The Wires
powered by Surfing Waves
Help!

To keep the Conversation going, please help me by linking news articles, opinion pieces and other political content in today's Comments section.

Link Code:   <a href="URL">text</a>

OR here's a link generator. The one I had posted died, but Akhilleus found this new one that he says is easy to use.

OR you can always just block, copy and paste to your comment the URL (Web address) of the page you want to link.

Note for Readers. It is not possible for commenters to "throw" their highlighted links to another window. But you can do that yourself. Right-click on the link and a drop-down box will give you choices as to where you want to open the link: in a new tab, new window or new private window.

Thank you to everyone who has been contributing links to articles & other content in the Comments section of each day's "Conversation." If you're missing the comments, you're missing some vital links.

The New York Times lists Emmy winners. The AP has an overview story here.

New York Times: “Hvaldimir, a beluga whale who had captured the public’s imagination since 2019 after he was spotted wearing a harness seemingly designed for a camera, was found dead on Saturday in Norway, according to a nonprofit that worked to protect the whale.... [Hvaldimir] was wearing a harness that identified it as “equipment” from St. Petersburg. There also appeared to be a camera mount. Some wondered if the whale was on a Russian reconnaissance mission. Russia has never claimed ownership of the whale. If Hvaldimir was a spy, he was an exceptionally friendly one. The whale showed signs of domestication, and was comfortable around people. He remained in busier waters than are typical for belugas....” ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Oh, Lord, do not let Bobby Kennedy, Jr., near that carcass. ~~~

     ~~~ AP Update: “There’s no evidence that a well-known beluga whale that lived off Norway’s coast and whose harness ignited speculation it was a Russian spy was shot to death last month as claimed by animal rights groups, Norwegian police said Monday.... Police said that the Norwegian Veterinary Institute conducted a preliminary autopsy on the animal, which was become known as 'Hvaldimir,' combining the Norwegian word for whale — hval — and the first name of Russian President Vladimir Putin. 'There are no findings from the autopsy that indicate that Hvaldimir has been shot,' police said in a statement.”

New York Times: Botswana's “President Mokgweetsi Masisi grinned as he lifted the diamond, a 2,492-carat stone that is the biggest diamond unearthed in more than a century and the second-largest ever found, according to the Vancouver-based mining operator Lucara, which owns the mine where it was found. This exceptional discovery could bring back the luster of the natural diamond mining industry, mining companies and experts say. The diamond was discovered in the same relatively small mine in northeastern Botswana that has produced several of the largest such stones in living memory. Such gemstones typically surface as a result of volcanic activity.... The diamond will likely sell in the range of tens of millions of dollars....”

Click on photo to enlarge.

~~~ Guardian: "On a distant reef 16,000km from Paris, surfer Gabriel Medina has given Olympic viewers one of the most memorable images of the Games yet, with an airborne celebration so well poised it looked too good to be true. The Brazilian took off a thundering wave at Teahupo’o in Tahiti on Monday, emerging from a barrelling section before soaring into the air and appearing to settle on a Pacific cloud, pointing to the sky with biblical serenity, his movements mirrored precisely by his surfboard. The shot was taken by Agence France-Presse photographer Jérôme Brouillet, who said “the conditions were perfect, the waves were taller than we expected”. He took the photo while aboard a boat nearby, capturing the surreal image with such accuracy that at first some suspected Photoshop or AI." 

Washington Post: “'Mary Cassatt at Work' is a large and mostly satisfying exhibition devoted to the career of the great American artist beloved for her sensitive and often sentimental views of family life. The 'at work' in the title of the Philadelphia Museum of Art show references the curators’ interest in Cassatt’s pioneering effort to establish herself as a professional artist within a male-dominated field. Throughout the show, which includes some 130 paintings, pastels, prints and drawings, the wall text and the art on view stresses Cassatt’s fixation on art as a career rather than a pastime.... Mary Cassatt at Work is on view at the Philadelphia Museum of Art through Sept. 8. philamuseum.org”

New York Times: “Bob Newhart, who died on Thursday at the age of 94, has been such a beloved giant of popular culture for so long that it’s easy to forget how unlikely it was that he became one of the founding fathers of stand-up comedy. Before basically inventing the hit stand-up special, with the 1960 Grammy-winning album 'The Button-Down Mind of Bob Newhart' — that doesn’t even count his pay-per-view event broadcast on Canadian television that some cite as the first filmed special — he was a soft-spoken accountant who had never done a set in a nightclub. That he made a classic with so little preparation is one of the great miracles in the history of comedy.... Bob Newhart holds up. In fact, it’s hard to think of a stand-up from that era who is a better argument against the commonplace idea that comedy does not age well.”

Washington Post: “An early Titian masterpiece — once looted by Napolean’s troops and a part of royal collections for centuries — caused a stir when it was stolen from the home of a British marquess in 1995. Seven years later, it was found inside an unassuming white and blue plastic bag at a bus stop in southwest London by an art detective, and returned. This week, the oil painting 'The Rest on the Flight into Egypt' sold for more than $22 million at Christie’s. It was a record for the Renaissance artist, whom museums describe as the greatest painter of 16th-century Venice. Ahead of the sale in April, the auction house billed it as 'the most important work by Titian to come to the auction market in more than a generation.'”

Washington Post: The Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, D.C., which houses the world's largest collection of Shakespeare material, has undergone a major renovation. "The change to the building is pervasive, both subtle and transformational."

Contact Marie

Click on this link to e-mail Marie.

Page Links

Constant Comments

A nation of sheep will beget a government of wolves. -- Edward R. Murrow

Publisher & Editor: Marie Burns


Thursday
Jun092022

June 10, 2022

Afternoon Update:

Dominick Mastrangelo & Rebecca Beitsch of the Hill: "A former top editor at Fox News said on Friday that he has been called to testify next week before the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. Chris Stirewalt, who was ousted from the network following the 2020 presidential election and is now a political editor at NewsNation, said the committee had requested his testimony during its next hearing on Monday.... Stirewalt was part of the team at Fox News that made the decision to call Arizona for Joe Biden on election night 2020, a move that infuriated former President Trump and his top aides, some of whom reportedly complained directly to Fox leadership about the relatively early race call."

MSNBC is reporting on-air that Jeffrey Rosen, Trump's acting attorney general, who refused to go along with Trump's scheme to decertify electors in states Biden narrowly won, has agreed to testify before the House committee on January 6. Speaking of fake elector schemes: ~~~

~~~ Ginni Blasts Emails. Emma Brown of the Washington Post: "Virginia 'Ginni' Thomas, the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, pressed 29 Republican state lawmakers in Arizona -- 27 more than previously known -- to set aside Joe Biden's popular vote victory and 'choose' presidential electors, according to emails obtained by The Washington Post.... On Nov. 9, she sent identical emails to 20 members of the Arizona House and seven Arizona state senators. That represents more than half of the Republican members of the state legislature at the time. The message, just days after media organizations called the race for Biden in Arizona and nationwide, urged lawmakers to 'stand strong in the face of political and media pressure' and claimed that the responsibility to choose electors was 'yours and yours alone.'... On Dec. 13, the day before members of the electoral college were slated to cast their votes and seal Biden's victory, Thomas emailed 22 House members and one senator. 'Before you choose your state's Electors ... consider what will happen to the nation we all love if you don't stand up and lead,' the email said."

Trump Blasts Ivanka. Kristen Holmes of CNN: "A day after the House January 6 committee revealed previously unseen video of ... Donald Trump's daughter and senior adviser, Ivanka Trump, saying she accepted then-Attorney General Bill Barr's statement that the Justice Department found no fraud sufficient to overturn the election, the former President is responding... 'Ivanka Trump was not involved in looking at, or studying, Election results. She had long since checked out and was, in my opinion, only trying to be respectful to Bill Barr and his position as Attorney General (he sucked!),' Trump wrote on his social media platform, Truth Social."

Philip Bump of the Washington Post has some thoughts on Fox "News" "coverage" of Thursday's Jan. 6 committee hearing: "The hearing began just as Tucker Carlson's show kicked off, and few people in America have been more energetically engaged than Carlson in casting the Jan. 6 riot as not worthy of discussion. Or as largely innocuous, save for some vandalism. Or maybe it's a government false flag aimed at casting Republicans as racists or something. Rhetorical consistency is not Carlson's strength, but that is happily for him not a limitation for his job."

Dan Morse of the Washington Post provides some new details on how Nicholas Roske abandoned his plan to murder Justice Brett Kavanaugh, then turn the gun on himself.

Zeke Miller of the AP: "The Biden administration is lifting its requirement that international air travelers to the U.S. take a COVID-19 test within a day before boarding their flights, easing one of the last remaining government mandates meant to contain the spread of the coronavirus. A senior administration official said Friday that the mandate will expire Sunday at 12:01 a.m. EDT, adding that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention determined it is no longer necessary."

~~~~~~~~~~

Marie: I don't know about you, but I feel just gutted. ~~~

The violence was no accident. It represents Trump's last stand, most desperate chance to halt the transfer of power. -- Rep. Bennie Thompson (R-Miss.), Chair of the House January 6 committee ~~~

~~~ Peter Baker of the New York Times: "In the entire 246-year history of the United States, there was surely never a more damning indictment presented against an American president than outlined on Thursday night in a cavernous congressional hearing room where the future of democracy felt on the line.... The case against Donald J. Trump mounted by the bipartisan House committee investigating the ... attack on the Capitol described not just a rogue president but a would-be autocrat willing to shred the Constitution to hang onto power at all costs.... Most incriminating were the words of Mr. Trump's own advisers and appointees, played over video.... [Rep. Liz] Ms. Cheney [R-Wy.] pulled together the committee's central findings in relentless, prosecutorial fashion.... Ms. Cheney ... reported that in the wake of the Jan. 6 attack, members of Mr. Trump's own cabinet discussed invoking the 25th Amendment to remove the president from office.... And she noted that while [Mike] Pence repeatedly took action to summon help to stop the mob on Jan. 6, the president himself made no such effort. Instead, his White House chief of staff, Mark Meadows, tried to convince Gen. Mark A. Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, to pretend that Mr. Trump was actively involved.... As she previewed the story that will be told in the weeks to come, Ms. Cheney all but wrote the script for [Attorney General Merrick] Garland." ~~~

~~~ Mike DeBonis of the Washington Post: "Thursday's prime-time congressional hearing -- the first from the select House committee established to investigate the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol -- was like none Capitol Hill had ever seen. Far from a dry examination of established facts or a bare-knuckle partisan throwdown, the presentation Thursday was carefully calibrated to tell a story.... After House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) moved to strike some Republican appointees to the special committee, Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) opted to pull out entirely. So while most congressional hearings on sharply partisan matters give viewers competing arguments on the matter at hand, [Chair Bennie] Thompson, [Vice Chair Liz] Cheney and their fellow panel members were free to weave a seamless narrative....

Capitol Police officer Caroline Edwards recounted her harrowing experience on Jan. 6 as one of the first cops overrun on the Capitol's West Front.... Her appearance Thursday -- blond, blue-eyed and perfectly composed -- stood in devastating contrast to video shown moments later, of a rioter savagely flinging her into a concrete staircase and knocking her unconscious. Edwards described coming to, getting up and rejoining the fight, later finding herself behind a battle line watching a 'war scene' unfold. 'I was slipping in people's blood,' she said. 'It was carnage. It was chaos.'" ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Let us pause to acknowledge that we own Kevin McCarthy our thanks. It was his stupid moves, first to oppose a bipartisan commission, then to select dunderheads like Jim Jordan for the committee, then to pull out altogether, that allowed for this extraordinary hearing to go forward unfettered by the harangues of the insurrection's defenders & apologists. ~~~

     ~~~ An AP story, by Farnoush Amiri, on Caroline Edwards' testimony is here.

Jan. 6 was the culmination of an attempted coup, a brazen attempt, as one rioter put it shortly after Jan. 6, to overthrow the government. The violence was no accident. -- Chairman Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.), committee hearing Thursday ~~~

~~~ Lisa Mascaro, et al., of the AP: "The House panel investigating the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol laid the blame firmly on Donald Trump Thursday night, saying the assault was hardly spontaneous but an 'attempted coup' and a direct result of the defeated president's effort to overturn the 2020 election. With a never-before-seen 12-minute video of extremist groups leading the deadly siege and startling testimony from Trump's most inner circle, the 1/6 committee provided gripping detail in contending that Trump's repeated lies about election fraud and his public effort to stop Joe Biden's victory led to the attack and imperiled American democracy[.]"

