Fascinating. Thanks.
TrumpReich in action
Re: TrumpReich in action
Re: TrumpReich in action
Thanks again.
I'm happy being an Episcopalian in the old Main Line tradition. These newfangled churches just don't feel quite comfortable.
Re: TrumpReich in action
WAPO today:
High-profile Republican members of Congress gained tens of thousands of Twitter followers in the first few weeks of Elon Musk’s reign over the social media network, while their Democratic counterparts experienced a decline, according to an analysis by The Washington Post.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Rep. Adam B. Schiff (D-Calif.) and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) all lost about 100,000 Twitter followers in the first three weeks of Musk’s ownership of Twitter, while Republican Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene (Ga.) and Jim Jordan (Ohio) gained more than 300,000 each.
It’s difficult to tell exactly why follower counts go up and down, and the counts are often affected by Twitter banning bot accounts en masse. Not everyone following a specific politician is a supporter.
Still, the pattern suggests that tens of thousands of liberals may be leaving the site while conservatives are joining or becoming more active, shifting the demographics of the site under Musk’s ownership. The changes are in line with a trend that began in April, when Musk announced his intention to buy the company.
On average, Republicans gained 8,000 followers and Democrats lost 4,000. For its analysis, The Post analyzed data from ProPublica’s Represent tool, which tracks congressional Twitter activity.
Musk and Twitter did not respond to requests for comment.
Musk bought Twitter for $44 billion late last month having pledged to bring his vision of free speech absolutism to the site. The day he took over, he said Twitter wouldn’t become “a free-for-all hellscape, where anything can be said with no consequences!” But users immediately started testing the boundaries of the new site under Musk, prompting hate speech to briefly surge.
Since then, Musk launched and rolled back Twitter Blue Verified, a $7.99 monthly membership that puts a check mark next to any account that pays. The move prompted an explosion of fake accounts. Musk also fired about half the staff, and required the rest of his workers to pledge to work long hours or leave the company, significantly reducing the number of people who are policing the site.
Musk also has restored several major rule-breaking accounts, including former president Donald Trump’s, following an unrepresentative and unscientific Twitter poll. On Thursday, after a similar poll, he said he would grant “general amnesty” for all banned accounts that didn’t post spam or break the law.
Advertisers have been fleeing, raising doubts about the site’s ability to make money. More than a third of Twitter’s top 100 marketers have not advertised on the social media network in the two weeks before Tuesday, according to a Washington Post analysis.
Elon Musk completed the acquisition of Twitter for $44 billion on Oct. 27. A lot has happened since then as Musk moves to overhaul the company, taking it private and firing top executives and handing half of Twitter’s workers pink slips.
Before the billionaire sealed the deal, an analysis of his 19,000 tweets showed his complicated relationship with Twitter.
Musk stated his desire to own the social media company so that there’s “an inclusive arena for free speech.” But not long after Musk took control, the Twitter trolls went on a rampage.
In an attempt to reassure advertisers, Musk said during a Twitter Spaces he had noted concerns about hate speech and misinformation on the platform. However, concerns continued to grow after top executives, including those leading content moderation efforts, quit.
Paid verification was the first product to launch under Musk’s leadership, and its roll-out was anything but smooth. The $7.99 subscription allowed any user to have a sought-after blue check mark, but after an explosion of impersonation accounts the program was paused. The backlash to the flood of misinformation caused some brands to pull their advertising from the platform.
Musk issued the remaining staff an ultimatum: commit to a new “hardcore” Twitter with longer hours and no remote work or leave the company with severance pay. Hundreds are said to have made the decision to leave the company.
The number of likely departures prompted Musk to ease his return-to-office edict and managers to meet to decide which engineers to ask back, causing many to question whether Twitter is on the verge of shutting down.
Musk says he is a political moderate, but has agreed with right-wing figures on the site who accuse Twitter’s previous management of being biased against conservatives. The day before the midterms, he called on his followers to vote Republican, breaking with tradition of other social media CEOs who typically do not explicitly endorse one party over another.
The right wing and conservatives for years have accused Twitter of censorship with no proof. Many have cheered Musk’s takeover, saying it’s a reason to return to the site.
On the day Musk’s purchase was finalized, Republican members of Congress saw their follower counts skyrocket. Greene gained some 37,000 followers, as did Jordan, then the chairman of the House Freedom Caucus. That same day, Democrats’ follower counts plummeted, with Warren losing nearly 19,000 followers and Schiff losing 13,000.
The trend continued for days, with prominent online Republicans gaining thousands of followers and Democrats losing them.
The same thing happened Nov. 19, when Musk announced that he would be reactivating Trump’s account after holding a poll in which any user could vote yes or no. Greene gained an additional 45,000 followers, and Warren and Sanders each lost more than 22,000. In the past month, Greene has increased her following by 330,000, a 28 percent gain, and Jordan by 290,000, a nearly 10 percent rise.
High-profile Republican members of Congress gained tens of thousands of Twitter followers in the first few weeks of Elon Musk’s reign over the social media network, while their Democratic counterparts experienced a decline, according to an analysis by The Washington Post.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Rep. Adam B. Schiff (D-Calif.) and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) all lost about 100,000 Twitter followers in the first three weeks of Musk’s ownership of Twitter, while Republican Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene (Ga.) and Jim Jordan (Ohio) gained more than 300,000 each.
It’s difficult to tell exactly why follower counts go up and down, and the counts are often affected by Twitter banning bot accounts en masse. Not everyone following a specific politician is a supporter.
Still, the pattern suggests that tens of thousands of liberals may be leaving the site while conservatives are joining or becoming more active, shifting the demographics of the site under Musk’s ownership. The changes are in line with a trend that began in April, when Musk announced his intention to buy the company.
On average, Republicans gained 8,000 followers and Democrats lost 4,000. For its analysis, The Post analyzed data from ProPublica’s Represent tool, which tracks congressional Twitter activity.
Musk and Twitter did not respond to requests for comment.
Musk bought Twitter for $44 billion late last month having pledged to bring his vision of free speech absolutism to the site. The day he took over, he said Twitter wouldn’t become “a free-for-all hellscape, where anything can be said with no consequences!” But users immediately started testing the boundaries of the new site under Musk, prompting hate speech to briefly surge.
Since then, Musk launched and rolled back Twitter Blue Verified, a $7.99 monthly membership that puts a check mark next to any account that pays. The move prompted an explosion of fake accounts. Musk also fired about half the staff, and required the rest of his workers to pledge to work long hours or leave the company, significantly reducing the number of people who are policing the site.
Musk also has restored several major rule-breaking accounts, including former president Donald Trump’s, following an unrepresentative and unscientific Twitter poll. On Thursday, after a similar poll, he said he would grant “general amnesty” for all banned accounts that didn’t post spam or break the law.
Advertisers have been fleeing, raising doubts about the site’s ability to make money. More than a third of Twitter’s top 100 marketers have not advertised on the social media network in the two weeks before Tuesday, according to a Washington Post analysis.
Elon Musk completed the acquisition of Twitter for $44 billion on Oct. 27. A lot has happened since then as Musk moves to overhaul the company, taking it private and firing top executives and handing half of Twitter’s workers pink slips.
Before the billionaire sealed the deal, an analysis of his 19,000 tweets showed his complicated relationship with Twitter.
Musk stated his desire to own the social media company so that there’s “an inclusive arena for free speech.” But not long after Musk took control, the Twitter trolls went on a rampage.
In an attempt to reassure advertisers, Musk said during a Twitter Spaces he had noted concerns about hate speech and misinformation on the platform. However, concerns continued to grow after top executives, including those leading content moderation efforts, quit.
Paid verification was the first product to launch under Musk’s leadership, and its roll-out was anything but smooth. The $7.99 subscription allowed any user to have a sought-after blue check mark, but after an explosion of impersonation accounts the program was paused. The backlash to the flood of misinformation caused some brands to pull their advertising from the platform.
Musk issued the remaining staff an ultimatum: commit to a new “hardcore” Twitter with longer hours and no remote work or leave the company with severance pay. Hundreds are said to have made the decision to leave the company.
The number of likely departures prompted Musk to ease his return-to-office edict and managers to meet to decide which engineers to ask back, causing many to question whether Twitter is on the verge of shutting down.
Musk says he is a political moderate, but has agreed with right-wing figures on the site who accuse Twitter’s previous management of being biased against conservatives. The day before the midterms, he called on his followers to vote Republican, breaking with tradition of other social media CEOs who typically do not explicitly endorse one party over another.
The right wing and conservatives for years have accused Twitter of censorship with no proof. Many have cheered Musk’s takeover, saying it’s a reason to return to the site.
On the day Musk’s purchase was finalized, Republican members of Congress saw their follower counts skyrocket. Greene gained some 37,000 followers, as did Jordan, then the chairman of the House Freedom Caucus. That same day, Democrats’ follower counts plummeted, with Warren losing nearly 19,000 followers and Schiff losing 13,000.
The trend continued for days, with prominent online Republicans gaining thousands of followers and Democrats losing them.
The same thing happened Nov. 19, when Musk announced that he would be reactivating Trump’s account after holding a poll in which any user could vote yes or no. Greene gained an additional 45,000 followers, and Warren and Sanders each lost more than 22,000. In the past month, Greene has increased her following by 330,000, a 28 percent gain, and Jordan by 290,000, a nearly 10 percent rise.
Re: TrumpReich in action
PALM BEACH (The Borowitz Report) Nov.28 —Donald J. Trump revealed that he did not know the identity of a recent dining companion at Mar-a-Lago because of the white hood his guest was wearing.
“The guy shows up in a white hood, and I thought, That’s some kind of wacko,” Trump said. “I thought since he was a friend of Ye’s maybe it was some weird new fashion Ye was trying to sell. He’s been dropped by a lot of companies and has been treated very unfairly.”
“Then I thought, Is this Mike Lindell?” Trump continued. “He’s the MyPillow guy, but he sells things besides pillows, like sheets. And he’s kind of a joker. Mike is a lot of fun, but the press doesn’t report that. They’ve been very nasty to him.”
“Whoever it was, I didn’t think it was very smart to be wearing white to dinner with me,” he added. “When I eat, a lot of ketchup goes flying. Who would wear a white hood when they know they’re going to get hit by ketchup? Only a wacko or a joker. Anyway, he didn’t get any ketchup on the hood, so everything was fine.”
“The guy shows up in a white hood, and I thought, That’s some kind of wacko,” Trump said. “I thought since he was a friend of Ye’s maybe it was some weird new fashion Ye was trying to sell. He’s been dropped by a lot of companies and has been treated very unfairly.”
