The Commentariat -- May 28, 2021

Late Morning/Afternoon Update:

Karoun Demirjian of the Washington Post: "The bipartisan push to launch an independent and nonpartisan investigation of the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol suffered a fatal blow Friday, after nearly all Senate Republicans banded together in opposition. The 54 to 35 outcome, which fell six votes shy of the 60 needed to circumvent a procedural filibuster, followed hours of overnight chaos as lawmakers haggled over unrelated legislation. The vote stood as a blunt rejection by Republicans of an emotional last-minute appeal from the family of a Capitol Police officer who died after responding to the insurrection, and an eleventh-hour bid by Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) to save the measure by introducing changes intended to address her party's principal objections.... Six [Republicans] -- Sens. Bill Cassidy (La.), Lisa Murkowski (Alaska), Rob Portman (Ohio), Mitt Romney (Utah), Ben Sasse (Neb.) and Collins -- joined all voting Democrats to back the commission. All except Portman voted earlier this year to convict Trump on impeachmen charges for inciting an insurrection." Politico's story is here.

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

** Dan Keating & Leslie Shapiro of the Washington Post: "The country's declining covid-19 case rates present an unrealistically optimistic perspective for half of the nation -- the half that is still not vaccinated. As more people receive vaccines, covid-19 cases are occurring mostly in the increasingly narrow slice of the unprotected population. So The Washington Post adjusted its case, death and hospitalization rates to account for that -- and found that in some places, the virus continues to rage among those who haven't received a shot.... Adjustments for vaccinations show the rate among susceptible, unvaccinated people is 69 percent higher than the standard figures being publicized. With that adjustment, the national death rate is roughly the same as it was two months ago and is barely inching down. The adjusted hospitalization rate is as high as it was three months ago. The case rate is still declining after the adjustment. Unvaccinated people are getting the wrong message, experts said. 'They think it's safe to take off the mask. It's not,' said Lynn Goldman ... [of] George Washington University. 'It looks like fewer numbers, looks like it's getting better, but it’s not necessarily better for those who aren't vaccinated.'" ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: The story is subscriber-firewalled, and it shouldn't be. Not that I think lazy people & anti-vaxxers will actually read the Washington Post, but now you can't even send a link to the story to your cousin the slacker with a toljaso note. So the nuts & ne'er-do-wells are still making each other sick, encouraging mutations to more virulent strains of the virus, running exhausted healthcare personnel ragged, driving up costs of health insurance (including Medicare & Medicaid, which we all pay for), and I don't know what-all else.

Lisa Friedman of the New York Times: "Despite President Biden's pledge to aggressively cut the pollution from fossil fuels that is driving climate change, his administration has quietly taken actions this month that will guarantee the drilling and burning of oil and gas for decades to come. The clash between Mr. Biden's pledges and some of his recent decisions illustrates the political, technical and legal difficulties of disentangling the country from the oil, gas and coal that have underpinned its economy for more than a century. On Wednesday, the Biden administration defended in federal court the Willow project, a huge oil drilling operation proposed on Alaska's North Slope that was approved by the Trump administration and is being fought by environmentalists. Weeks earlier, it backed ... Donald J. Trump's decision to grant oil and gas leases on federal land in Wyoming. Also this month, it declined to act when it had an opportunity to stop crude oil from continuing to flow through the bit>~~~~~~~~~~

Matt Viser of the Washington Post: "President Biden on Thursday toured a community college [in Cleveland, Ohio,] and made an optimistic case for pumping trillions of dollars into the economy, arguing that it was beginning to stabilize, while imploring Republicans to drop their opposition to raising taxes on the wealthiest Americans. Bringing his economic arguments on the road, to a longtime swing state that he lost by eight points in 2020, Biden pointed four months into his presidency to a range of metrics to make the case that 'the Biden economic plan is working.' He also urged Congress to make 'generational investments' in education, research and infrastructure.... Midway through his speech, Biden mocked Republicans who voted against his $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief bill but nonetheless have touted elements of it that are popular in their districts. 'I'm not going to embarrass any one of them, but I have here a list,' he said, holding up a notecard that listed at least 13 members and which aspects of the legislation they have promoted. 'I mean, some people have no shame.'" ~~~

     ~~~ Video of President Biden's full speech is here. It begins at about 4:25 minutes in.

Jim Tankersley of the New York Times: "President Biden will propose a $6 trillion budget on Friday that would take the United States to its highest sustained levels of federal spending since World War II, while running deficits above $1.3 trillion throughout the next decade. Documents obtained by The New York Times show that Mr. Biden's first budget request as president calls for the federal government to spend $6 trillion in the 2022 fiscal year, and for total spending to rise to $8.2 trillion by 2031. The growth is driven by Mr. Biden's two-part agenda to upgrade the nation's infrastructure and substantially expand the social safety net, contained in his American Jobs Plan and American Families Plan, along with other planned increases in discretionary spending." MB: Tankersley is a deficit hawk; hence, the emphasis on the deficit. (Also linked yesterday.)"

Michael Shear of the New York Times: "The Biden administration has informed Russia that the United States will not rejoin a treaty that allowed the nations to conduct surveillance of each other, even though President Biden harshly criticized his predecessor during last year's campaign for pulling out of the agreement, State Department officials said Thursday.... But as president, Mr. Biden ordered a new review of the treaty, and officials said they have concluded that the Russians continue to violate the pact and that there is no chance of salvaging it.... The nearly 30-year-old accord, known as the Open Skies Treaty, was put in place to ensure that Russia and the United States could monitor military movements by using sophisticated sensors in aircraft that would fly over certain territory of the other's country.... Donald J. Trump told Russia last May of his intention to withdraw from the treaty, citing numerous violations by the Russians.... At one point, the Russians angered the United States by running a surveillance flight over Florida, near Mr. Trump's Mar-a-Lago retreat...."

David Sanger & Nicole Perlroth of the New York Times: "Hackers linked to Russia's main intelligence agency surreptitiously seized an email system used by the State Department's international aid agency to burrow into the computer networks of human rights groups and other organizations of the sort that have been critical of President Vladimir V. Putin, Microsoft Corporation disclosed on Thursday. Discovery of the breach comes only three weeks before President Biden is scheduled to meet Mr. Putin in Geneva, and at a moment of increased tension between the two nations -- in part because of a series of increasingly sophisticated cyberattacks emanating from Russia.... [Hackers implanted emails] with code that would give the hackers unlimited access to the computer systems of the recipients, from 'stealing data to infecting other computers on a network,' Tom Burt, a Microsoft vice president, wrote on Thursday night." Burt's public remarks are here. The Raw Story has a brief report here.

Jordain Carney of the Hill: "A bill aimed at combating China's competitiveness is getting pushed well into Friday after a series of last-minute objections injected fresh chaos into the debate. The Senate pushed the next steps in the bill until at least mid-morning Friday, after adjourning around 3 a.m. until 9 a.m. The late-night session came after Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), backed by a group of fellow conservative senators, threw the bill back into limbo as he refused to let it move forward over frustration that he didn't get some of his amendments in the package." MB: Johnson's maneuvers on this bill held up movement of other legislation, including the cloture vote on a January 6 bipartisan commission.

Marianne Levine of Politico: "Senate Republicans unveiled a $928 billion infrastructure counteroffer Thursday, in an effort to reach a bipartisan agreement with the White House. The proposal comes as talks are set to go past the Biden administration's unofficial deadline of Memorial Day. But the latest GOP offer only includes $257 billion in new spending, a far cry from the White House number of $1.7 trillion." The Washington Post's story is here. (Also linked yesterday.)

