to local conditions of climate and soils. We can learn from those cultures instead of trying to maintain a system of food production that is neither efficient (in terms of calories expended for calories returned) nor sustainable.
I don't eat eggs, and I don't eat simple carbs (so no cake, pancakes, etc). But I do feed hard boiled eggs to my dog, along with raw chicken, and various other stuff.
Today's Letter, Heather Cox Richardson, is the dark ode in plain words; the lucid truth-teller of our days and nights in America over the last eight years, with echoes that go back more than a couple of centuries. You have spoken the facts of what we have known in our bones.
Today’s letter was a masterpiece. Beginning with the Howard U story, HCR started with Biden’s masterful speech which was widely seen —nowhere. (Find it on YouTube. It’s fantastic). And then the information kept coming until I had to sit down and stop my head from spinning. May this letter be the start of the wake-up call to everyone on both sides—“What the hell is going on here!?”
I do not get why people think Biden is "boring". Perhaps it is exposure to too many tv shows broken up into commercials and sound-bite news that has created a population unaccustomed to listening to actual speeches. I find his speeches beautifully written and beautifully presented. There are sound bites there for people who want them, but his speeches themselves are nutritious meals, with courses that one can follow.
Could you imagine if John Stewart was the moderator at the dumpster 's town hall !! The outcome would have been so different with dumpster whining and walking off the stage !! Just to imagine this brings a smile to my face !!😅😂😅😂
Justjanice, what Heather didn't mention is that Empty Greene is implying that that the informant is missing but is "very safe, and he fears for his life". Wait for it - she'll be saying out loud in the near future that Biden's henchmen are trying to kill him.
What a disgusting dishonest post. Daniel Penny is a hero. Neely had a rap sheet a mile long of subway crime including 42 arrests in the last 10 years, most recently in November 2021 for slugging a 67-year-old female stranger in the face as she exited a subway station and trying to abduct a child. The day of the incident he was threatening passengers with violence.
Trying to tie this event to white nationalism is disgrace. ITS A LIE. The whole episode is a LIE. You vilify a good and decent man and lionize a serial criminal. That is the left today. Shame on you.
There is an old Jewish phrase "When are kind to the cruel, you are usually cruel to the kind.
BTW You make no mention of the Durham Report final report which came out yesterday and showed once and for all that there never any Russian collusion - except by the Clinton campaign when it paid Christopher Steele $1MM dollars for the report. The Clinton didn't report the expenditure (sound familiar) and paid a finance law penalty. The FBI, Justice Department were weaponized by the Democrats to spy and affect a presidential election. Plain and simple.
Like always there is no price to be paid for lying and dishonest. Same goes for the COVID farce.
I know you came here to argue in bad faith and troll but I'll take the bait.
First, calling Penny a hero is a little absurd and diminishing to actual heroes... There is nothing to suggest that Neely was physically threatening anyone or was a danger to others. You can read the Times report on the story here: What We Know About Jordan Neely’s Killing (https://www.nytimes.com/2023/05/05/nyregion/jordan-neely-chokehold-death-subway.html). You bringing up Neely's history of crime still doesn't excuse being choked to death. You say that he was threatening passengers with violence, but there is no report out there that actually says that, he was threatening himself, but not threatening others. Additionally, as a trained Marine, Penny should have known not to hold someone in a compression choke hold for 15min. Additionally, it isn't Prof Richardson linking Penny to white supremacists, it is actual white supremacist's are doing that. Did you even read her post? She said the following > "Maria Cramer of the New York Times noted yesterday that while no one actually knows much about Daniel Penny, a white man who was recently charged with choking Jordan Neely, a homeless Black man, to death on a subway in New York, right-wing politicians and supporters have rallied around Penny. They seem to see him as a symbol of a powerful man who took matters into his own hands to restore order—although the events that led to the choking are still unclear—much as they lionized Kyle Rittenhouse after he killed two people and wounded another at a Black Lives Matter rally in 2020. Florida governor Ron DeSantis tweeted: “We must defeat the Soros-Funded DAs, stop the Left’s pro-criminal agenda, and take back the streets for law abiding citizens.”"
Key Quote from the article; "At Mr. Penny’s arraignment, the prosecutor, Joshua Steinglass, said “the defendant approached Mr. Neely from behind and placed him in a chokehold, taking him down to the ground.” The train stopped at Broadway-Lafayette, where it remained standing while Mr. Neely was pinned down, as two other men grabbed his arms. At 2:29 p.m., another passenger can be heard in the video saying that his wife had been in the military and knew about chokeholds, and warning the men that they should make sure Mr. Neely had not defecated on himself. “You don’t want to catch a murder charge,” he says. “You got a hell of a chokehold, man.”"
Your comment about "the left" just shows that you aren't as pragmatic as you pretend to be, is basically anyone to the left of you politically just part of this nebulous "the left" group? You'd think it be pretty easy for us to all just be against general white nationalism and I think we all know that if Neely wasn't someone with a rap sheet and just a white hippie girl that was homeless, and acting erratically and she was choked out by a man for 15min and ended up dying, everyone would probably be calling for justice. Coming up to a homeless person from behind and choking them for 15min doesn't make you a hero, especially if the person wasn't threatening anyone. The manslaughter charge which will probably be dropped down to involuntary manslaughter seems like the appropriate charge. I have not seen anyone online or in real life claim that Daniel Penny went out of his way to murder Neely, but to make it seem that he is a hero or just because he had a rap sheet he was deserving of death is bad form, everyone knows not to keep someone in a choke hold for 15min, especially Marines.
Additionally, there are a lot of other outlets that have spoken about the Durham report. Prof Richardson doesn't always have to report on every newsworthy thing everyday. Additionally, after all of these years I keep seeing right wing people like yourself not actually define what is Russian collusion, because it was proven by the Mueller report that the Trump campaign did actually try to work with Russia to influence the 2016 election, while the left or Democrats never claimed that votes were changed or anything like that. Additionally, while the Steele dossier was mostly false, there were some key points that were actually true, such as that Vladimir Putin favored Trump over Hillary Clinton; that Putin personally ordered an "influence campaign" to harm Clinton's campaign and to "undermine public faith in the US democratic process"; and that Putin ordered cyberattacks on both parties; further it was proven to and even admitted that Trump campaign officials and associates had numerous secretive contacts with Russian agents. Finally Fusion GPS who helped produce the report was originally hired by Marco Rubio before completing the report on behalf of the DNC and the Clinton Campaign. There is nothing illegal about opposition research, even if it is not high quality opposition research.
Going back to the report, you are right that the investigation "could not prove" that Russian interference in the 2016 election was facilitated by communications with the Trump campaign. So while it seems that election interference did happen, it doesn't appear that it was personally directed by Trump in a method that would define collusion. Just for context by the way, the Durham’s investigation cost $6.5 million and lasted twice as long as Mueller's. (The Mueller investigation was effectively free because Mueller recovered $48 million for the US)
Durham's investigation was more of a nothing burger. He prosecuted 2 people and they were both acquitted, his report includes a lot of feelings and not facts. In contrast, special counsel Robert Mueller filed charges against 34 individuals and 3 companies, obtained 8 guilty pleas, and obtained the conviction of Paul Manafort after a jury trial. Durham made claims about the FBI’s (alleged) differential treatment of Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump, but didn't really provide concrete examples, nor did the report reveal anything that was new information. What is still true is that the FBI disclosed details of its investigation into Secretary Clinton ten days before the 2016 election and leaked it to the NY Time's but kept its investigation of Trump's connections to Russia confidential until after the election.
Additionally, the FBI had already announced and made reforms years ago, nothing in Durham's report actually makes recommendations. However it does appear that the report had the intended affect of keeping people like you upset and hating on "the left" and Democrats while refusing to acknowledge that Republicans are terrible and do a lot of sham investigations. Again, the Durham investigation accused the FBI of ignoring mitigating facts in its Russia investigation, but it still did not find evidence of politically motivated misconduct, as Donald Trump had suggested.
To say the Justice Department and FBI were weaponized by Democrats goes to show you don't know anything of the people who work there, that is a disingenuous statement to say the least. To also say Covid was a farce when some of us have known people that were hospitalized or died from Covid is also ridiculous and ignorant.
Another stupid cliche. How about you fire your brain and outline where you believe I'm wrong. Leftist have no idea how to defend ideas. That would require brain waves.
"Covid farce?" That statement destroys any credibility for your other assertions. Explain "covid farce" to the children, friends, and loved ones of the million-plus Americans killed by covid.
The left demanded EVERYONE get vaccinated. "The believe in science" Just a little problem
they promoted a "vaccine" that didn't work or was tested. It didn't work.
2) The LEFT demanded that everyone get a booster regardless of whether they had been infected. They claimed that the booster/vaccine where superior to natural immunity. THAT WAS A LIE.
3) The LEFT demanded children be vaccinated, and locked up at home. Yet no a single child in America died from the pandemic other than children who had severe cancer or other illnesses. Children suffer from the lockdown with depression, suicide, drug, and learning loss.
4) The LEFT demanded that all critics be CENSORED. As the twitter files show a number of leading scientist, academics, and journalist were banned from social media because THEY TOLD THE TRUTH about the pandemic.