“Then I thought, Is this Mike Lindell?” Trump continued. “He’s the MyPillow guy, but he sells things besides pillows, like sheets. And he’s kind of a joker. Mike is a lot of fun, but the press doesn’t report that. They’ve been very nasty to him.”
“Whoever it was, I didn’t think it was very smart to be wearing white to dinner with me,” he added. “When I eat, a lot of ketchup goes flying. Who would wear a white hood when they know they’re going to get hit by ketchup? Only a wacko or a joker. Anyway, he didn’t get any ketchup on the hood, so everything was fine.”
Re: TrumpReich in action
The "stealth" SCOTUS.per NYT today :
" The Supreme Court is increasingly setting aside legally significant decisions from the lower courts as if they had never happened, invalidating them in brief procedural orders. The pace of these actions has increased in the past 22 months, neutralizing important civil rights and civil liberties decisions.
Reasoned opinions by the federal appeals courts on issues ranging from voting rights to Donald Trump’s border wall have been wiped from the books, leaving no precedent for the lower federal courts to follow. Legally, it is as if these decisions by the appeals courts, one rung below the Supreme Court, had never existed. The Supreme Court’s final, unilateral exercises of power in these cases have gone largely unreported."
Full article:
https://tinyurl.com/4epurdmk
" The Supreme Court is increasingly setting aside legally significant decisions from the lower courts as if they had never happened, invalidating them in brief procedural orders. The pace of these actions has increased in the past 22 months, neutralizing important civil rights and civil liberties decisions.
Reasoned opinions by the federal appeals courts on issues ranging from voting rights to Donald Trump’s border wall have been wiped from the books, leaving no precedent for the lower federal courts to follow. Legally, it is as if these decisions by the appeals courts, one rung below the Supreme Court, had never existed. The Supreme Court’s final, unilateral exercises of power in these cases have gone largely unreported."
Full article:
https://tinyurl.com/4epurdmk
Re: TrumpReich in action
From NYT today:
By Ava Sasani and Sheryl Gay Stolberg
Nov. 30, 2022
Indiana’s attorney general, Todd Rokita, asked a state medical board on Wednesday to discipline the doctor who provided an abortion to a 10-year-old rape victim this summer.
Dr. Caitlin Bernard, an Indianapolis obstetrician-gynecologist, treated the girl, who had traveled from Ohio when the state enacted a ban on abortion after six weeks of pregnancy.
The case became a focus of the national abortion debate after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, the 1973 decision that established a constitutional right to abortion. It also put a focus on childhood pregnancies and the emerging legal risks to doctors who provide abortions. Mr. Rotika began an investigation into Dr. Bernard; she sued in an effort to stop him from obtaining medical records of her patients as part of that investigation.
Mr. Rokita’s office said in a statement on Wednesday that he was asking the board to discipline Dr. Bernard because she had “failed to uphold legal and Hippocratic responsibilities by exploiting a 10-year-old little girl’s traumatic medical story to the press for her own interests.”
The Indianapolis Star first reported the story of Dr. Bernard’s young patient. Dr. Bernard has refused to discuss the details of the girl’s case, and has not revealed her identity.
But Mr. Rokita, who opposes abortion, said that “simply concealing the patient’s name falls far short of her legal and ethical duties here.” He also said that Dr. Bernard had “failed to immediately report the abuse and rape of a child to Indiana authorities.”
Dr. Bernard’s lawyer, Kathleen DeLaney, said the attorney general’s step was “a last-ditch effort to intimidate Dr. Bernard and other providers of abortion care.”
In July, Mr. Rokita started an investigation into whether Dr. Bernard had properly reported the Ohio girl’s abortion to state officials in Indiana. Records show that Dr. Bernard had informed state authorities within the required reporting period.
Mr. Rokita did not say whether Wednesday’s action had brought an end to his investigation. But his petition to the medical board said that “following investigative efforts” he had obtained “sufficient evidence” to support his complaint.
Mr. Rokita deferred to the medical licensing board of Indiana to determine an appropriate disciplinary action for Dr. Bernard. Under the state statute cited by Mr. Rokita, the board could choose from a range of penalties, from suspending or permanently revoking Dr. Bernard’s license to sending a letter of reprimand.
As part of Mr. Rokita’s investigation into Dr. Bernard, he has tried to subpoena medical records of Dr. Bernard’s patients.
Dr. Bernard and her employer, Indiana University Health, sued Mr. Rokita to block the subpoena of confidential medical records.
The state attorney general said at the time that those suits were “designed to thwart our investigation into the physician’s behavior.”
In a hearing related to her lawsuit against the attorney general last week, Dr. Bernard testified that she had reported potential child abuse to her hospital’s social work department before the patient had traveled to Indianapolis.
Dr. Katie McHugh, an OB-GYN in Indiana, said Mr. Rokita’s investigation into Dr. Bernard was a “witch hunt” against physicians who provided abortion care.
“This doctor is being vilified for what has been internationally recognized as compassionate intervention,” said Dr. McHugh, who is a board member of Physicians for Reproductive Health, a group that favors abortion rights.
By Ava Sasani and Sheryl Gay Stolberg
Nov. 30, 2022
Indiana’s attorney general, Todd Rokita, asked a state medical board on Wednesday to discipline the doctor who provided an abortion to a 10-year-old rape victim this summer.
Dr. Caitlin Bernard, an Indianapolis obstetrician-gynecologist, treated the girl, who had traveled from Ohio when the state enacted a ban on abortion after six weeks of pregnancy.
The case became a focus of the national abortion debate after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, the 1973 decision that established a constitutional right to abortion. It also put a focus on childhood pregnancies and the emerging legal risks to doctors who provide abortions. Mr. Rotika began an investigation into Dr. Bernard; she sued in an effort to stop him from obtaining medical records of her patients as part of that investigation.
Mr. Rokita’s office said in a statement on Wednesday that he was asking the board to discipline Dr. Bernard because she had “failed to uphold legal and Hippocratic responsibilities by exploiting a 10-year-old little girl’s traumatic medical story to the press for her own interests.”
The Indianapolis Star first reported the story of Dr. Bernard’s young patient. Dr. Bernard has refused to discuss the details of the girl’s case, and has not revealed her identity.
But Mr. Rokita, who opposes abortion, said that “simply concealing the patient’s name falls far short of her legal and ethical duties here.” He also said that Dr. Bernard had “failed to immediately report the abuse and rape of a child to Indiana authorities.”
Dr. Bernard’s lawyer, Kathleen DeLaney, said the attorney general’s step was “a last-ditch effort to intimidate Dr. Bernard and other providers of abortion care.”
In July, Mr. Rokita started an investigation into whether Dr. Bernard had properly reported the Ohio girl’s abortion to state officials in Indiana. Records show that Dr. Bernard had informed state authorities within the required reporting period.
Mr. Rokita did not say whether Wednesday’s action had brought an end to his investigation. But his petition to the medical board said that “following investigative efforts” he had obtained “sufficient evidence” to support his complaint.
Mr. Rokita deferred to the medical licensing board of Indiana to determine an appropriate disciplinary action for Dr. Bernard. Under the state statute cited by Mr. Rokita, the board could choose from a range of penalties, from suspending or permanently revoking Dr. Bernard’s license to sending a letter of reprimand.
As part of Mr. Rokita’s investigation into Dr. Bernard, he has tried to subpoena medical records of Dr. Bernard’s patients.
Dr. Bernard and her employer, Indiana University Health, sued Mr. Rokita to block the subpoena of confidential medical records.
The state attorney general said at the time that those suits were “designed to thwart our investigation into the physician’s behavior.”
In a hearing related to her lawsuit against the attorney general last week, Dr. Bernard testified that she had reported potential child abuse to her hospital’s social work department before the patient had traveled to Indianapolis.
Dr. Katie McHugh, an OB-GYN in Indiana, said Mr. Rokita’s investigation into Dr. Bernard was a “witch hunt” against physicians who provided abortion care.
“This doctor is being vilified for what has been internationally recognized as compassionate intervention,” said Dr. McHugh, who is a board member of Physicians for Reproductive Health, a group that favors abortion rights.
Re: TrumpReich in action
The title of this topic again shown to be absolutely accurate:
https://www.businessinsider.com/house-r ... et-2022-12
Show the tweet to your GOP friends and family you have not yet disowned.
https://www.businessinsider.com/house-r ... et-2022-12
Show the tweet to your GOP friends and family you have not yet disowned.
Re: TrumpReich in action
Oh no, it can't happen here, no way!Rach3 wrote: ↑Thu Dec 01, 2022 8:05 pmThe title of this topic again shown to be absolutely accurate:
https://www.businessinsider.com/house-r ... et-2022-12
Show the tweet to your GOP friends and family you have not yet disowned.
Never forget.
Re: TrumpReich in action
Some commentator called Kanye the best-known Black man in the world. To those of us not interested in rap or celebrity, he's barely swum into our ken. Surely Obama is ahead of this try-hard buffoon. Kanye is an emblem of what's sickest about our social media age.
Re: TrumpReich in action
Per IPR today : "Twitter has stopped enforcing its coronavirus misinformation policy. “Effective November 23, 2022, Twitter is no longer enforcing the COVID-19 misleading information policy,” the company wrote."
Re: TrumpReich in action
Too many legal Latinos in USA:
https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/03/us/latin ... index.html
Attack Till supporters, leave his accuser alone :
https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/03/us/kentu ... index.html
Biden stole the 2020 election :
https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/03/politics ... index.html
https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/03/us/latin ... index.html
Attack Till supporters, leave his accuser alone :
https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/03/us/kentu ... index.html
Biden stole the 2020 election :
https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/03/politics ... index.html
Re: TrumpReich in action
The fossil fuel industry's new attack on environmentalists, claim " climate change" a hoax that will make you poorer, fossil fuels are the future prosperity, and back the campaign with powerful forces, from NYT today:
https://tinyurl.com/5n8jxx8z ( Free access link)
https://tinyurl.com/5n8jxx8z ( Free access link)
Re: TrumpReich in action
Drag show starts at 7 pm, then power goes off.Sieg Heil !
https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/04/us/power ... index.html
https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/04/us/power ... index.html
Re: TrumpReich in action
The GOP Justices have not been to Missouri recently it appears.
https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/2 ... 3_o759.pdf
https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/2 ... 3_o759.pdf
Re: TrumpReich in action
Kari Lake Sues Arizona’s Largest County, Seeking to Overturn Her Defeat
Ms. Lake, who fueled the false claims that the 2020 election had been stolen from Donald Trump, lost the Arizona governor’s race by 17,000 votes.
By Alexandra Berzon, Ken Bensinger and Charles Homans
Dec. 9, 2022
Kari Lake, the losing Republican candidate for governor of Arizona, filed a lawsuit Friday contesting the results of an election that was certified by the state this week.