Jordain Carney of the Hill: "Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) signaled frustration with her Republican colleagues, who appear poised to block legislation forming a commission to probe the Jan. 6 attack as soon as Thursday night. Murkowski, speaking to a group of reporters, pushed back on concerns, voiced by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) and other Republicans, that the commission could hurt the party heading into the 2022 election, when she is up for reelection. 'To be making a decision for the short-term political gain at the expense of understanding and acknowledging what was in front of us on January 6, I think we need to look at that critically,' Murkowski said." ~~~

~~~ Burgess Everett of Politico: "During Thursday's Senate Republican lunch, Sen. Susan Collins made one last plea to her colleagues to advance a proposed independent commission to probe the Capitol riot, with changes she fought for.... Collins kept trying to whip up 10 votes to break a filibuster on Thursday and said in an interview that she wouldn't 'give up.' But [Mitch] McConnell didn't let her go un-rebutted at the conference's closed-door meeting.... And the GOP leader is set to win the day, much to the consternation of a handful of his members who fear the party is making a mistake in voting down the House-passed commission bill sometime Friday. After an increasingly hard public and private push from McConnell, Senate Republicans are ready to make the independent investigation into the Capitol attack their first filibuster of the Biden administration." ~~~

~~~ Jamie Gangel & Michael Warren of CNN: "In the last 24 hours, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has ramped up the pressure on his GOP Senate colleagues to oppose a bill creating a January 6 commission, according to two Republicans familiar with his effort. One of those Republicans told CNN that McConnell has even made the unusual move of asking wavering senators to support filibustering the bill as 'a personal favor' to him. 'No one can understand why Mitch is going to this extreme of asking for a "personal favor" to kill the commission,"' said the Republican." ~~~

~~~ Manchin Is Mad at Mitch. Jordan Williams of the Hill: "Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) on Thursday blasted Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) for playing politics over a bill establishing a bipartisan commission to investigate the Jan. 6 riots at the U.S. Capitol. Manchin issued a strongly-worded statement ... and accused McConnell of blocking the commission to help the GOP avoid the topic ahead of the 2022 midterm elections, when the Senate majority will be in play. 'There is no excuse for any Republican to vote against the commission since Democrats have agreed to everything they asked for,' Manchin said.... Manchin told reporters Thursday, however, that he would not nix the filibuster to pass the bill to form the commission." (Also linked yesterday.)

Oh, This Should Change Everything. Daniella Diaz of CNN: "Former House Speaker Paul Ryan is set to criticize ... Donald Trump and his hold on the Republican Party during a speech Thursday night, according to excerpts obtained by CNN. Ryan, a critic of the former President in the past, is expected to say at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, California, that Republicans must move away from the 'populist appeal of one personality' because 'then we're not going anywhere.'" (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

     ~~~ Update. Annie Karni of the New York Times: "The former speaker tempered his criticism by avoiding any mention of Mr. Trump by name -- except to say that the former president's brand of populism, when 'tethered to conservative principles,' had led to economic growth, and to credit him with bringing new voters to the party." MB: Jim Acosta of CNN said that Ryan is on Fox "News"' board, so if he wanted to do something about Trumpist extremism, he has a better place to start than California.

Andrew Solender of Forbes: "Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) on Thursday continued to make comparisons between her modern day opponents and Nazi Germany just days after her own party leaders condemned her for similar remarks. At a rally in Georgia with Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.), Greene said the Nazis were the National Socialist Party 'just like the Democrats are now a national socialist party.'... Greene also spent much of the rally tearing into the 'squad,' a group of progressive women of color serving in the House, dubbing them the 'Jihad Squad' and accusing them of supporting Palestinian militant group Hamas. Greene said members of Congress 'should be expelled if they're supporting terrorism,' despite her own sympathetic remarks about the Trump supporters who attacked the Capitol on Jan. 6."

** William Rashbaum, et al., of the New York Times: "Federal prosecutors in Brooklyn have been investigating whether several Ukrainian officials helped orchestrate a wide-ranging plan to meddle in the 2020 presidential campaign, including using Rudolph W. Giuliani to spread their misleading claims about President Biden and tilt the election in Donald J. Trump's favor, according to people with knowledge of the matter.... Mr. Giuliani is not a subject of the Brooklyn investigation, the people said.... At least one of the current and former officials Mr. Giuliani met [in a December 2019 trip to Europe], a Ukrainian member of parliament named Andriy Derkach, is now a focus of the Brooklyn investigation, the people said. The trip was the culmination of a yearlong effort by Mr. Giuliani, with support from Mr. Trump, to undermine Mr. Biden's presidential campaign."

** Your Neighbors Are Insane. Giovanni Russonello of the New York Times: "... it's increasingly clear that the Republican base remains in thrall to the web of untruths spun by Donald J. Trump -- and perhaps even more outlandish lies, beyond those of the former president's making. A federal judge [-- Amy Berman Jackson --] warned in an opinion yesterday that Mr. Trump's insistence on the 'big lie' -- that the November election was stolen from him -- still posed a serious threat.... QAnon, an outlandish and ever-evolving conspiracy theory spread by some of Mr. Trump's most ardent followers, has significant traction with a segment of the public -- particularly Republicans and Americans who consume news from far-right sources. Those are the findings of a poll released today by the Public Religion Research Institute and the Interfaith Youth Core, which found that 15 percent of Americans say they think that the levers of power are controlled by a cabal of Satan-worshiping pedophiles, a core belief of QAnon supporters. The same share said it was true that 'American patriots may have to resort to violence' to depose the pedophiles and restore the country's rightful order." Roughly one in four Republicans believe QAnon's outlandish theories and another 55 percent of Republicans don't entirely reject the theories. ~~~

~~~ Marie: One reason so many Americans believe loony conspiracy theories is that "leaders" & authority figures like one Army Col. Douglas Macgregor feed impressionable young people crap like this: ~~~

The idea is that they [Biden administration officials] have to bring in as many non-Europeans as possible in order to outnumber the numbers of Americans of European ancestry who live in the United States. That's what it's all about. And I don't think there's any point in questioning it. That is the policy.... It is a deliberate policy to enact demographic change. -- Col. Douglas Macgregor (Ret.), April 2021 ~~~

~~~ Andrew Kaczynski & Em Steck of CNN: "A Trump appointee serving on West Point's advisory board has repeatedly spread a conspiracy that the Biden administration is bringing in non-White immigrants as part of a 'grand plan' to have them outnumber White Americans of European ancestry in the United States. In another interview, he also attacked women serving in the military in combat roles. The comments were made in April and May by retired Army Col. Douglas Macgregor, who was appointed to West Point's Board of Visitors in the waning months of the Trump administration.... Macgregor also served as a senior official in Trump's Department of Defense, where he was tasked with the US withdrawal from Afghanistan after being appointed in November 2020. Macgregor was previously nominated to be the Trump administration's ambassador to Germany, but his nomination failed to receive a hearing following a CNN KFile report on controversial comments on minorities, Islam, and Germany's remembrance of the Holocaust." ~~~

~~~ Here's a decidedly more heart-warming story about West Point: ~~~

Michael Ruane of the Washington Post: "... starting in 1907, a detachment of Buffalo Soldiers [-- who were Black --] was posted at segregated West Point to instruct the cadets in the fine points of horsemanship -- and to do menial work across the campus. The training had previously been done by a White cavalry outfit, which suffered from poor morale, indiscipline and low reenlistment rates. The arrival of the Black soldiers solved the problem 'pretty much over night,' Army reports showed. Buffalo Soldier morale, discipline and reenlistment rates were all high, according to historian Brian G. Shellum. The Buffalo Soldiers served at West Point until 1947; the next year, the Army was racially desegregated, Shellum has said." The article is mostly about the sculptor Eddie Dixon who is creating an equestrian statue to honor the Buffalo Soldiers. The statue will be placed at West Point. ~~~

The Pandemic, Ctd.

