On Sunday, President Alexander Lukashenko of Belarus forced a commercial airliner, operated by Ryanair, flying from Athens, Greece, to Vilnius, Lithuania, out of the sky as it passed through the airspace over Belarus. A MiG-29 fighter jet diverted the plane to Minsk, the capital of Belarus, after ground support warned its pilots (falsely) there was a bomb on board.
“ A new Gallup poll today finds that 53% of Republicans think that Trump won the 2020 election. But only 26% of Americans identify as Republicans. Journalist Richard Hine crunched the numbers and notes that those percentages boil down to about 14% of Americans who think Trump is still president. They are a minority, but they believe the former president, who continues to insist that he won the 2020 election despite all evidence to the contrary.”
Proof Albert Einstein was correct when he said, “ Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I’m not sure about the universe.” I think he must have foreseen Trump Republicans.
It may only be 14% of Americans who believe the Big Lie. The question remains: how many Americans does it take to exist in an alternate epistemological reality before the political structures begin to crumble? Maybe 14% is a dangerous number. Something to consider I think.
No big surprise that the Mueller report confirms that Tя☭mp's campaign colluded with the Russians. Why else did AG Barr seek to scuttle the report? Why else was Manafort selected to be Tя☭mp's campaign chair??? Does Manafort's pardon cover this treasonous act?
Is it logical to deduce that Tя☭mp was elected illegally? Can Tя☭mp's judicial appointments be revoked, as a result?
It's time to bring accountability to those in government who protected Tя☭mp; to those who refused to impeach Tя☭mp. Accountability -- not South Africa-style truth and reconciliation.
Thank you so much, Dr. Richardson for providing the proper context to the “shocking” poll showing the 53% of Republicans believe Trump is President. The media, even the “liberal” media like MSNBC endlessly publicizes the raw number to scare the audience. I can’t think of another reason. But it’s 53% of 26%. Thanks for confirming what I thought to be the case.
Additional information in Timothy Snyder's essay on this arrest of Belarusian journalist Roman Protasevich by Pres. Lukashenko and the news agency Protasevich worked for, NEXTA, a Telegram channel that provided Belarusians with the facts about what was happening in their own country:
Thanks, HCR, for always providing context to all the craziness flying around us. Belarus seems like exactly what Trump wanted America to become. Think about that for a second. Also, I wonder when we will ever get into the depths of treachery that the Trump Administration instigated during his reign! Every time you turn over another Trump rock, vermin crawls out. God bless Joe Biden and his team who are doing their best to return some sense of normalcy. Whatever that is.
With all the continuing stress in the world, still feel much calmer every day.
Thank you, thank you, thank you for showing the math that only 14% of the electorate think DT won the election! Finally! To have meaningful statistics! I always mutter under my breath when I see the polls that show only Rs and Ds and leave out the 38% of the population which identify as Independents. I always want to know 26% of what? Or has the percent of Rs gone up or down since the last time the poll said 53% of Rs believe in the Big Lie. Let's stop using statistics that are meaningless! It is such a treat to see the full story!
The Letter went from President Alexander Lukashenko of Belarus ordering a MiG-29 fighter jet to divert a commercial plane for the purpose of capturing 26-year-old Roman Protasevich (an opposition journalist) to news that the United States Commerce Department was turned into a rogue counterintelligence operation for the past few years.
' Lukashenko, who has been called “Europe’s Last Dictator,” has been president of Belarus since 1994 and claimed to be reelected on August 9, 2020, with 80% of the vote, although before the election the president’s security forces threw journalists, political opponents, activists, and human rights defenders in jail. After the election, security forces arrested almost 7000 people in four days, denying many food and water and torturing hundreds of them. By mid-November, the number arrested had climbed to more than 25,000 people.' (The Letter)
Our former president was a piece of cake compared to Lukashenko. (seven layer cake?)
In between the two bombshells that I noted from the Letter,, 'new documents unsealed in the Paul Manafort case today show that the Trump campaign chair did, indeed, collude with his partner Konstantin Kilimnik, a Russian operative, before the 2016 election.' (The Letter) That piece of news won't surprise many, but I learned something tonight that may startle a few.
'Antigovernment provocateur Ammon Bundy filed papers to run for governor in Idaho next year, even though he's not currently registered to vote or legally allowed to set foot on Capitol grounds.'
'Secretary of State candidacy records show Bundy listing his address as a post-office box in Emmett, with a local contractor, Aaron Welling, acting as treasurer. He would be seeking the 2022 GOP nomination for the state's top post, currently held by Republican Brad Little. The governor had been unsuccessfully targeted for recall by anti-government activists unhappy with shutdowns he ordered in response to the pandemic.' (NBC News)
Bundy a 'car fleet manager by profession, gained widespread attention by leading the 2016 occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge.[7][8][9] He is the son of rancher Cliven Bundy, who was the central figure in the 2014 Bundy standoff regarding unpaid grazing fees on federally-owned public land.'