Yes the COVID farce.
The good news, it was a great trial run for a police state the left so joyful would love to impose.
It will be a special day on earth when the whole kit and kaboodle of the frump fiasco is finito, done and dusted, over and bloody done with.
Decades of wasted time, running backwards and screwing everything up... finito. Hallelujah. A world wide holiday. Let’s call it “the Welcome Sanity day””
"Nick Fuentes, as sort of the organizer of the Groypers, expresses Holocaust denialism, white supremacy, white nationalism, pretty strong anti-women bigotry, he calls for a kind of return to Twelfth Century Catholicism."
The ages seem pretty dark over there. My mother, married to a rich "cracker" family, wrote to me that DeSantis is "helping them be safe." Yep: white, monied and close to the bastion of whiteness in mid-Florida, The Villages.
DeSantis' programs indeed pander to those who want a government which 'is helping them to be safe.' Safe from whom? This is the same rationale upon which the Second Amendment was based in 1789, guaranteeing the availability of weapons to enable States to be safe from those same forces. Today, subtract the States from the equation (as the SCOTUS did in 2008) and just make guns available to anyone. Behind it all is racism.
Racism is certainly part of it, but I think that there is also a fundamental refusal to rule out the use of violence to work one's will; and you see and hear it in their rhetoric in general. The kitted out cosplaytriot is sending the same message as the noose displayed at the insurrection, "we get to use violence if we want to". That differs starkly from what the Constitution says an official "militia" is and is for.
Like the schoolyard bullies (and Desantis) they wrap their reliance on violence with Orwellinan claims about rule of law, yet hold themselves out as somehow exempt from its restraints. Part of the function of governance is to provide channels that are as just as we can make them by which competing and conflicting agendas can be resolved without harm to society.
Althought that was not their intention, personal acts of violence were condoned by the politicized Supreme Court in 2008 in their DC vs Heller decision when it eliminated State-established militias as the beneficiaries of the Second Amendment right to possess and bear arms and left that unencumbered right in the hands of uncontrolled individuals. Since then, the hands of the SCOTUS have been bathed in the flow of blood unleashed by the late Justice Scalia's opinion. It will take a new Court, responsive to the public's wishes, to change things.
“The Groypers are essentially the equivalent of neo-Nazis…. They are attached to violent events like Jan. 6. Nick Fuentes, as sort of the organizer of the Groypers, expresses Holocaust denialism, white supremacy, white nationalism, pretty strong anti-women bigotry, he calls for a kind of return to Twelfth Century Catholicism. They’re an extremist group that is OK with violence.” This pretty much wraps up the Repugnants long game: to take the country back to the Medieval Period. And they will emulate the Hapsburgs…Donny can play, Rudolf I, who became German king in 1273.
12th century sounds like Disney World for these folks. Crusaders killing Muslims, serfs bought and sold like slaves to work the fields and mines. The only thing missing is hunting and killing witches, which was more a 14th -18th Century thing. But I imagine they could just mix centuries to get the maximum fun.
I am convinced that the actual message of "Reaganomics" and certainly the theme of it's implementation, was that democracy is a pathetic pipe dream, and the feudal lords were the proper natural leaders all along. And where did that notion come from? Follow the money.
Yes, the "Dark Ages" moniker is too broad, but too many of our better angels are suffocated when social authority becomes invested in somebody's say so, and often enforced with violence rather than collaborative exploration and empathy. The "Renaissance" and the "Enlightenment" were mixed bags as well, but supported questioning and exploration. Modern "Republicans" would have us believe that only they can fix it, and that anyone who questions their self-serving formulas is evil; when arguably obsessive hubristic self-absorption, to the point of sociopathy, is the essence of what evil is.
Despite Special Investigator Durham's claim of FBI insufficiency re: the Russian connection to Trump, it seems that Putin is weakening considerably. I take heart that his predicted failure in Ukraine might also signal to the right wing toadies here that they, too, are being exposed for what they are.
As much as I dislike being a wet blanket or a killjoy, don't hold your breath. Wherever there's a gaggle / GAG - gle of conservatives you can expect an accumulation of undiluted shite.
When i was a junior in high school, i took a class ''US Government'' and we were taught that conservatives that governed like the ones now in the GQP are ''Reactionaries'' that is exactly what these scumbags are now, far right Reactionaries. There are very few real conservatives that remain in the Rethuglican party.
MAYBE " Conservatives of Convenience ", not unlike " Christians of Convenience ", & the 2 groups have a LOT in common since Evangelicals started worshipping the failed Antichrist Trump, even going so far as to compare him to Jesus when DJT has as much in common with
Jesus as I do with Genghis Khan or Rameses the Great.
Christianiods? Antichristers? Jesus said to help the poor and the stranger, reject great wealth, love, not shoot thy enemy, and to go ahead and pay the taxes. Sound like Trump?
I use other terms, some unfit for mixed company & certainly NOT the ears of those claiming to be " Christian ", such as my holier - than - Jesus cousin. I refer to her as " The Second Coming " or " Li'l Ms. Jesus ", just not to her face.
I have read that some churches have replaced their huge pictures of Jesus with huge pictures of TUMP, and that some have put a picture of TUMP beside their pictures of Jesus.. These TUMP idiots disgust me to no end. I just wished all of this would end, i am sick and tired of TUMP and his mentally deranged cult members.
At least one Evangelical called DJT " the Antichrist ", a voice crying in the wilderness, & indicated that he was DONE with him. Some of them like DJT's policies but are tired of him being a narcissistic buffoon & a 70 + BRAT.
That CNN town hall thing was disaster, all he did was tell the same lies over and over again. I didn't watch it, but i read all about it on other websites. I didn't watch it because personally, i can't stand the sight of him and hear his raspy, broken voice. He is a narcissistic, arrogant, pathological liar. I honestly do not see how anyone could like this cretin.
"That is the issue that will continue in this country when these poor tongues of Judge Douglas and myself shall be silent. It is the eternal struggle between these two principles -- right and wrong -- throughout the world. They are the two principles that have stood face to face from the beginning of time, and will ever continue to struggle. The one is the common right of humanity and the other the divine right of kings." -Lincoln
It would be a special day, but will it ever happen? Trump, with loads of help from mainstream and social media, woke up the 20% of the US population who are true haters, and who have always been here, whom the rich have always manipulated to retain control over the majority.
I remember the Berlin Wall going up. I remember the Berlin Airlift. So did Obama, and he used it as the kernel of that great speech - misunderstood, alas, by some of the European translators.
Even if you date the Berlin Wall from the end of WWII (the Russians and East Germans had electrified fences and armed soldiers), it's still roughly 42 years.
Black Americans were stripped of most of their rights in the 1890s and 1910s. Legally stripped of their rights.
I'm not saying this isn't bad. I'm saying we've been through bad and we overcome it.
I'm 64. My mother not only didn't think she would see a black president in her lifetime -- she doubted I would see one in mine. She was pretty amazed she saw a Catholic president.
My mother raised us to understand that way too many people allow fear to rule them.
If she could see the world her grandchildren were growing up in she would be ecstatic.
But I will not live to see it. In my life time women gained rights that as I single parent were denied & now to have our right to be self determining individuals taken away is heart breaking. Although the undermining of our democracy has happened over a time of complacency, the personification of it & Christian Nationalism/ fascism will take more decades than I have years. I will not go quietly in hopes that the new voters will steer our country onto the process of becoming a democracy for all.
Forgive my going off topic briefly, my fellow HCRites.
Late on Mother's Day evening, former L.A. County Supervisor Gloria Molina left this earthly realm. She was a major figure in SoCal politics for forty years.
She was in many ways, Rosa Parks, Betsy Ross and everyone's cantankerous yet loving abuela rolled into one.
Los Angeles County is the largest county in America, comprising approximately 10 million souls. The County Board of Supes is still comprised of a mere five Supervisors, so you can imagine their power.
In 1991, she became the first Latina and only the second woman to win election thereto, and served for 23 years.
She was a raucously passionate fighter for the under-served, the underrepresented and for good government from nuts to bolts. She was also a great cook, and a master quilter.
She was a true pioneer, and will long be remembered.
"consequences for the country if Trump wins again. How will American life change? Who will benefit? Who will suffer?"
And also, who HAS benefited and who HAS suffered already due to four decades of "Reaganomic" policies? Since we seem to keep doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result, it's high time for a thorough and lucid performance inventory.
There can be no doubt that billionaires are raking it in, but how much has the quality of life improved and/or decayed for most of the rest of us, due to tax cuts, deregulation, reduced voting rights and legalized de facto bribery? Not to mention increasingly haywire climate events with more on the horizon. It all very much smacks of "bait and switch" to me, and the "Republican" faithful are being had.
They just pop into my cranium & I set them loose to be free, not unlike the Wicked Witch Marjorie Taylor Greene & her flying monkeys. Cue the Wicked Witch in the Twister theme !
Maybe it's a corruption of Anglicized French ? Or another language in the Indo - European family. It's almost 0800 & my higher thought processes usually kick in around 0900 - 0930 hours.