Julian Barnes & David Sanger of the New York Times: "President Biden';s call for a 90-day sprint to understand the origins of the coronavirus pandemic came after intelligence officials told the White House they had a raft of still-unexamined evidence that required additional computer analysis that might shed light on the mystery, according to senior administration officials.... Officials ... are hoping to apply an extraordinary amount of computer power to the question of whether the virus accidentally leaked from a Chinese laboratory suggests that the government may not have exhausted its databases of Chinese communications, the movement of lab workers and the pattern of the outbreak of the disease around the city of Wuhan.... Mr. Biden committed on Thursday to making the results of the review public, but added a caveat: 'unless there's something I'm unaware of.'"

The New York Times' live updates of Covid-19 developments Thursday are here. The Washington Post's live updates for Thursday are here: "China on Thursday criticized the Biden administration for its renewed push to investigate the origins of the coronavirus, saying that the United States 'does not care about facts or truth, nor is it interested in serious scientific origin tracing.' The comments by Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian follow President Biden's announcement Wednesday ordering the U.S. intelligence community to 'redouble their efforts' to determine how the pandemic started, including probing whether the pathogen emerged from a lab accident in the Chinese city of Wuhan." (Also linked yesterday.)

Tennessee. Anti-Vaxxer Tries to Kill Vaccination Providers. Timothy Bella of the Washington Post: "... Virginia Christine Lewis Brown protest[ed] the [coronavirus] vaccine by driving her Chrysler Pacifica 'at a high rate of speed' through a vaccine tent in a mall parking lot [in Maryville, Tenn.], police said. 'No vaccine!' she yelled Monday as she plowed through the tent, according to witness accounts to sheriff's deputies. Brown, 36, was arrested for driving through a vaccination tent and 'placing the lives of seven workers in danger,' the Blount County Sheriff's Office announced Thursday. She's been charged with seven counts of felony reckless endangerment. Tennessee attorneys claim each count carries penalties that include a possible prison sentence of 1 to 15 years and a fine of up to $10,000."

Beyond the Beltway

Idaho. Caroline Kelly of CNN: "Idaho Lt. Gov. Janice McGeachin issued an executive order on Thursday banning mask mandates while Gov. Brad Little was unaware and out of town.... McGeachin tweeted Thursday that she had barred state entities and officials from requiring mask wearing."

Washington State. Michael Levenson of the New York Times: "Three police officers in Tacoma, Wash., were charged on Thursday in the killing of a Black man who had pleaded 'I can't breathe,' after they punched him, squeezed his neck, pressed on his back and placed a spit hood over his head, prosecutors said. Two of the officers, Christopher Burbank and Matthew Collins, were charged with second-degree murder, and the third, Timothy Rankine, was charged with first-degree manslaughter in the death of Manuel Ellis on March 3, 2020, Washington State&'s attorney general said. The attorney general's office said it was the second time that homicide charges had been filed in the state against law enforcement officers since the passage of Initiative 940 in 2018. The voter-approved initiative redefined when deadly force is justified, making it clear that there should be an increased role for juries in determining whether such force constitutes a crime."

Way Beyond

Belarus/Russia. Mary Ilyushina & Isabelle Khurshudyan of the Washington Post: "As the West has moved to isolate and punish Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko for intercepting a civilian jetliner flying over Belarus, in what European leaders have said was an operation to arrest an opposition journalist on board, the strongman is traveling to Russia Friday for a meeting with his counterpart Vladimir Putin.... Lukashenko [is] ... increasingly dependent on his closest ally's support to maintain his grip on power."

News Lede

New York Times: "Indications that [Samuel] Cassidy [-- the San Jose man who murdered 9 fellow employees --] held anger toward his workplace had been discovered by federal officials years earlier, after Customs and Border Protection stopped him as he returned from a trip to the Philippines in 2016. When officers searched his bags, they found books about terrorism, manifestoes and a notebook detailing how he detested the transportation authority, known as the V.T.A., according to an official who spoke on condition of anonymity to describe the contents of an internal message sent around the agency after the shooting." The story includes numerous other details of the incident. A USA Today story covers the 2016 incident in more detail.

The Commentariat -- May 27, 2021

Late Morning Update:

Jim Tankersley of the New York Times: "President Biden will propose a $6 trillion budget on Friday that would take the United States to its highest sustained levels of federal spending since World War II, while running deficits above $1.3 trillion throughout the next decade. Documents obtained by The New York Times show that Mr. Biden's first budget request as president calls for the federal government to spend $6 trillion in the 2022 fiscal year, and for total spending to rise to $8.2 trillion by 2031. The growth is driven by Mr. Biden's two-part agenda to upgrade the nation's infrastructure and substantially expand the social safety net, contained in his American Jobs Plan and American Families Plan, along with other planned increases in discretionary spending."

Marianne Levine of Politico: "Senate Republicans unveiled a $928 billion infrastructure counteroffer Thursday, in an effort to reach a bipartisan agreement with the White House. The proposal comes as talks are set to go past the Biden administration's unofficial deadline of Memorial Day. But the latest GOP offer only includes $257 billion in new spending, a far cry from the White House number of $1.7 trillion." The Washington Post's story is here.

Manchin Is Mad at Mitch. Jordan Williams of the Hill: "Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) on Thursday blasted Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) for playing politics over a bill establishing a bipartisan commission to investigate the Jan. 6 riots at the U.S. Capitol. Manchin issued a strongly-worded statement ... and accused McConnell of blocking the commission to help the GOP avoid the topic ahead of the 2022 midterm elections, when the Senate majority will be in play. 'There is no excuse for any Republican to vote against the commission since Democrats have agreed to everything they asked for,' Manchin said.... Manchin told reporters Thursday, however, that he would not nix the filibuster to pass the bill to form the commission."

Oh, This Should Change Everything. Daniella Diaz of CNN: "Former House Speaker Paul Ryan is set to criticize ... Donald Trump and his hold on the Republican Party during a speech Thursday night, according to excerpts obtained by CNN. Ryan, a critic of the former President in the past, is expected to say at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, California, that Republicans must move away from the 'populist appeal of one personality' because 'then we're not going anywhere.'"