The New York Times is live-updating the hearing of the January 6 committee here: "The Democratic and Republican leaders of the House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, riot began laying out on Thursday evening what they described as a methodical conspiracy, led and coordinated by ... Donald J. Trump, to remain in power, which culminated in the worst attack on the Capitol since 1814. The committee's chairman, Representative Bennie Thompson, Democrat of Mississippi, and its vice chairman, Liz Cheney, Republican of Wyoming, used a multimedia presentation that relied on the videotaped testimony of Trump loyalists, including the former attorney general, William P. Barr, the former president's daughter Ivanka Trump, and a longtime aide and spokesman Jason Miller." ~~~

     ~~~ ABC News' live updates are here.

The video timeline of the attack, which was presented at the hearing:

Rep. Liz Cheney's opening remarks, which laid out the committee's case:

I say this to my Republican colleagues who are defending the indefensible. There will come a day when Donald Trump is gone, but your dishonor will remain. --Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wy.), opening statement ~~~

~~~ Dana Milbank of the Washington Post: Liz Cheney "outlined for the country, and for history, two contrasting stories about the bloody insurrection. One was a tale of honor and duty. Officials in the Justice Department and White House, to a greater extent than was previously known, confronted Trump about his election lies and repeatedly threatened to resign if he followed through with his darkest impulses. The other was a tale of brutality and deceit by Trump and a small band of loyalists. They knew he had lost, and yet, as Cheney put it, 'Trump oversaw and coordinated a sophisticated, seven-part plan to overturn the presidential election and prevent the transfer of presidential power.'... 'Aware of the rioters' chants to hang Mike Pence, the president responded with this sentiment, quote, "Maybe our supporters have the right idea." Mike Pence, quote, "deserves it."'"

Maggie Haberman of the New York Times: "In brief video clips, Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump appeared [via video clips] in the first of a half-dozen public hearings held by the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.... In his video he was pressed by Representative Liz Cheney ... about whether he was aware that the White House counsel, Pat A. Cipollone, had been threatening to resign because Mr. Trump was making increasingly outlandish efforts to stay in power.... [Kushner said] that he knew that Mr. Cipollone and 'the team were always saying, "Oh we are going to resign, we are not going to be there if this happens, if that happens." So I kind of took it up to just be whining, to be honest with you.'... Mr. Kushner's words enraged Mr. Cipollone’s former colleagues, many of whom traded messages as they complained to reporters and one another ... that the former president's son-in-law was 'arrogant.'.... According to more than a half-dozen former Trump advisers..., neither [Ivanka nor Jared] made much of an effort to pull Mr. Trump away from his obsession with staying in power. Instead, they left that task to the paid staff, who in turn kept waiting for the family to intervene more aggressively."

Emily Brooks & Rebecca Beitsch of the Hill: "Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pa.) was one of 'multiple' GOP lawmakers who asked President Trump for pardons given their roles in seeking to unwind the 2020 election results, the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol said in its first hearing Thursday night.... 'As you will see, Representative Perry contacted the White House in the weeks after January 6th to seek a presidential pardon. Multiple other Republican congressmen also sought presidential pardons for their roles in attempting to overturn the 2020 election,' [Rep. Liz] Cheney said. Perry's office forcefully denied the allegation....'Laughable, ludicrous, and a thoroughly soulless lie,' [Perry's spokesman] told The Hill." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: After the hearing, Manu Raju of CNN said on-air that he had spoken to committee chair Bennie Thompson, who said the committee had the receipts -- which they would present in a future hearing -- on Perry and others. On MSNBC, Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), a committee member & former prosecutor, said that requesting a preemptive pardon was evidence of consciousness of guilt.

MEANWHILE. Annals of "Journalism," Ha Ha Ha. Igor Derysh of Salon: "Fox News was the only news network not to carry the first day of the Jan. 6 committee hearings as its hosts repeatedly trashed the two-hour hearing without providing their audience any of the content.... At one point, as the committee showed damning footage of the violence in the Capitol, Fox News cut away from its side graphic showing the hearing to a panned-out shot of the hearing room.... 'This is the only hour on an American news channel that will not be carrying their propaganda live,' [Tucker] Carlson said. 'They are lying and we are not going to help them do it. What we will do instead is try to tell you the truth.'... "Fox is desperate to keep its viewers from switching to another channel and seeing the hearing in real time,' [Media Matters' Matt] Gertz tweeted.... Sean Hannity also did not air any of the hearing, describing it as the 'dullest, the most boring -- there's absolutely nothing new -- multi-hour Democratic fundraiser masquerading as a Jan. 6 hearing.' After the hearing wrapped up, Hannity declared that the 'one person that looks good is Donald Trump.'"

Betsy Swan of Politico: "Cassidy Hutchinson -- a top aide to former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows during the Trump era — has parted ways with her lawyer and brought on new representation. Her new lawyer, Jody Hunt of Alston Bird, confirmed the move to Politico. The change in counsel signals an increased willingness from Hutchinson to cooperate fully with the Jan. 6 select committee's probe, according to a person familiar with her thinking. The panel has signaled that it views her as a key witness. Hutchinson's former attorney, Stefan Passantino, has deep Trump World connections. Her new lawyer, Jody Hunt, is a longtime close ally of Jeff Sessions and served as his chief of staff when the former attorney general enraged Trump by recusing from the Russia probe." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Michael Balsamo of the AP: "In a court filing, the Justice Department alleged that [Trump economic advisor Peter] Navarro lied to the judge and to members of the media by claiming he was told he couldn't call a lawyer and that he was denied food and water while being held for several hours after his arrest on Friday.... [An] The FBI report said Navarro was given a bottle of water, chocolate, nuts and dried fruits about an hour after he was arrested at the airport. Navarro 'was asked if he wanted anything else to eat or drink which he declined,' the report said." While still at the airport where Navarro was arrested, the FBI report said agents offered to call Navarro's attorney for him. However, Navarro told the judge he did not have an attorney. Appearing later on Tucker Carlson's show, Navarro said, "Next thing I know, I'm in leg irons, handcuffs and strip-searched.... People do not want to sit in solitary confinement in leg irons, denied food, denied water, denied an attorney...." ~~~

     ~~~ Kyle Cheney, et al., of Politico: "Former Trump administration official Peter Navarro called the FBI agents who arrested him 'Nazis,' according to Justice Department documents filed Thursday in court accusing Navarro of repeatedly lying about the conditions of his arrest.... 'NAVARRO made statements to the effect that the arresting agents were "kind Nazis' and "how could you live with yourselves?"'" The FBI report mentions that Navarro was handcuffed, but makes no mention of placing him in leg irons, which Navarro has asserted they did.

Bryan Schott of the Salt Lake Tribune: "Leaked text messages between Utah Sen. Mike Lee and former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows suggest Lee was a participant in the plot to keep Donald Trump in office, a charge Lee vehemently disputes. Recently released court documents could prove problematic for Lee's defense.... His text messages with [White House Chief of Staff Mark] Meadows make repeated references to alternate electors in the run-up to Jan. 6.... On December 8, Lee texted Meadows, 'If a very small handful of states were to have their legislatures appoint alternative slates of delegates, there could be a path.'... On Jan. 3, 2021, Lee texted Meadows several times, stressing the need for action by state legislators. 'Everything changes, of course, if the swing states submit competing slates of electors pursuant to state law, Lee wrote in one message. 'Again, all of this could change if the states in question certified Trump electors pursuant to state law,' Lee texted later. The next day, Lee texted Meadows, claiming he was 'spending 14 hours a day' working on electoral objections.... Lee has repeatedly claimed he was [merely] investigating 'rumors' that states were considering appointing Trump electors...." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Robert Snell, et al., of the Detroit News: "FBI agents arrested [Michigan] Republican gubernatorial candidate Ryan Kelley on misdemeanor charges related to the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol. The arrest and search unfolding at Kelley's home in Allendale add more uncertainty to a chaotic race for governor that has seen several Republican candidates blocked from the ballot for submitting fraudulent nominating petition signatures. Kelley, 40, is expected to make an initial appearance later Thursday in federal court in Grand Rapids. Prosecutors filed four charges against Kelley.... Federal court records describe Kelley as being an active participant in the riot, climbing onto portions of the Capitol, encouraging yelling, gesturing to participants and removing a covering from a temporary structure outside the Capitol.... Kelley unwittingly helped FBI investigators by wearing identical clothing to various rallies and marches in the first few months of the pandemic in 2020." Read on. MB: Besides needing a more extensive wardrobe, the guy is a real nutjob. I just hope his arrest today doesn't mean he'll have to miss watching the Jan. 6 hearing tonight. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~

     ~~~ Update. The Washington Post report, by Spencer Hsu & others, is here: "Kelley was released from custody Thursday afternoon after a brief initial appearance in federal court before U.S. Magistrate Judge Sally J. Berens of Grand Rapids, Mich." MB: So my worries yesterday, that he would miss watching his traitorist self in teevee footage Thursday night, have been allayed.

Ryan Reilly of NBC News: "A D.C. chiropractor who stormed the halls of Congress on Jan. 6 was arrested on federal charges Wednesday as FBI special agents descended on his office just blocks from the Capitol. A source familiar with the case confirmed to NBC News the arrest of David Walls-Kaufman of the Capitol Hill Chiropractic Center.... Walls-Kaufman faces four misdemeanor charges in connection with the Jan. 6 attack.... The FBI affidavit in Walls-Kaufman's case includes surveillance images that the bureau snapped of the chiropractor in October. The FBI said he was spotted on 'approximately nine different U.S. Capitol security cameras, and approximately twenty Metropolitan Police Department body worn cameras on January 6, 2021.'" MB: That guy should have been realigning his head instead of other people's bones.


Elliott Spagat & Chris Megherian of the AP: "President Joe Biden and other Western Hemisphere leaders are set to announce on Friday what is being billed as a roadmap for countries to host large numbers of migrants and refugees. 'The Los Angeles Declaration' is perhaps the biggest achievement of the Summit of the Americas.... A set of principles to be announced Friday on the summit's final day includes legal pathways to enter countries, aid to communities most affected by migration, humane border management and coordinated emergency responses, according to a senior U.S. official who briefed reporters ahead of an official announcement. It is a blueprint already being followed to a large extent by Colombia and Ecuador, whose right-leaning leaders were warmly greeted at the summit for welcoming many of the 6 million people who have left Venezuela in recent years.”

Amanda Seitz of the AP: "White nationalists and supremacists, on accounts often run by young men, are building thriving, macho communities across social media platforms like Instagram, Telegram and TikTok, evading detection with coded hashtags and innuendo. Their snarky memes and trendy videos are riling up thousands of followers on divisive issues, like abortion, guns, immigration and LGTBQ rights. The Department of Homeland Security warned Tuesday that such skewed framing of the subjects could drive extremists to violently attack public places across the U.S. in the coming months. These type of threats and racist ideology have become so commonplace on social media that it's nearly impossible for law enforcement to separate internet ramblings from dangerous, potentially violent people, Michael German, who infiltrated white supremacy groups as an FBI agent, told the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday."

Child Sacrifice. GOP Voters: Guns Are More Important than Children. Philip Bump of the Washington Post: In a recent Marist poll, "Respondents were asked which they felt was more important: protecting gun rights or controlling gun violence.... Overall, Americans were more likely to say that controlling gun violence is more important, 59 to 35 percent. Among gun owners, as you might expect, protecting gun rights was the majority position, although only barely.... Democrats said that controlling gun violence was more important by a nearly 90-point margin. Independents said the same, more narrowly. Among Republicans, though, more than two-thirds said protecting gun ownership was more important -- a higher level of support than even among gun owners themselves." Emphasis added.

Marie's Sports Report. Tariq Panja of the New York Times: "The PGA Tour on Thursday said it had suspended the 17 players who have taken part in the first event of the Saudi-backed LIV Golf tour, a move that punished the rebel pros but also seemed aimed at dissuading further defections. In a memo sent to his membership, the PGA Tour's commissioner, Jay Monahan, said those golfers who teed off in the first LIV Golf event, which began Thursday outside London, were 'no longer eligible to participate' in events on the American-based tour or any of its affiliated tours. He also vowed to apply the same suspension to any pro who joins one of the rival tour's coming events. Ahead of the event at the Centurion Club, the majority of players who had signed on with LIV Golf, including Dustin Johnson, Louis Oosthuizen, Kevin Na and Sergio García, said they had resigned from the PGA Tour, perhaps to avoid a suspension or lifetime ban. But Monahan's letter said they faced excommunication anyway." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)"

Max Tani of Politico: "The Washington Post has fired Felicia Sonmez after the well-known reporter complained publicly about a perceived lack of institutional willingness to confront misogynistic treatment of female staffers. Sonmez's firing comes days after the paper suspended a fellow reporter, Dave Weigel, for a month after he retweeted a crude joke about women. Sonmez was highly critical of Weigel for the tweet, prompting WaPo Executive Editor Sally Buzbee to put out a memo encouraging staff members to treat one another with respect and kindness, including on social media platforms, and reminding staff that criticizing fellow employees was a violation of company policies.... But the infighting continued to spill out into public view from there." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~

     ~~~ Here's the Washington Post's story, by Paul Schwartzman & Jeremy Barr.


Adam Taylor of the Washington Post: "A team of scientists convened by the World Health Organization to better understand the origins of the coronavirus pandemic and possible future outbreaks has said a theory that the virus could have escaped from a laboratory needs 'further investigations.' However, in a report released Thursday, the WHO-backed team said it had not received any new data that would allow it to better evaluate that theory. Members of the group from Brazil, China and Russia objected to the calls for further investigation into the 'lab leak' theory. The report also said that available data suggests SARS-CoV-2 had a zoonotic origin, which means it spread between animals in a natural setting, but that neither the animal that infected humans nor the place where this infection occurred could be identified." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Beyond the Beltway

Louisiana. Jim Mustian & Jake Bleiberg of the AP: "The U.S. Justice Department is opening a sweeping civil rights investigation into the Louisiana State Police amid mounting evidence that the agency has a pattern of looking the other way in the face of beatings of mostly Black men, including the deadly 2019 arrest of Ronald Greene. The federal 'pattern-or-practice' probe announced Thursday followed an Associated Press investigation that found Greene's arrest was among at least a dozen cases over the past decade in which state police troopers or their bosses ignored or concealed evidence of beatings, deflected blame and impeded efforts to root out misconduct. Dozens of current and former troopers said the beatings were countenanced by a culture of impunity, nepotism and, in some cases, outright racism."

Montana Congressional Race. Hannah Knowles of the Washington Post: "Ryan Zinke, a former Trump administration official, is projected to win the GOP nomination for Montana's new U.S. House district, according to the Associated Press. Zinke, the Interior Department secretary during the Trump presidency, won the Republican nomination with Donald Trump's endorsement despite charges that he wasn't as conservative as some of the other candidates and that his wife's primary residence is in California. He will be heavily favored to win in November in a state Trump won by 16 points in 2020.... A former Navy SEAL officer and state senator, Zinke previously represented Montana in the House from 2015 to 2017, when he joined the Trump administration. He resigned as secretary of the Interior Department in December 2018 under pressure from the White House during probes into alleged misconduct in office. The Interior Department's inspector general had recently referred an inquiry to the Justice Department, which ultimately declined to bring charges. In a report released this year, the inspector general found that Zinke broke ethics rules while participating in real estate negotiations and lied to an ethics official."

New York Congressional Race. Nichols Fandos of the New York Times: "Carl P. Paladino, a Republican running for a House seat in Western New York, praised Adolf Hitler last year for inspiring his followers, describing the fascist dictator as 'the kind of leader we need today.'... 'He would get up there screaming these epithets and these people were just, they were hypnotized by him,' he said in [a radio] interview, resurfaced by the left-leaning watchdog group Media Matters. 'I guess, I guess that's the kind of leader we need today. We need somebody inspirational. We need somebody that is a doer.'" Paladino says he does not "support" Hitler.

Pennsylvania Senate Race. Robert Barnes of the Washington Post: "The Supreme Court on Thursday cleared the way for Pennsylvania to count mail-in primary ballots received by the Election Day deadline but lacked a state-required handwritten date on the return envelope. There are relatively few 'undated' ballots, though they could make a difference in tight races. But the sense of urgency surrounding the Supreme Court's action diminished last week, when Republican Senate candidate David McCormick conceded to rival Mehmet Oz. McCormick, who trailed Oz by less than 1,000 votes, sued to have the votes counted, and Pennsylvania's commonwealth court agreed. But there were not enough of the ballots to make a difference, McCormick decided.... The Supreme Court case also involves a judicial candidate in Lehigh County, who says counting the ballots threatens his lead in a close election. Three justices -- Clarence Thomas, Samuel A. Alito Jr. and Neil M. Gorsuch -- noted their dissents from the court's order."

Texas. David Goodman of the New York Times: "Heavily armed officers delayed confronting a gunman in Uvalde, Texas, for more than an hour even though supervisors at the scene had been told that some trapped with him in two elementary school classrooms needed medical treatment, a new review of video footage and other investigative material shows. Instead, the documents show, they waited for protective equipment to lower the risk to law enforcement officers.... There is no question that some of the victims were still alive and in desperate need of medical attention. One teacher died in an ambulance. Three children died at nearby hospitals, according to the documents." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: It doesn't take a genius or someone with police training to figure out that after a gunman has been heard firing shots into a classroom full of children, there will be some wounded and in need of medical attention. Besides, waiting for body armor sounds to me like a made-up excuse. According to previous reports, when the Border Patrol went in, they did so carrying ballistic shields. So at least some of the officers loitering in the hallway already had protective gear. ~~~