'In August 2020, Bundy was arrested twice over a two-day period at the Idaho State Capitol after leading a large group of maskless protesters who were protesting the Idaho stay-at-home order and related Idaho COVID-19 legislation. He was first arrested on August 25, 2020, and charged with criminal trespass for actively disrupting legislative hearings and refusing to leave the building when directed to do so by the Speaker of the Idaho House of Representatives. He was also charged with resisting arrest.' (Wikipedia) Bundy was arrested five more times after August, 2020.
How about this All American Nut'n better Crazy Pie?
Again, so much of my long personal history is brot up here. From the late 1960s with “Not a Crook” Richard Nixon keeping dossiers on political opponents. It was a bragging point if you were in one and it even went beyond J. Edgar Hoover’s liking who kept tabs on Martin Luther King Jr. and Sammy Davis Jr. for their defiance of the racial status quo. And from that paranoid time we have gone back to “a rogue counterintelligence operation over the past few years, collecting information on hundreds of people suspected of talking critically about the 2020 U.S. census” ... that “has been allowed to operate far outside the bounds of federal law enforcement norms and has created an environment of paranoia and retaliation.”
When I was in the U.S. Air Force in the mid 1960s, I was stationed in Turkey spying on the Soviet Union radio communications. When I left, I flew back on a Pan Am jet, an international carrier, which even in the Cold War landed in Moscow. I found it strange at that time being a U.S. military man with a Top Secret clearance and information sitting on a plane in the Soviet Union. We didn’t leave the plane and I was wearing civvies. Some women came on and cleaned the plane while we sat in our seats. Still surreal but apparently civil airlines were left alone in international travel. So, things may now be worse than during the Cold War.
BTW, that spelling confusion of Roman Protasevich (also spelled Raman Pratasevich) might be due to the strange pronunciation of “o” in Russian. It is pronounced “a.” I was taught a few words in Russian for radioprinter readouts, so it was written not verbal. I always pronounced спасибо (thanks) as it was spelled “spacibo.” It wasn’t until working with Russians in Miami that I learned it is pronounced “spaciba.” This is a problem here and I tried to convince my Russian boss that calling Fernando “Fernanda” might be insulting.
Some people may call Lukashenko Europe's last dictator, but only those who leave Russia out of Europe. Otherwise, they'd and Putin to the list and describe Lukashenko as one of Europe's two remaining dictators. While we're considering European leaders, there is an aspirant to being Europe's third dictator -- Viktor Orban, whose title is Prime Minister of Hungary.
Not much difference between Trump and his gang of hoodlums and the Lukashenko "family". Same methods, same "mantra", same lies, same objectives......pillage of the people and the country and rape of the constitution...pirates indeed!
Pirates die out or are forced to the geographic margins once governments impose forcibly the rule of law irrespective of the popularity or influence of the pirate or when the societies and governments refuse absolutely to facilitate the monetization of the pirates "booty"...it has to cost them very dearly in every possible way to continue.
Isolation is a good place to start be it for Trump, Lukashenko, Putin.....or any other wouldbe terrorist. Then you can get down to the solid business of undermining both them and the backers , emptying their pockets and depriving them of the means to impose their will and spew their lies.
Our world is getting ever more dangerous as autocrats like Lukashenko see that they can commit acts of violence, terrorism and election interference with impunity.
Putin freely poisons his opponents, interfes in our elections and across the world, takes territory like the Crimea.
Netanyahu bombs Palestinian hospitals, schools, residential buildings, international news media offices and municipal utilities killing noncombatant men, women and children.
Trump creates a new Republican Party based on conspiracy theories, promoting hate crimes and attacks against his opponents and those who try to speak truth, calling our elections fraudulent when he doesn't win, inciting the January 6th insurrection until our democracy is in doubt on all sides.
None
All of the authoritarian figures in the 21st Century operate on a mob boss model with similar disinformation tools. Not all that different than the white supremacy leaders in the south that created a one party system with impunity with no effective Constitutional protections. Without a democratic citizenry with our own strong constitution to fight this, the world has no response.
Trump and all of his friends and cohorts around the world are out right criminals. Justice requires even stronger measures against their measures.
It would sure be nice if the mainstream news media would include "those percentages boil down to about 14% of Americans who think Trump is still president" in their reporting instead of using only the larger percentage numbers--terrifying the reasonable public into thinking there are many thousands more rabid Trump followers with an unshakeable belief in their hero's parallel-world concept of reality.
And I'm second, just before bedtime. Thank you, Heather, for clarifying a(nother) complicated news story and for helping us make sense of a world that seems spinning out of control.