The New York Times' live updates of Covid-19 developments Thursday are here. The Washington Post's live updates for Thursday are here: "China on Thursday criticized the Biden administration for its renewed push to investigate the origins of the coronavirus, saying that the United States 'does not care about facts or truth, nor is it interested in serious scientific origin tracing.'The comments by Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian follow President Biden's announcement Wednesday ordering the U.S. intelligence community to 'redouble their efforts' to determine how the pandemic started, including probing whether the pathogen emerged from a lab accident in the Chinese city of Wuhan."

~~~~~~~~~~

Nick Niedzwiadek of Politico: "Karine Jean-Pierre on Wednesday sought to downplay the historic nature of her leading the White House's daily press briefing, saying the Biden administration has embarked on a broad effort to ensure representation.... With Wednesday's appearance, Jean-Pierre -- the principal deputy press secretary -- became just the second Black woman to ever take the podium and the first since Judy Smith did so in 1991 under former president George H.W. Bush. She's also the first openly gay spokeswoman to field questions in the briefing room.... 'I appreciate the historic nature,' she said when prompted by a reporter. 'I really do, but I believe that being behind this podium, being in this room, being in this building is not about one person. It's about what we do on behalf of the American people.'" MB: Hard to imagine Sarah Sanders being this gracious if someone complimented her on, say, telling more lies in one briefing than any other White House press secretary in history. (This would have been the day she surpassed Sean Crowd-Size Spicer's record.)

Kat Stafford, et al., of the AP: "In interviews with The Associated Press, current and former enlistees and officers in nearly every branch of the armed services described a deep-rooted culture of racism and discrimination that stubbornly festers, despite repeated efforts to eradicate it. The AP found that the military's judicial system has no explicit category for hate crimes, making it difficult to quantify crimes motivated by prejudice. The Defense Department also has no way to track the number of troops ousted for extremist views, despite its repeated pledges to root them out. More than 20 people linked to the Jan. 6 siege of the U.S. Capitol were found to have military ties."

Trumpified & McConnellized. Mary Jalonick & Lisa Mascaro of the AP: "Senate Republicans are ready to deploy the filibuster to block a commission on the Jan. 6 insurrection, shattering hopes for a bipartisan probe of the deadly assault on the U.S. Capitol and reviving pressure on Democrats to do away with the procedural tactic that critics say has lost its purpose. The vote expected Thursday would be the first successful use of a filibuster this year to halt Senate legislative action. Most Republicans oppose the bill.... Trump has made it clear he opposes the formation of any panel to investigate the mob siege. With the former president wielding influence, Democrats are warning that if Republicans are willing to use the filibuster to stop an arguably popular measure, it shows the limits of trying to broker compromises, particularly on bills related to election reforms or other aspects of the Democrats' agenda."

Dana Milbank of the Washington Post: "It has long been obvious that Mitch McConnell puts party before country, but this week he actually admitted it. The Senate minority leader told Republican colleagues that they should oppose the creation of a Jan. 6 commission, no matter how it is structured, because it 'could hurt the party's midterm election message,' as Politico's Burgess Everett reported. And so, as early as Thursday, McConnell will use the filibuster to thwart a bipartisan effort to prevent further attacks on the U.S. government by domestic terrorists -- because he thinks it's good politics for Republicans.... In addition to denouncing the Jan. 6 commission bill..., McConnell undercut Tim Scott (S.C.), the lone Black Republican in the Senate and McConnell's designee to negotiate policing legislation.... This week, McConnell disrupted progress on a broadly bipartisan bill designed to improve American technological competitiveness against China.... Why? Because unrelenting obstruction is McConnell's only way to placate the GOP base in the face of Trump's attacks.... Maybe [Sen. Joe] Manchin [D-W.Va.] will be disturbed by this, too."

Felicia Sonmez & Peter Hermann of the Washington Post: "The mother and partner of the late Capitol Police officer Brian D. Sicknick [-- Gladys Sicknick and Sandra Garza --] are requesting meetings with all Republican senators to urge them to establish an independent commission to investigate the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol by a pro-Trump mob." MB: I heard on the teevee that 15 Republican senators had agreed to meet with Sicknick & Garza. The article cites excerpts from Gladys Sicknick's statement; those GOP senators will have a hard time countering her arguments. Politico's story is here. ~~~

     ~~~ The Post reporters write, "Several Republican lawmakers have also in recent days sought to play down the seriousness of the Jan. 6 attack, comparing the violent mob to 'tourists,' railing against law enforcement for seeking to arrest them and questioning how anyone could be sure the rioters were supporters of ... Donald Trump." But the two stories that follow, among many others, make ridiculous the claim that imposters were, or might have been, were pretending to be Trump supporters. These long-time prominent Republicans/Trump backers would have had to been posing as Republicans & planning this supposed false-flag operation for years, an event they did not even foresee until a short time before it happened. ~~~