~~~ James Barragán & Zach Despart of the Texas Tribune: "Criticized by law enforcement experts for slowness in taking out the shooter, Pete Arredondo described an agonizing wait for a key that would work. In an interview with The Texas Tribune, he said he hadn't spoken out sooner because he didn't want to compound his hometown's grief or point blame.... When keys arrived, he tried dozens of them, but one by one they failed to work.... Texas Department of Public Safety officials and news outlets have reported that the shooter fired his gun at least two more times as police waited in the hallway outside the classrooms for more than an hour.... [Arredondo] said he never considered himself the scene's incident commander and did not give any instruction that police should not attempt to breach the building.... [Experts] said by running into the school with no key and no radios and failing to take charge of the situation, the chief appears to have contributed to a chaotic approach in which officers deployed inappropriate tactics, adopted a defensive posture, failed to coordinate their actions, and wasted precious time as students and teachers remained trapped in two classrooms with a gunman who continued to fire his rifle."

Way Beyond

Ukraine, et al.

The New York Times' live updates of developments Friday in Russia's war on Ukraine are here: "As his military suffers heavy losses in eastern Ukraine, President Volodymyr Zelensky and other Ukrainian leaders are stepping up their pleas for the quick delivery of heavy weapons to help them in the current battles and for deeper political integration into Europe for a greater sense of security when the war is over.... A day after ... Vladimir V. Putin compared himself to the 18th-century czar, Peter the Great, saying that he was engaged in a similar struggle to win back lands he sees as rightfully Russian, Mr. Zelensky said it was time to listen to the current Russian leader's threats and act swiftly.... Two Britons and a Moroccan who fought for Ukraine were sentenced to death on Thursday by a court in Russian-held eastern territory, the Russian news agency Interfax reported. The men were accused of being mercenaries." ~~~

     ~~~ Here's the New York Times' summary of developments Thursday.

News Lede

CNBC: "Inflation accelerated further in May, with prices rising 8.6% from a year ago for the fastest increase since December 1981, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Friday. The consumer price index, a wide-ranging measure of goods and services prices, increased even more than the 8.3% Dow Jones estimate. Excluding volatile food and energy prices, so-called core CPI was up 6%, slightly higher than the 5.9% estimate. On a monthly basis, headline CPI was up 1% while core rose 0.6%, compared with respective estimates of 0.7% and 0.5%."

Comments Off
Wednesday
Jun082022

June 9, 2022

Afternoon Update:

Bryan Schott of the Salt Lake Tribune: "Leaked text messages between Utah Sen. Mike Lee and former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows suggest Lee was a participant in the plot to keep Donald Trump in office, a charge Lee vehemently disputes. Recently released court documents could prove problematic for Lee's defense.... His text messages with [White House Chief of Staff Mark] Meadows make repeated references to alternate electors in the run-up to Jan. 6.... On December 8, Lee texted Meadows, 'If a very small handful of states were to have their legislatures appoint alternative slates of delegates, there could be a path.'... On Jan. 3, 2021, Lee texted Meadows several times, stressing the need for action by state legislators. 'Everything changes, of course, if the swing states submit competing slates of electors pursuant to state law, Lee wrote in one message. 'Again, all of this could change if the states in question certified Trump electors pursuant to state law,' Lee texted later. The next day, Lee texted Meadows, claiming he was 'spending 14 hours a day' working on electoral objections.... Lee has repeatedly claimed he was [merely] investigating 'rumors' that states were considering appointing Trump electors...."

Max Tani of Politico: "The Washington Post has fired Felicia Sonmez after the well-known reporter complained publicly about a perceived lack of institutional willingness to confront misogynistic treatment of female staffers. Sonmez's firing comes days after the paper suspended a fellow reporter, Dave Weigel, for a month after he retweeted a crude joke about women. Sonmez was highly critical of Weigel for the tweet, prompting WaPo Executive Editor Sally Buzbee to put out a memo encouraging staff members to treat one another with respect and kindness, including on social media platforms, and reminding staff that criticizing fellow employees was a violation of company policies.... But the infighting continued to spill out into public view from there."

Betsy Swan of Politico: "Cassidy Hutchinson -- a top aide to former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows during the Trump era — has parted ways with her lawyer and brought on new representation. Her new lawyer, Jody Hunt of Alston Bird, confirmed the move to Politico. The change in counsel signals an increased willingness from Hutchinson to cooperate fully with the Jan. 6 select committee's probe, according to a person familiar with her thinking. The panel has signaled that it views her as a key witness. Hutchinson's former attorney, Stefan Passantino, has deep Trump World connections. Her new lawyer, Jody Hunt, is a longtime close ally of Jeff Sessions and served as his chief of staff when the former attorney general enraged Trump by recusing from the Russia probe."