Ms. Lake’s lawsuit came after she had spent weeks making a series of public statements and social media posts aimed at sowing doubt in the outcome of a contest she lost by more than 17,000 votes to her Democratic opponent, Katie Hobbs. That loss was certified in documents signed on Monday by Ms. Hobbs, who currently serves as secretary of state.
A former news anchor, Ms. Lake centered her candidacy on false conspiratorial claims that the 2020 presidential election had been stolen from Donald J. Trump, who had endorsed her. For the past month, Ms. Lake, her campaign and other allies have been soliciting Election Day accounts from voters on social media and at rallies.
“If the process was illegitimate, then so are the results,” Ms. Lake said on Twitter on Friday evening after announcing her lawsuit. “Stay tuned, folks.”
Ms. Hobbs called Ms. Lake’s suit “baseless” in a post of her own on Twitter, describing it as the “latest desperate attempt to undermine our democracy and throw out the will of the voters.”
Ms. Lake sued Ms. Hobbs as well as officials in Maricopa County, which includes Phoenix and is Arizona’s largest county.
The suit claims that the election was corrupted in Maricopa County and that she should be declared the winner. The 70-page filing relies on a hodgepodge of allegations, ranging from voter and poll worker accounts to poll numbers claiming that voters agreed with Ms. Lake on the election’s mismanagement. Some of what is cited comes not from last month’s election but from the 2020 contest. Other allegations accuse officials of wrongdoing for taking part in efforts to try to tamp down election misinformation.
Fields Moseley, a spokesman for Maricopa County, said the court system was the proper place for campaigns to make their case to challenge results.
“Maricopa County respects the election contest process and looks forward to sharing facts about the administration of the 2022 general election and our work to ensure every legal voter had an opportunity to cast their ballot,” Mr. Moseley said.
A number of those cited as experts in the lawsuit and one of the lawyers who filed the case — Kurt Olsen — are part of a loose election-denial network led by Mike Lindell, the pillow company entrepreneur who has been pushing conspiracy theories about election machines since early 2021. Another Lake lawyer, Bryan Blehm, represented the contractor Cyber Ninjas during the partisan audit of Maricopa County’s 2020 election results last year and also represented supervisors in Cochise County this year in a lawsuit over an attempt to carry out a hand-counted audit plan.
Ms. Lake’s legal action came as lawsuits were also filed Friday by two other Arizona Republicans who lost their midterm elections: Mark Finchem, who ran for secretary of state, and Abe Hamadeh, the attorney general candidate. Mr. Hamadeh, who is trailing his opponent by 511 votes in a race that is undergoing a recount, was joined in his lawsuit by the Republican National Committee.
Mr. Hamadeh previously filed suit late last month seeking to overturn the election, but the suit was dismissed by a Maricopa County judge for being filed prematurely. His new suit — filed in Mohave County, a Republican stronghold where he won 75 percent of the vote — is more narrow than Ms. Lake’s, claiming that it is not questioning the election’s validity. But, as with Ms. Lake, Mr. Hamadeh is seeking an order overturning the election results and declaring him the winner, claiming he is not alleging widespread fraud but rather “certain errors and inaccuracies.” On Twitter late Friday, Mr. Hamadeh wrote that “Maricopa County faced unprecedented and unacceptable issues on Election Day.”
Dan Barr, a lawyer for Mr. Hamadeh’s opponent, Kris Mayes, said the lawsuit was “based on speculation” and contained “no real facts.” He said he planned to file motions to dismiss it and move it to Maricopa County early next week.
Mr. Finchem, one of several secretary of state candidates around the country who denied the results of the 2020 presidential race, lost by more than 120,000 votes. In his suit, filed in Maricopa County, Mr. Finchem alleged that Arizona had “failed miserably” to administer a “full, fair, and secure election” and asked that the court declare the election “annulled” and name him the winner.
That suit was filed by Daniel McCauley, who also represented Cochise County in its recent failed attempt to deny certification of the election results.
One of Ms. Lake’s lawyers, Mr. Olsen, was also involved in an earlier federal lawsuit brought unsuccessfully on behalf of Ms. Lake and Mr. Finchem. It was filed before the Nov. 8 election, but earlier this month a federal judge found that it made “false, misleading and unsupported factual assertions” about election systems. The judge said those misleading assertions warranted sanctions. He said he would determine who among the lawyers involved in the case should be sanctioned at a later date.
Mr. Olsen and Ms. Lake’s campaign did not respond to requests for comment. A lawyer for Mr. Finchem did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Some of the claims in Ms. Lake’s lawsuit centered on long lines and other problems on Election Day in Maricopa County that she alleges led to voter disenfranchisement.
Last month, The New York Times reviewed dozens of accounts from voters, poll workers and observers posted by Ms. Lake and her allies on social media or recounted in public hearings in the wake of the election. The review found that while they said they had been inconvenienced by the long wait lines, most voters specified that they had ultimately been able to cast their ballots.
County officials have said they responded to printer problems at around 30 percent of the county’s voting locations. The printer problem meant that on-site tabulators — the machines that count ballots — rejected some of those ballots. The county had provided a backup system that allowed voters to drop ballots in a secure box to be processed at a different location rather than by the tabulator on site.
But some voters’ mistrust of the voting systems led them to not want to use the ballot boxes. Officials say those voters were given other options, including voting elsewhere. The situation created long lines at some of the voting centers, but the county says that every person who wanted to cast a ballot was able to do so.
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/09/us/p ... wsuit.html
Ms. Lake, who fueled the false claims that the 2020 election had been stolen from Donald Trump, lost the Arizona governor’s race by 17,000 votes.
By Alexandra Berzon, Ken Bensinger and Charles Homans
Dec. 9, 2022
Kari Lake, the losing Republican candidate for governor of Arizona, filed a lawsuit Friday contesting the results of an election that was certified by the state this week.
Ms. Lake’s lawsuit came after she had spent weeks making a series of public statements and social media posts aimed at sowing doubt in the outcome of a contest she lost by more than 17,000 votes to her Democratic opponent, Katie Hobbs. That loss was certified in documents signed on Monday by Ms. Hobbs, who currently serves as secretary of state.
A former news anchor, Ms. Lake centered her candidacy on false conspiratorial claims that the 2020 presidential election had been stolen from Donald J. Trump, who had endorsed her. For the past month, Ms. Lake, her campaign and other allies have been soliciting Election Day accounts from voters on social media and at rallies.
“If the process was illegitimate, then so are the results,” Ms. Lake said on Twitter on Friday evening after announcing her lawsuit. “Stay tuned, folks.”
Ms. Hobbs called Ms. Lake’s suit “baseless” in a post of her own on Twitter, describing it as the “latest desperate attempt to undermine our democracy and throw out the will of the voters.”
Ms. Lake sued Ms. Hobbs as well as officials in Maricopa County, which includes Phoenix and is Arizona’s largest county.
The suit claims that the election was corrupted in Maricopa County and that she should be declared the winner. The 70-page filing relies on a hodgepodge of allegations, ranging from voter and poll worker accounts to poll numbers claiming that voters agreed with Ms. Lake on the election’s mismanagement. Some of what is cited comes not from last month’s election but from the 2020 contest. Other allegations accuse officials of wrongdoing for taking part in efforts to try to tamp down election misinformation.
Fields Moseley, a spokesman for Maricopa County, said the court system was the proper place for campaigns to make their case to challenge results.
“Maricopa County respects the election contest process and looks forward to sharing facts about the administration of the 2022 general election and our work to ensure every legal voter had an opportunity to cast their ballot,” Mr. Moseley said.
A number of those cited as experts in the lawsuit and one of the lawyers who filed the case — Kurt Olsen — are part of a loose election-denial network led by Mike Lindell, the pillow company entrepreneur who has been pushing conspiracy theories about election machines since early 2021. Another Lake lawyer, Bryan Blehm, represented the contractor Cyber Ninjas during the partisan audit of Maricopa County’s 2020 election results last year and also represented supervisors in Cochise County this year in a lawsuit over an attempt to carry out a hand-counted audit plan.
Ms. Lake’s legal action came as lawsuits were also filed Friday by two other Arizona Republicans who lost their midterm elections: Mark Finchem, who ran for secretary of state, and Abe Hamadeh, the attorney general candidate. Mr. Hamadeh, who is trailing his opponent by 511 votes in a race that is undergoing a recount, was joined in his lawsuit by the Republican National Committee.
Mr. Hamadeh previously filed suit late last month seeking to overturn the election, but the suit was dismissed by a Maricopa County judge for being filed prematurely. His new suit — filed in Mohave County, a Republican stronghold where he won 75 percent of the vote — is more narrow than Ms. Lake’s, claiming that it is not questioning the election’s validity. But, as with Ms. Lake, Mr. Hamadeh is seeking an order overturning the election results and declaring him the winner, claiming he is not alleging widespread fraud but rather “certain errors and inaccuracies.” On Twitter late Friday, Mr. Hamadeh wrote that “Maricopa County faced unprecedented and unacceptable issues on Election Day.”
Dan Barr, a lawyer for Mr. Hamadeh’s opponent, Kris Mayes, said the lawsuit was “based on speculation” and contained “no real facts.” He said he planned to file motions to dismiss it and move it to Maricopa County early next week.
Mr. Finchem, one of several secretary of state candidates around the country who denied the results of the 2020 presidential race, lost by more than 120,000 votes. In his suit, filed in Maricopa County, Mr. Finchem alleged that Arizona had “failed miserably” to administer a “full, fair, and secure election” and asked that the court declare the election “annulled” and name him the winner.
That suit was filed by Daniel McCauley, who also represented Cochise County in its recent failed attempt to deny certification of the election results.
One of Ms. Lake’s lawyers, Mr. Olsen, was also involved in an earlier federal lawsuit brought unsuccessfully on behalf of Ms. Lake and Mr. Finchem. It was filed before the Nov. 8 election, but earlier this month a federal judge found that it made “false, misleading and unsupported factual assertions” about election systems. The judge said those misleading assertions warranted sanctions. He said he would determine who among the lawyers involved in the case should be sanctioned at a later date.
Mr. Olsen and Ms. Lake’s campaign did not respond to requests for comment. A lawyer for Mr. Finchem did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Some of the claims in Ms. Lake’s lawsuit centered on long lines and other problems on Election Day in Maricopa County that she alleges led to voter disenfranchisement.
Last month, The New York Times reviewed dozens of accounts from voters, poll workers and observers posted by Ms. Lake and her allies on social media or recounted in public hearings in the wake of the election. The review found that while they said they had been inconvenienced by the long wait lines, most voters specified that they had ultimately been able to cast their ballots.