~~~ James Musgrave of the Palm Beach Post: "Using Facebook photos and video captured during the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol, the FBI this week accused a one-time Palm Beach County commission candidate and former GOP heavyweight of joining the deadly rampage. Jody Tagaris, 67, who lives near Jupiter, is charged with four federal misdemeanors, accusing her of illegally entering a restricted building and being disruptive and disorderly once inside. She faces a maximum year-long prison sentence on two of the charges and six months on the two others.... In court papers, FBI agents say Tagaris' undoing began when they were alerted that she had posted a photo of herself on Facebook, sitting in a broken window of the Capitol. The caption on the photo was: 'The Capital. ... back at hotel safe! Got tear gassed but okay!' While the woman was masked, she was wearing a MAGA hat, an American flag scarf, blue jeans, and what agents described as a 'unique U.S. Olympics American flag jacket.'" ~~~

~~~ Peter Montgomery of Right Wing Watch: "Doug Mastriano, a Pennsylvania state senator and promoter of ... Donald Trump's false stolen-election claims, is facing a fresh wave of criticism after evidence emerged challenging Mastriano's claims about his participation in the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. Mastriano, who describes his entry into politics as a religious mission and has portrayed resistance to pandemic-related mask mandates as a Christian duty, is positioning himself to run for governor. Mastriano used his state senate campaign funds to charter buses to bring Trump supporters to the Capitol on Jan. 6. Mastriano has since condemned the violence at the Capitol, while claiming that 'at no point' had he crossed police lines, entered the Capitol, or walked on the Capitol steps. On Saturday, the Sedition Hunters, described by the HuffPost as an 'online community that has worked to identify riot participants,' flagged footage of Mastriano on the Capitol grounds, video that has since been reviewed by other journalists. The video and images 'contradict [Mastriano's] claims that he never breached police lines and left the area before violence broke out," HuffPost's Josephine Harvey reported Tuesday.'"

Trump Was Always Corrupt. Timothy Bella of the Washington Post: "Donald Trump allegedly attempted to stop a congressional probe of the Spygate case involving the New England Patriots by offering a bribe to then-Sen. Arlen Specter, the late senator's son claimed Wednesday. An ESPN report detailed how Trump, nearly a decade before he became president, allegedly acted on behalf of Patriots owner Robert Kraft when he met with Specter in 2008 to offer him 'a lot of money in Palm Beach' if the then-Republican senator from Pennsylvania dropped his investigation into the team ... illegally filming an opponent's hand signals.... Shanin Specter, the senator's son, said to ESPN that Trump intervened in the probe, while Charles Robbins, the senator's longtime communications aide, told The Washington Post that he surmised Trump to be the person who offered Arlen Specter the bribe." Shanin Specter said his father told him about the bribe within days of its being offered.

Clifford Krauss & Peter Eavis of the New York Times: "Big Oil was dealt a stunning defeat on Wednesday when shareholders of Exxon Mobil elected at least two board candidates nominated by activist investors who pledged to steer the company toward cleaner energy and away from oil and gas. The success of the campaign, led by a tiny hedge fund against the nation's largest oil company, could force the energy industry to confront climate change and embolden Wall Street investment firms that are prioritizing the issue. Analysts could not recall another time that Exxon management had lost a vote against company-picked directors."

Ruth Graham & Liam Stack of the New York Times: "The past several weeks have seen an outbreak of anti-Semitic threats and violence across the United States, stoking fear among Jews in small towns and major cities. During the two weeks of clashes in Israel and Gaza this month, the Anti-Defamation League collected 222 reports of anti-Semitic harassment, vandalism and violence in the United States, compared with 127 over the previous two weeks.... Until the latest surge, anti-Semitic violence in recent years was largely considered a right-wing phenomenon, driven by a white supremacist movement emboldened by rhetoric from ... Donald J. Trump, who often trafficked in stereotypes. Many of the most recent incidents, by contrast, have come from perpetrators expressing support for the Palestinian cause and criticism of Israel's right-wing government." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Particularly in stressful times, millions of white people lose any ability to distinguish between, say, (a) Bibi Netanyahu & his government, and (b) all Jews. Logic does not factor into this well-known racist equation, yet these same white people are capable of rationally realizing one can distinguish "all white men" from mass murderers.

Grade School Teacher Moonlights as Racist Writer. Christopher Mathias of the Huffington Post: "... 'Sinclair Jenkins,' [a white nationalist writer]..., is really a pseudonym for Benjamin Welton, a 33-year-old Boston University history PhD candidate who, until this week, taught English, social studies and computer science at Star Academy, an elementary school in Massachusetts. When HuffPost contacted the school for comment, Welton was put on leave, and was fired shortly before this article was published. For years, he has also worked as a freelance writer for major media outlets, including The Atlantic and Vice, for whom he published articles about esoteric spy and detective novels. He also wrote pieces for the The Daily Caller and The Weekly Standard, which let him make his racist sympathies clear in print. He was meanwhile using multiple pen names to secretly author fascist screeds online, in some cases advocating violence to establish a whites-only ethnostate." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Funny, but Star Academy's Website never mentions it's a school for white kids to realize they're so much better than children of other races. The main page is more about their "customized curriculum[, which] combines proven traditional American methods with the world's best innovative approaches to teaching." In fairness, white nationalism is traditional in the U.S.

Annals of "Journalism," Ctd. Jeremy Barr of the Washington Post: "Senior managers at the Associated Press admitted fault on Wednesday in the firing last week of a 22-year-old junior staffer, Emily Wilder, who was being targeted by right-wing commentators over her political activism in college. Wilder was fired last Wednesday for violating the news organization's social media policy. Company managers felt that her tweets showed a bias toward the Palestinian people in their conflict with the Israeli government and Israeli settlers -- though Wilder says her editors never told her which of her tweets were problematic. Since then, the AP -- a huge international news organization whose internal dramas rarely go public -- has been dealing with dissent from employees who feel it abandoned Wilder in the face of an online mob.... In a town hall with employees on Wednesday..., managing editor Brian Carovillano called them 'mistakes of process, and not of outcome.' He said it was still 'the right decision' to fire Wilder." MB: That is, we were right all along, but our PR team failed to cover up the fact that we don't give a damn about our employees. The Hill has a story here.

Donald Baker of the Washington Post: "John W. Warner, the five-term U.S. senator from Virginia who helped plan the nation's 1976 bicentennial celebrations, played a central role in military affairs and gained respect on both sides of the political aisle for his diligence, consensus-building and independence, died May 24 at his home in Alexandria, Va. He was 94.... He also brought a touch of glamour to the political world through his six-year marriage to film star Elizabeth Taylor." Gillian Brockell of the WashPo has an article on the Warner-Taylor marriage. MB: I recall seeing a group photo of Senate wives, a quaint tradition back when all U.S. senators were men. Taylor, well, stood out among the less-glamorous women.

The Pandemic, Ctd.

Apoorva Mandavilli of the New York Times: "Immunity to the coronavirus lasts at least a year, possibly a lifetime, improving over time especially after vaccination, according to two new studies. The findings may help put to rest lingering fears that protection against the virus will be short-lived. Together, the studies suggest that most people who have recovered from Covid-19 and who were later immunized will not need boosters. Vaccinated people who were never infected most likely will need the shots, however, as will a minority who were infected but did not produce a robust immune response."

Annie Linskey, et al., of the Washington Post: "President Biden said Wednesday he had asked U.S. intelligence agencies to 'redouble their efforts' to determine the origin of the coronavirus, an abrupt departure from the previous White House position of relying on the World Health Organization to uncover how the contagion started. The new message reflects a notable shift in some prominent scientists' assessments that the virus all but certainly jumped from an animal species to humans. The theory that has more recently gained traction is that the pandemic -- which has killed more than 3.4 million people worldwide -- may have accidentally escaped from the Wuhan Institute of Virology in China, though that is far from conclusive. Biden ordered intelligence officials to deliver a report within 90 days 'that could bring us closer to a definitive conclusion.'" The AP's story is here. President Biden's statement is here.

Hannah Sampson of the Washington Post: "While several [cruise] lines have announced plans to return to service after a 15-month halt due to the pandemic, those have all been missing approval from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. On Wednesday, Miami-based Celebrity Cruises said it had everything it needed: plans to cruise with paying passengers and the go-ahead from the public health agency. The CDC confirmed the approval.... Celebrity Edge will leave Fort Lauderdale on June 26 for the Caribbean at reduced capacity. All crew will be vaccinated, and most passengers will have to be."

Beyond the Beltway

Arizona. Tierney Sneed of TPM: "Recently added language to the state's budget package, which could be passed by the legislature as soon as this week, deprives Democratic Secretary of State Katie Hobbs of any role in elections-related litigation. The bill rests that authority solely with the state's attorney general, who currently is a Republican, Mark Brnovich. But there's a catch. The measure sunsets in Jan. 2023 -- presumably because, come the 2022 election, the attorney general could be a Democrat. Or, perhaps, the secretary of state could be a Republican.... 'The fact that the legislature has singled out me and my office for these unjustifiable restrictions -- restrictions which would expire at the end of my term -- make it clear what this is really about: partisan politics,' she said. She also connected the bill to the sketchy Senate-ordered audit underway to recount Maricopa's 2.1 million ballots and how the legislature had worked 'all year' to 'undermine our elections. It appears their next step is an attempt to undermine Arizona's Chief Election Officer,' she said.<"

New York. Racist Woman Sues Company that Fired Her for Being Famously Racist. Jonah Bromwich & Ed Shanahan of the New York Times: "Amy Cooper, a white woman who last year became an international symbol of the routine racism that Black people face in their daily lives, is suing her former employer for firing her, arguing that she is a victim of racial discrimination. Ms. Cooper makes the claim in a lawsuit filed this week against the investment firm Franklin Templeton, which terminated her employment a year ago after she was captured on a widely shared video in a tense encounter with a Black bird-watcher. The lawsuit is the latest fallout from the May 2020 episode in Central Park, which touched off intense discussions about the history of white people making false, and sometimes life-threatening, accusations against Black people to the police." A Law & Crime story is here.

Oklahoma. Nolan Clay & Chris Casteel of the Oklahoman: "Attorney General Mike Hunter announced his resignation on Wednesday, less than a week after filing for divorce from his wife, Cheryl. The Oklahoman submitted questions to Hunter on Tuesday night about an extramarital affair that the newspaper confirmed through people familiar with the situation. The sources said the affair was with a state employee, who did not work in the attorney general's office." In a statement Mike Hunter called his affair a "distraction." MB: Apparently so.

Texas. Peter Aldhous, et al., of BuzzFeed News: "The true number of people killed by the disastrous winter storm and power outages that devastated Texas in February is likely four or five times what the state has acknowledged so far. A BuzzFeed News data analysis reveals the hidden scale of a catastrophe that trapped millions of people in freezing darkness, cut off access to running water, and overwhelmed emergency services for days. The state's tally currently stands at 151 deaths. But by looking at how many more people died during and immediately after the storm than would have been expected -- an established method that has been used to count the full toll of other disasters -- we estimate that 700 people were killed by the storm during the week with the worst power outages. This astonishing toll exposes the full consequence of officials' neglect in preventing the power grid's collapse despite repeated warnings of its vulnerability to cold weather, as well as the state's failure to reckon with the magnitude of the crisis that followed. Many of the uncounted victims of the storm and power outages were already medically vulnerable...."

Wisconsin. Patrick Marley of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: "Assembly Speaker Robin Vos [R] is hiring retired police officers to investigate aspects of the November election, joining with Republicans from around the country who have questioned President Joe Biden's victory. Vos, of Rochester, said he recognizes Biden narrowly won Wisconsin and is not trying to change the results with his taxpayer-funded investigation. He said he hopes the investigators can get to the bottom of issues Republicans have raised unsuccessfully in court, such as how the state's largest cities used more than $6 million in grants from a private group to run their elections.... In addition to the grant spending, he said they may look into claims of double voting and review how clerks fixed absentee ballot credentials."

News Ledes

CNBC: "The U.S. jobs market edged closer to its pre-pandemic self last week as initial jobless claims totaled just 406,000 for the week ended May 22, the Labor Department reported Thursday. While that level is still well above the pre-Covid norm, it is the closest to the previous trend since the crisis began in March 2020 and a decline from the previous week's 444,000."

AP: "An employee who gunned down eight people at a California rail yard and then killed himself as law enforcement rushed in had talked about killing people at work more than a decade ago, his ex-wife said. 'I never believed him, and it never happened. Until now,' a tearful Cecilia Nelms told The Associated Press on Wednesday following the 6:30 a.m. attack at a light rail facility for the Valley Transportation Authority. 'When our deputies went through the door, initially he was still firing rounds. When our deputy saw him, he took his life,' Santa Clara County Sheriff Laurie Smith told reporters. The sheriff's office is next door to the rail yard, which serves the county of more than 1 million people in the heart of the Silicon Valley. The attacker was identified as 57-year-old Samuel Cassidy, according to two law enforcement officials. Investigators offered no immediate word on a possible motive but his ex-wife said he used to come home from work resentful and angry over what he perceived as unfair assignments.... President Joe Biden ordered flags to be flown at half-staff and urged Congress to act on legislation to curb gun violence.... Gov. Gavin Newsom visited the site and then spoke emotionally about the country's latest mass killing." ~~~

     ~~~ CNN Update: "The gunman who opened fire on coworkers at a light rail yard in Northern California on Wednesday -- killing nine people before killing himself -- bypassed certain people and so appeared to select those he shot, a witness said. 'He ... was targeting certain people. He walked by other people,' Kirk Bertolet, a worker at the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority (VTA) in San Jose, told CNN affiliate KGO Wednesday night. 'He let other people live as he gunned down other people.' The gunman, armed with two semiautomatic handguns, shot coworkers in two buildings around the time of a morning shift change...."

The Commentariat -- May 26, 2021

Tim Arango & Andrés Martínez of the New York Times: “In Minneapolis on Tuesday, as people gathered to mark the anniversary of the police killing of George Floyd, there was space for ... the trauma and the grief; some celebration, over a murder conviction of a police officer; and a measure of hope, too, that in death Mr. Floyd, a Black man, had nudged America toward more racial equality.... Even as all eyes were on Minneapolis — where the governor issued a proclamation for a moment of silence lasting nine minutes and 29 seconds, the amount of time a white officer’s knee remained on Mr. Floyd’s neck — people gathered in remembrance all across the country, to honor not just the life of Mr. Floyd, but to reflect on what has changed, and what has not, in America.... All this was happening as members of the Floyd family met privately with President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris at the White House.... The president said he was hopeful that a police reform bill that has stalled in the Senate would reach his desk soon, saying, 'we face an inflection point.'” ~~~

     ~~~ Michael Shear & Nicholas Fandos of the New York Times have more on the Floyd family's meeting with President Biden & Vice President Harris. ~~~