Noelle Dunphy. Without having read the cited complaint, something tells me that this has tremendous potential. Thank you, HCR, for bringing us the real news.
Good point. Not a peep from the NYT or CNN on the story yet (as of 1:30 PM, EST). The smaller outlets like Axios, Daily beast, Newsweek are reporting on this. Somethings up. I’m waiting to see what Joyce Vance has to say.
Busy as always Heather. Very newsy and informative post for 5/15/2023. Love the last quote of Rep. Comer with a call out for his committee's lost informant. An excellent metaphor for the GOP, groping for substance but finding none.
Inflation is down. Most measures of crime are down. The number of migrants crossing the southern border is down. And the price of eggs is down. What are the Republicans going to run on? Oh. One more thing. The informant is lost -- if he or she ever existed in the first place.
“Also of note is her claim that, since part of her job was managing emails, Giuliani gave her access to his email account. The system stored at least 23,000 emails on her own personal computer, including “privileged, confidential, and highly sensitive” emails from, to, or concerning Trump, his children Donald Trump Jr., Ivanka Trump, and Eric Trump; Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner; Trump’s lawyers and advisors; media figures including Rupert Murdoch, Sean Hannity, and Tucker Carlson; and so on.”
As I read the news daily, including HCR's letters, I keep getting the image in my head of the Republican Party spinning round and round in a toilet or circling a drain. It's funny to see the individual heads bobbing up and down, their arms flailing as they try to swim against the current.
Headline hog and unofficial party leader Mitch McConnell has been eerily quiet of late. Is that all due to the fall he took? hmmmm.
Good for Joe Biden for pointing out the real terrorist threat to the nation.
Now there is talk from repugnants about increasing the voting age to 25 years to get the GenZ lose their right to vote ! They feel they will lose if GenZ vote ! This is the same crap that one of dumpster 's followers who is a lawyer told at a Superpac !!
When neoNazi Christian Nationalists speak of a "return to 20th century Catholicism" they mean a Vatican aligned with Hitler, Mussolini, and Franco. Authoritarian bedfellows.
Opus Dei Knight of Malta Leonard Leo, has crafted a Supreme Court dominated by racist right wing religious extremists to repurpose our democratic republic as a clerical fascist state. (They just happen to be Catholics.) More in the service of his plutocrat paymasters than true to either the Gospels or Pope Francis.
I would look for a money trail between Leo affiliated shell corporations and Gossar and Fuentes. The trail may lead through Ginni Thomas.
Today's newsletter was hammer blows of evil. For me, this 'Representative George Santos (R-NY) has pleaded guilty to charges of theft in Brazil, but insists he is not guilty of the federal charges against him for financial crimes. He says he will not resign from Congress.' is the most rage inducing because there seems nothing in place to be able to force him out, to prevent the Lump from running for the office of President of the United States, to prevent the expulsion of Thomas, the list goes on. It is as though the deck is stacked against life, liberty, and pursuit of health, a life of dignity for all, let alone happiness. Here is an article in The Atlantic about the darkness of America. I have to say, we feel so much safer no longer living there. https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/05/poverty-in-america-book-matthew-desmond-interview/674058/
Life...except for Native Americans from the beginning...Liberty, except for African Americans since 1619...Pursuit of happiness, except for American women who could not vote until the 1920s... Ms. Dunphy's stash of Giuliani emails may bring down the naked emperors and all their perverted followers and fraudsters and gropergroypers.
The Matthew Desmond interview answers the question “who has not benefited from the past 40+ years since Reagan. The answer is at least half of America. My copy of his book is on the way and referenced Atlantic article has inspired me to action. This is not my America.
Thank you for recommending the Atlantic article. An important part of the whole picture that was left out of the article is the poverty perpetuating way we fund schools with property taxes. Of course the wealthy aren't paying their fair share of taxes which underlies most of the reason why the US is circling the drain. Does the law of diminishing returns apply to "donor class" investments in our "governing class" as there is less and less to trickle up?
The Atlantic now has a paywall. It doesn't allow even one free article. I even had to buy a subscription for my husband. It has gone from about $30 a year to about $80, but it is worth every penny. It publishes excellent relevant journalism every day. On September 23, 2020, it published "The Election That Could Break America". It said "If the vote is close, Donald Trump could easily throw the election into chaos and subvert the result. Who will stop him?" It warned us about numerous threats to the election.
There were numerous flashing red lights about the 2020 election, just as there are now for the 2024 election -- as Professor Richardson has shown us tonight. It is very painful to realize that 75 years after the Allies defeated Hitler and his fascists in Europe, we are facing an existential threat to our democracy by fascists. We dare not ignore these threats.
President Biden is absolutely correct about the threat of white supremacy. In Florida, where I live, our governor is using all his power to suppress the votes of those who disagree with his policies. And he has said that he wants to make the rest of America be like his version of Florida. This is not the kind of government we want or that we want to leave to children being born today.
I agree. I also support ProPublica, which continues to do important investigative work. Their most recent publicized work has been about Clarence Thomas' connection to billionaire friend Harlan Crow. And they have done great work on Trump's taxes, as well as multiple reports on state and local corruption. Democracy will not survive without a free and ethical press.
I used to subscribe, too! I already subscribe to five other journals and support my local PBS station. I can’t afford another fee, especially if McCarthy gets his way with blocking a debt ceiling increase and my Social Security pension is reduced.
I feel like you Rose, wash post, balto sun, Weta, npr, worthy non profits, local state and fed politicians, I thought there'd be a rest after the 2022 elections but now I receive loads more requests, all worthy Dems but I can't support them all!
McCarthy’s comments regarding SS pensions should be a wake-up call for any and all republicans on SS unless his plan would be to single out only those voting as Democrats.
I try to read all Barton Gellman articles. Note that was the November 2020 issue but they intentionally got it out online in September. There were others as well trying to warn of what was to come. It is ashame that only subscribers get this kind of reporting. But they have to make a living.
Galilee, it's a pain in the ass, but someone who subscribes to The Atlantic could copy the article to Word, clean out some of the extraneous ads and photos and then send it to you via email as an attachment. I'd do it myself but I do not know your email address.
I posted a share link from the Atlantic (I am a long-time print/electronic subscriber). Please give it a try, and if it works, post here so I will know. Hope it works.
Unfortunately, Annie, this link doesn’t work for me either. Thanks so much for trying, though. I may look for it at my local library; I’m intrigued enough.
All of this shows why last night's episode of "Succession" which was a "preview" of next year's election in allegory, was so terrifying, since it cut so close to the bone.
In referring to the trumps, giulianis, and others of the true swamp ilk, I have often paraphrased Michelle Obama’s great line, “When they go low, flush.” That’s what we do when we vote…..in addition to all else that we can do in the meantime.
What a dizzying array of currents and cross currents! No wonder that gaslighting and conspiracy theories consume so much of our best human energies...
But the number that grabbed me this morning was our nation's trillion dollar credit card debt. What movement do we need (Paid Lives Matter?) to convince grownups -- especially those who have a duty to act like grownups, such as declared presidential candidates -- that it's NOT OK to make a joke of defaulting on the national debt? It's not a laughing matter. Let people read the books they choose to read and love the people they choose to love (thank goodness for healthy love and kindness). But for heaven's sake, politicians, let the United States pay its bills! This is not an occasion that should involve bullying, hostage-taking, or any other form of "negotiation." This is NOT about making a deal. We have a duty to act like grown-ups. My heart-felt two cents.
It’s homegrown terrorism.........it is no laughing matter. It’s f’n scary. This is not a video game.....it is real. Perhaps that is the way to teach the young......thru video games that some how teach them what is really going on.......just a thought
Another “What a news day!” So much that is anti-Democracy, like Rudy Giuliani. And Santos. Repubs. White Christian Nationalism and Holocaust deniers connected to violence. It feels like a time warp. Yet, there are many who work for Democracy. I would have liked to be in the stands at Howard University, listening to President Biden’s speech to the graduation class. He spoke about “excellence, leadership, and truth and service,” singled out white supremacy “as the most dangerous terrorist threat to our homeland.” President Biden calling for all of us to stand against political extremism and protect the rights and freedoms of choice for women and transgender children to be free. We must work to add more Democrats to our government in the coming elections. But good news in the marketplace: we can once again afford eggs.
Thank you, Dr. Heather, as always, for a concise yet illuminating summary of current events. Rarely ever cheery news but had to laugh at your closing quote of tonight's letter:
"Well, unfortunately, we can’t track down the informant,” Comer said. “We’re hopeful that the informant is still there. The whistleblower knows the informant. The whistleblower is very credible.”
Very fine, credible people indeed.
I laughed too, Just Janice! How could Comer ever be considered an authority on the definition of “credible”? Anyway, grateful for a somewhat positive closing to a LFAA filled with frightening, ominous news recaps…
The s--tstorm before the calm, maybe. WILL THIS MESS NEVER END ?
Grab the plunger and flush 15 times.
I'll look up Roto - Rooter.....
15 isn't enough...the mess is too big.
Rosalind, too true. This job calls for an industrial-sized snake. 👍🏻😂
There’s so much MESSINESS going on, it’s practically impossible to keep up with it.