County officials have said they responded to printer problems at around 30 percent of the county’s voting locations. The printer problem meant that on-site tabulators — the machines that count ballots — rejected some of those ballots. The county had provided a backup system that allowed voters to drop ballots in a secure box to be processed at a different location rather than by the tabulator on site.
But some voters’ mistrust of the voting systems led them to not want to use the ballot boxes. Officials say those voters were given other options, including voting elsewhere. The situation created long lines at some of the voting centers, but the county says that every person who wanted to cast a ballot was able to do so.
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/09/us/p ... wsuit.html
Re: TrumpReich in action
By The Editorial Board - NYT 12/11/22
(The editorial board is a group of opinion journalists whose views are informed by expertise, research, debate and certain longstanding values. It is separate from the newsroom.
This editorial is the fifth in a series, “The Danger Within,” urging readers to understand the danger of extremist violence and possible solutions. )
A year ago, Representative Thomas Massie of Kentucky posted a Christmas photo on Twitter. In it, Mr. Massie, his wife and five children pose in front of their ornament-bedecked tree. Each person is wearing a big grin and holding an assault weapon. “Merry Christmas! ps. Santa, please bring ammo,” Mr. Massie wrote on Twitter.The photo was posted on Dec. 4, just four days after a mass shooting at a school in Oxford, Mich., that left four students dead and seven other people injured.The grotesque timing led many Democrats and several Republicans to criticize Mr. Massie for sharing the photo. Others lauded it and nearly 80,000 people liked his tweet. “That’s my kind of Christmas card!” wrote Representative Lauren Boebert of Colorado, who then posted a photo of her four sons brandishing similar weapons.
These weapons, lightweight and endlessly customizable, aren’t often used in the way their devotees imagine — to defend themselves and their families. (In a recent comprehensive survey, only 13 percent of all defensive use of guns involved any type of rifle.) Nevertheless, in the 18 years since the end of the federal assault weapons ban, the country has been flooded with an estimated 25 million AR-15-style semiautomatic rifles, making them one of the most popular in the United States. When used in mass shootings, the AR-15 makes those acts of violence far more deadly. It has become the gun of choice for mass killers, from Las Vegas to Uvalde, Sandy Hook to Buffalo.
The AR-15 has also become a potent talisman for right-wing politicians and many of their voters. That’s a particularly disturbing trend at a time when violent political rhetoric and actual political violence in the United States are rising.
Addressing violent right-wing extremism is a challenge on many fronts: This board has argued for stronger enforcement of state anti-militia laws, better tracking of extremists in law enforcement and the military, and stronger international cooperation to tackle it as a transnational issue. Most important, there is a civil war raging inside the Republican Party between those who support democracy and peaceful politics and those who support far-right extremism. That conflict has repercussions for all of us, and the fetishization of guns is a pervasive part of it.
The prominence of guns in campaign ads is a good barometer of their political potency. Democrats have sometimes used guns in ads — in 2010, Joe Manchin of West Virginia, running for the Senate, shot a hole through a copy of the cap-and-trade climate bill with a single-shot hunting rifle. Since then, guns have all but disappeared from Democratic messaging. But in the most recent midterm elections, Republican politicians ran more than 100 ads featuring guns and more than a dozen that featured semiautomatic military-style rifles.
In one of the most violent of those ads, Eric Greitens, a Republican candidate for Senate in Missouri and a former Navy SEAL, kicks in the door of a house and barges in with a group of men dressed in tactical gear and holding assault rifles. Mr. Greitens boasts that the group is hunting RINOs — a derogatory term for “Republicans in name only.” The ad continues, “Get a RINO hunting permit. There’s no bagging limit, no tagging limit, and it doesn’t expire until we save our country.”
Twitter flagged the ad, Facebook banned it for violating its terms of service, and Mr. Greitens lost his race for office. He may have been playacting in the ad, but many other heavily armed people with far-right political views are not. Openly carried assault rifles have become an all too common feature of political events around the country and are having a chilling effect on the exercise of political speech.
This intimidating display of weaponry isn’t a bipartisan phenomenon: A recent New York Times analysis examined more than 700 demonstrations where people openly carrying guns showed up. At about 77 percent of the protests, those who were armed “represented right-wing views, such as opposition to L.G.B.T.Q. rights and abortion access, hostility to racial justice rallies and support for former President Donald J. Trump’s lie of winning the 2020 election.”
As we’ve seen at libraries that host drag queen book readings, Juneteenth celebrations and Pride marches, the Second Amendment’s right to bear arms is fast running up against the First Amendment’s right to peaceably assemble. Securing that right, and addressing political violence in general, requires addressing the armed intimidation that has become commonplace in public places and the gun culture that makes it possible.
A growing number of American civilians have an unhealthy obsession with “tactical culture” and rifles like the AR-15. It’s a fringe movement among the 81 million American gun owners, but it is one of several alarming trends that have coincided with the increase in political violence in this country, along with the spread of far-right extremist groups, an explosion of anti-government sentiment and the embrace of deranged conspiracy theories by many Republican politicians. Understanding how these currents feed one another is crucial to understanding and reversing political violence and right-wing extremism.
The American gun industry has reaped an estimated $1 billion in sales over the past decade from AR-15-style guns, and it has done so by using and cultivating their status as near mythical emblems of power, hyper-patriotism and manhood. Earlier this year, an investigation by the House Committee on Oversight and Reform found that the gun industry explicitly markets its products by touting their military pedigree and making “covert references to violent white supremacists like the Boogaloo Boys.” These tactics “prey on young men’s insecurities by claiming their weapons will put them ‘at the top of the testosterone food chain.’”
This marketing and those sales come at a significant cost to America’s social fabric.
In his recent book “Gunfight: My Battle Against the Industry That Radicalized America,” Ryan Busse, a former firearms company executive, described attending a Black Lives Matter rally with his son in Montana in 2020. At the rally, dozens of armed men, some of them wearing insignia from two paramilitary groups — the 3 Percenters and the Oath Keepers — appeared, carrying assault rifles. After one of the armed men assaulted his 12-year-old son, Mr. Busse had his epiphany.
“For years prior to this protest, advertising executives in the gun industry had been encouraging the ‘tactical lifestyle,’” Mr. Busse wrote. The gun industry created a culture that “glorified weapons of war and encouraged followers to ‘own the libs.’”
The formula is a simple one: More rage, more fear, more gun sales.
A portion of those proceeds are then funneled back into politics through millions of dollars in direct contributions, lobbying and spending on outside groups, most often in support of Republicans.
All told, gun rights groups spent a record $15.8 million on lobbying in 2021 and $2 million in the first quarter of 2022, the transparency group OpenSecrets reported. “From 1989 to 2022, gun rights groups contributed $50.5 million to federal candidates and party committees,” the group found. “Of that, 99 percent of direct contributions went to Republicans.”
It is important, of course, to distinguish between the large majority of law-abiding gun owners and the small number of extremists. Only about 30 percent of gun owners have owned an AR-15 or similar rifle, a majority support common sense gun restrictions and a majority reject political violence.
Institutions and individuals — prominent politicians, for instance, and responsible gun owners — could do far more to insist that assault weapons have no place in public spaces, even if they are permitted in many states, where the open carry of firearms is legal. Public condemnation of such displays is a good place to start.
Republicans should also show more courage in condemning extremists in their own ranks. When Representative Massie posted his Christmas photo, Representative Adam Kinzinger of Illinois responded on Twitter: “I’m pro second amendment, but this isn’t supporting right to keep and bear arms, this is a gun fetish.” There’s a difference between celebrating Christmas secure in the knowledge that you have a weapon to defend your home and family and sending out a photo of your arsenal days after a school shooting.
Democrats, while they may hope for stricter gun laws overall, should also recognize that they do share common ground with many gun owners — armed right-wing extremists and those who fetishize AR-15s do not represent typical American gun owners or their beliefs. That’s especially true given the changing nature of who owns guns in the United States: women and Black Americans are among the fastest-growing demographics.
This summer, for the first time in decades, Congress passed major bipartisan gun safety legislation — a major accomplishment and a sign that common ground is not terra incognita. It should have gone further — and can in the future: preventing anyone under 21 from buying a semiautomatic weapon, for instance, and erasing the 10-year sunset of the background-check provision. States should also be compelled to pass tougher red-flag laws to take guns out of the hands of suicidal or potentially violent people. Mandatory gun-liability insurance is also an idea with merit.
States and the federal government should also pass far tougher regulations on the gun industry, particularly through restrictions on the marketing of guns, which have helped supercharge the cult of the AR-15. New York’s law, which allows parties like victims of gun violence and the state government to sue gun sellers, manufacturers and distributors, is a good model for other states to follow.
Federal regulators should also do more to regulate the arms industry’s marketing practices, which are becoming more deadly and deranged by the year. They have the legal authority to do so but, thus far, not the will to act.
Americans are going to live with a lot of guns for a long time. There are already more than 415 million guns in circulation, including 25 million semiautomatic military-style rifles. Calls for confiscating them — or even calls for another assault weapons ban — are well intentioned and completely unrealistic. With proper care and maintenance, guns made today will still fire decades from now. Each month, Americans add nearly two million more to the national stockpile.
But even if common-sense regulation of guns is far from political reality, Americans do not have to accept the worst of gun culture becoming pervasive in our politics. The only hope the nation has for living in and around so many deadly weapons is a political system capable of resolving our many differences without the need to use them.
(The editorial board is a group of opinion journalists whose views are informed by expertise, research, debate and certain longstanding values. It is separate from the newsroom.
This editorial is the fifth in a series, “The Danger Within,” urging readers to understand the danger of extremist violence and possible solutions. )
A year ago, Representative Thomas Massie of Kentucky posted a Christmas photo on Twitter. In it, Mr. Massie, his wife and five children pose in front of their ornament-bedecked tree. Each person is wearing a big grin and holding an assault weapon. “Merry Christmas! ps. Santa, please bring ammo,” Mr. Massie wrote on Twitter.The photo was posted on Dec. 4, just four days after a mass shooting at a school in Oxford, Mich., that left four students dead and seven other people injured.The grotesque timing led many Democrats and several Republicans to criticize Mr. Massie for sharing the photo. Others lauded it and nearly 80,000 people liked his tweet. “That’s my kind of Christmas card!” wrote Representative Lauren Boebert of Colorado, who then posted a photo of her four sons brandishing similar weapons.