~~~ The New York Times liveblogged how the country is marking the first anniversary of George Floyd's murder. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~

~~~ Dana Milbank of the Washington Post: "Republicans chose a special way of observing the anniversary of George Floyd’s murder. They tried to vote down a highly qualified Black woman who had been nominated to run the Justice Department’s civil rights division.... All but one [Senate Republican] (Susan Collins of Maine) voted not even to allow [Kristen] Clarke a confirmation vote — and, when that failed, voted by an identical tally against confirming Clarke.... [Also,] Republican senators rose in near lockstep to oppose the confirmation of Chiquita Brooks-LaSure, the first Black woman tapped to lead the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. Only five of the 50 Republican senators supported this health-policy veteran.... President Biden had set a deadline of Tuesday for Congress to enact legislation to counter police brutality. But while the House passed the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act almost three months ago, Republican objections have bottled up negotiations in the Senate.... Racism isn’t just a factor in Republican politics. It is the factor."

Matt Viser of the Washington Post: "President Biden and Russian President Vladimir Putin are planning to meet next month in Geneva, the first face-to-face meeting between the two adversaries and one that comes at a time of deteriorating relations. The day-long summit is scheduled for June 16, according to an official familiar with the meeting, and will cover a wide range of topics including nuclear proliferation, Russian interference in U.S. elections, climate change and covid-19." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Nick Miroff & Maria Sacchetti of the Washington Post: "Under new Biden administration rules curtailing immigration enforcement, ICE carried out fewer than 3,000 deportations last month, the lowest level on record. The agency’s 6,000 officers currently average one arrest every two months. ICE under President Biden is an agency on probation. The new administration has rejected calls from some Democrats to eliminate the agency entirely, but Biden has placed ICE deportation officers on a leash so tight that some say their work is being functionally abolished.... The Biden administration is preparing to release its first Department of Homeland Security budget request this week, and immigrant advocates want deep cuts to ICE. DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas announced plans last week to shutter two ICE detention centers, but in an interview he said he ... wants to reorient ICE [toward national security & public safety], not shrink it...."

Ellen Nakashima & Lori Aratani of the Washington Post: "The Department of Homeland Security is moving to regulate cybersecurity in the pipeline industry for the first time in an effort to prevent a repeat of a major computer attack that crippled nearly half the East Coast’s fuel supply this month — an incident that highlighted the vulnerability of critical infrastructure to online attacks. The Transportation Security Administration, a DHS unit, will issue a security directive this week requiring pipeline companies to report cyber incidents to federal authorities, senior DHS officials said. It will follow up in coming weeks with a more robust set of mandatory rules for how pipeline companies must safeguard their systems against cyberattacks and the steps they should take if they are hacked, the officials said. The agency has offered only voluntary guidelines in the past." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Peggy McGlone of the Washington Post: “Having ousted four Trump-appointed members of the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts, President Biden announced Tuesday that he will replace them with four people who bring 'a diversity of background and experience, as well as a range of aesthetic viewpoints.' Architect Peter Cook, Howard University professor of architecture Hazel Ruth Edwards, Andrew Mellon Foundation program officer Justin Garrett Moore and architect Billie Tsien will join the seven-member commission, an independent agency responsible for guiding the design of the capital city, including renovations of historic homes and the look and scale of government buildings, museums and memorials.... On Monday, the Biden administration sent letters to ... [Trump-appointed members] asking that they resign by 6 p.m. that day or face termination. None of the four resigned.” Trump's appointments made the board all-white and all-male. ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: If you're interested in the way D.C. looks, or in urban planning in general, this story is for you.

Catie Edmondson of the New York Times: "House Republican leaders on Tuesday broke nearly a week of silence about comments by Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia comparing mask and vaccine mandates to the treatment of Jews by Nazis during the Holocaust, condemning her language but stopping short of punishing her. The slow response by Representative Kevin McCarthy of California, the minority leader, to Ms. Greene’s string of anti-Semitic statements reflected the reluctance of top Republicans to take on the first-term congresswoman, who had previously endorsed violent and racist conspiracy theories and whose combative style has made her a favorite of ... Donald J. Trump and his far-right supporters." ~~~