As to Comer, his “credibility”has no basis:
https://congressionalintegrity.org/why-does-james-comer-keep-lying-to-the-press/
It's been going on for a long time, but was hidden from us. Living in bliss is a lovely thing until the truth is revealed. Maybe the shock value will give rational people a kick start to help them get in gear and take part in the adult world of responsibility.
Thank you for the quiet intensity of your comment, Susan. It brings us to the need for all of us to recognize that we have for too long failed to stand up for democracy in the mistaken belief that it cannot be broken.
Interesting thought. I believe that many of us "failed to stand up for democracy" because as we saw it, it had little to do with our lives and we had too much else to worry about.
I fear, however, that the number of rational people may be insufficient to overcome those motivated by racist, misogynistic and xenophobic impulses. White Christian Nationalism is definitely on the move here in the U.S., throughout the South and the Midwest.
My fear also, the MAGAts and their ilk rule in much of Texas. I used to think that logical and rational people were the majority.
I'm really at a loss here. Wasn't America created by people fleeing religious autocracy? How is it that people here practice what Jesus was against (hypocrisy being #1) in the name of Jesus? How did it come to be that a minority of lunatics dictate what is the correct skin color, what happens to our bodies and in our bedrooms, and what books our kids can't read? Yet, "free speech" is their refrain. What happened to the "melting pot" concept? I'm having a problem digesting....
It is a real cancer fed my right wing media and it can be fatal if unchecked.
I am Hoosier born and raised and I just started A Fever in the Heartland about the rise of the KKK in the 1920s especially in Indiana. It was run by a horrible man who would give Santos, Rudy, and death star a run for their money. I knew Indiana had largest number of KKK in the 20s, but was not aware of how awful it was. I am now in Oregon which did not escape the plague either. What bothers me most is that all of it sounds very familiar especially the use of Protestant ministers and churches to spread the word, the number of pols who belonged, and how many in LE also belonged. My own family certainly had all the prejudices although I can't see them belonging to such a group and it also explains some of the nonsense i heard growing up especially about Catholics. The KKK burned a cross at Notre Dame in 1923 on St. Patrick's Day. South Bend was always suspect when I was growing up as it was full of Ds and Catholics. He also describes Indiana as the most southern of northern states, an observation I made long ago.
Do not forget about some of the western states! ID & MT especially!
Yes Richard Sutherland. Ominous times. The coming election is certainly a critical time.
Rational, informed, and activated people are definitely in the minority . . . Tragically, too many people are activated by their irrational, uninformed, and ultimately self-defeating allegiance to messiahs and their mythologies .
The pandemic was the monkey wrench thrown into the mess. The disaster that is two Trumps, father and son, expanded in New York until Trump, the TV “star” did his beauty contest in Moscow, found a second “daddy,”
decided that building Trump Tower Moscow would be his greatest achievement, then, roasted by Obama, decided to run for president.
Because he knows nothing except autocracy (which is how he got rich), having learned nothing of American history, civics, or tolerance, he used his TV “stardom” as bully pulpit to get the Republican nomination. The rest is recent enough history that, were it not for the pandemic, we might remember Trump-as-president’s misdeeds. Instead, fear of poverty and premature death has addled our collective political brains giving Trumpists and the Republican Party generally, room to expand their anti-people agenda to the point that there is very little middle class left to counter big business (supporting Trump and his doctrine) and support those trying to get SCOTUS back to integrity. (Thinking of John Marshall or Earl Warren and looking at John Roberts.)
Do you know that you can message President Biden? Today I encouraged him to go to the meeting of 7 and to do whatever it takes to pay our bills and protect Social Security, etc. We cannot let the traitors take US over!
(If Heather can end a sentence with a preposition, I can dare to also.)
Oh, golly, while there are a few grammar police here, they've learned that this is not the place for it. (Besides, the thing about not ending in a proposition has nothing to do with English, which has always done that. If it's good enough for Shakespeare, it's good enough for the rest of us.)
Excellent points!--PS: The preposition rule is pretty much an anachronism. https://www.thefreedictionary.com/Dangling-Prepositions.htm#:~:text=A%20dangling%20preposition%20(also%20called,form%20a%20complete%20prepositional%20phrase.
It certainly was hidden from me as a child. As a Baby Boomer with a lengthening lens for history now, I see how little I knew at all. One of my children took two classes from HCR in 1999. I found her then. I bought a couple of her books and found them almost impossible to understand because I still knew so little. You know, that learning curve thing. I'm wide awake and on fire now, but the "not knowing" I had in the past helps me interact with others who still don't really know. I can admit my own journey of discovery and appeal to the goodness of the still uninformed or ignorant. It makes my skin crawl to see how I accepted much that wasn't true at all. I was missing the visceral sense of what systemic racism is, for example. So, I keep speaking up (and writing) and finding different ways to bring a few more people here and there across the finish line. History is replete with awful stories. They've always been there. Power mongers, cheats, and users. I figure, let's make a difference now while we are here, each of us. Heather is a godsend.
If I were a professional journalist, I'd need an intelligent octopus or perhaps 2 to help fact - check & research.
It's interesting that you would choose to use an octopus. Studies have shown that they are very intelligent.
Hence my reason. & they would go through research material 8 times as fast, AND their ink would come in quite handy if they learned to write ! 🐙🦑 Great, I made myself hungry for calamari.....
Thank you professor for leading off with the wonderful message of President Biden on Saturday, because after that it all went downhill with the constant reporting noise on the increasing neo nazi/fascism violence growing in this country. Why oh why did I not hear anything on the multiple sources I read or listen to about our Presidents speech and only the constant barrage of neo nazi BS spewing from the mouths of the GOP masking as conservatism. It is my experience the more you hear something the more to start buying into it if you get only one sided information, excuse me mis and disinformation. I am so grateful to be able to have you sharing so succinctly the events and potential effects. Please stay healthy..
Totally agree the media needs to stop seeing the political situation as two parties disagreeing and giving credence to both sides. The Republicans, whether they're the Gosar types or the one's not saying anything, want the end of our democratic government.
THEY'VE HAD THE EQUIVALENT OF WET DREAMS ABOUT IT FOR ABOUT 20 YEARS. EXCUSE my candor.
Of course, right-wing media (e.g. Maria Bartiromo) is spinning this "missing" informant as possibly being silenced/kidnapped/killed by Biden's operatives. Expect more of this in the future. Who needs proof, or even basic competence, when you can spin like that?
I was thinking that Comer should take a look in that pizza place basement. Maybe the missing person is down there with the kids. Just saying.
My first thought, too, Martin!
The story is rife with conspiratorial possibilities. Could the missing person have been Antifa all along? A plant? And now he has been spirited away to one of George Soros’ alpine redoubts. All a plot by vile Dems to discredit the “investigation”?
I could go on…
This era has definitely left its mark on everyone! 😵💫‼️
Rupert never needed proof
Surely the Clintons do the Democrats wet work, don't they?
If Hillary Clinton was responsible for as many murders as Republicans like to claim, Donnie boy would have broken his neck coming down that escalator.
😁
Hillary is competent.
Love it ! I didn't realize that Hillary Clinton was so CIA ! If she did anything you would never find the bodies . She is that good !!🤣😅😂🤣😅😂
How did you know that Chelsea is one of the deadliest assassins working for the CIA-LWW (CIA-Liberal WetWork) division? That she trained with Army Rangers, spent a couple of years at a Shaolin monastery honing her stealth skills, and now is one of the most formidable members of the GSWD (George Soros World Domination) group? That she was the inspiration for Jennifer Garner's character in "Alias?"
I miss laugh reacts like on Facebook. Well played!
Haven’t the Clintons been trashed by Republican cretins enough. Or are you one
If that were really the fact (and I'm hoping you were just being sarcastic here), do you honestly think they would leave as many enemies around as there are???
Sometimes I honestly do wish that they were the efficient death merchants crazy-ass right-wingers seem to (illogically) think they are!!
Yes, I was being sarcastic.
Sorry, I don't know you well enough to pick up the sarcasm (although I hope I will in the future). It's very odd how the crap right-wingers spout in deadly seriousness now used to be the laugh lines on Saturday Night Live 10 years ago. Thanks for the clarification (and for letting me admire my memories of Jennifer Garner).
It really is amazing, and not in a good way.
And she and Bill are as patriotic Americans as I ever hope to see (I saw them together in Capitol Square in Richmond, VA, 1992 and have followed them closely ever since).
Do you have a link to Bartiromo’s spin?
I also had to laugh about the price of eggs...
Omelettes, pancakes, multi-layer sponge cakes...eggs are good for you! Make the most of it.
Enjoy the inexpensive eggs while you can. Climate change is hard on wheat and other grain crops that chickens eat. Not making this up. Have seen the evidence.
True enough about climate change. But that's at the level of mega farming and factory chickens. In many places, small diversified farms are returning, even in urban areas, so we will be eating food grown closer to our homes, including chickens and eggs. Chickens don't need wheat: they eat all kinds of things. (There are also the ubiquitous backyard flocks).