These weapons, lightweight and endlessly customizable, aren’t often used in the way their devotees imagine — to defend themselves and their families. (In a recent comprehensive survey, only 13 percent of all defensive use of guns involved any type of rifle.) Nevertheless, in the 18 years since the end of the federal assault weapons ban, the country has been flooded with an estimated 25 million AR-15-style semiautomatic rifles, making them one of the most popular in the United States. When used in mass shootings, the AR-15 makes those acts of violence far more deadly. It has become the gun of choice for mass killers, from Las Vegas to Uvalde, Sandy Hook to Buffalo.
The AR-15 has also become a potent talisman for right-wing politicians and many of their voters. That’s a particularly disturbing trend at a time when violent political rhetoric and actual political violence in the United States are rising.
Addressing violent right-wing extremism is a challenge on many fronts: This board has argued for stronger enforcement of state anti-militia laws, better tracking of extremists in law enforcement and the military, and stronger international cooperation to tackle it as a transnational issue. Most important, there is a civil war raging inside the Republican Party between those who support democracy and peaceful politics and those who support far-right extremism. That conflict has repercussions for all of us, and the fetishization of guns is a pervasive part of it.
The prominence of guns in campaign ads is a good barometer of their political potency. Democrats have sometimes used guns in ads — in 2010, Joe Manchin of West Virginia, running for the Senate, shot a hole through a copy of the cap-and-trade climate bill with a single-shot hunting rifle. Since then, guns have all but disappeared from Democratic messaging. But in the most recent midterm elections, Republican politicians ran more than 100 ads featuring guns and more than a dozen that featured semiautomatic military-style rifles.
In one of the most violent of those ads, Eric Greitens, a Republican candidate for Senate in Missouri and a former Navy SEAL, kicks in the door of a house and barges in with a group of men dressed in tactical gear and holding assault rifles. Mr. Greitens boasts that the group is hunting RINOs — a derogatory term for “Republicans in name only.” The ad continues, “Get a RINO hunting permit. There’s no bagging limit, no tagging limit, and it doesn’t expire until we save our country.”
Twitter flagged the ad, Facebook banned it for violating its terms of service, and Mr. Greitens lost his race for office. He may have been playacting in the ad, but many other heavily armed people with far-right political views are not. Openly carried assault rifles have become an all too common feature of political events around the country and are having a chilling effect on the exercise of political speech.
This intimidating display of weaponry isn’t a bipartisan phenomenon: A recent New York Times analysis examined more than 700 demonstrations where people openly carrying guns showed up. At about 77 percent of the protests, those who were armed “represented right-wing views, such as opposition to L.G.B.T.Q. rights and abortion access, hostility to racial justice rallies and support for former President Donald J. Trump’s lie of winning the 2020 election.”
As we’ve seen at libraries that host drag queen book readings, Juneteenth celebrations and Pride marches, the Second Amendment’s right to bear arms is fast running up against the First Amendment’s right to peaceably assemble. Securing that right, and addressing political violence in general, requires addressing the armed intimidation that has become commonplace in public places and the gun culture that makes it possible.
A growing number of American civilians have an unhealthy obsession with “tactical culture” and rifles like the AR-15. It’s a fringe movement among the 81 million American gun owners, but it is one of several alarming trends that have coincided with the increase in political violence in this country, along with the spread of far-right extremist groups, an explosion of anti-government sentiment and the embrace of deranged conspiracy theories by many Republican politicians. Understanding how these currents feed one another is crucial to understanding and reversing political violence and right-wing extremism.
The American gun industry has reaped an estimated $1 billion in sales over the past decade from AR-15-style guns, and it has done so by using and cultivating their status as near mythical emblems of power, hyper-patriotism and manhood. Earlier this year, an investigation by the House Committee on Oversight and Reform found that the gun industry explicitly markets its products by touting their military pedigree and making “covert references to violent white supremacists like the Boogaloo Boys.” These tactics “prey on young men’s insecurities by claiming their weapons will put them ‘at the top of the testosterone food chain.’”
This marketing and those sales come at a significant cost to America’s social fabric.
In his recent book “Gunfight: My Battle Against the Industry That Radicalized America,” Ryan Busse, a former firearms company executive, described attending a Black Lives Matter rally with his son in Montana in 2020. At the rally, dozens of armed men, some of them wearing insignia from two paramilitary groups — the 3 Percenters and the Oath Keepers — appeared, carrying assault rifles. After one of the armed men assaulted his 12-year-old son, Mr. Busse had his epiphany.
“For years prior to this protest, advertising executives in the gun industry had been encouraging the ‘tactical lifestyle,’” Mr. Busse wrote. The gun industry created a culture that “glorified weapons of war and encouraged followers to ‘own the libs.’”
The formula is a simple one: More rage, more fear, more gun sales.
A portion of those proceeds are then funneled back into politics through millions of dollars in direct contributions, lobbying and spending on outside groups, most often in support of Republicans.
All told, gun rights groups spent a record $15.8 million on lobbying in 2021 and $2 million in the first quarter of 2022, the transparency group OpenSecrets reported. “From 1989 to 2022, gun rights groups contributed $50.5 million to federal candidates and party committees,” the group found. “Of that, 99 percent of direct contributions went to Republicans.”
It is important, of course, to distinguish between the large majority of law-abiding gun owners and the small number of extremists. Only about 30 percent of gun owners have owned an AR-15 or similar rifle, a majority support common sense gun restrictions and a majority reject political violence.
Institutions and individuals — prominent politicians, for instance, and responsible gun owners — could do far more to insist that assault weapons have no place in public spaces, even if they are permitted in many states, where the open carry of firearms is legal. Public condemnation of such displays is a good place to start.
Republicans should also show more courage in condemning extremists in their own ranks. When Representative Massie posted his Christmas photo, Representative Adam Kinzinger of Illinois responded on Twitter: “I’m pro second amendment, but this isn’t supporting right to keep and bear arms, this is a gun fetish.” There’s a difference between celebrating Christmas secure in the knowledge that you have a weapon to defend your home and family and sending out a photo of your arsenal days after a school shooting.
Democrats, while they may hope for stricter gun laws overall, should also recognize that they do share common ground with many gun owners — armed right-wing extremists and those who fetishize AR-15s do not represent typical American gun owners or their beliefs. That’s especially true given the changing nature of who owns guns in the United States: women and Black Americans are among the fastest-growing demographics.
This summer, for the first time in decades, Congress passed major bipartisan gun safety legislation — a major accomplishment and a sign that common ground is not terra incognita. It should have gone further — and can in the future: preventing anyone under 21 from buying a semiautomatic weapon, for instance, and erasing the 10-year sunset of the background-check provision. States should also be compelled to pass tougher red-flag laws to take guns out of the hands of suicidal or potentially violent people. Mandatory gun-liability insurance is also an idea with merit.
States and the federal government should also pass far tougher regulations on the gun industry, particularly through restrictions on the marketing of guns, which have helped supercharge the cult of the AR-15. New York’s law, which allows parties like victims of gun violence and the state government to sue gun sellers, manufacturers and distributors, is a good model for other states to follow.
Federal regulators should also do more to regulate the arms industry’s marketing practices, which are becoming more deadly and deranged by the year. They have the legal authority to do so but, thus far, not the will to act.
Americans are going to live with a lot of guns for a long time. There are already more than 415 million guns in circulation, including 25 million semiautomatic military-style rifles. Calls for confiscating them — or even calls for another assault weapons ban — are well intentioned and completely unrealistic. With proper care and maintenance, guns made today will still fire decades from now. Each month, Americans add nearly two million more to the national stockpile.
But even if common-sense regulation of guns is far from political reality, Americans do not have to accept the worst of gun culture becoming pervasive in our politics. The only hope the nation has for living in and around so many deadly weapons is a political system capable of resolving our many differences without the need to use them.
Re: TrumpReich in action
Fuhrer DeSantis attacks the COVID vaccines ; again:
https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/13/politics ... index.html
https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/13/politics ... index.html
Re: TrumpReich in action
Pity the children with RSV from covid in Florida.Rach3 wrote: ↑Wed Dec 14, 2022 12:49 pmFuhrer DeSantis attacks the COVID vaccines ; again:
https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/13/politics ... index.html
Re: TrumpReich in action
The crazies in action , their texts to Meadows:
https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-sho ... -rcna61686
https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-sho ... -rcna61632
https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-sho ... -rcna61686
https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-sho ... -rcna61632
Re: TrumpReich in action
New Yorker Magazine, Summer, 2021
Driving across the Midwest, I saw one Trump 2024 sign after another—this while the election was an entire three years away. “You know you’re in a place that’s inhospitable to liberals when you see fireworks stores,” Adam said in rural Indiana as we passed one powder keg after another.
“Fireworks are guns for children,” I observed.
“They’re the gateway drug,” Adam agreed.
Driving across the Midwest, I saw one Trump 2024 sign after another—this while the election was an entire three years away. “You know you’re in a place that’s inhospitable to liberals when you see fireworks stores,” Adam said in rural Indiana as we passed one powder keg after another.
“Fireworks are guns for children,” I observed.
“They’re the gateway drug,” Adam agreed.
Re: TrumpReich in action
From the Kansas City Star today:
"Missouri voters legalized weed, expanded Medicaid. GOP wants to block more ballot measures.In the wake of Missouri voters approving progressive policies through ballot measures, Republicans are pushing to make it tougher for citizen-led petitions to pass."
"Missouri voters legalized weed, expanded Medicaid. GOP wants to block more ballot measures.In the wake of Missouri voters approving progressive policies through ballot measures, Republicans are pushing to make it tougher for citizen-led petitions to pass."
Re: TrumpReich in action
The latest from the Iowa God Ofal Party:
Cut food benefits for the poor.From the Cedar Rapids Gazette today:
House File 3, which would throw up high barriers and dramatically curtail choices at the grocery store for Iowans who need food assistance through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP. It has 39 Republican co-sponsors, including the House speaker and majority leader.
The bill would require the Department of Health and Human Services to seek a federal waiver allowing Iowa to scrap an already restrictive federal list of approved foods and replace it with a list of food available to recipients of aid to Women, Infants and Children, or WIC.
So what would change? Well, SNAP recipients would no longer be able to use their benefits to buy meat, unless it’s canned tuna or salmon or pureed in baby food. They couldn’t buy flour, cooking oil, spices or even salt and pepper. Canned vegetables and fruit would be off the list. And no soup for you.
The bill would also, for the first time, create an asset test, limiting household assets to $2,750 or $4,250 if one member of the household is over 60. It exempts just one vehicle, potentially making households with two cars ineligible.
Beyond all of that draconian wisdom, the bill would force recipients to jump through far more regulatory hoops to become eligible and stay on SNAP, wrapping recipients tightly in red tape and likely costing the state millions more to administer the program.