“ A new Gallup poll today finds that 53% of Republicans think that Trump won the 2020 election. But only 26% of Americans identify as Republicans. Journalist Richard Hine crunched the numbers and notes that those percentages boil down to about 14% of Americans who think Trump is still president. They are a minority, but they believe the former president, who continues to insist that he won the 2020 election despite all evidence to the contrary.”
Proof Albert Einstein was correct when he said, “ Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I’m not sure about the universe.” I think he must have foreseen Trump Republicans.
It may only be 14% of Americans who believe the Big Lie. The question remains: how many Americans does it take to exist in an alternate epistemological reality before the political structures begin to crumble? Maybe 14% is a dangerous number. Something to consider I think.
No big surprise that the Mueller report confirms that Tя☭mp's campaign colluded with the Russians. Why else did AG Barr seek to scuttle the report? Why else was Manafort selected to be Tя☭mp's campaign chair??? Does Manafort's pardon cover this treasonous act?
Is it logical to deduce that Tя☭mp was elected illegally? Can Tя☭mp's judicial appointments be revoked, as a result?
It's time to bring accountability to those in government who protected Tя☭mp; to those who refused to impeach Tя☭mp. Accountability -- not South Africa-style truth and reconciliation.
Thank you so much, Dr. Richardson for providing the proper context to the “shocking” poll showing the 53% of Republicans believe Trump is President. The media, even the “liberal” media like MSNBC endlessly publicizes the raw number to scare the audience. I can’t think of another reason. But it’s 53% of 26%. Thanks for confirming what I thought to be the case.
Additional information in Timothy Snyder's essay on this arrest of Belarusian journalist Roman Protasevich by Pres. Lukashenko and the news agency Protasevich worked for, NEXTA, a Telegram channel that provided Belarusians with the facts about what was happening in their own country:
https://snyder.substack.com/p/terror-vs-the-truth-in-belarus
Thanks, HCR, for always providing context to all the craziness flying around us. Belarus seems like exactly what Trump wanted America to become. Think about that for a second. Also, I wonder when we will ever get into the depths of treachery that the Trump Administration instigated during his reign! Every time you turn over another Trump rock, vermin crawls out. God bless Joe Biden and his team who are doing their best to return some sense of normalcy. Whatever that is.
With all the continuing stress in the world, still feel much calmer every day.
Thank you, thank you, thank you for showing the math that only 14% of the electorate think DT won the election! Finally! To have meaningful statistics! I always mutter under my breath when I see the polls that show only Rs and Ds and leave out the 38% of the population which identify as Independents. I always want to know 26% of what? Or has the percent of Rs gone up or down since the last time the poll said 53% of Rs believe in the Big Lie. Let's stop using statistics that are meaningless! It is such a treat to see the full story!
The Letter went from President Alexander Lukashenko of Belarus ordering a MiG-29 fighter jet to divert a commercial plane for the purpose of capturing 26-year-old Roman Protasevich (an opposition journalist) to news that the United States Commerce Department was turned into a rogue counterintelligence operation for the past few years.
' Lukashenko, who has been called “Europe’s Last Dictator,” has been president of Belarus since 1994 and claimed to be reelected on August 9, 2020, with 80% of the vote, although before the election the president’s security forces threw journalists, political opponents, activists, and human rights defenders in jail. After the election, security forces arrested almost 7000 people in four days, denying many food and water and torturing hundreds of them. By mid-November, the number arrested had climbed to more than 25,000 people.' (The Letter)
Our former president was a piece of cake compared to Lukashenko. (seven layer cake?)
In between the two bombshells that I noted from the Letter,, 'new documents unsealed in the Paul Manafort case today show that the Trump campaign chair did, indeed, collude with his partner Konstantin Kilimnik, a Russian operative, before the 2016 election.' (The Letter) That piece of news won't surprise many, but I learned something tonight that may startle a few.
'Antigovernment provocateur Ammon Bundy filed papers to run for governor in Idaho next year, even though he's not currently registered to vote or legally allowed to set foot on Capitol grounds.'
'Secretary of State candidacy records show Bundy listing his address as a post-office box in Emmett, with a local contractor, Aaron Welling, acting as treasurer. He would be seeking the 2022 GOP nomination for the state's top post, currently held by Republican Brad Little. The governor had been unsuccessfully targeted for recall by anti-government activists unhappy with shutdowns he ordered in response to the pandemic.' (NBC News)
Bundy a 'car fleet manager by profession, gained widespread attention by leading the 2016 occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge.[7][8][9] He is the son of rancher Cliven Bundy, who was the central figure in the 2014 Bundy standoff regarding unpaid grazing fees on federally-owned public land.'
'In August 2020, Bundy was arrested twice over a two-day period at the Idaho State Capitol after leading a large group of maskless protesters who were protesting the Idaho stay-at-home order and related Idaho COVID-19 legislation. He was first arrested on August 25, 2020, and charged with criminal trespass for actively disrupting legislative hearings and refusing to leave the building when directed to do so by the Speaker of the Idaho House of Representatives. He was also charged with resisting arrest.' (Wikipedia) Bundy was arrested five more times after August, 2020.