~~~ Make That "Leaders." Ryan Nobles of CNN: "House Republican leaders have condemned incendiary remarks from GOP Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene five days after she first publicly compared Capitol Hill mask rules to the Holocaust, amid a wave of criticism from Republican and conservative critics as well as Jewish groups aimed at the Georgia congresswoman and the party leaders' silence. 'Marjorie is wrong, and her intentional decision to compare the horrors of the Holocaust with wearing masks is appalling,' House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy said in a statement five days after Greene's original comments and after she made similar comparisons Tuesday. 'Let me be clear: the House Republican Conference condemns this language.' The No. 2 House Republican, Rep. Steve Scalise of Louisiana, also responded [in a written statement] to Greene's comments for the first time on Tuesday.... Rep. Elise Stefanik of New York, the newly elected No. 3 House Republican, also responded to the controversy in a tweet that didn't include Greene's name.... Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell spoke out against Greene on Tuesday morning when asked about her latest comments on the Holocaust. 'Once again an outrageous and reprehensible comment,' McConnell ... said." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: A tweet, Elise? Here it is: "'Equating mask wearing and vaccines to the Holocaust belittles the most significant human atrocities ever committed. We must all work together to educate our fellow Americans on the unthinkable horrors of the Holocaust. #NeverAgain,' Stefanik wrote Tuesday morning, following McCarthy and Scalise's remarks." Wow! I'll bet Margie feels terrible now. ~~~

Vaccinated employees get a vaccination logo just like the Nazi’s forced Jewish people to wear a gold star. -- Marjorie Taylor Greene, in tweeted early Tuesday morning, linking to a news story on a Tennessee supermarket chain’s decision to include a special logo on the name badges of vaccinated employees  ~~~

     ~~~ AND She's Still at It. Mike DeBonis & John Wagner of the Washington Post: “Top congressional leaders condemned Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene on Tuesday after the Georgia Republican compared a supermarket’s face-mask policy to the Nazi practice of labeling Jews with Star of David badges.... [In his statement, House GOP 'Leader' Kevin McCarthy said,] 'At a time when the Jewish people face increased violence and threats, anti-Semitism is on the rise in the Democrat Party and is completely ignored by Speaker Nancy Pelosi.'... Following the widespread condemnations Tuesday, Greene posted tweets explaining, but not apologizing for, her remarks. Echoing McCarthy, she accused the media and others of seeking to hide 'the disgusting anti-semitism within the Democrat Party.... Their attempts to shame, ostracize, and brand Americans who choose not to get vaccinated or wear a mask are reminiscent of the great tyrants of history who did the same to those who would not comply,' she wrote.... No elected Democrats recently have made any similar comparison, and prominent party leaders have condemned a spate of antisemitic attacks.” (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Michelle Goldberg of the New York Times: "Violence between Jews and Muslims in the Middle East is often accompanied by spikes in anti-Semitic activity in the United States, but what’s happened over the last week or so has been different.... What’s new, and more reminiscent of the sort of anti-Semitic aggression common in Europe, is flagrant public assaults on Jews — sometimes in broad daylight — motivated by anti-Zionism.... These apparent hate crimes are, first and foremost, a catastrophe for Jewish people in the United States, who’ve just endured four years of spiking anti-Semitism that started around the time Republicans nominated Donald Trump in 2016.... But this violence also threatens to undermine progress that’s been made in getting American politicians to take Palestinian rights more seriously. Right-wing Zionists and anti-Semitic anti-Zionists have something fundamental in common: Both conflate the Jewish people with the Israeli state." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~

~~~ MEANWHILE, Steve M., with a little help from Jonathan Chait, explains why -- in the eyes of the "bonkers" right wing, the spate of attacks on Jewish communities is all Democrats' fault. MB: Turns out there is a "logic" to at least some conspiracy theories, but it's a "logic" turned upside-down or inside-out.

Shayna Jacobs & David Fahrenthold of the Washington Post: "Manhattan's district attorney has convened the grand jury that is expected to decide whether to indict ... Donald Trump, other executives at his company or the business itself should prosecutors present the panel with criminal charges, according to two people familiar with the development. The panel was convened recently and will sit three days a week for six months. It is likely to hear several matters — not just the Trump case ­— during the duration of its term, which is longer than a traditional New York state grand-jury assignment, these people said.... The move indicates that District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance Jr.’s investigation ... has reached an advanced stage after more than two years. It suggests, too, that Vance believes he has found evidence of a crime — if not by Trump then by someone potentially close to him or by his company." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) The AP's story is here.

Shayna Jacobs of the Washington Post: “A federal judge on Monday formally dismissed the fraud case against Stephen K. Bannon, the conservative provocateur and ex-adviser to ... Donald Trump, ending months of litigation over how the court system should handle his pardon while related criminal cases remain unresolved. U.S. District Judge Analisa Torres, citing examples of other cases being dismissed following a presidential reprieve, granted Bannon’s application — saying in a seven-page ruling that Trump’s pardon was valid and that 'dismissal of the Indictment is the proper course.' Bannon was charged with fraud last year alongside three others in what prosecutors described as a massive fundraising scam targeting the donors of a private campaign to build a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. Bannon was accused of pocketing more than $1 million from his involvement with 'We Build the Wall' while representing to the organization’s backers that all of the money was being used for construction.” (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~

     ~~~ BUT Judge Rules Bannon Is Guilty. Adam Klasfeld of Law & Crime: “... [U.S. District Judge Analisa] Torres extensively cited case law suggesting [Steve] Bannon’s acceptance of the pardon acknowledged the truth behind allegations that he conspired to defraud donors of the non-profit We Build the Wall and pocketing the loot through money laundering.... '... from the country’s earliest days, courts, including the Supreme Court, have acknowledged that even if there is no formal admission of guilt, the issuance of a pardon may “carr[y] an imputation of guilt; acceptance a confession of it,”' [citing Burdick v. United States].... Quoting another 19th century ruling from the New Jersey Supreme Court, Torres wrote: 'Pardon implies guilt.'”

Cat Zakrzewski &  Rachel Lerman of the Washington Post: “D.C. Attorney General Karl A. Racine on Tuesday brought an antitrust complaint against Amazon, alleging that the e-commerce giant wields monopoly power that has resulted in higher prices for consumers. Racine’s office accused the company of fixing prices through contract provisions with third-party sellers who peddle their products on its platform. The attorney general said that Amazon prevents sellers from offering their products at lower prices or on better terms on any other online platforms, including their own websites, and that that prohibition results in 'artificially high' prices across e-commerce sales.”

Katie Robertson of the New York Times: “The Associated Press has started a review of its social media policy after more than 150 staff members publicly condemned the firing of a young journalist for violating that policy.... The news agency faced a backlash after Emily Wilder, a 22-year-old news associate who had joined the company in Arizona, was dismissed on May 19, three weeks after she was hired. Ms. Wilder, who graduated from Stanford University in 2020 and had worked at The Arizona Republic, said in a statement on Friday that she had been the subject of a campaign by Stanford College Republicans, whose social media posts drew attention to her pro-Palestine activism at the university. She added that her editors had reassured her she would not be fired for her past advocacy work. 'Less than 48 hours later, The A.P. fired me,' she said.” ~~~

     ~~~ Erik Wemple of the Washington Post: Emily Wilder's firing "points to two emerging facts of life in contemporary mainstream media — one, that editors at large news organizations quake when right-wing actors target their colleagues; and two, publishers’ concerns over ethical appearances and perceptions are reaching irrationality."

The Pandemic, Ctd.

The New York Times' live updates of Covid-19 developments Wednesday are here. The Washington Post's live updates for Wednesday are here.

Yasmeen Abutaleb, et al., of the Washington Post: “The United States’ top health official called Tuesday for a swift follow-up investigation into the coronavirus’s origins amid renewed questions about whether the virus jumped from an animal host into humans in a naturally occurring event or escaped from a lab in Wuhan, China. Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra told an annual ministerial meeting of the World Health Organization that international experts should be given 'the independence to fully assess the source of the virus and the early days of the outbreak.' Becerra’s remarks, which were prerecorded, signaled that the Biden administration would continue to press the WHO to expand its investigation to determine the virus’s origins.... At a White House briefing Tuesday, Anthony S. Fauci ... said he believes it’s most likely the virus originated from a 'natural occurrence.' But he said a deeper probe is warranted.” The story is free to nonsubscribers. ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: IOW, one of Rand Paul's many crazy conspiracy theories is at least worth investigating. So not completely crazy. Congrats, Randy! ~~~