We’re talking about food, folks, not some luxury. Luke Elzinga, head of the Iowa Hunger Coalition tells me that roughly half of SNAP recipients are children, disabled or elderly. Only 8 percent of SNAP clients are able-bodied adults.
Making it harder for struggling Iowans to get help is called “public assistance program integrity.” Sort of like “election integrity” made it harder to vote. Twisting the meaning of integrity is a good indication you really don’t have any.
Similar bills have been floated in past years. But what makes this so remarkably ironic is that Republicans also are pushing legislation that would eventually hand $7,600 publicly funded scholarships to any family in Iowa that wants send kids to private school. Every family would be eligible in year three of the program, with no means or asset testing whatsoever, to the tune of $341 million annually.
That money would then go to private schools that face fewer transparency requirements. It’s basically a large new entitlement program with virtually no strings attached. Gov. Kim Reynolds talks about public assistance recipients in hammocks. Scholarships likely will go to people who actually have hammocks, maybe even in-ground pools and teak patio loungers.
Attack transgenders. From Iowa Capital Dispatch today:
The Iowa Supreme Court heard arguments Wednesday in a case involving the state’s ability to deny Medicaid funding for transgender surgery.
Wednesday’s hearing stems from the state’s appeal of a 2021 district court ruling that found legislation amending the Iowa Civil Rights Act violated the Iowa Constitution. That legislation had attempted to strip away protections for transgender Iowans who rely on Medicaid for transition surgery and related procedures.
The district court had also ruled that an Iowa Medicaid rule or regulation blocking Medicaid coverage for medically necessary transgender care violated both the Iowa Constitution and the Iowa Civil Rights Act.
The state appealed the ruling that deals with the Iowa Legislature’s amendment to the Iowa Civil Rights Act, arguing that the state’s elected lawmakers have the right to redefine the language of the act or even repeal it in its entirety.
Cut food benefits for the poor.From the Cedar Rapids Gazette today:
House File 3, which would throw up high barriers and dramatically curtail choices at the grocery store for Iowans who need food assistance through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP. It has 39 Republican co-sponsors, including the House speaker and majority leader.
The bill would require the Department of Health and Human Services to seek a federal waiver allowing Iowa to scrap an already restrictive federal list of approved foods and replace it with a list of food available to recipients of aid to Women, Infants and Children, or WIC.
So what would change? Well, SNAP recipients would no longer be able to use their benefits to buy meat, unless it’s canned tuna or salmon or pureed in baby food. They couldn’t buy flour, cooking oil, spices or even salt and pepper. Canned vegetables and fruit would be off the list. And no soup for you.
The bill would also, for the first time, create an asset test, limiting household assets to $2,750 or $4,250 if one member of the household is over 60. It exempts just one vehicle, potentially making households with two cars ineligible.
Beyond all of that draconian wisdom, the bill would force recipients to jump through far more regulatory hoops to become eligible and stay on SNAP, wrapping recipients tightly in red tape and likely costing the state millions more to administer the program.
We’re talking about food, folks, not some luxury. Luke Elzinga, head of the Iowa Hunger Coalition tells me that roughly half of SNAP recipients are children, disabled or elderly. Only 8 percent of SNAP clients are able-bodied adults.
Making it harder for struggling Iowans to get help is called “public assistance program integrity.” Sort of like “election integrity” made it harder to vote. Twisting the meaning of integrity is a good indication you really don’t have any.
Similar bills have been floated in past years. But what makes this so remarkably ironic is that Republicans also are pushing legislation that would eventually hand $7,600 publicly funded scholarships to any family in Iowa that wants send kids to private school. Every family would be eligible in year three of the program, with no means or asset testing whatsoever, to the tune of $341 million annually.
That money would then go to private schools that face fewer transparency requirements. It’s basically a large new entitlement program with virtually no strings attached. Gov. Kim Reynolds talks about public assistance recipients in hammocks. Scholarships likely will go to people who actually have hammocks, maybe even in-ground pools and teak patio loungers.
Attack transgenders. From Iowa Capital Dispatch today:
The Iowa Supreme Court heard arguments Wednesday in a case involving the state’s ability to deny Medicaid funding for transgender surgery.
Wednesday’s hearing stems from the state’s appeal of a 2021 district court ruling that found legislation amending the Iowa Civil Rights Act violated the Iowa Constitution. That legislation had attempted to strip away protections for transgender Iowans who rely on Medicaid for transition surgery and related procedures.
The district court had also ruled that an Iowa Medicaid rule or regulation blocking Medicaid coverage for medically necessary transgender care violated both the Iowa Constitution and the Iowa Civil Rights Act.
The state appealed the ruling that deals with the Iowa Legislature’s amendment to the Iowa Civil Rights Act, arguing that the state’s elected lawmakers have the right to redefine the language of the act or even repeal it in its entirety.
Re: TrumpReich in action
GOP has no interest in Trump’s NY taxes. And of course are planning to investigate, ie de-rail all the DOJ criminal investigations into Trump while starting new ones against Biden.
Accounting Today,Jan.24:
“Former President Donald Trump has dropped a long-running court fight with Congress over access to his New York state tax returns, notifying a judge late Friday in a joint filing with a House committee that the new Republican leadership "has no interest" in the documents.
The case dated back to 2019, when Trump was still president. He sued the House Ways and Means Committee, then led by Massachusetts Representative Richard Neal, and New York state officials over a newly passed state law known as the TRUST Act, which gave members of Congress a way to get a president's state tax records.
The committee didn't end up making a request for the New York documents and a judge didn't have to rule on Trump's claims challenging the validity of the law. The case stayed mostly dormant for the next two years, with the judge occasionally ordering status reports from the parties.
The latest filing from Trump's lawyer and the acting general counsel for the House of Representatives voluntarily dismissing the case repeated Trump's position that the TRUST Act couldn't apply to a former president, and noted the recent change in political circumstances.
"Plaintiff is no longer 'the president of the United States.' Even if he were, Defendant Neal no longer chairs the House Ways and Means Committee, and the current committee has no interest in plaintiff's tax returns," the lawyers wrote in the joint submission.
Following years of litigation in a separate case, the Ways and Means Committee did get access to Trump's federal tax returns and released them to the public late last year, before Republicans took control of the chamber.”
Accounting Today,Jan.24:
“Former President Donald Trump has dropped a long-running court fight with Congress over access to his New York state tax returns, notifying a judge late Friday in a joint filing with a House committee that the new Republican leadership "has no interest" in the documents.
The case dated back to 2019, when Trump was still president. He sued the House Ways and Means Committee, then led by Massachusetts Representative Richard Neal, and New York state officials over a newly passed state law known as the TRUST Act, which gave members of Congress a way to get a president's state tax records.
The committee didn't end up making a request for the New York documents and a judge didn't have to rule on Trump's claims challenging the validity of the law. The case stayed mostly dormant for the next two years, with the judge occasionally ordering status reports from the parties.
The latest filing from Trump's lawyer and the acting general counsel for the House of Representatives voluntarily dismissing the case repeated Trump's position that the TRUST Act couldn't apply to a former president, and noted the recent change in political circumstances.
"Plaintiff is no longer 'the president of the United States.' Even if he were, Defendant Neal no longer chairs the House Ways and Means Committee, and the current committee has no interest in plaintiff's tax returns," the lawyers wrote in the joint submission.
Following years of litigation in a separate case, the Ways and Means Committee did get access to Trump's federal tax returns and released them to the public late last year, before Republicans took control of the chamber.”
Re: TrumpReich in action
I don't know why you continue to be obsessed with Donald Trump. It's the Eighth Wonder of the World. He's as dead as last year's Christmas turkey and if the GOP endorse him to run for the Presidency they'll be telling the American people they're not interested in governing. Shouldn't you be celebrating?
Move on.
Move on.
Re: TrumpReich in action
Trump, and much more importantly his followers, ie. the "Reich", many even more insane than he, are marching on, as the article you did not read makes clear , and are a clear and present danger , as are the re-born Third Reich autocrats recently empowered in Europe,Turkey,elsewhere.Belle wrote: ↑Mon Jan 30, 2023 5:41 pmI don't know why you continue to be obsessed with Donald Trump. It's the Eighth Wonder of the World. He's as dead as last year's Christmas turkey and if the GOP endorse him to run for the Presidency they'll be telling the American people they're not interested in governing. Shouldn't you be celebrating?
Move on.
Re: TrumpReich in action
Exactly so, Steve. Who thought any politician could make Trump look good, but MTG manages it with aplomb.Rach3 wrote: ↑Mon Jan 30, 2023 6:41 pmTrump, and much more importantly his followers, ie. the "Reich", many even more insane than he, are marching on, as the article you did not read makes clear , and are a clear and present danger , as are the re-born Third Reich autocrats recently empowered in Europe,Turkey,elsewhere.Belle wrote: ↑Mon Jan 30, 2023 5:41 pmI don't know why you continue to be obsessed with Donald Trump. It's the Eighth Wonder of the World. He's as dead as last year's Christmas turkey and if the GOP endorse him to run for the Presidency they'll be telling the American people they're not interested in governing. Shouldn't you be celebrating?
Move on.
Re: TrumpReich in action
Oh, so it isn't just Trump - but a diffuse hatred. Trump's starting to 'look good'!? If you'd stuck with him it wouldn't have been so bad after all, would it now!! 
But you're right; I don't read those hysteria-laden articles and conspiracy theories.
There is cancellation and doctrinaire fascism from the Left, so your insults about 'Trump Reich" are merely a projection. The real clue was found in abuse towards circa half the voting population of the USA as 'deplorables' in 'fly-over country'. That was beyond reprehensible as a form of bullying, insult and coercion against your own people by your political leadership. A low water mark.
This man has sociological imagination and he discusses the qualities he thinks make a successful President. I've never known Dr. Weinstein to spew any kind of hatred towards another American - and he's certainly been a victim of cancellation culture.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ec9QITzPJfs
The media has an awful lot to answer for:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=84renr4polg
But you're right; I don't read those hysteria-laden articles and conspiracy theories.
There is cancellation and doctrinaire fascism from the Left, so your insults about 'Trump Reich" are merely a projection. The real clue was found in abuse towards circa half the voting population of the USA as 'deplorables' in 'fly-over country'. That was beyond reprehensible as a form of bullying, insult and coercion against your own people by your political leadership. A low water mark.
This man has sociological imagination and he discusses the qualities he thinks make a successful President. I've never known Dr. Weinstein to spew any kind of hatred towards another American - and he's certainly been a victim of cancellation culture.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ec9QITzPJfs
The media has an awful lot to answer for:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=84renr4polg
-
jserraglio
- Posts: 11954
- Joined: Sun May 29, 2005 7:06 am
- Location: Cleveland, Ohio
Re: TrumpReich in action
Like ‘God the Father’ in Milton’s Paradise Lost, Trump looks good precisely because he is so bad. Pretentious, pompous, priggish.