How about this All American Nut'n better Crazy Pie?
.
Again, so much of my long personal history is brot up here. From the late 1960s with “Not a Crook” Richard Nixon keeping dossiers on political opponents. It was a bragging point if you were in one and it even went beyond J. Edgar Hoover’s liking who kept tabs on Martin Luther King Jr. and Sammy Davis Jr. for their defiance of the racial status quo. And from that paranoid time we have gone back to “a rogue counterintelligence operation over the past few years, collecting information on hundreds of people suspected of talking critically about the 2020 U.S. census” ... that “has been allowed to operate far outside the bounds of federal law enforcement norms and has created an environment of paranoia and retaliation.”
When I was in the U.S. Air Force in the mid 1960s, I was stationed in Turkey spying on the Soviet Union radio communications. When I left, I flew back on a Pan Am jet, an international carrier, which even in the Cold War landed in Moscow. I found it strange at that time being a U.S. military man with a Top Secret clearance and information sitting on a plane in the Soviet Union. We didn’t leave the plane and I was wearing civvies. Some women came on and cleaned the plane while we sat in our seats. Still surreal but apparently civil airlines were left alone in international travel. So, things may now be worse than during the Cold War.
BTW, that spelling confusion of Roman Protasevich (also spelled Raman Pratasevich) might be due to the strange pronunciation of “o” in Russian. It is pronounced “a.” I was taught a few words in Russian for radioprinter readouts, so it was written not verbal. I always pronounced спасибо (thanks) as it was spelled “spacibo.” It wasn’t until working with Russians in Miami that I learned it is pronounced “spaciba.” This is a problem here and I tried to convince my Russian boss that calling Fernando “Fernanda” might be insulting.
Some people may call Lukashenko Europe's last dictator, but only those who leave Russia out of Europe. Otherwise, they'd and Putin to the list and describe Lukashenko as one of Europe's two remaining dictators. While we're considering European leaders, there is an aspirant to being Europe's third dictator -- Viktor Orban, whose title is Prime Minister of Hungary.
Not much difference between Trump and his gang of hoodlums and the Lukashenko "family". Same methods, same "mantra", same lies, same objectives......pillage of the people and the country and rape of the constitution...pirates indeed!
Pirates die out or are forced to the geographic margins once governments impose forcibly the rule of law irrespective of the popularity or influence of the pirate or when the societies and governments refuse absolutely to facilitate the monetization of the pirates "booty"...it has to cost them very dearly in every possible way to continue.
Isolation is a good place to start be it for Trump, Lukashenko, Putin.....or any other wouldbe terrorist. Then you can get down to the solid business of undermining both them and the backers , emptying their pockets and depriving them of the means to impose their will and spew their lies.
Trump wanted Biden, Biden's son, and others arrested before the 2020 Election (from the Wall Street Journal https://www.wsj.com/articles/trump-urges-barr-to-initiate-investigation-into-joe-biden-and-son-11603220876 ). How different is this from what Belarus strongman Lukashenko did to Roman Protasevich? I feel it demonstrates how important what our government has to do to stop Trump and the the Retrumplicans.
Our world is getting ever more dangerous as autocrats like Lukashenko see that they can commit acts of violence, terrorism and election interference with impunity.
Putin freely poisons his opponents, interfes in our elections and across the world, takes territory like the Crimea.
Netanyahu bombs Palestinian hospitals, schools, residential buildings, international news media offices and municipal utilities killing noncombatant men, women and children.
Trump creates a new Republican Party based on conspiracy theories, promoting hate crimes and attacks against his opponents and those who try to speak truth, calling our elections fraudulent when he doesn't win, inciting the January 6th insurrection until our democracy is in doubt on all sides.
None
All of the authoritarian figures in the 21st Century operate on a mob boss model with similar disinformation tools. Not all that different than the white supremacy leaders in the south that created a one party system with impunity with no effective Constitutional protections. Without a democratic citizenry with our own strong constitution to fight this, the world has no response.
Trump and all of his friends and cohorts around the world are out right criminals. Justice requires even stronger measures against their measures.
It would sure be nice if the mainstream news media would include "those percentages boil down to about 14% of Americans who think Trump is still president" in their reporting instead of using only the larger percentage numbers--terrifying the reasonable public into thinking there are many thousands more rabid Trump followers with an unshakeable belief in their hero's parallel-world concept of reality.
And I'm second, just before bedtime. Thank you, Heather, for clarifying a(nother) complicated news story and for helping us make sense of a world that seems spinning out of control.
Wow. I think I’m first. I had hoped that life and democracy would improve after the last election. Alas, it has only become worse.