~~~ Kylie Atwood of CNN: "President Joe Biden's team shut down a closely-held State Department effort launched late in the Trump administration to prove the coronavirus originated in a Chinese lab over concerns about the quality of its work.... The existence of the State Department inquiry and its termination this spring by the Biden administration ... comes to light amid renewed interest in whether the virus could have leaked out of a Wuhan lab with links to the Chinese military.... Those involved in the previously undisclosed inquiry, which was launched last fall by allies of then-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, say it was an honest effort to probe what many initially dismissed: that China's biological weapons program could have had a greater role in the pandemic's origin in Wuhan, according to two additional sources. But the inquiry quickly became mired in internal discord amid concerns that it was part of a broader politicized effort by the Trump administration to blame China and cherry-pick facts to prove a theory." ~~~

~~~ Glenn Kessler of the Washington Post: "The source of the coronavirus ... remains a mystery. But in recent months the idea that it emerged from the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) — once dismissed as a ridiculous conspiracy theory — has gained new credence. How and why did this happen? For one, efforts to discover a natural source of the virus have failed. Second, early efforts to spotlight a lab leak often got mixed up with speculation that the virus was deliberately created as a bioweapon. That made it easier for many scientists to dismiss the lab scenario as tin-hat nonsense. But a lack of transparency by China and renewed attention to the activities of the Wuhan lab have led some scientists to say they were too quick to discount a possible link at first." Kessler traces the timeline of the Wuhan Lab theory.

The New York Times' live updates of Covid-19 developments Tuesday are here: "Moderna said on Tuesday that its coronavirus vaccine, authorized only for use in adults, was powerfully effective in 12- to 17-year-olds, and that it planned to apply to the Food and Drug Administration in June for authorization to use the vaccine in adolescents. If approved, its vaccine would become the second Covid-19 vaccine available to U.S. adolescents. Federal regulators authorized the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine this month for 12- to 15-year-olds." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) Update: The Times' full story on the Moderna vaccine is here. ~~~

     ~~~ The Washington Post's live Covid-19 updates Tuesday are here. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) 

Beyond the Beltway

Arizona. Jeremy Duda of the Arizona Mirror: "Wake Technology Services, Inc., the company that has been in charge of recounting ballots as part of Senate President Karen Fann’s election audit, has left the audit team. Audit spokesman Randy Pullen told the Arizona Republic that Wake TSI’s contract ended on May 14, when the Senate’s contract with Veterans Memorial Coliseum, where the audit is taking place, was originally scheduled to end. Pullen said Wake chose not to renew its contract.... Wake TSI stood out as the only company [working on the 'audit'] that appeared to have any experience with election work.... [But] Wake’s work in Pennsylvania raised questions as well. Fulton County ... allowed Wake to audit its election at the request of a state senator who’s been a prominent advocate of election conspiracy theories and bogus claims that the election was rigged against ... Donald Trump.... Wake was actually hired by Defending the Republic, a 501(c)(4) nonprofit organization run by attorney Sidney Powell, a former Trump campaign lawyer who has spread myriad baseless conspiracy theories and filed unsuccessful lawsuits in several states, including Arizona, seeking to overturn legitimate election results." ~~~

~~~ Mark Phillips of ABC News 15 Arizona: “On Tuesday morning, the Arizona House Appropriations Committee[, dominated by Republicans,] stripped Secretary of State Katie Hobbs [D] of her ability to defend election lawsuits. It gave the power exclusively to the Attorney General [R]. Later in the day, the state's Senate Appropriations Committee[, dominated by Republicans,] passed the same changes. Now these proposed changes are part of the full budget proposal that will be voted on later this week. 'We are meddling with the constitution,' State Representative Randy Friese, (D) Tucson, said. Friese and other Democrats see the move as a response to Secretary of State Hobbs' use of outside counsel to defend Arizona voters from lawsuits filed by the State Republican Party and others challenging Arizona’s election results.”

Nevada. Proud Boy Cast Decidiing Vote in Nevada GOP Censure Resolution. Michael Scherer of the Washington Post: "The leaders of the Nevada Republican Party are facing an internal revolt after an avowed Proud Boys member said he was invited with friends to attend a state party meeting last month and cast the deciding votes in the censure of a state official who concluded that the 2020 election in the state was not tainted by fraud. In the past week, the Nevada Senate GOP caucus and the chairmen of the two largest Republican county organizations have called for an audit of an April state party vote to uncover who cast ballots as seated party members and proxies for a resolution against Secretary of State Barbara Cegavske (R)."

Texas Legislature Goes Wild-West Insane. Neil MacFarquhar & Edgar Sandoval of the New York Times: “... within days, Gov. Greg Abbott is expected to sign a wide-ranging law that will ... [allow] virtually anyone over the age of 21 to carry a handgun, no permit required. The landmark bill would make Texas — which has three of the nation’s 10 biggest cities — the largest among 20 other states to adopt a 'constitutional carry' law that basically eliminates most restrictions on the ability to carry handguns.... Critics, including some senior law enforcement officers, call the new legislation a dangerous retreat from gun control amid a recent surge in gun violence, particularly in a state with a long and painfully recent history of mass shootings.”

Way Beyond

Belarus Hostage Video. Antonia Farzan of the Washington Post: “A video purporting to show dissident Belarusian journalist Roman Protasevich confessing to organizing 'mass riots' has met with skepticism from scholars, family members and human rights groups who say that there is little doubt that he was coerced.... The detained journalist’s demeanor in the video alarmed his father, Dzmitry, who told Reuters that his son’s nose appeared to have been broken, 'because the shape of it is changed,' and that his remarks were out of character.... In the video, Protasevich’s face appears to be marked with abrasions and bruises, suggesting that authorities subjected him to 'torture or other ill-treatment' before recording the supposed confession, Amnesty International spokesman Alexander Artemyev told The Washington Post.”