Robert Snell, et al., of the Detroit News: "FBI agents arrested [Michigan] Republican gubernatorial candidate Ryan Kelley on misdemeanor charges related to the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol. The arrest and search unfolding at Kelley's home in Allendale add more uncertainty to a chaotic race for governor that has seen several Republican candidates blocked from the ballot for submitting fraudulent nominating petition signatures. Kelley, 40, is expected to make an initial appearance later Thursday in federal court in Grand Rapids. Prosecutors filed four charges against Kelley.... Federal court records describe Kelley as being an active participant in the riot, climbing onto portions of the Capitol, encouraging yelling, gesturing to participants and removing a covering from a temporary structure outside the Capitol.... Kelley unwittingly helped FBI investigators by wearing identical clothing to various rallies and marches in the first few months of the pandemic in 2020." Read on. MB: Besides needing a more extensive wardrobe, the guy is a real nutjob. I just hope his arrest today doesn't mean he'll have to miss watching the Jan. 6 hearing tonight.

Adam Taylor of the Washington Post: "A team of scientists convened by the World Health Organization to better understand the origins of the coronavirus pandemic and possible future outbreaks has said a theory that the virus could have escaped from a laboratory needs 'further investigations.' However, in a report released Thursday, the WHO-backed team said it had not received any new data that would allow it to better evaluate that theory. Members of the group from Brazil, China and Russia objected to the calls for further investigation into the 'lab leak' theory. The report also said that available data suggests SARS-CoV-2 had a zoonotic origin, which means it spread between animals in a natural setting, but that neither the animal that infected humans nor the place where this infection occurred could be identified."

Marie's Sports Report. Tariq Panja of the New York Times: "The PGA Tour on Thursday said it had suspended the 17 players who have taken part in the first event of the Saudi-backed LIV Golf tour, a move that punished the rebel pros but also seemed aimed at dissuading further defections. In a memo sent to his membership, the PGA Tour's commissioner, Jay Monahan, said those golfers who teed off in the first LIV Golf event, which began Thursday outside London, were 'no longer eligible to participate' in events on the American-based tour or any of its affiliated tours. He also vowed to apply the same suspension to any pro who joins one of the rival tour's coming events. Ahead of the event at the Centurion Club, the majority of players who had signed on with LIV Golf, including Dustin Johnson, Louis Oosthuizen, Kevin Na and Sergio García, said they had resigned from the PGA Tour, perhaps to avoid a suspension or lifetime ban. But Monahan's letter said they faced excommunication anyway."

~~~~~~~~~~

Marie: Late start today. There's no late morning update because I posted about half of today's entries in more-or-less the late morning.

Luke Broadwater of the New York Times: "The House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the Capitol plans to open a landmark series of public hearings on Thursday by playing previously unreleased video of ... Donald J. Trump's top aides and family members testifying before its staff, as well as footage revealing the role of the Proud Boys, a right-wing extremist group, in the assault. Committee aides say the evidence will show that Mr. Trump was at the center of a 'coordinated, multi-step effort to overturn the results of the 2020 election' that resulted in a mob of his supporters storming the halls of Congress.... 'We'll demonstrate the multipronged effort to overturn a presidential election, how one strategy to subvert the election led to another, culminating in a violent attack on our democracy,' said Representative Adam B. Schiff, Democrat of California and a member of the committee."

** Alan Feuer, et al., of the New York Times: &"... Jan. 6 has ... become a somewhat misleading shorthand for something bigger: a monthslong campaign by [Donald] Trump and his allies to subvert American democracy and cling to power by reversing an election.... At its heart is a grievance-filled, insecure president, unable to face the fact of his defeat, working with a cabal of loyalists in and out of government to pursue an evolving plan that unfolded in successive chapters, each in effect taking aim at a pillar of democracy. There was a failed legal strategy that clogged the courts with fantastical conspiracy theories. It was followed by a plot to twist the Justice Department into backing Mr. Trump's repeated lie that the election had been rigged and stolen from him, and consideration of proposals that he direct the military or the Homeland Security Department to seize voting machines. Those were followed by a strong-armed attempt to subvert the Electoral College process and bludgeon Mr. Pence into taking part, all leading to the violent effort to keep Congress from formally affirming Mr. Trump's loss on Jan. 6. Taken as a whole, the narrative that has emerged -- elements of which the House select committee on Jan. 6 will begin setting out on Thursday evening in the first of a series of hearings -- is as chilling as it is audacious." This is a long, multi-part narrative that summarizes what we know through public reporting.

Zach Montague of the New York Times: "The House committee that has spent nearly a year investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol and the events that led up to it will hold a public hearing on Thursday evening to begin setting out its findings.... The committee will begin the session at 8 p.m. Eastern time on Thursday.... The committee's next hearing is scheduled for Monday at 10 a.m. The panel has yet to announce dates and times for subsequent sessions, but it is expected to hold two more next week and others the following week."

Emma Hurt & Andrew Solender of Axios: "Georgia election officials Brad Raffensperger and Gabriel Sterling are in talks to testify at one of the House Jan. 6 committee's public hearings.... Raffensperger, Georgia's Republican secretary of state, and Sterling, the chief operating officer for Raffensperger's office, resisted Trump's entreaties and publicly debunked his claims the election was stolen.... The two would testify together as part of a panel."

Kyle Cheney of Politico: "Gregory Jacob, a top adviser to former Vice President Mike Pence, will testify publicly before the Jan. 6 select committee on June 16.... Jacob's appearance will be under subpoena, according to a person familiar with the panel's schedule. Jacob, who helped Pence fend off efforts by Trump attorney John Eastman to single-handedly disrupt the transition of power to President Joe Biden, testified at length before the House's Capitol riot investigators in February.... Jacob was instrumental in preparing Pence for the showdown with Eastman, preparing a memo on Dec. 7, 2020, outlining his initial interpretation of the role of the vice president in counting electoral votes. Over the next month, Pence and Jacob worked closely with the House and Senate parliamentarians and ultimately concluded that Pence did not have the authority that Eastman and Trump claimed."

Betsy Swan of Politico: "As ... Donald Trump left a rally with his supporters on Jan. 6, 2021, he appears to have held out hope until the last minute -- even as chaos unfolded -- that he'd be able to join them at the Capitol. Trump even raised the prospect privately with the head of his Secret Service detail at the time, Robert Engel, according to a person familiar with the agent's congressional testimony. Engel rode with Trump in the presidential armored car called 'The Beast' back to the White House after the Ellipse rally that preceded that day's violent riot. Engel told Jan. 6 select committee investigators that the two men discussed Trump's desire to go to the Capitol and took different views on the topic.... [Engel's] testimony shows just how much Trump wanted to be at the Capitol with his backers as Congress voted to certify his Electoral College loss to Joe Biden. And he expressed his desire to join the protesters even as violence was unfolding."

That Was Then, This Is Now. Mary Jalonick of the AP: "Most every Republican lawmaker expressed outrage in the days after the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. Some even blamed ... Donald Trump. But the larger GOP narrative shifted in the weeks and months that followed. Republican House leader Kevin McCarthy, who had said in the hours after the attack that it had been 'the saddest day I have ever had serving as a member of this institution,' went on to visit Trump at his Florida home only weeks after the riot.... [Here's] a look at comments from key Republicans in the year-and-a half since the attack as the House committee investigating the riot prepares to begin public hearings Thursday night." ~~~

~~~ Kevin, Then and Now:

Say, Maybe That Insurrection Was Just a False Flag! Alex Rogers & Maju Raju of CNN: "Blake Masters, the Republican Senate candidate from Arizona, met with conservative activists at a Phoenix IHOP this spring ... [where he] floated the conspiracy theory that the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol actually may have been a false-flag operation set up by the FBI, according to a recording of the March 30 meeting obtained by CNN. 'Don't we suspect that like one-third of the people outside of the Capitol complex on January 6 were actual FBI agents hanging out,' Masters asked.... 'What did people know and when did they know it? We got to get to the bottom of this.'... In January, Masters joined Trump at a rally in Arizona, where the former President asked, 'Exactly how many of those present at the Capitol complex on January 6 were FBI confidential informants, agents or otherwise working directly or indirectly with an agency of the United States government?'... Masters is part of a wave of Republicans who have won the coveted endorsement of ... Donald Trump after parroting his false claims that the 2020 election was stolen and downplaying the actions of the pro-Trump mob that attacked the Capitol last year.... "


Amy Wang & Theodoric Meyer of the Washington Post: "President Biden made his first in-studio appearance on a late-night talk show Wednesday, discussing gun control and a range of other issues with host Jimmy Kimmel in Los Angeles." ~~~

Annie Karni & Catie Edmondson of the New York Times: "The House on Wednesday voted nearly along party lines to bar the sale of semiautomatic weapons to people under the age of 21 and ban the sale of large-capacity magazines, acting as traumatized parents of victims and survivors of mass shootings made wrenching appeals for Congress to act on gun violence.... Several hours earlier, parents of one of the children killed [in Uvalde, Texas,] and an 11-year-old who survived addressed a House committee to drive home the stakes of the issue. Though the bill passed 223 to 204, it stands no chance in the evenly divided Senate, where solid Republican opposition means it cannot draw the 60 votes needed to break through a filibuster and move forward. Bipartisan negotiations in the Senate continued among a small group of Republicans and Democrats on more modest measures that might actually have a chance of drawing sufficient backing. But one crucial player, Senator John Cornyn, Republican of Texas, warned that there were 'sticking points everywhere.'" ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: I'm sure every House Democrat realizes that passing this bill is akin to tilting at windmills. But passage of the bill also is proof to the American people that if they don't want to risk having a teenager blast off their heads, they had better vote Democratic.

Devlin Barrett, et al., of the Washington Post: "A man with a gun and a knife was detained by police early Wednesday morning near Brett M. Kavanaugh's Maryland home after making threats against the Supreme Court justice, according to federal officials. According to a criminal complaint charging Nicholas John Roske with attempted murder of a federal judge, two U.S. Deputy Marshals spotted Roske get out of a cab in front of Kavanaugh's home at approximately 1:05 a.m. He looked at the marshals and then walked down the street. Not long after, Montgomery County got the call from Roske saying he was suicidal and came to kill Kavanaugh. Montgomery County Police Department officers were dispatched and arrested Roske without incident while he was still on the phone with 911, according to the affidavit. In his suitcase and backpack were a Glock 17 with two magazines and ammunition, pepper spray, a tactical knife, a hammer, a screwdriver, a crow bar, zip ties and duct tape, along with other gear. After his arrest, according to the affidavit, Roske told police he was upset over the leaked draft of an opinion that would overturn the constitutional right to abortion and also over the recent school shooting in Uvalde, Tex. He thought Kavanaugh would support looser gun laws." The story has been updated. NPR's story is here. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~

     ~~~ A later-written New York Times story is here: "Mr. Roske appeared in U.S. District Court in Maryland on Wednesday afternoon before Magistrate Judge Timothy J. Sullivan, who ordered that he be detained pending a later court hearing."

Michael Balsamo of the AP: "The Justice Department has named a team of nine people, including an FBI official and former police chiefs, to aid in a review of the law enforcement response to the Uvalde, Texas, elementary school shooting that left 19 children and two teachers dead. Attorney General Merrick Garland announced the team during a meeting in his office in Washington on Wednesday. The critical incident review is being led by the Justice Department's Office of Community Oriented Policing Services. The review will include an examination of police policies, training and communication, along with the deployment of officers and tactics, the Justice Department said. It will also examine who was in command of the incident and how police prepared for potential active-shooter incidents." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~

     ~~~ Lawrence O'Donnell of MSNBC has claimed that Texas Gov. Greg Abbott is using the FBI review as an excuse for a prolonged cover-up of what happened in Uvalde. Abbott has apparently said he cannot make public any more findings until all investigations, including the DOJ review, are complete. O'Donnell points out that the DOJ review is not a true investigation and the panel cannot demand cooperation or bring criminal charges.