I am looking for the MAGA G.O.P. to put him forward him in 2024. They are something else aren’t they?—right out of the Cretinaceous Period.
Re: TrumpReich in action
Bones-spur Trump slams US military ; GOP silent, of course:
https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-sho ... -rcna68167
https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-sho ... -rcna68167
Re: TrumpReich in action
DeSantis raids Florida universities ; Sieg Heil or get fired:
https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/31/politics ... index.html
https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/31/politics ... index.html
Re: TrumpReich in action
Gender identity process a “ mental illness” to Iowa GOP.
Iowa Capital Dispatch,Feb.3:
"House lawmakers approved legislation Tuesday banning school districts from letting a student use a different name or pronouns than what they were given at birth without written parental consent.
Sen. Jeff Shipley, R-Fairfield, said school board members claimed the school could not reverse this policy because it would violate state and federal civil rights protections given based on gender identity.
House File 190 was also introduced Thursday to remove gender identity as a protected category from the state’s civil rights act.
“Mental illness should not be accommodated as a civil right,” Shipley said Thursday.”
If anyone has a mental problem , it’s deplorable Shipley.
Iowa Capital Dispatch,Feb.3:
"House lawmakers approved legislation Tuesday banning school districts from letting a student use a different name or pronouns than what they were given at birth without written parental consent.
Sen. Jeff Shipley, R-Fairfield, said school board members claimed the school could not reverse this policy because it would violate state and federal civil rights protections given based on gender identity.
House File 190 was also introduced Thursday to remove gender identity as a protected category from the state’s civil rights act.
“Mental illness should not be accommodated as a civil right,” Shipley said Thursday.”
If anyone has a mental problem , it’s deplorable Shipley.
Re: TrumpReich in action
Of course these facts will make no difference to fascist MAGA even though they are proven to be the fools they are and played for the same by their Dear Leader:
https://wapo.st/3E0R9b3
https://wapo.st/3E0R9b3
Re: TrumpReich in action
Iowa Public Radio Feb.13:
"A West Virginia Public Broadcasting reporter's dismissal is exposing political pressures and ties between the news outlet and state lawmakers. Late last fall, Amelia Ferrell Knisely reported on abuse allegations against people with disabilities in state-run facilities for the station. But after political pushback, Knisley was dismissed from her part-time reporting role — a decision she later found out came from the station's chief executive. Interviews with 20 people with direct knowledge of the events say it was not an aberration but part of a years'-long pattern of mounting pressure on the station from (GOP) Gov. Jim Justice's administration and some state legislators."
GOP Sen.Joe Manchin silent as far as I know.
"A West Virginia Public Broadcasting reporter's dismissal is exposing political pressures and ties between the news outlet and state lawmakers. Late last fall, Amelia Ferrell Knisely reported on abuse allegations against people with disabilities in state-run facilities for the station. But after political pushback, Knisley was dismissed from her part-time reporting role — a decision she later found out came from the station's chief executive. Interviews with 20 people with direct knowledge of the events say it was not an aberration but part of a years'-long pattern of mounting pressure on the station from (GOP) Gov. Jim Justice's administration and some state legislators."
GOP Sen.Joe Manchin silent as far as I know.
Re: TrumpReich in action
From Slipped Disc today about a Florida cancellation of the Kings Singers:
"The group have complained that their weekend Florida concert at a fundamentalist Christian college was cancelled at two hours’ notice due to ‘”concerns” expressed about the “lifestyle” of members of our group.’
The Singers continue: ‘It has become clear to us, from a flood of correspondence from students and members of the public, that these concerns related to the sexuality of members of our group.’
The group says they had performed before at Pensacola Christian College without experiencing difficulty or prejudice."
"The group have complained that their weekend Florida concert at a fundamentalist Christian college was cancelled at two hours’ notice due to ‘”concerns” expressed about the “lifestyle” of members of our group.’
The Singers continue: ‘It has become clear to us, from a flood of correspondence from students and members of the public, that these concerns related to the sexuality of members of our group.’
The group says they had performed before at Pensacola Christian College without experiencing difficulty or prejudice."
Re: TrumpReich in action
From IPR Feb.15:
"More than half of Republicans support Christian nationalism, according to a new survey. The Public Religion Research Institute and the Brookings Institution survey found the once-fringe viewpoint now has more support, with more than half of Republican respondents saying they believe the United States should be a strictly Christian nation."
Apparently, an amendment to the First Amendment is coming.
"More than half of Republicans support Christian nationalism, according to a new survey. The Public Religion Research Institute and the Brookings Institution survey found the once-fringe viewpoint now has more support, with more than half of Republican respondents saying they believe the United States should be a strictly Christian nation."
Apparently, an amendment to the First Amendment is coming.
Re: TrumpReich in action
For those who dont watch Fox.
Greg Sargent
WAPO Feb.21 Op Ed
The fiery derailment of a freight train carrying hazardous chemicals in eastern Ohio is coming to represent bigger societal failures. It’s a story about profit-driven rail companies underinvesting in safety, lobbyists weakening rail regulation, and the government’s failure to assure residents’ security from lingering toxins.
But in certain right-wing media precincts, the disaster is about something else: A campaign of discrimination being waged against White people.
“East Palestine is overwhelmingly White, and it’s politically conservative,” Fox News’s Tucker Carlson recently said of the roughly 4,700 residents of the disaster zone. “That shouldn’t be relevant,” he added, but “it very much is.”
It very much isn’t. But ever since the Feb. 3 disaster, Carlson and his comrades have sought to transform East Palestine’s plight into a tale about “woke” Democrats abandoning White communities in the virtuous, forgotten heartland.
What this illustrates is how the right uses race-baiting to deceive people into forgetting that Democrats are now the far more committed party when it comes to investing in such left-behind communities.
Central to Carlson’s insinuation about the “relevance” of East Palestine’s Whiteness is the conduct of Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg. Carlson cites recent remarks by Buttigieg about the construction industry’s racial makeup, sneering that Buttigieg has been neglecting East Palestine specifically to focus on a more “pressing problem,” that “we have too many White construction workers.”
Similarly, Sen. J.D. Vance (R-Ohio) ripped Buttigieg for neglecting railroad safety while instead “talking about how we have too many White male construction workers,” adding in the “male” for good measure.
The relevant Buttigieg comments were about the importation of White workers to build projects in high-unemployment minority communities, and about how to create opportunities for minority construction workers. For Vance and Carlson, this apparently isn’t a concern. But even if you disagree with Buttigieg on this, it’s disgusting to link it to East Palestine: It’s meant to imply neglect of White disaster victims to serve a hidden agenda of preferring minorities over Whites.
Carlson ratchets up this vile game by saying that if the accident had happened in Philadelphia or Detroit — wink, wink — there would be no neglect. And the race-baiting gets worse. One Fox News host suggested the Biden administration is “spilling toxic chemicals on poor white people.” Far-right personality Charlie Kirk decried a “war on white people” waged by the “Biden regime,” which is supposedly allowing the “poisoning” of “citizens of eastern Ohio.” Note the hints of the ugly trope that elites are plotting to exterminate Whites, or at least allowing them to perish.
Unquestionably, when the facts are all found, the administration, Congress, the rail company Norfolk Southern and the freight-rail industry should be held accountable to whatever extent they are implicated. For now, what’s objectionable is the right’s deliberate racializing of this story.
This notion of a premeditated project of elite Democratic neglect is absurd, given recent history. Biden presided over passage of bills, such as the Inflation Reduction Act and the Chips and Science Act, that will pump huge sums into tech and green manufacturing in many regions that are a lot like East Palestine.
Mark Muro, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, says that spending is already helping facilitate such projects in Ohio, including expansions of electric vehicle battery and chip manufacturing in places such as Lordstown and Licking County. Ultimately, Muro told me, the programs will mean “thousands of new jobs in advanced manufacturing and green energy” in “areas like northeast Ohio.”
Such places do have legitimate longtime grievances. But as MSNBC’s Chris Hayes notes, some of the same Republicans demagoguing about East Palestine have been silent about real answers to those grievances. Worse, we’re in the middle of an extraordinarily ambitious effort to address those regional grievances, and Republicans have mostly opposed it.
Democrats can lean into that argument, says Tim Ryan, who challenged Vance for the Senate and is now a senior fellow for the moderate group Third Way.
“You guys want to talk about a train accident as an attack on White people?” Ryan said of Republicans. “We want to talk about how we rebuild these communities.”
Something deeper is at stake. Many commentators have offered what the Atlantic’s Adam Serwer calls a “Calamity Thesis” about working-class White America: It has endured a social catastrophe rooted in globalization and cultural change that liberal elites won’t acknowledge, fomenting backlash. This story inevitably privileges working-class White victimization as a driving fact of U.S. politics.
The right’s East Palestine demagoguery employs a widely shared graphic of an enormous chemical plume from a controlled fire burning off chemicals. This is meant to suggest a left-behind area victimized by a deliberately inflicted calamity, which is explicitly described in right-wing media as woke elite punishment for the Whiteness of its abandoned residents.
For some on the right, it isn’t enough for this story to be about corporate greed, the need for bureaucratic reform, or which party is genuinely committed to investing in — and governing on behalf of — places like East Palestine. Instead, it must be transformed into a tale about racial malice, with White Americans as the victims."
Greg Sargent
WAPO Feb.21 Op Ed
The fiery derailment of a freight train carrying hazardous chemicals in eastern Ohio is coming to represent bigger societal failures. It’s a story about profit-driven rail companies underinvesting in safety, lobbyists weakening rail regulation, and the government’s failure to assure residents’ security from lingering toxins.
But in certain right-wing media precincts, the disaster is about something else: A campaign of discrimination being waged against White people.
“East Palestine is overwhelmingly White, and it’s politically conservative,” Fox News’s Tucker Carlson recently said of the roughly 4,700 residents of the disaster zone. “That shouldn’t be relevant,” he added, but “it very much is.”
It very much isn’t. But ever since the Feb. 3 disaster, Carlson and his comrades have sought to transform East Palestine’s plight into a tale about “woke” Democrats abandoning White communities in the virtuous, forgotten heartland.
What this illustrates is how the right uses race-baiting to deceive people into forgetting that Democrats are now the far more committed party when it comes to investing in such left-behind communities.
Central to Carlson’s insinuation about the “relevance” of East Palestine’s Whiteness is the conduct of Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg. Carlson cites recent remarks by Buttigieg about the construction industry’s racial makeup, sneering that Buttigieg has been neglecting East Palestine specifically to focus on a more “pressing problem,” that “we have too many White construction workers.”