I think we will see some changes that actually are already happening: dry land grain farming will make a return. Some lands that should not have ever been tilled will be returned to it's natural state. Indigenous people in the SW, whose cultural memory includes past droughts, are retrieving old food-ways and practices that are better suited to their conditions than "modern" farming. There is already a trend toward eating seasonally and locally.
The more interest we take in where our food comes from, and the more aware we become to how we can produce food that is suited to where we live, the more able we will be to adjust to climate changes. After all, the various ethnic foods grew out of this very kind of circumstance: using food plants that were adapted to local conditions of climate and soils. We can learn from those cultures instead of trying to maintain a system of food production that is neither efficient (in terms of calories expended for calories returned) nor sustainable.
We will see the careful reuse of water as well.
I don't eat eggs, and I don't eat simple carbs (so no cake, pancakes, etc). But I do feed hard boiled eggs to my dog, along with raw chicken, and various other stuff.
Colette Wismer -- I laughed too because paying 50-cents an egg is still a steal!
I have always said this.
Yes, it is Judith.
Today's Letter, Heather Cox Richardson, is the dark ode in plain words; the lucid truth-teller of our days and nights in America over the last eight years, with echoes that go back more than a couple of centuries. You have spoken the facts of what we have known in our bones.
Thank you.
Today’s letter was a masterpiece. Beginning with the Howard U story, HCR started with Biden’s masterful speech which was widely seen —nowhere. (Find it on YouTube. It’s fantastic). And then the information kept coming until I had to sit down and stop my head from spinning. May this letter be the start of the wake-up call to everyone on both sides—“What the hell is going on here!?”
I do not get why people think Biden is "boring". Perhaps it is exposure to too many tv shows broken up into commercials and sound-bite news that has created a population unaccustomed to listening to actual speeches. I find his speeches beautifully written and beautifully presented. There are sound bites there for people who want them, but his speeches themselves are nutritious meals, with courses that one can follow.
I haven't seen/heard the full speech but have seen a number of excerpted clips on MSNBC and the local CBS affiliate.
I expect that G. Santos will vouch for him.
🤣🤣🤣
Maybe Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert can hold another “Rally for Sanity.” We need it.
Could you imagine if John Stewart was the moderator at the dumpster 's town hall !! The outcome would have been so different with dumpster whining and walking off the stage !! Just to imagine this brings a smile to my face !!😅😂😅😂
I also thought that was laughable! It seems we are in a nightmare from which we cannot awaken but a bit of levity doesn't hurt.
Just don’t lose sight of the threat to us all…
probably never existed
Justjanice, what Heather didn't mention is that Empty Greene is implying that that the informant is missing but is "very safe, and he fears for his life". Wait for it - she'll be saying out loud in the near future that Biden's henchmen are trying to kill him.
BEST nickname for that twit I've heard yet. Sure does fit like a glove.
I must admit that I plagiarized that one from another commenter on this site. Wish I'd been smart enough to do it on my own. 😉
You’re smart enough to steal good material
Thanks for the vote of confidence!
Doesnt matter - there have been quite a few little hummers from many on here. I should have been making a note of them = my memory isnt that great!
Welcome to my world!
I doubt we are alone here!
I agree with you, that quote is great. I laughed out loud.😂
That one made me laugh out loud. That should have had a spew alert - I was lucky I had just swallowed a swig of coffee!! :0)
Yup, and the typical, tyrannical Trump toady says to all of this….”So……?”
What a sorted news day. Beginning after Mr Biden's inspiration at Howard and on to the end of today’s Letter.
What a disgusting dishonest post. Daniel Penny is a hero. Neely had a rap sheet a mile long of subway crime including 42 arrests in the last 10 years, most recently in November 2021 for slugging a 67-year-old female stranger in the face as she exited a subway station and trying to abduct a child. The day of the incident he was threatening passengers with violence.
Trying to tie this event to white nationalism is disgrace. ITS A LIE. The whole episode is a LIE. You vilify a good and decent man and lionize a serial criminal. That is the left today. Shame on you.
There is an old Jewish phrase "When are kind to the cruel, you are usually cruel to the kind.
BTW You make no mention of the Durham Report final report which came out yesterday and showed once and for all that there never any Russian collusion - except by the Clinton campaign when it paid Christopher Steele $1MM dollars for the report. The Clinton didn't report the expenditure (sound familiar) and paid a finance law penalty. The FBI, Justice Department were weaponized by the Democrats to spy and affect a presidential election. Plain and simple.
Like always there is no price to be paid for lying and dishonest. Same goes for the COVID farce.
Dude.
Penny, US Marine trained to kill. Marine chokeholds -kill
Neely, in the momem, Penny had ZERO clue about Neelys past. Irrelevant.
Penny absolutely should have RESTRAINED Neely by simply binding his legs ans then his arms.
Neely had no weapon.
Penny was the weapon.
Penny murderered Neely when he should have restrained him as I explained
Another passenger held Neely’s legs while Penny kept him in the chokehold
Which is more evidence of murder. Neely was restrained. They just had to bind his legs with a shirt or pants and pull the Emergency Subway stop lever.
Agreed. Who goes immediately to a chokehold, much less maintain it?
Join me in reporting him (…under his comments).
Join me in reporting him (…under his comments).
I know you came here to argue in bad faith and troll but I'll take the bait.
First, calling Penny a hero is a little absurd and diminishing to actual heroes... There is nothing to suggest that Neely was physically threatening anyone or was a danger to others. You can read the Times report on the story here: What We Know About Jordan Neely’s Killing (https://www.nytimes.com/2023/05/05/nyregion/jordan-neely-chokehold-death-subway.html). You bringing up Neely's history of crime still doesn't excuse being choked to death. You say that he was threatening passengers with violence, but there is no report out there that actually says that, he was threatening himself, but not threatening others. Additionally, as a trained Marine, Penny should have known not to hold someone in a compression choke hold for 15min. Additionally, it isn't Prof Richardson linking Penny to white supremacists, it is actual white supremacist's are doing that. Did you even read her post? She said the following > "Maria Cramer of the New York Times noted yesterday that while no one actually knows much about Daniel Penny, a white man who was recently charged with choking Jordan Neely, a homeless Black man, to death on a subway in New York, right-wing politicians and supporters have rallied around Penny. They seem to see him as a symbol of a powerful man who took matters into his own hands to restore order—although the events that led to the choking are still unclear—much as they lionized Kyle Rittenhouse after he killed two people and wounded another at a Black Lives Matter rally in 2020. Florida governor Ron DeSantis tweeted: “We must defeat the Soros-Funded DAs, stop the Left’s pro-criminal agenda, and take back the streets for law abiding citizens.”"
Key Quote from the article; "At Mr. Penny’s arraignment, the prosecutor, Joshua Steinglass, said “the defendant approached Mr. Neely from behind and placed him in a chokehold, taking him down to the ground.” The train stopped at Broadway-Lafayette, where it remained standing while Mr. Neely was pinned down, as two other men grabbed his arms. At 2:29 p.m., another passenger can be heard in the video saying that his wife had been in the military and knew about chokeholds, and warning the men that they should make sure Mr. Neely had not defecated on himself. “You don’t want to catch a murder charge,” he says. “You got a hell of a chokehold, man.”"
Your comment about "the left" just shows that you aren't as pragmatic as you pretend to be, is basically anyone to the left of you politically just part of this nebulous "the left" group? You'd think it be pretty easy for us to all just be against general white nationalism and I think we all know that if Neely wasn't someone with a rap sheet and just a white hippie girl that was homeless, and acting erratically and she was choked out by a man for 15min and ended up dying, everyone would probably be calling for justice. Coming up to a homeless person from behind and choking them for 15min doesn't make you a hero, especially if the person wasn't threatening anyone. The manslaughter charge which will probably be dropped down to involuntary manslaughter seems like the appropriate charge. I have not seen anyone online or in real life claim that Daniel Penny went out of his way to murder Neely, but to make it seem that he is a hero or just because he had a rap sheet he was deserving of death is bad form, everyone knows not to keep someone in a choke hold for 15min, especially Marines.
Additionally, there are a lot of other outlets that have spoken about the Durham report. Prof Richardson doesn't always have to report on every newsworthy thing everyday. Additionally, after all of these years I keep seeing right wing people like yourself not actually define what is Russian collusion, because it was proven by the Mueller report that the Trump campaign did actually try to work with Russia to influence the 2016 election, while the left or Democrats never claimed that votes were changed or anything like that. Additionally, while the Steele dossier was mostly false, there were some key points that were actually true, such as that Vladimir Putin favored Trump over Hillary Clinton; that Putin personally ordered an "influence campaign" to harm Clinton's campaign and to "undermine public faith in the US democratic process"; and that Putin ordered cyberattacks on both parties; further it was proven to and even admitted that Trump campaign officials and associates had numerous secretive contacts with Russian agents. Finally Fusion GPS who helped produce the report was originally hired by Marco Rubio before completing the report on behalf of the DNC and the Clinton Campaign. There is nothing illegal about opposition research, even if it is not high quality opposition research.