To the lawmakers who feel that we do not need stricter gun laws, let me paint a picture for you: My son Zaire has a hole in the right side of his neck, two on his back and another on his left leg caused by an exploding bullet from an AR-15.... As I clean his wounds, I can feel pieces of that bullet in his back. Shrapnel will be left inside of his body for the rest of his life. Now, I want you to picture that exact scenario for one of your children. -- Zeneta Everhart of Buffalo, N.Y., in testimony yesterday ~~~

~~~ Amy Wang, et al., of the Washington Post: "The mother of a man who was among those shot during last month's mass shooting at a Buffalo grocery store offered powerful testimony before Congress on Wednesday about how 'America is inherently violent' and admonished lawmakers opposing stricter gun laws after a spate of shootings across the country. Zeneta Everhart, the mother of 21-year-old Zaire Goodman, who was wounded but survived the racially motivated attack on the Tops supermarket on May 14, testified before the House Oversight Committee about how the massacre in Buffalo and recent mass shootings in Uvalde, Tex., and Tulsa reflected what the United States has been in terms of gun violence. She spoke of her son's wounds and invited lawmakers to come to her home to see the damage up close if they would not act on gun laws." ~~~

~~~  Nichols Bogel-Burroughs of the New York Times: "Dr. Roy Guerrero, a pediatrician in Uvalde, Texas, described to members of Congress on Wednesday the horrors he saw two weeks ago in the city's emergency room as he treated wounded and dying students after a gunman massacred an elementary school classroom.... Speaking to the House committee, Dr. Guerrero described returning to the emergency room to horrifying sights: two children who he said had been 'pulverized' and 'decapitated' by bullets." ~~~

~~~ CNN is live-updating a House hearing on gun violence. "Dr. Roy Guerrero, a pediatrician in Texas, testified during Wednesday's hearing.... [Includes a transcript of Dr. Guerrero's full remarks -- well worth reading.] In a pre-recorded video, 11-year-old Miah Cerrillo described to lawmakers how she survived the Robb Elementary School massacre by smearing her friend's blood over herself and pretending to be dead. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Morgan Chesky & David Li of NBC News: "Embattled school police chief and newly sworn-in City Councilman Pete Arredondo on Tuesday missed what would have been his first meeting as a town lawmaker. Arredondo has kept an incredibly low profile since ... [a gunman] broke into Robb Elementary School on May 24 and killed 19 children and two teachers.... Mayor Don McLaughlin said he couldn't explain Arredondo's absence and didn't question the newly elected member's legitimacy on the council." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Some "Ban"! Elizabeth Dwoskin & Naomi Nix of the Washington Post: "Facebook prohibits gun sales on its service. But buyers and sellers can violate the rule 10 times before they are kicked off the social network, according to internal guidance obtained by The Washington Post. The policy, which has not previously been reported, is much more lenient than for users who post child pornography, which is illegal, or a terrorist image on Facebook, which prompts immediate removal from the platform. A separate five-strikes policy extends even to gun sellers and purchasers who actively call for violence or praise a known dangerous organization, according to the documents."


Michael Shear of the New York Times: "President Biden opened the three-day Summit of the Americas on Wednesday by promising leaders from Latin America that the United States was committed to helping the region combat crime, corruption and its economic struggles.... The United States is serving as the host to the ninth of these summits, which began in Miami in 1994. In brief remarks, Mr. Biden delivered a version of his domestic economic pitch, urging governments in the hemisphere to invest in workers and the middle class. 'What's true in the United States is true in every country: Trickle-down economics does not work,' he said, prompting some applause from the audience inside the Microsoft Theater near the Los Angeles Convention Center.... Mr. Biden proceeded on Wednesday night as if the snub [by several prominent leaders] had made no difference, saying that the gathering in Los Angeles would announce what he called 'a groundbreaking, integrated new approach to managing migration and sharing responsibility across the hemisphere.'"

Lisa Friedman of the New York Times: "Electric vehicle charging stations built with federal dollars should be positioned along Interstates every 50 miles, be able to recharge cars quickly and be located no more than a mile from a major highway, according to new rules proposed by the Biden administration on Thursday. 'EV drivers should be able to count on finding a place to recharge easily wherever they go,' Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg told reporters Wednesday. Mr. Buttigieg and Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm outlined the proposed regulations, which are designed to make sure that rural areas and communities with few services would have the same access to electric charging stations as more urbanized areas that already have access."

Lisa Friedman of the New York Times: "Hudson Canyon, a vast gorge in the Atlantic Ocean that is home to endangered whales, sharks, sea turtles, would become a national marine sanctuary under a proposal made by the Biden administration on Wednesday. Located about 100 miles southeast of the Statue of Liberty, the Hudson Canyon would be off limits to oil and gas drilling in order to protect marine life and cold-water coral as well as several shipwrecks. Details, including the boundaries of the proposed sanctuary and prohibited activities beyond drilling, have yet to be announced. The proposal will undergo a public comment period through Aug. 8 before it is finalized."

Jonathan Weisman of the New York Times: "Colorado officials are examining allegations that Representative Lauren Boebert, a Republican representing the state's western half, inflated the mileage she logged on the campaign trail in 2020 and then used more than $20,000 in reimbursements from donors to pay off years of tax liens on her restaurant. The allegations have bounced around liberal circles since The Denver Post first reported in February 2021 that Ms. Boebert had cashed two checks from her campaign totaling $22,259 for mileage reimbursement. The number equated to 38,712 miles -- well more than the 24,901-mile circumference of the planet. But the same group that unleashed a torrent of unflattering information about Representative Madison Cawthorn that helped defeat his bid for a second term in North Carolina last month has brought the matter to the Colorado attorney general's office, which has referred it for an interagency examination."

Adam Liptak of the New York Times: "The owner of an inn on the Canadian border who said he had been assaulted by a Border Patrol agent may not sue the agent for violating the Constitution by using excessive force, the Supreme Court ruled on Wednesday. The decision, by a 6-to-3 vote along ideological lines, stopped just short of overruling a 1971 precedent, Bivens v. Six Unknown Named Agents, that allowed federal courts, rather than Congress, to authorize at least some kinds of lawsuits seeking money from federal officials accused of violating constitutional rights. But the basic message of Wednesday's decision, Egbert v. Boule, No. 21-147, was that only Congress can authorize such suits." Clarence Thomas wrote the opinion.

Nina Totenberg of NPR: "At the Supreme Court, nothing is as usual this term after the leak of Justice Samuel Alito's draft opinion in the biggest abortion case in nearly a half-century. Normally at this time of year, the justices would be exchanging hundreds of pages of draft opinions and working with each other to resolve differences and reach consensus in the most challenging cases of the term. Instead, the court is riven with distrust among the law clerks, staff and, most of all, the justices themselves. The atmosphere behind the scenes is so ugly that, as one source put it, 'the place sounds like it's imploding.'... Justice Clarence Thomas in a speech a few weeks ago seemed to say he no longer trusts his colleagues." An interesting read, particularly the part where it appears CJ John Roberts may be ready to subvert the Fourth Amendment in order to find out who leaked Alito's draft opinion. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Jonah Bromwich of the New York Times: "Donald J. Trump and two of his adult children have agreed to be questioned under oath in mid-July by lawyers from the New York State attorney general's office, unless the state's highest court intervenes. The agreement, filed Wednesday in New York State Supreme Court, says that Mr. Trump, Donald Trump Jr. and Ivanka Trump have agreed to appear for testimony that will begin on Friday, July 15, and end the following week. The questioning will come as the state attorney general, Letitia James, concludes the final phase of her investigation into Mr. Trump and the business practices of his company, The Trump Organization. The agreement follows a number of legal setbacks for the former president, whose lawyers had fought the attorney general for months, hoping to avoid questioning." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: At his swearing-in, Donald Trump will give a repeat performance of the only gymnastic feat of which he is capable: simultaneously placing his left hand on the Bible and crossing his fingers.

A Dear-John Letter for the General. Mark Mazzetti of the New York Times: "John R. Allen, the retired four-star general who once commanded American troops in Afghanistan, has been placed on administrative leave as president of the Brookings Institution amid a federal inquiry into whether he secretly lobbied for the government of Qatar, the think tank announced on Wednesday."

Senator Foghorn Leghorn Proposes a Way to Curb Inflation. Victor Nava of the Washington Examiner: "Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA) joked on Tuesday that because of gas prices, it would be cheaper in his state 'to buy cocaine and just run everywhere' rather than drive." Kennedy, in typical GOP fashion, went on to complain about President Biden's economic policies, without suggesting any real solutions.

Elizabeth Dwoskin of the Washington Post: "After a weeks-long impasse, Twitter's board plans to comply with Elon Musk's demands for internal data by offering access to its full 'firehose,' the massive stream of data comprising more than 500 million tweets posted each day, according to a person familiar with the company's thinking, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe the state of negotiations. The move aims to end a standoff with the billionaire, who has threatened to pull out of his $44 billion deal to buy Twitter unless the company provides access to data he says is necessary to evaluate the number of fake users on the platform." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)


The New York Times' live updates of Covid-19 developments Thursday are here: "The White House has outlined the early stages of its plan for making coronavirus vaccines available this month to roughly 18 million children under 5, the last group of Americans yet to be eligible for the shots. The Biden administration has made 10 million doses available to states and health providers; half were made available for order last week, the other half this week. It is offering equal numbers of Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines. Orders from states have been somewhat tepid so far, according to data that senior administration officials provided to reporters in a briefing on Wednesday evening." ~~~

     ~~~ An ABC News story, by Cheyenne Haslett, on the vaccine for children under age 5 is here.

Yasmeen Abutaleb & Andrew Jeong of the Washington Post: "Moderna said it will seek authorization for an updated coronavirus vaccine designed to protect against omicron subvariants that the company described as its lead candidate' for a fall booster, but it remains unclear how effective the shot will be against the latest versions of the omicron variant spreading in the United States. Preliminary data released by the company on Wednesday showed that its omicron-targeting coronavirus booster candidate produced 1.75 times as many neutralizing antibodies against the version of omicron that circulated over the winter, known as BA.1, compared with its existing vaccine."

David Leonhardt of the New York Times: "One of the defining characteristics of the pandemic's early stages was its disproportionate toll on Black and Latino Americans.... These large racial gaps seemed as if they might persist throughout the pandemic, especially because white and Asian Americans were initially quicker to receive vaccine shots. Black and Latino Americans, by contrast, had less convenient access to the shots and many were skeptical of them.... Instead, Covid's racial gaps have narrowed and, more recently, even flipped. Over the past year, the Covid death rate for white Americans has been 14 percent higher than the rate for Black Americans and 72 percent higher than the Latino rate, according to the latest C.D.C. data.... [The] bad news: The share of white Americans who have received a Covid vaccine shot has barely budged since last summer. The main culprit is politics. Only about 60 percent of Republican adults are vaccinated, compared with about 75 percent of independents and more than 90 percent of Democrats, according to Kaiser. And Republicans are both disproportionately white and older." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: One of the most mystifying aspects of this story -- to me -- is why Trump, TuKKKer & Co. would purposely & literally kill off righty-right voters. And it isn't for any discernible political advantage, like "proving" that Joe Biden has failed to curb Covid; this rolling mass murder-suicide epidemic began when Trump was still President*.

Way Beyond the Beltway

Ukraine, et al.

The New York Times' live updates of developments Thursday in Russia's war on Ukraine are here: "... President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine has described the battle for [Sievierodonetsk] as a crucial moment in the war as his outgunned forces struggle to deny Russian forces another foothold in the Donbas region. Mr. Zelensky said late Wednesday that his troops were continuing to inflict losses on Russian forces. But from across a river in the Ukrainian-held city of Lyschansk, the perils facing the Ukrainian side are clear as barrages of artillery from the better-armed Russian forces send soldiers scrambling for cover.... In Ukrainian areas under Russian control, guerrilla-style attacks on Kremlin loyalists and proxies hint at continuing challenges from Ukrainians against Russia's rule. Radiation detectors at the defunct Chernobyl nuclear plant in Ukraine are back online for the first time since the Russian invasion and are showing readings of normal radiation levels, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency. The European Parliament recommended that Ukraine be granted candidate status for membership in the European Union, according to Ukraine's prime minister. The E.U.'s decision on Ukraine's candidacy is expected in late June." ~~~

     ~~~ The New York Times' summary of developments Wednesday is here. ~~~

     ~~~ The Washington Post's live updates for Thursday are here: "Some 10,000 civilians remain stuck in the strategic eastern city of Severodonetsk -- and evacuations are 'impossible' for most because of the intensity of Russian attacks, Oleksandr Stryuk, the city's mayor, said Thursday. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky described the fight for the city as 'a very fierce battle ... probably one of the most difficult throughout this war,' adding that the battle for control of the Donbas region was 'being decided' there.... Tensions are rising over a looming global food crisis, with top U.N. officials working on a deal to export Ukrainian and Russian food products. The foreign ministers of Russia and Turkey said they held 'substantial' talks on opening a shipping corridor for wheat from Ukraine, but did not announce any agreement.... European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen called the impact of Russia's invasion of Ukraine on food supplies a 'cold, callous and calculated siege' by ... Vladimir Putin on 'some of the most vulnerable countries and people in the world.' The U.S. military has devised a plan to train Ukrainian soldiers a platoon at a time on how to use sophisticated multiple-launch rocket artillery, the Pentagon's top general said Wednesday, raising the likelihood that more of the weapons could be sent to Ukraine."

Comments Off
Tuesday
Jun072022

June 8, 2022

Afternoon Update:

Devlin Barrett, et al., of the Washington Post: "A man with a gun and a knife was detained by police early Wednesday morning near Brett M. Kavanaugh's Maryland home after making threats against the Supreme Court justice, according to federal officials. According to a criminal complaint charging Nicholas John Roske with attempted murder of a federal judge, two U.S. Deputy Marshals spotted Roske get out of a cab in front of Kavanaugh's home at approximately 1:05 a.m. He looked at the marshals and then walked down the street. Not long after, Montgomery County got the call from Roske saying he was suicidal and came to kill Kavanaugh. Montgomery County Police Department officers were dispatched and arrested Roske without incident while he was still on the phone with 911, according to the affidavit. In his suitcase and backpack were a Glock 17 with two magazines and ammunition, pepper spray, a tactical knife, a hammer, a screwdriver, a crow bar, zip ties and duct tape, along with other gear. After his arrest, according to the affidavit, Roske told police he was upset over the leaked draft of an opinion that would overturn the constitutional right to abortion and also over the recent school shooting in Uvalde, Tex. He thought Kavanaugh would support looser gun laws." NPR's story is here.

Nina Totenberg of NPR: "At the Supreme Court, nothing is as usual this term after the leak of Justice Samuel Alito's draft opinion in the biggest abortion case in nearly a half-century. Normally at this time of year, the justices would be exchanging hundreds of pages of draft opinions and working with each other to resolve differences and reach consensus in the most challenging cases of the term. Instead, the court is riven with distrust among the law clerks, staff and, most of all, the justices themselves. The atmosphere behind the scenes is so ugly that, as one source put it, 'the place sounds like it's imploding.'... Justice Clarence Thomas in a speech a few weeks ago seemed to say he no longer trusts his colleagues." An interesting read, particularly the part where it appears CJ John Roberts may be ready to subvert the Fourth Amendment in order to find out who leaked Alito's draft opinion.

Michael Balsamo of the AP: "The Justice Department has named a team of nine people, including an FBI official and former police chiefs, to aid in a review of the law enforcement response to the Uvalde, Texas, elementary school shooting that left 19 children and two teachers dead. Attorney General Merrick Garland announced the team during a meeting in his office in Washington on Wednesday. The critical incident review is being led by the Justice Department's Office of Community Oriented Policing Services. The review will include an examination of police policies, training and communication, along with the deployment of officers and tactics, the Justice Department said. It will also examine who was in command of the incident and how police prepared for potential active-shooter incidents."

CNN is live-updating a House hearing on gun violence. "Dr. Roy Guerrero, a pediatrician in Texas, testified during Wednesday's hearing and recounted a horrifying and disturbing scene he saw at Uvalde Memorial Hospital on the day of the mass shooting.... In a pre-recorded video, 11-year-old Miah Cerrillo described to lawmakers how she survived the Robb Elementary School massacre by smearing her friend's blood over herself and pretending to be dead.

Morgan Chesky & David Li of NBC News: "Embattled school police chief and newly sworn-in City Councilman Pete Arredondo on Tuesday missed what would have been his first meeting as a town lawmaker. Arredondo has kept an incredibly low profile since ... [a gunman] broke into Robb Elementary School on May 24 and killed 19 children and two teachers.... Mayor Don McLaughlin said he couldn't explain Arredondo's absence and didn't question the newly elected member's legitimacy on the council."

Elizabeth Dwoskin of the Washington Post: "After a weeks-long impasse, Twitter's board plans to comply with Elon Musk's demands for internal data by offering access to its full 'firehose,' the massive stream of data comprising more than 500 million tweets posted each day, according to a person familiar with the company's thinking, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe the state of negotiations. The move aims to end a standoff with the billionaire, who has threatened to pull out of his $44 billion deal to buy Twitter unless the company provides access to data he says is necessary to evaluate the number of fake users on the platform."