Similarly, Sen. J.D. Vance (R-Ohio) ripped Buttigieg for neglecting railroad safety while instead “talking about how we have too many White male construction workers,” adding in the “male” for good measure.
The relevant Buttigieg comments were about the importation of White workers to build projects in high-unemployment minority communities, and about how to create opportunities for minority construction workers. For Vance and Carlson, this apparently isn’t a concern. But even if you disagree with Buttigieg on this, it’s disgusting to link it to East Palestine: It’s meant to imply neglect of White disaster victims to serve a hidden agenda of preferring minorities over Whites.
Carlson ratchets up this vile game by saying that if the accident had happened in Philadelphia or Detroit — wink, wink — there would be no neglect. And the race-baiting gets worse. One Fox News host suggested the Biden administration is “spilling toxic chemicals on poor white people.” Far-right personality Charlie Kirk decried a “war on white people” waged by the “Biden regime,” which is supposedly allowing the “poisoning” of “citizens of eastern Ohio.” Note the hints of the ugly trope that elites are plotting to exterminate Whites, or at least allowing them to perish.
Unquestionably, when the facts are all found, the administration, Congress, the rail company Norfolk Southern and the freight-rail industry should be held accountable to whatever extent they are implicated. For now, what’s objectionable is the right’s deliberate racializing of this story.
This notion of a premeditated project of elite Democratic neglect is absurd, given recent history. Biden presided over passage of bills, such as the Inflation Reduction Act and the Chips and Science Act, that will pump huge sums into tech and green manufacturing in many regions that are a lot like East Palestine.
Mark Muro, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, says that spending is already helping facilitate such projects in Ohio, including expansions of electric vehicle battery and chip manufacturing in places such as Lordstown and Licking County. Ultimately, Muro told me, the programs will mean “thousands of new jobs in advanced manufacturing and green energy” in “areas like northeast Ohio.”
Such places do have legitimate longtime grievances. But as MSNBC’s Chris Hayes notes, some of the same Republicans demagoguing about East Palestine have been silent about real answers to those grievances. Worse, we’re in the middle of an extraordinarily ambitious effort to address those regional grievances, and Republicans have mostly opposed it.
Democrats can lean into that argument, says Tim Ryan, who challenged Vance for the Senate and is now a senior fellow for the moderate group Third Way.
“You guys want to talk about a train accident as an attack on White people?” Ryan said of Republicans. “We want to talk about how we rebuild these communities.”
Something deeper is at stake. Many commentators have offered what the Atlantic’s Adam Serwer calls a “Calamity Thesis” about working-class White America: It has endured a social catastrophe rooted in globalization and cultural change that liberal elites won’t acknowledge, fomenting backlash. This story inevitably privileges working-class White victimization as a driving fact of U.S. politics.
The right’s East Palestine demagoguery employs a widely shared graphic of an enormous chemical plume from a controlled fire burning off chemicals. This is meant to suggest a left-behind area victimized by a deliberately inflicted calamity, which is explicitly described in right-wing media as woke elite punishment for the Whiteness of its abandoned residents.
For some on the right, it isn’t enough for this story to be about corporate greed, the need for bureaucratic reform, or which party is genuinely committed to investing in — and governing on behalf of — places like East Palestine. Instead, it must be transformed into a tale about racial malice, with White Americans as the victims."
Re: TrumpReich in action
Carlson of course ignores the goings-on in Flint,Michigan and jackson,Mississippi.Rach3 wrote: ↑Tue Feb 21, 2023 12:45 pmFor those who dont watch Fox.
Greg Sargent
WAPO Feb.21 Op Ed
The fiery derailment of a freight train carrying hazardous chemicals in eastern Ohio is coming to represent bigger societal failures. It’s a story about profit-driven rail companies underinvesting in safety, lobbyists weakening rail regulation, and the government’s failure to assure residents’ security from lingering toxins.
But in certain right-wing media precincts, the disaster is about something else: A campaign of discrimination being waged against White people.
Re: TrumpReich in action
Part of a WPAO report today:
PHOENIX — Nearly a year after the 2020 election, Arizona’s then-attorney general Mark Brnovich launched an investigation into voting in the state’s largest county that quickly consumed more than 10,000 hours of his staff’s time.
Investigators prepared a report in March 2022 stating that virtually all claims of error and malfeasance were unfounded, according to internal documents reviewed by The Washington Post. Brnovich, a Republican, kept it private.
In April, the attorney general — who was running in the GOP primary for a U.S. Senate seat — released an “Interim Report” claiming that his office had discovered “serious vulnerabilities.” He left out edits from his own investigators refuting his assertions.
His office then compiled an “Election Review Summary” in September that systematically refuted accusations of widespread fraud and made clear that none of the complaining parties — from state lawmakers to self-styled “election integrity” groups — had presented any evidence to support their claims. Brnovich left office last month without releasing the summary.
That timeline emerges from documents released to The Post this week by Brnovich’s successor, Kris Mayes, a Democrat. She said she considered the taxpayer-funded investigation closed and, earlier this month, notified leaders on Maricopa County’s governing board that they were no longer in the state’s crosshairs.....
PHOENIX — Nearly a year after the 2020 election, Arizona’s then-attorney general Mark Brnovich launched an investigation into voting in the state’s largest county that quickly consumed more than 10,000 hours of his staff’s time.
Investigators prepared a report in March 2022 stating that virtually all claims of error and malfeasance were unfounded, according to internal documents reviewed by The Washington Post. Brnovich, a Republican, kept it private.
In April, the attorney general — who was running in the GOP primary for a U.S. Senate seat — released an “Interim Report” claiming that his office had discovered “serious vulnerabilities.” He left out edits from his own investigators refuting his assertions.
His office then compiled an “Election Review Summary” in September that systematically refuted accusations of widespread fraud and made clear that none of the complaining parties — from state lawmakers to self-styled “election integrity” groups — had presented any evidence to support their claims. Brnovich left office last month without releasing the summary.
That timeline emerges from documents released to The Post this week by Brnovich’s successor, Kris Mayes, a Democrat. She said she considered the taxpayer-funded investigation closed and, earlier this month, notified leaders on Maricopa County’s governing board that they were no longer in the state’s crosshairs.....
Re: TrumpReich in action
Iowa not the only Red State where the neo-Nazis are proposing similar. From IPR today:
"House Republicans are considering legislation to restrict gender-affirming medical care for transgender kids and teens. During a hearing held shortly after the announcement, Katie Imborek, co-director of the LGBTQ clinic at UIHC ( University of Iowa Health Care) said care for transgender minors follows guidelines from leading medical institutions and is done under the supervision of a team of medical professionals, and always with parental consent. When asked how her patients would be affected if there were laws preventing treatment, Imborek says she feels there could be devastating consequences.
A bill has advanced that would prohibit religious discrimination against adoption agencies. Conservative Christian groups that support the bill say it’s needed to protect those who run adoption agencies from having to violate their own religious beliefs, which includes being able to deny adoption or foster placements to same-sex couples.
Gov. Kim Reynolds’ version of a bill banning school curriculum and class instruction about gender identity is moving forward in the Iowa Senate. The wide-ranging bill (SSB 1145) bans discussion of gender identity and sexual activity in kindergarten through third grade. Reynolds’ proposal would also require any teacher or school worker to notify a parent if a child expresses a gender different from their sex at birth. Another bill (HF 367) would prohibit schools from disciplining teachers who call a student by something other than their preferred pronoun." ( Rach3: So alt.Right teachers have free license to humiliate youngsters.Such teachers will of course claim they are just "educating" and " fighting the Devil as God commands" .)
The article does not mention other bills that would extend the instruction ban thru 8th grade( about ages 12-14 ).
Sieg Heil !
"House Republicans are considering legislation to restrict gender-affirming medical care for transgender kids and teens. During a hearing held shortly after the announcement, Katie Imborek, co-director of the LGBTQ clinic at UIHC ( University of Iowa Health Care) said care for transgender minors follows guidelines from leading medical institutions and is done under the supervision of a team of medical professionals, and always with parental consent. When asked how her patients would be affected if there were laws preventing treatment, Imborek says she feels there could be devastating consequences.
A bill has advanced that would prohibit religious discrimination against adoption agencies. Conservative Christian groups that support the bill say it’s needed to protect those who run adoption agencies from having to violate their own religious beliefs, which includes being able to deny adoption or foster placements to same-sex couples.
Gov. Kim Reynolds’ version of a bill banning school curriculum and class instruction about gender identity is moving forward in the Iowa Senate. The wide-ranging bill (SSB 1145) bans discussion of gender identity and sexual activity in kindergarten through third grade. Reynolds’ proposal would also require any teacher or school worker to notify a parent if a child expresses a gender different from their sex at birth. Another bill (HF 367) would prohibit schools from disciplining teachers who call a student by something other than their preferred pronoun." ( Rach3: So alt.Right teachers have free license to humiliate youngsters.Such teachers will of course claim they are just "educating" and " fighting the Devil as God commands" .)
The article does not mention other bills that would extend the instruction ban thru 8th grade( about ages 12-14 ).
Sieg Heil !
Re: TrumpReich in action
The GOP loonies get right to work : https://wapo.st/3EQQ5Hu
Re: TrumpReich in action
The treasonous clown show unfolds : https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-sho ... -rcna73252
Re: TrumpReich in action
WAPO today on Fox' Carlson edited Jan.6 tapes:
" But some Republicans in the House cheered Carlson’s version of events. Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) appeared on the show Monday night, telling the host: “You’ve exposed so many lies tonight with these tapes.”
Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.), a member of McCarthy’s leadership team, tweeted Tuesday: “The Democrats’ dishonest narrative is being demolished. The January 6th Committee was nothing more than a scam, with the sole purpose of smearing President Trump and his supporters,” with a link to an article about Carlson’s coverage of Chansley.
And the official House Republican Twitter account promoted video from the show, using red alarm emoji and all caps, saying “MUST WATCH.”
" But some Republicans in the House cheered Carlson’s version of events. Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) appeared on the show Monday night, telling the host: “You’ve exposed so many lies tonight with these tapes.”
Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.), a member of McCarthy’s leadership team, tweeted Tuesday: “The Democrats’ dishonest narrative is being demolished. The January 6th Committee was nothing more than a scam, with the sole purpose of smearing President Trump and his supporters,” with a link to an article about Carlson’s coverage of Chansley.
And the official House Republican Twitter account promoted video from the show, using red alarm emoji and all caps, saying “MUST WATCH.”
Re: TrumpReich in action
GOP turns out the lights in Georgia , "deliverance" of justice:
https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/08/politics ... index.html
https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/08/politics ... index.html
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