Going back to the report, you are right that the investigation "could not prove" that Russian interference in the 2016 election was facilitated by communications with the Trump campaign. So while it seems that election interference did happen, it doesn't appear that it was personally directed by Trump in a method that would define collusion. Just for context by the way, the Durham’s investigation cost $6.5 million and lasted twice as long as Mueller's. (The Mueller investigation was effectively free because Mueller recovered $48 million for the US)
Durham's investigation was more of a nothing burger. He prosecuted 2 people and they were both acquitted, his report includes a lot of feelings and not facts. In contrast, special counsel Robert Mueller filed charges against 34 individuals and 3 companies, obtained 8 guilty pleas, and obtained the conviction of Paul Manafort after a jury trial. Durham made claims about the FBI’s (alleged) differential treatment of Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump, but didn't really provide concrete examples, nor did the report reveal anything that was new information. What is still true is that the FBI disclosed details of its investigation into Secretary Clinton ten days before the 2016 election and leaked it to the NY Time's but kept its investigation of Trump's connections to Russia confidential until after the election.
Additionally, the FBI had already announced and made reforms years ago, nothing in Durham's report actually makes recommendations. However it does appear that the report had the intended affect of keeping people like you upset and hating on "the left" and Democrats while refusing to acknowledge that Republicans are terrible and do a lot of sham investigations. Again, the Durham investigation accused the FBI of ignoring mitigating facts in its Russia investigation, but it still did not find evidence of politically motivated misconduct, as Donald Trump had suggested.
To say the Justice Department and FBI were weaponized by Democrats goes to show you don't know anything of the people who work there, that is a disingenuous statement to say the least. To also say Covid was a farce when some of us have known people that were hospitalized or died from Covid is also ridiculous and ignorant.
Right on! Philly T. Thank you!!
Thank you, PhillyT.
Join me in reporting him (…under his comments).
Immediate execution is not the punishment for irritating people riding in the subway.
And here we have another case of rectal-cranial inversion.
So sad... :/
Join me in reporting him (…under his comments).
Another stupid cliche. How about you fire your brain and outline where you believe I'm wrong. Leftist have no idea how to defend ideas. That would require brain waves.
You are as predicable as the other mosquitos.
I don't owe you shit. Go buzz into the ether with the other flying insects.
Just another no nothing leftist who couldn't think their way out of a paper bag. Your stupid post speaks for itself.
Yes I'm predictable. I believe in facts over feelings.
Pro tip: Don’t feed the trolls
Generally agree although I really appreciate PhillyT's factual comment in reply.
What facts? He omitted all the relevant facts. Mr Neely was a serial criminal who had a long record including assault and attempted kidnap.
Of course Heather is trying to tie white supremacy and the incident in NYC together - its why she she linked everything together.
"Covid farce?" That statement destroys any credibility for your other assertions. Explain "covid farce" to the children, friends, and loved ones of the million-plus Americans killed by covid.
Join me in reporting him (…under his comments).
Have you been living in a cave?
The left demanded EVERYONE get vaccinated. "The believe in science" Just a little problem
they promoted a "vaccine" that didn't work or was tested. It didn't work.
2) The LEFT demanded that everyone get a booster regardless of whether they had been infected. They claimed that the booster/vaccine where superior to natural immunity. THAT WAS A LIE.
3) The LEFT demanded children be vaccinated, and locked up at home. Yet no a single child in America died from the pandemic other than children who had severe cancer or other illnesses. Children suffer from the lockdown with depression, suicide, drug, and learning loss.
4) The LEFT demanded that all critics be CENSORED. As the twitter files show a number of leading scientist, academics, and journalist were banned from social media because THEY TOLD THE TRUTH about the pandemic.
Yes the COVID farce.
The good news, it was a great trial run for a police state the left so joyful would love to impose.
Except for the dead. There’s always the dead, James. Bad luck, eh?
Join me in reporting him (…under his comments).
PLOP!
So true, Charlie!
Join me in reporting him (…under his comments).
And from which part of the web (or is it Fox “news”) do you get your information? We are about truth here.
James A is not about information. This is about distraction and diversion. Let's not feed the trolls.
However, I did appreciate PhillyT's well-done summary of what has been going on, using facts and thoughtful analysis. Thank you, PhillyT.
Join me in reporting him (…under his comments).
Join me in reporting him (…under his comments).
It will be a special day on earth when the whole kit and kaboodle of the frump fiasco is finito, done and dusted, over and bloody done with.
Decades of wasted time, running backwards and screwing everything up... finito. Hallelujah. A world wide holiday. Let’s call it “the Welcome Sanity day””
"Nick Fuentes, as sort of the organizer of the Groypers, expresses Holocaust denialism, white supremacy, white nationalism, pretty strong anti-women bigotry, he calls for a kind of return to Twelfth Century Catholicism."
Make the ages "dark" again.
The ages seem pretty dark over there. My mother, married to a rich "cracker" family, wrote to me that DeSantis is "helping them be safe." Yep: white, monied and close to the bastion of whiteness in mid-Florida, The Villages.
DeSantis' programs indeed pander to those who want a government which 'is helping them to be safe.' Safe from whom? This is the same rationale upon which the Second Amendment was based in 1789, guaranteeing the availability of weapons to enable States to be safe from those same forces. Today, subtract the States from the equation (as the SCOTUS did in 2008) and just make guns available to anyone. Behind it all is racism.
Racism is certainly part of it, but I think that there is also a fundamental refusal to rule out the use of violence to work one's will; and you see and hear it in their rhetoric in general. The kitted out cosplaytriot is sending the same message as the noose displayed at the insurrection, "we get to use violence if we want to". That differs starkly from what the Constitution says an official "militia" is and is for.
Like the schoolyard bullies (and Desantis) they wrap their reliance on violence with Orwellinan claims about rule of law, yet hold themselves out as somehow exempt from its restraints. Part of the function of governance is to provide channels that are as just as we can make them by which competing and conflicting agendas can be resolved without harm to society.
Althought that was not their intention, personal acts of violence were condoned by the politicized Supreme Court in 2008 in their DC vs Heller decision when it eliminated State-established militias as the beneficiaries of the Second Amendment right to possess and bear arms and left that unencumbered right in the hands of uncontrolled individuals. Since then, the hands of the SCOTUS have been bathed in the flow of blood unleashed by the late Justice Scalia's opinion. It will take a new Court, responsive to the public's wishes, to change things.
As a Floridian, all I can say about the Villages is 🤮
I can't wait to see all those Villagers cleaning their own homes, mowing their own lawns, when there are no more immigrants left in the state
My sister lived in the Villages for almost two years. I helped get her out of that morass.
Now there is a picture! I imagine the reason many wealthier Floridians live behind gates & fences might be their concern of their "safety".
Have read about the Villages - To have to do their own maintenance & "labor" certainly would be interesting.
Might even cut down on their STD transmission rates. Have read it is quite high in the Villages (laptop does not allow emojis)
There may be early dementia in many Villages residents which would make them more susceptible to right wing BS. Critical thinking would be lost.
“The Groypers are essentially the equivalent of neo-Nazis…. They are attached to violent events like Jan. 6. Nick Fuentes, as sort of the organizer of the Groypers, expresses Holocaust denialism, white supremacy, white nationalism, pretty strong anti-women bigotry, he calls for a kind of return to Twelfth Century Catholicism. They’re an extremist group that is OK with violence.” This pretty much wraps up the Repugnants long game: to take the country back to the Medieval Period. And they will emulate the Hapsburgs…Donny can play, Rudolf I, who became German king in 1273.
12th century sounds like Disney World for these folks. Crusaders killing Muslims, serfs bought and sold like slaves to work the fields and mines. The only thing missing is hunting and killing witches, which was more a 14th -18th Century thing. But I imagine they could just mix centuries to get the maximum fun.
Although “the greatest witch-hunt in the history of our country” has taken place in the 21st century 😉
So long as they got to be despots.
I am convinced that the actual message of "Reaganomics" and certainly the theme of it's implementation, was that democracy is a pathetic pipe dream, and the feudal lords were the proper natural leaders all along. And where did that notion come from? Follow the money.
I said this way before chump. Nice that some of our MSM has “woke.”
There were some terrific opinion writers. Augustine. Thomas Aquinas.
Yes, the "Dark Ages" moniker is too broad, but too many of our better angels are suffocated when social authority becomes invested in somebody's say so, and often enforced with violence rather than collaborative exploration and empathy. The "Renaissance" and the "Enlightenment" were mixed bags as well, but supported questioning and exploration. Modern "Republicans" would have us believe that only they can fix it, and that anyone who questions their self-serving formulas is evil; when arguably obsessive hubristic self-absorption, to the point of sociopathy, is the essence of what evil is.
Shuddering, I agree with you.
Despite Special Investigator Durham's claim of FBI insufficiency re: the Russian connection to Trump, it seems that Putin is weakening considerably. I take heart that his predicted failure in Ukraine might also signal to the right wing toadies here that they, too, are being exposed for what they are.
As much as I dislike being a wet blanket or a killjoy, don't hold your breath. Wherever there's a gaggle / GAG - gle of conservatives you can expect an accumulation of undiluted shite.
When i was a junior in high school, i took a class ''US Government'' and we were taught that conservatives that governed like the ones now in the GQP are ''Reactionaries'' that is exactly what these scumbags are now, far right Reactionaries. There are very few real conservatives that remain in the Rethuglican party.