~~~~~~~~~~

The New York Times is live-updating Tuesday's primary election results here. The Times' front page currently also has links to Tuesday's results for each state.

CNN's story on the "takeaways" from yesterday's primary election results is here.

Here's a New York Times liveblog of California results.

Hannah Knowles of the Washington Post: "Crime, homelessness and Democratic divisions over the issues took center stage Tuesday as a liberal prosecutor in San Francisco was recalled and seven states held primaries that helped mold each party's image heading into November's fight for control of Congress, statehouses and major cities across the country." ~~~

~~~ The recall of San Francisco District Attorney Chesa Boudin (D) -- whom critics called too lenient -- came as angst over liberal leaders' approach to public safety also loomed large in a contest for Los Angeles mayor, where Rep. Karen Bass (D-Calif.) and billionaire businessman Rick Caruso are projected to advance to a runoff. Caruso, a former Republican, has pitched himself as a different kind of Democrat who will fix long-simmering crises in the nation's second-largest city. ~~~

~~~ Soaring inflation, gun violence and abortion rights were on voters' minds Tuesday as they headed to the polls in California, Iowa, Mississippi, Montana, New Jersey, New Mexico and South Dakota.... [In Iowa, Chuck] Grassley [R] won renomination, the AP projected, and he is favored to keep the seat. In the Democratic race to replace him, retired Navy Vice Adm. Mike Franken defeated former congresswoman Abby Finkenauer, who was also seen as a strong contender.... ~~~

~~~ In New Jersey's 7th Congressional District -- one of many the GOP hopes to flip this year -- Tom Kean Jr. was projected to defeat challengers who attacked him as not conservative enough.... Kean finished just over a percentage point behind incumbent Rep. Tom Malinowski (D) in 2020 and will face Malinowski again this fall under more favorable conditions for Republicans nationwide.... ~~~

~~~ And Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.), who has clashed with Trump, won renomination, the AP projected.

An AP story on the recall of San Francisco D.A. Chesa Boudin is here.

California. Don Thompson of the AP: "California's Democratic attorney general advanced to the November general election Tuesday and was on pace to face the Republican Party's endorsed candidate in a state that overwhelmingly favors Democrats. Attorney General Rob Bonta, the only Democrat in the five-way primary field, advanced after winning 57% of the vote. The GOP's endorsed candidate, Nathan Hochman, trailed with 17.5% of the votes counted. Hochman is a former federal prosecutor and former assistant U.S. attorney general."

New Mexico. Morgan Lee of the AP: "Republicans picked a seasoned TV broadcaster to take on New Mexico's incumbent Democratic governor [Michelle Lujan Grisham], nominating former network meteorologist Mark Ronchetti on his pledges to rein in state spending, shore up policing and unleash already record-setting oil production.... Separately, the Democratic nomination for attorney general went to Raúl Torrez, a second-term district attorney for Albuquerque and its outskirts. He defeated State Auditor Brian Colón to vie in an open race against Republican attorney and U.S. Marine veteran Jeremy Michael Gay of Gallup."


Kate Sullivan of CNN: "Actor Matthew McConaughey delivered impassioned and at-times emotional remarks at the White House press briefing on Tuesday, telling the stories of those who died in the elementary school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, and urging more action on gun control. McConaughey, a Uvalde native, said he and his wife, Camila Alves, spent most of the past week with the families of those who were killed in his hometown. He showed pictures of their artwork and brought to the briefing room the green Converse shoes that one girl wore every day that were used to identify her body after the shooting. She had drawn a heart on one of the shoes. He said he needed to tell their stories to show how action needed to be taken to honor the lives of the 19 children and two teachers killed at Robb Elementary School last month." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) A New York Times story is here. ~~~

     ~~~ Video of McConaughey's full remarks is here.

** Libby Cathey of ABC News: "A son of the oldest victim in the Buffalo supermarket shooting, appearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee Tuesday in a hearing on domestic terrorism, called on lawmakers to 'yield your positions' if they're unwilling to meet 'the urgency of the moment' in the wake of the apparent racially-motivated attack that left 10 Black people dead, including his 86-year-old mother." (Also linked yesterday.) See also entry below about New York's Carl Paladino.

     ~~~ Marie: It's important to remember that mass murder such as occurred in Buffalo, white supremacy, Second Amendment enthusiasm, Christianism, Trumpism, authoritarianism and insurrection are all part and parcel of the same political "philosophy." As Patrick pointed out a few days ago, it's nothing new. In fact, we are a country that was founded by a widespread insurrection. Today, the country is peppered with statues, place names and other memorials dedicated to revolutionaries. The American Revolution was, in large part, a civil war, which -- even more than the Civil War of the 1860s -- pitted brother against brother. We should not be suprised that violent organizations like the Proud Boys identify with the revolution that "officially" began in 1776 (see Greg Sargent's post, linked below). ~~~

~~~ In yesterday's Comments thread, we had a discussion about Republican "contributions" to Congressional hearings. Dana Milbank of the Washington Post provides another example of what we were discussing: "Garnell Whitfield was testifying about his 86-year-old mother, Ruth, shot dead last month along with nine other Black people in a Buffalo, N.Y., supermarket, allegedly by a white supremacist motivated by the racist 'great replacement' conspiracy theory.... Then, Republicans on the panel answered -- with accounts of violence committed by Black people and antifa. 'The Brooklyn subway shooter was a known Black supremacist who called for racial violence,' said Sen. Ted Cruz (Tex.)."... [And so forth.] Sen. Chuck Grassley (Iowa) ... spoke of 2016, when 'two Black racists killed eight police officers in Dallas and Baton Rouge,' and of 2018, when 'members of antifa in Philadelphia assaulted two Marines.'... Since 2015, when the recent upsurge in political violence began, the brutality has been overwhelmingly perpetrated by the far right."


Hugo Lowell of the Guardian: "The House select committee investigating the January 6 Capitol attack is scheduled to hold its inaugural hearing on Thursday and according to the running order obtained by the Guardian, the panel will track the activities of the far-right Proud Boys group before and during the insurrection. At the start of the hearing, the panel's chairman Bennie Thompson and vice-chair Liz Cheney will make a series of opening arguments before outlining a general roadmap of how each of the six Watergate-style hearings are expected to unfold. For the second hour, Thompson and Cheney will hand control of the hearing to Tim Heaphy, the chief investigative counsel for the select committee, who will lead the questioning of two witnesses and walk through the key moments of the Capitol attack. The select committee is expected to start the questioning with testimony from Nick Quested, a British documentary film-maker who was embedded with the far-right Proud Boys group in the days and weeks leading up to January 6 and caught their activities on camera.... Heaphy is expected at that point to have the second witness, US Capitol Police officer Caroline Edwards, testify about her recollections of those key minutes during which she was assaulted by another man who had been speaking with the Proud Boy member."

Katherine Faulders & John Fantucci of ABC News: "The House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol is in active discussions with former White House counsel Pat Cipollone regarding a potential public appearance in one of their upcoming hearings, according to sources familiar with the matter. Cipollone and former deputy White House counsel Pat Philbin previously met with committee investigators for an informal interview in April. Cipollone was one of the few aides who was with ... Donald Trump in the West Wing on Jan. 6. ABC News previously reported that in the days following the attack on the Capitol, he advised Trump that Trump could potentially face civil liability in connection with his role encouraging supporters to march on the Capitol."

Annie Karni & Luke Broadwater of the New York Times: "... House Democrats plan to use a landmark set of investigative hearings beginning this week to try to refocus voters' attention on Jan. 6, aiming to tie Republicans directly to an unprecedented plot to undermine democracy itself.... Democrats plan to use made-for-television moments and a carefully choreographed rollout of revelations over the course of six hearings to remind the public of the magnitude of Mr. Trump's effort to overturn the election, and to persuade voters that the coming midterm elections are a chance to hold Republicans accountable for it.... The select committee investigating the attack ... says it has approached its work in a sober, apolitical manner and will present its findings as such. But it is clear that the hearings, coming five months before midterm elections in which Democrats are bracing for big losses, carry high political stakes." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Dr. Eastman's actions in these few weeks indicate that his and President Trump's pressure campaign to stop the electoral count did not end with Vice President Pence -- it targeted every tier of federal and state elected officials. Convincing state legislatures to certify competing electors was essential to stop the count and ensure President Trump's reelection. -- District court Judge David Carter, in a ruling Tuesday ~~~

~~~ Kyle Cheney of Politico: "A federal judge Tuesday ordered John Eastman --- the attorney who developed ... Donald Trump's last-ditch strategy to overturn the election -- to disclose a batch of 159 sensitive documents to the Jan. 6 select committee, including another email that the judge said presented evidence of a likely crime. In a 26-page ruling, U.S. District Court Judge David Carter also ordered Eastman to provide 10 documents about meetings Eastman held with a secretive pro-Trump group that included a 'high-profile' leader discussing strategies for overturning the 2020 election. The 10 documents in question related to three December meetings held by the group.... The single email that Carter said pertained to a potential crime was an exchange on Dec. 22, 2020, in which an unidentified attorney encouraged Trump's legal team not to pursue a case in court related to the Jan. 6 session of Congress.... The judge also determined that more than 400 of Eastman's remaining emails were legitimately privileged and not subject to disclosure to the Jan. 6 committee."

Annals of "Journalism," Ha Ha Ha. Philip Bump of the Washington Post: "From the first hours after the riot, Fox News's opinion hosts were spinning the riot as something other than it was -- although they'd just sent text messages to Trump's chief of staff, Mark Meadows, asking him to get Trump to take a firmer hand against the violence. Over the past 17 months, Fox News's hosts (particularly Tucker Carlson) have been at the forefront of casting doubt on the riot and depicting efforts to investigate what happened as partisan. There is a news side at Fox, but it sits under the shadow of the late-night hosts. The effect is that Fox News has unique power to influence Republican politics and the Republican electorate. So of course the network is not going to carry hearings run by the House select committee probing the Jan. 6 attack."

Carol Leonnig, et al., of the Washington Post: "Shortly before pro-Trump rioters stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, Secret Service agents scrambled to try to secure a motorcade route so ... Donald Trump could accompany his supporters as they marched on Congress to demand he stay in power.... The hectic events that day followed nearly two weeks of persistent pressure from Trump on the Secret Service to devise a plan for him to join his supporters on a march to the Capitol from the park near the White House where he was leading a rally that he predicted would be 'wild.' The agency had rebuffed Trump's early entreaties, but the rushed effort on Jan. 6 to accommodate the president came as Secret Service personnel heard Trump urge his rally audience of nearly 30,000 people to march to the Capitol while suggesting he would join them.... Around New Year's Eve, Trump aides raised with Tony Ornato, a Secret Service official then temporarily serving as a deputy chief of staff in the White House, the president's desire to ride in a motorcade on Jan. 6 alongside marchers heading to the Capitol...." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Let's be clear: Trump planned to ride, not walk alongside his wild supporters, the approximately two miles from the Ellipse to the Capitol building. When I first heard the bones of this story on the teevee, I was skeptical, because a few years before, Trump couldn't walk even 700 yards on pavement in Taormina, Sicily. None of the other G-7 leaders at the time, including Angela Merkel, who was wearing (sensible) heels, had any trouble making the short trek. Presumably, his steed would have been, not a white hourse, but the bulletproof Beast, so I don't quite see why the Secret Service would have found it so dangerous -- unless they had a good inkling of what would happen at the Capitol.

Betsy Swan of Politico: "The Jan. 6 select committee has interviewed the top Secret Service agent on ... Donald Trump's protective detail during the Capitol attack, according to three people familiar with the probe. Robert Engel was the special agent in charge on Jan. 6, 2021, meaning he was responsible for protecting the president from 'socks on to socks off' -- the whole work day. In that role, he rode from the White House to that day's 'Stop the Steal' rally with Trump in the presidential armored car called 'The Beast.' Engel was also backstage at the rally and close to the then-president throughout the day as violence unfolded when thousands of pro-Trump rally participants marched to the Capitol to try to disrupt congressional certification of the 2020 election. Because of that work, Engel has detailed insight on a key select committee focus: how the Secret Service handled the day's chaos. A Secret Service spokesperson said the agency has cooperated fully with the committee probe." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Peter Baker of the New York Times: "No matter how vociferously [Donald] Trump claimed otherwise, neither [Jared] Kushner nor Ivanka Trump believed then or later that the election had been stolen, according to people close to them. While the president spent the hours and days after the polls closed complaining about imagined fraud in battleground states and plotting a strategy to hold on to power, his daughter and son-in-law were already washing their hands of the Trump presidency. Their decision to move on [to Miami & to Kushner's little Middle East money-making project] opened a vacuum around the president that was filled by conspiracy theorists like Rudolph W. Giuliani and Sidney Powell, who relayed to Mr. Trump farcically false stories of dead voters, stuffed ballot boxes, corrupted voting machines and foreign plots.... Mr. Kushner's decision to withdraw from the most consequential moment of the Trump presidency left few effective counterweights to the plotters seeking to subvert the will of the voters to hang on to power.... One of the most striking realizations that emerged from the book research [which Baker & his wife Susan Glasser did] was how many people around Mr. Trump did not believe the election had been stolen but kept quiet or checked out, including White House officials and campaign aides.

Sara Murray of CNN: "Steve Bannon, set to go to trial next month for defying a congressional subpoena, has subpoenaed House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and members of the House select committee investigating the January 6 insurrection as he builds his defense.... Bannon ... was charged with two counts of contempt of Congress in November 2021 after refusing to testify and produce documents. He has pleaded not guilty. Last week, Bannon's legal team subpoenaed 16 lawmakers and congressional staffers to testify at the July trial and produce documents, according to one of Bannon's attorneys and copies of the subpoenas provided to CNN. The subpoenas were aimed at all nine members of the select committee, three committee staffers and General Counsel for the House of Representatives Douglas Letter. Bannon also subpoenaed House Democratic leadership, including Pelosi, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer and Rep. Jim Clyburn.... Historically it has been a challenge to compel members of Congress to testify because their legislative activity is protected under the Constitution's Speech and Debate Clause." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: This must be Bannon's idea of a joke: Subpoena me??!! I'll subpoena you.!!

Greg Sargent of the Washington Post: "In a new indictment that prosecutors filed against [the Proud Boys]..., members refer to the insurrection as a glorious revival of 1776 again and again, with almost comic predictability.... In the indictment prosecutors disclose highly revealing text exchanges between leaders Enrique Tarrio -- who was not present that day -- and another member later on Jan. 6. The exchanges appear to refer back to a document Tarrio possessed called '1776 returns,' which reportedly contains a detailed scheme to attack government buildings.... Right now the evidence appears strong that Proud Boys members did scheme to thwart a legitimately elected government from taking power with coordinated violence." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

What? Trump Stole Stuff? Unpossible! Zachary Cohen & Kylie Atwood of CNN: "House Democrats are investigating ... Donald Trump's 'apparent failure to account for gifts from foreign government officials while in office' after learning there may be thousands of dollars-worth of items that are either missing or were not tracked properly, according to a new letter sent to the National Archives by the House Oversight and Reform Committee chairwoman.... The committee says it has received information from the State Department that 'indicates the Trump administration "did not prioritize this obligation" and failed to comply with the law that governs foreign gift reporting during President Trump's final year in office,' the letter states. 'As a result, the foreign sources and monetary value of gifts President Trump received remain unknown,' it adds. 'The Department of State also stated that it was unable to determine the identities of some government officials who received foreign gifts during the Trump Administration, as well as the sources of those foreign gifts.'" (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

A Trumpy Juror Causes a Mistrial in a Build-the-Wall Scam Case. Colin Moynihan of the New York Times: "A federal judge declared a mistrial on Tuesday in the case of Timothy Shea, a Colorado man accused of stealing hundreds of thousands of dollars from a nonprofit group that had collected $25 million to privately fulfill Donald J. Trump's promise to create a barrier between the United States and Mexico. The declaration came after 11 jurors sent a note last week to Judge Analisa Torres of Federal District Court in Manhattan, asking that she remove the 12th, who they said had spoken of a 'government witch hunt' and refused to deliberate based on evidence. The note, which Judge Torres read aloud in court, said the 12th juror had exhibited 'political bias,' claiming fellow jurors were 'liberals' who had reached a verdict before hearing evidence. 'Not true at all,' the others wrote."


Michael Shear of the New York Times: "President Biden is scheduled to arrive in Los Angeles on Wednesday to host a three-day summit meeting of Latin American leaders, where he hopes to demonstrate his ability to confront the economic and migration issues that fuel the region's most serious challenges. Even before his first meeting, the president is the subject of a boycott by some of the most important heads of state, who have refused to attend because Mr. Biden excluded several dictators in the region. His agenda for the meeting -- which includes a series of lofty-sounding announcements -- is being met with deep skepticism. And a caravan of thousands of migrants is making its way north through Mexico in the hopes of crossing into the United States while Mr. Biden is in California, a small but visible reminder of the problems at the border that have plagued his presidency."