MAYBE " Conservatives of Convenience ", not unlike " Christians of Convenience ", & the 2 groups have a LOT in common since Evangelicals started worshipping the failed Antichrist Trump, even going so far as to compare him to Jesus when DJT has as much in common with
Jesus as I do with Genghis Khan or Rameses the Great.
Christians of Convenience, great descriptor, or maybe Pharisees
American Neo - Pharisee Hypocrite party ? I'm sure some acronym could be strung together from that.
Christianiods? Antichristers? Jesus said to help the poor and the stranger, reject great wealth, love, not shoot thy enemy, and to go ahead and pay the taxes. Sound like Trump?
Daniel I think of many of the ‘Christian’ evangelicals as Judasites.
I use other terms, some unfit for mixed company & certainly NOT the ears of those claiming to be " Christian ", such as my holier - than - Jesus cousin. I refer to her as " The Second Coming " or " Li'l Ms. Jesus ", just not to her face.
Daniel How about Pontius Pilate? This could make her think (for the first time?)
😂
Keith, the resemblance to “prarasites” is too good to miss. But do these people know who Judas was? What betrayal means?
Virginia These folks don’t know who Judas was [look in the mirror?] and don’t know the difference between Holy Toast and Holy Ghost.
Perhaps they should sign up for Parasites Pilates with Pontius.
I have read that some churches have replaced their huge pictures of Jesus with huge pictures of TUMP, and that some have put a picture of TUMP beside their pictures of Jesus.. These TUMP idiots disgust me to no end. I just wished all of this would end, i am sick and tired of TUMP and his mentally deranged cult members.
At least one Evangelical called DJT " the Antichrist ", a voice crying in the wilderness, & indicated that he was DONE with him. Some of them like DJT's policies but are tired of him being a narcissistic buffoon & a 70 + BRAT.
That CNN town hall thing was disaster, all he did was tell the same lies over and over again. I didn't watch it, but i read all about it on other websites. I didn't watch it because personally, i can't stand the sight of him and hear his raspy, broken voice. He is a narcissistic, arrogant, pathological liar. I honestly do not see how anyone could like this cretin.
John These days a US Government class should describe the GOP as Reactionaries and false fact Defactuaries.
Oh, man, you DO have a way with words. 😂
"That is the issue that will continue in this country when these poor tongues of Judge Douglas and myself shall be silent. It is the eternal struggle between these two principles -- right and wrong -- throughout the world. They are the two principles that have stood face to face from the beginning of time, and will ever continue to struggle. The one is the common right of humanity and the other the divine right of kings." -Lincoln
I couldn't have said it better!
It would be a special day, but will it ever happen? Trump, with loads of help from mainstream and social media, woke up the 20% of the US population who are true haters, and who have always been here, whom the rich have always manipulated to retain control over the majority.
I don't disagree but I may not see that in my lifetime.
Or you may.
If you're old enough, do you remember watching the Berlin Wall come down?
All things are possible.
I remember the Berlin Wall going up. I remember the Berlin Airlift. So did Obama, and he used it as the kernel of that great speech - misunderstood, alas, by some of the European translators.
How wonderful!
Did you think it would ever come down?
Because I didn't -- until it did.
And I wept.
Which I never would have predicted.
Gorbachev didn't get much in the way of thanks.
From neither side.
Hopefully, history will cut through the BS and give him is due.
How long did that take?
28 years.
Putin became president of Russia in 2000.
23 years ago.
Even if you date the Berlin Wall from the end of WWII (the Russians and East Germans had electrified fences and armed soldiers), it's still roughly 42 years.
Black Americans were stripped of most of their rights in the 1890s and 1910s. Legally stripped of their rights.
I'm not saying this isn't bad. I'm saying we've been through bad and we overcome it.
I'm 64. My mother not only didn't think she would see a black president in her lifetime -- she doubted I would see one in mine. She was pretty amazed she saw a Catholic president.
My mother raised us to understand that way too many people allow fear to rule them.
If she could see the world her grandchildren were growing up in she would be ecstatic.
We will get through this.
But I will not live to see it. In my life time women gained rights that as I single parent were denied & now to have our right to be self determining individuals taken away is heart breaking. Although the undermining of our democracy has happened over a time of complacency, the personification of it & Christian Nationalism/ fascism will take more decades than I have years. I will not go quietly in hopes that the new voters will steer our country onto the process of becoming a democracy for all.
I wish I could be so optimistic.
It helps if your first thought on reading the latest Republican inanity is "I will not let those bastards win."
Anger is a perfectly useful emotion - when channeled into action.
"We live in capitalism. It's power seems inescapable. But then, so did the divine right of kings"
Ursula Le Guin- National Book Awards, 2014
If you can imagine such a day, you are far more optimistic than I am.
I still fantasize about waking up on Nov 9, 2016, and hearing that Hillary has been elected, and that everything after is an oft bad dream.
Well said, Diana! Why don't we call it that day, come on.
AMEN!!!!!!!!!!!
Forgive my going off topic briefly, my fellow HCRites.
Late on Mother's Day evening, former L.A. County Supervisor Gloria Molina left this earthly realm. She was a major figure in SoCal politics for forty years.
She was in many ways, Rosa Parks, Betsy Ross and everyone's cantankerous yet loving abuela rolled into one.
Los Angeles County is the largest county in America, comprising approximately 10 million souls. The County Board of Supes is still comprised of a mere five Supervisors, so you can imagine their power.
In 1991, she became the first Latina and only the second woman to win election thereto, and served for 23 years.
She was a raucously passionate fighter for the under-served, the underrepresented and for good government from nuts to bolts. She was also a great cook, and a master quilter.
She was a true pioneer, and will long be remembered.
Vaya con Dios, Gloria
Thanks for telling us. It makes her shine.
Good morning, Anne-Louise, and thank you for the sweet reply.
DANNY
"consequences for the country if Trump wins again. How will American life change? Who will benefit? Who will suffer?"
And also, who HAS benefited and who HAS suffered already due to four decades of "Reaganomic" policies? Since we seem to keep doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result, it's high time for a thorough and lucid performance inventory.
There can be no doubt that billionaires are raking it in, but how much has the quality of life improved and/or decayed for most of the rest of us, due to tax cuts, deregulation, reduced voting rights and legalized de facto bribery? Not to mention increasingly haywire climate events with more on the horizon. It all very much smacks of "bait and switch" to me, and the "Republican" faithful are being had.
" Groypers " ? Good heavens, these conservative / ultra - conservative groups pop up like mushrooms in a fresh manure pile after a flash flood.
Haha - great visual! 👀
They just pop into my cranium & I set them loose to be free, not unlike the Wicked Witch Marjorie Taylor Greene & her flying monkeys. Cue the Wicked Witch in the Twister theme !
How did they invent that word? My inbuilt mental Germanic spellcheck writes it as "greupers".
Maybe it's a corruption of Anglicized French ? Or another language in the Indo - European family. It's almost 0800 & my higher thought processes usually kick in around 0900 - 0930 hours.
You think they have higher thought processes??
Like one of the monkeys at a typewriter trying to write something Shakespearean.
A sonnet, to be precise. Yes, could be.
Noelle Dunphy. Without having read the cited complaint, something tells me that this has tremendous potential. Thank you, HCR, for bringing us the real news.
It does, but I'm reserving my own opinion until the documentation she says she has comes out.
I don't trust these Reactionary monsters to not try to sucker our side into anything to then pull the rug out afterwards and point fingers.
Good point. Not a peep from the NYT or CNN on the story yet (as of 1:30 PM, EST). The smaller outlets like Axios, Daily beast, Newsweek are reporting on this. Somethings up. I’m waiting to see what Joyce Vance has to say.
Busy as always Heather. Very newsy and informative post for 5/15/2023. Love the last quote of Rep. Comer with a call out for his committee's lost informant. An excellent metaphor for the GOP, groping for substance but finding none.
Kinda like "the dog ate my homework"
Inflation is down. Most measures of crime are down. The number of migrants crossing the southern border is down. And the price of eggs is down. What are the Republicans going to run on? Oh. One more thing. The informant is lost -- if he or she ever existed in the first place.
And Ms. Dunphy and her emails!
“Also of note is her claim that, since part of her job was managing emails, Giuliani gave her access to his email account. The system stored at least 23,000 emails on her own personal computer, including “privileged, confidential, and highly sensitive” emails from, to, or concerning Trump, his children Donald Trump Jr., Ivanka Trump, and Eric Trump; Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner; Trump’s lawyers and advisors; media figures including Rupert Murdoch, Sean Hannity, and Tucker Carlson; and so on.”
Let's hope Ms. Dunphy can stay safe.
As I read the news daily, including HCR's letters, I keep getting the image in my head of the Republican Party spinning round and round in a toilet or circling a drain. It's funny to see the individual heads bobbing up and down, their arms flailing as they try to swim against the current.
Headline hog and unofficial party leader Mitch McConnell has been eerily quiet of late. Is that all due to the fall he took? hmmmm.
Good for Joe Biden for pointing out the real terrorist threat to the nation.