Alan Rappeport of the New York Times: Treasury Secretary Janet "Yellen's role in crafting and selling the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan, which Congress passed in March [2021], is being parsed amid an intensifying blame game to determine who is responsible for the highest rates of inflation in 40 years.... Ms. Yellen acknowledged last week that she had gotten it 'wrong,' putting the Biden administration on the defensive and thrusting herself into the middle of a political storm.... Ms. Yellen faced tough questions on inflation when she testified before the Senate Finance Committee on Tuesday and is likely to confront similar queries on Wednesday, when she appears before House lawmakers.... Ms. Yellen said at the hearing on Tuesday that current levels of inflation were 'unacceptable.' She pointed to 'disruptions caused by the pandemic's effect on supply chains, and the effects of supply-side disturbances to oil and food markets resulting from Russia's war in Ukraine' as the primary reasons for high prices." ~~~

~~~ David Lynch of the Washington Post: "The global economy may be headed for years of weak growth and rising prices, a toxic combination that will test the stability of dozens of countries still struggling to rebound from the pandemic, the World Bank warned Tuesday. Not since the 1970s -- when twin oil shocks sapped growth and lifted prices, giving rise to the malady known as 'stagflation' -- has the global economy faced such a challenge. The bank slashed its annual global growth forecast to 2.9 percent from January's 4.1 percent and said that 'subdued growth will likely persist throughout the decade because of weak investment in most of the world.'" (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Edward Wong of the New York Times: "The State Department and the Defense Department have failed to assess civilian casualties caused by a Saudi-led coalition in the catastrophic war in Yemen and the use of American-made weapons in the killings, according to an internal government report. The report from the Government Accountability Office focuses on attacks in recent years by a Saudi-led coalition that is fighting Houthi rebels for control of Yemen. The alliance has carried out deadly strikes using combat jets and munitions that have been supplied and maintained largely by American companies with the approval of the State Department and the Pentagon. The report spans the Obama, Trump and Biden administrations.... [This and an earlier report] cannot be released publicly because the executive branch has determined they contain classified information or 'controlled unclassified information.'"

Alan Suderman & Jim Mustian of the AP: "The FBI has seized the electronic data of a retired four-star general who authorities say made false statements and withheld 'incriminating' documents about his role in an illegal foreign lobbying campaign on behalf of the wealthy Persian Gulf nation of Qatar. New federal court filings obtained Tuesday outlined a potential criminal case against former Marine Gen. John R. Allen, who led U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan before being tapped in 2017 to lead the influential Brookings Institution.... The court filings detail Allen's behind-the scenes efforts to help Qatar influence U.S. policy in 2017 when a diplomatic crisis erupted between the gas-rich Persian Gulf monarchy and its neighbors. 'There is substantial evidence that these FARA violations were willful,' FBI agent Babak Adib wrote in a search warrant application, referring to the Foreign Agents Registration Act. Allen also misrepresented his role in the lobbying campaign to U.S. officials, Adib wrote, and failed to disclose 'that he was simultaneously pursuing multimillion-dollar business deals with the government of Qatar.'" The New York Times story is here.

Ed White of the AP: "Olympic gold medalist Simone Biles and dozens of other women who say they were sexually assaulted by Larry Nassar are seeking more than $1 billion from the FBI for failing to stop the now convicted sports doctor when the agency first received allegations against him, lawyers said Wednesday. There's no dispute that FBI agents in 2015 knew that Nassar was accused of assaulting gymnasts, but they failed to act, leaving him free to continue to target young women and girls for more than a year."

Manuel Roig-Franzia of the Washington Post: One Sunday in March 1974, Martha Mitchell called Bob Woodward & invited Carl Bernstein & him to come to her Manhattan apartment & look through the papers in her husband John Mitchell's home office. John had just been indicted for a second time and had left Martha. "'Have at it, boys,' she told [the reporters when they arrived at her Fifth Avenue home]. 'Please nail him. I hope you get the bastard.'... They were there for hours.... The documents provided material that informed The Post's coverage of Watergate, but Woodward can only remember the trip producing one big scoop." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)


The New York Times' live updates of Covid-19 developments Wednesday are here: "The Omicron subvariants known as BA.4 and BA.5 now represent 13 percent of new coronavirus cases in the United States, up from 7.5 percent a week ago and 1 percent in early May, according to new estimates from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The spread of the subvariants adds more uncertainty to the trajectory of the pandemic in the United States, where current case counts are likely to be a significant underestimate. But whether it leads to a major new wave of infections, or spikes in hospitalizations and deaths, remains unclear, scientists cautioned. The new figures, which were released on Tuesday, are based on modeling, and the C.D.C.'s estimates have missed the mark before."

The New York Times' live updates of Covid-19 developments Tuesday are here.

Carolyn Johnson & Laurie McGinley of the Washington Post: "A panel of independent vaccine experts recommended Tuesday that the Food and Drug Administration authorize a coronavirus vaccine developed by the Maryland biotechnology company Novavax, paving the way for the fourth shot in the United States. The experts' vote was 21 in favor of authorizing the Novavax vaccine, with one abstention. But it remained unclear when doses will become available. A decision by the FDA is unlikely to happen immediately because a review of data regarding manufacturing remains ongoing. Novavax on Friday submitted updated manufacturing information to support its vaccine authorization."

Florida. Ian Hodgson of the Tampa Bay Times: "Florida's COVID-19 data was so inaccurate, incomplete and delayed during the first months of the pandemic that government officials and the public may not have had necessary information to determine the effectiveness of the state's COVID-19 precautions and the best plan to fight the virus, according to a state report released Monday. Covering the state's pandemic response from March to October 2020, the year-long analysis by the State Auditor General found missing case and death data, unreported demographic details, and incomplete contact tracing as the virus spread across the state. In addition, the report concluded that state health officials did not perform routine checks on the data to ensure accuracy and did not follow up on discrepancies."

Beyond the Beltway

California. I Picked up This Free Chair & All I Got Was $36,000. Cathy Free of the Washington Post: A grandmother, Vicky Umodo, who had moved to San Bernardino County to be near her son's family answered a Craigslist listing for free furniture because her new home was bare. She and her son picked up an upholstered chair, and the owner also gave her some kitchenware & other household supplies. When she was arranging the chair at her new home, she found $36,000 in envelopes stuffed in the seat cushion. She returned the money to the man who had given her the chair. He said his deceased uncle, who had previously owned his house, had told a family member that he had squirreled away cash around the house; the man had previously found $1,000 and figured that was all there was. He gave Umodo a $2,200 reward to buy a refrigerator.

New York Congressional Race. Eric Hananoki of Media Matters: "Carl Paladino, who announced that he's running for Congress, previously shared a post on Facebook which pushed conspiracy theories about the recent mass shootings in Buffalo, New York, and Uvalde, Texas. The Facebook post portrayed the tragedies as false flag attacks meant to help Democrats 'revoke the 2nd amendment and take away guns' and claimed 'the Texas shooter was receiving hypnosis training' apparently under the direction of the CIA.... Paladino announced on June 3 that he is running as a Republican for New York's 23th Congressional District (which includes part of the Buffalo suburbs) after Republican Rep. Chris Jacobs said that he would drop his reelection bid. Jacobs made the move after he lost party backing for saying he would support gun safety measures. Rep. Elise Stefanik, the third-ranked Republican member of Congress, announced that she is supporting Paladino's campaign.... Donald Trump also recently praised Paladino." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: So a former President* & the No. 3 GOP House honcho are supporting a candidate who is either stark staring mad or is purposely exploiting the mass murder of Americans. This is not laughable; it's disgusting.

Utah. Christopher Flavelle of the New York Times: "Climate change and rapid population growth are shrinking the [Great Salt L]ake, creating a bowl of toxic dust.... If the Great Salt Lake, which has already shrunk by two-thirds, continues to dry up, here's what's in store: The lake's flies and brine shrimp would die off -- scientists warn it could start as soon as this summer -- threatening the 10 million migratory birds that stop at the lake annually to feed on the tiny creatures. Ski conditions at the resorts above Salt Lake City, a vital source of revenue, would deteriorate. The lucrative extraction of magnesium and other minerals from the lake could stop. Most alarming, the air surrounding Salt Lake City would occasionally turn poisonous. The lake bed contains high levels of arsenic and as more of it becomes exposed, wind storms carry that arsenic into the lungs of nearby residents, who make up three-quarters of Utah's population." And more. ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Perhaps we should ask Utah Sen. Mike Lee (R) what to do. In a 2019 Senate floor speech rejecting the Democrat's proposal for a Green New Deal, he had a unique -- and extremely odd -- plan to "solve" the effects of climate change: "The solution to climate change is ... the serious business of human flourishing. The solution to so many of our problems, at all times and in all places, is to fall in love, get married and have some kids.... More people mean bigger markets for more innovation. More babies mean forward-looking adults, the sort we need to tackle long-term, large-scale problems." Those babies and their loving parents had better not live anywhere near the Great Salt Lake, or they'll die from arsenic poisoning way before the babies grow up, become scientists, and find solutions.

Way Beyond

Ukraine, et al.

The New York Times' live updates of developments Wednesday in Russia's war on Ukraine are here.: "As Russia continues to pound towns and villages across eastern Ukraine, the Kremlin is trying to deepen its hold on occupied territory in the south, restoring transportation links and other key infrastructure to secure a 'land bridge' from Russia to the Crimean Peninsula. Russia's defense minister, Sergei K. Shoigu, said on Tuesday that its military, working with Russian Railways, had repaired about 750 miles of track in southeastern Ukraine and set the conditions for 'full-fledged traffic' to flow from Russia, through Ukraine's eastern Donbas region, to occupied territory in Kherson and on to Crimea. He also said that water was once again flowing to Crimea through the North Crimean Canal -- an essential source of freshwater that Ukraine cut off in 2014 after the Kremlin annexed the peninsula, a move that Ukraine and its Western allies have termed illegal.... For Ukrainians, the announcements were a further demonstration that Russia intended to break Ukraine apart and pillage its natural resources.... Russia's foreign minister, Sergey V. Lavrov, held talks on Wednesday with Turkish officials but announced no progress toward allowing grain exports from Ukraine.... The World Bank on Tuesday approved $1.49 billion of additional financing for Ukraine, part of the total support package of over $4 billion. Nearly $2 billion of the funding has already been disbursed."

     ~~~ The Times' summary of developments Tuesday is here. ~~~

     ~~~ The Washington Post's live updates for Wednesday are here: "Ukrainian troops are locked in a brutal fight against Russian forces who advanced into Severodonetsk, a city central to the Kremlin's bid to capture eastern Ukraine.... As Russia's blockade of Black Sea ports raised fears of a global food crisis, Ukraine said it was seeking a safe corridor for its agricultural exports. Kyiv wants security guarantees, worried that Moscow could target convoys after a recent attack on a grain depository. Russia said two ports it recently captured have been demined and are ready to ship grain. Western officials accused Moscow of weaponizing food.... Satellite photos from eastern Ukraine show pulverized city blocks and fields freckled with artillery craters. Nearly 800 civilians are reportedly sheltering in bunkers beneath a chemical factory in Severodonetsk. A Ukrainian intelligence agency said Russia turned over the bodies of 210 fighters from the city of Mariupol, most of them killed while making a last stand at the Azovstal steel plant." ~~~

     ~~~ The Guardian's live updates for Wednesday are here.\


Israel. Betrayal in the Defense of Self-Interest Is No Vice. Patrick Kingsley of the New York Times: "Almost a year after losing power, Israel's former prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu has finessed a strategy to regain it: voting against his beliefs and those of his strongest supporters. In one of the strangest episodes in Israeli political history, Mr. Netanyahu's right-wing opposition alliance voted on Monday against extending the law that applies Israeli civilian statutes to Israelis in the occupied West Bank. Thanks to Mr. Netanyahu's intervention, the legislation failed to pass, potentially hindering a key part of his electoral base, the West Bank settlers."

U.K. Stiff Upper Lip. Mark Landler & Stephen Castle of the New York Times: "Prime Minister Boris Johnson tried to lift himself off the mat on Tuesday after a stinging rebuke by his Conservative Party. But with a fresh electoral challenge looming and Britain's economy in a downward spiral, there are few easy ways for Mr. Johnson to reverse his fading fortunes. Mr. Johnson's too-close-for-comfort victory in a no-confidence vote on Monday evening left him badly damaged, with plenty of openings for would-be coup plotters. A pair of Parliamentary elections on June 23 could trigger another move against him if, as expected, the Conservatives lose at least one of the seats. Even if Mr. Johnson clings to power, he faces a hard slog, with surging food and fuel prices, and predictions that Britain could slip into a recession. With more than 40 percent of his lawmakers having turned on him, pushing contentious legislation through the Parliament will be no easy feat."

Comments Off
Page 1 ... 282 283 284 285 286 ... 1738 Next 3 Entries ยป