I loved your image of the Republican Party. And you're absolutely right, Biden is a man who cares about our country. Thank him for trying for us.
They know they can’t prevail in an open, honest election so do what can be done
to rig the vote.
These are the death rattles of a dying political party.
Now there is talk from repugnants about increasing the voting age to 25 years to get the GenZ lose their right to vote ! They feel they will lose if GenZ vote ! This is the same crap that one of dumpster 's followers who is a lawyer told at a Superpac !!
When neoNazi Christian Nationalists speak of a "return to 20th century Catholicism" they mean a Vatican aligned with Hitler, Mussolini, and Franco. Authoritarian bedfellows.
Opus Dei Knight of Malta Leonard Leo, has crafted a Supreme Court dominated by racist right wing religious extremists to repurpose our democratic republic as a clerical fascist state. (They just happen to be Catholics.) More in the service of his plutocrat paymasters than true to either the Gospels or Pope Francis.
I would look for a money trail between Leo affiliated shell corporations and Gossar and Fuentes. The trail may lead through Ginni Thomas.
Today's newsletter was hammer blows of evil. For me, this 'Representative George Santos (R-NY) has pleaded guilty to charges of theft in Brazil, but insists he is not guilty of the federal charges against him for financial crimes. He says he will not resign from Congress.' is the most rage inducing because there seems nothing in place to be able to force him out, to prevent the Lump from running for the office of President of the United States, to prevent the expulsion of Thomas, the list goes on. It is as though the deck is stacked against life, liberty, and pursuit of health, a life of dignity for all, let alone happiness. Here is an article in The Atlantic about the darkness of America. I have to say, we feel so much safer no longer living there. https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/05/poverty-in-america-book-matthew-desmond-interview/674058/
Life...except for Native Americans from the beginning...Liberty, except for African Americans since 1619...Pursuit of happiness, except for American women who could not vote until the 1920s... Ms. Dunphy's stash of Giuliani emails may bring down the naked emperors and all their perverted followers and fraudsters and gropergroypers.
The Matthew Desmond interview answers the question “who has not benefited from the past 40+ years since Reagan. The answer is at least half of America. My copy of his book is on the way and referenced Atlantic article has inspired me to action. This is not my America.
Thank you, Victor. Nor mine.
Thank you for recommending the Atlantic article. An important part of the whole picture that was left out of the article is the poverty perpetuating way we fund schools with property taxes. Of course the wealthy aren't paying their fair share of taxes which underlies most of the reason why the US is circling the drain. Does the law of diminishing returns apply to "donor class" investments in our "governing class" as there is less and less to trickle up?
Thanks for sharing this article, Gailee. It’s paywalled, though.
Hmmm. I just clicked in the link, and it was available. I have a subscription, but it also comes in my email without the subscription. I have to always log in which is annoying. You can try this https://www.google.com/search?rlz=1C1CHBF_esES920ES920&q=How+to+read+The+Atlantic+articles%3F&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjRovj6qvn-AhU_UaQEHWnRB0MQzmd6BAhOEAY&biw=1229&bih=571&dpr=1.56
The Atlantic now has a paywall. It doesn't allow even one free article. I even had to buy a subscription for my husband. It has gone from about $30 a year to about $80, but it is worth every penny. It publishes excellent relevant journalism every day. On September 23, 2020, it published "The Election That Could Break America". It said "If the vote is close, Donald Trump could easily throw the election into chaos and subvert the result. Who will stop him?" It warned us about numerous threats to the election.
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2020/11/what-if-trump-refuses-concede/616424/. (I do not work for The Atlantic.)
There were numerous flashing red lights about the 2020 election, just as there are now for the 2024 election -- as Professor Richardson has shown us tonight. It is very painful to realize that 75 years after the Allies defeated Hitler and his fascists in Europe, we are facing an existential threat to our democracy by fascists. We dare not ignore these threats.
President Biden is absolutely correct about the threat of white supremacy. In Florida, where I live, our governor is using all his power to suppress the votes of those who disagree with his policies. And he has said that he wants to make the rest of America be like his version of Florida. This is not the kind of government we want or that we want to leave to children being born today.
I also subscribe. Tom Nichols is reason enough, but, for me, it is so important to support ethical journalism.
I agree. I also support ProPublica, which continues to do important investigative work. Their most recent publicized work has been about Clarence Thomas' connection to billionaire friend Harlan Crow. And they have done great work on Trump's taxes, as well as multiple reports on state and local corruption. Democracy will not survive without a free and ethical press.
ProPublica has been an investigative reporting star, indeed!
I used to subscribe, too! I already subscribe to five other journals and support my local PBS station. I can’t afford another fee, especially if McCarthy gets his way with blocking a debt ceiling increase and my Social Security pension is reduced.
I feel like you Rose, wash post, balto sun, Weta, npr, worthy non profits, local state and fed politicians, I thought there'd be a rest after the 2022 elections but now I receive loads more requests, all worthy Dems but I can't support them all!
McCarthy’s comments regarding SS pensions should be a wake-up call for any and all republicans on SS unless his plan would be to single out only those voting as Democrats.
Those who died in WW2 spinning in their graves, so is Ike
I try to read all Barton Gellman articles. Note that was the November 2020 issue but they intentionally got it out online in September. There were others as well trying to warn of what was to come. It is ashame that only subscribers get this kind of reporting. But they have to make a living.
I am having trouble with comments- if I try to edit, it takes me to a new comment. Then posts the original. Trying again;
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/05/poverty-in-america-book-matthew-desmond-interview/674058/?utm_source=copy-link&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=share
Still nope..
But thanks for trying.
Try this https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/05/poverty-in-america-book-matthew-desmond-interview/674058/
Rose (WNY via OH/OR/MA/FL/CO) - "Thanks for sharing this article, Gailee. It’s paywalled, though."
This Link may work for you. (I subscribe to the Atlantic so am unsure.)
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/the-war-on-poverty-is-over-rich-people-won/ar-AA1bag5n
Got it, thanks!
Try this https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/05/poverty-in-america-book-matthew-desmond-interview/674058/
It still requires that I start a free trial subscription to finish reading the article. Thanks for trying, Gailee!
Galilee, it's a pain in the ass, but someone who subscribes to The Atlantic could copy the article to Word, clean out some of the extraneous ads and photos and then send it to you via email as an attachment. I'd do it myself but I do not know your email address.
I posted a share link from the Atlantic (I am a long-time print/electronic subscriber). Please give it a try, and if it works, post here so I will know. Hope it works.
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/05/poverty-in-america-book-matthew-desmond-interview/674058/?utm_source=copy-link&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=share
Unfortunately, Annie, this link doesn’t work for me either. Thanks so much for trying, though. I may look for it at my local library; I’m intrigued enough.
The Lump. How perfect, especially visually.
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/05/poverty-in-america-book-matthew-desmond-interview/674058/
Thank you for that link. Fascinating article--now I want to buy or get Desmond's book at the library!
All of this shows why last night's episode of "Succession" which was a "preview" of next year's election in allegory, was so terrifying, since it cut so close to the bone.
Omg TC, that episode was chilling, terrifying, and absolutely excellent. I didn’t sleep very well on Sunday night.
You and me both.
In referring to the trumps, giulianis, and others of the true swamp ilk, I have often paraphrased Michelle Obama’s great line, “When they go low, flush.” That’s what we do when we vote…..in addition to all else that we can do in the meantime.
Dear HCR:
What a dizzying array of currents and cross currents! No wonder that gaslighting and conspiracy theories consume so much of our best human energies...
But the number that grabbed me this morning was our nation's trillion dollar credit card debt. What movement do we need (Paid Lives Matter?) to convince grownups -- especially those who have a duty to act like grownups, such as declared presidential candidates -- that it's NOT OK to make a joke of defaulting on the national debt? It's not a laughing matter. Let people read the books they choose to read and love the people they choose to love (thank goodness for healthy love and kindness). But for heaven's sake, politicians, let the United States pay its bills! This is not an occasion that should involve bullying, hostage-taking, or any other form of "negotiation." This is NOT about making a deal. We have a duty to act like grown-ups. My heart-felt two cents.
PAID BILLS MATTER! Absolutely. America has a deadbeat party: the gQp.
It’s homegrown terrorism.........it is no laughing matter. It’s f’n scary. This is not a video game.....it is real. Perhaps that is the way to teach the young......thru video games that some how teach them what is really going on.......just a thought
Another “What a news day!” So much that is anti-Democracy, like Rudy Giuliani. And Santos. Repubs. White Christian Nationalism and Holocaust deniers connected to violence. It feels like a time warp. Yet, there are many who work for Democracy. I would have liked to be in the stands at Howard University, listening to President Biden’s speech to the graduation class. He spoke about “excellence, leadership, and truth and service,” singled out white supremacy “as the most dangerous terrorist threat to our homeland.” President Biden calling for all of us to stand against political extremism and protect the rights and freedoms of choice for women and transgender children to be free. We must work to add more Democrats to our government in the coming elections. But good news in the marketplace: we can once again afford eggs.
Giuliani. Four Seasons. Dentures. Trickles of dark hair dye.
I don't think James Comer would know anything about credibility if it bit him in the ass!