January 12, 2023

Late Morning/Afternoon Update:

Perry Stein, et al., of the Washington Post: "Attorney General Merrick Garland has appointed a special counsel to investigate the handling of classified documents found at a former office and the Delaware home of President Biden -- ratcheting up the stakes and potential consequences surrounding the national security cases that have now ensnared both the current president and his predecessor. Garland made the announcement Thursday at the Justice Department, tapping Robert K. Hur, a former U.S. Attorney in Maryland who also served as a senior Justice Department official during the Trump administration. The attorney general also offered the most detailed timeline to date of how the investigation has progressed, noting that on Jan. 5, the first prosecutor assigned by Garland to review the matter [-- U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois John R. Lausch Jr., a Trump appointee ---] recommended that a special counsel take up the case. The new investigation will examine whether 'any person or entity violated the law in connection with this matter,' Garland said." ~~~

     ~~~ Adam Goldman, in the New York Times liveblog, also linked below: "In selecting Hur, Garland continued his pattern of using current and former Trump-appointed U.S. attorneys to handle politically sensitive investigations -- like the Hunter Biden inquiry -- to allay concerns about political bias. That's a shift from his predecessor, William P. Barr, who repeatedly used fellow Trump appointees to run politically charged investigations." ~~~

     ~~~ AND this post by Ben Shpigel in the NYT liveblog gives a very helpful timeline of the Biden docs case.

CNN's liveblog is here. From the liveblog: "Richard Sauber, special counsel to President Biden, issued a statement following the appointment of a special counsel Rob Hur. 'We are confident that a thorough review will show that these documents were inadvertently misplaced, and the President and his lawyers acted promptly upon discovery of this mistake,' he said.... Robert Hur issued a statement following his appointment by Attorney General Merrick Garland as special counsel in the Biden documents probe. 'I will conduct the assigned investigation with fair, impartial, and dispassionate judgment. I intend to follow the facts swiftly and thoroughly, without fear or favor, and will honor the trust placed in me to perform this service,' he said.... Some context: The special counsel announcement significantly escalates the existing inquiry, which started as a review handled by the US attorney in Chicago. This also increases the potential legal exposure for Biden, his aides and lawyers who handled sensitive government materials from his time as vice president."

Well, This Is Not Good. Charle Savage of the New York Times: "The second set of classified documents from President Biden's time as vice president were discovered at a storage space in the garage of his home in Wilmington, Del., a top White House lawyer said on Thursday. The Times reported on Wednesday that this second set of documents had been found at a location 'associated' with Mr. Biden. On Thursday the White House statement offered more detail by specifying that the location was his private residence, where he often spends weekends. The White House statement, by Richard Sauber, a special counsel to Mr. Biden, did not answer fundamental questions about the contents of the documents, who packed them and whether anyone had gained access to them after he left office. It also did not say when the second batch had been found.... Mr. Sauber said Mr. Biden's team had also searched a house the president owned in Rehoboth Beach, Del., but found no documents stored there." This page has become a liveblog. MB: So, like, the classified docs were in a cardboard box right next to the motor oil & socket wrenches? ~~~

     ~~~ Nah. The Docs Were Here, There & Everywhere. Zeke Miller & Michael Balsamo of the AP: "President Joe Biden acknowledged on Thursday that a document with classified markings from his time as vice president was found in his 'personal library' at his home in Wilmington, Delaware, along with other documents found in his garage.... Biden did not say when the latest series of documents were found, only that his lawyers' review of potential storage locations was completed Wednesday night." At 11:30 am ET, this is a breaking news story. An update of the story says that Merrick Garland will make a statement later today. (According to the Times blog linked above Garland will speak at 1:15 pm ET.) MB: I hope Hunter didn't rummage through the place at Christmas time & put snapshots of the classified docs on Instagram next to his dick pix, imagery that reminds me that now this is a real cock-up.

Gosh, Could Santos Have Been Running a "Scam PAC"? Alexander Berzon & Grace Ashford of the New York Times: "A month before George Santos was elected to Congress, one of his large donors received a call asking him to consider making another sizable contribution. The request came from a Republican loyalist calling on behalf of RedStone Strategies.... Days later, on Oct. 21, [the donor] sent $25,000 to a Wells Fargo Bank account belonging to RedStone Strategies.... The Federal Election Commission said it had no evidence that RedStone Strategies was registered as a political group, and there do not appear to be any records documenting its donors, contributions or spending. Mr. Santos and his lawyer refused to answer questions about RedStone.... But the firm listed the Devolder Organization, a company owned by Mr. Santos, as one of its managing officers.... RedStone may have skirted the law.... The donor ... [said] he was told by the Queens Republican operative that the $25,000 that he gave to RedStone ... would be used as part of a large ad buy for Mr. Santos. But ... a review of spending ... does not show the group making any ad buys on Mr. Santos's behalf, nor did it show any spending for Mr. Santos from other independent groups in the months leading up to Election Day. If a group raised money under false political pretense, that activity could lead federal election officials to regard it as what is commonly known as a 'scam PAC.'..."

Natasha Bertrand of CNN: "An American Navy veteran who has been detained in Russia for nearly a year was released from Russian custody on Thursday, his family's spokesperson told CNN, after months of negotiations spearheaded by former New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson. Taylor Dudley, 35, of Lansing, Michigan, was detained by Russian border patrol police in April 2022 after crossing from Poland into Kaliningrad, a Russian exclave which is territory governed by Moscow between Poland and Lithuania. He was in Poland attending a music festival, and it is not clear why he crossed the border. Dudley's detention -- which the US government had not deemed as 'wrongful,' or based on arbitrary and discriminatory motivations -- had not been widely publicized before Thursday because his family wanted the negotiations for his release to remain private."

~~~~~~~~~~

Carol Lee & Ken Dilanian of NBC News: "Aides to President Joe Biden have discovered at least one additional batch of classified documents in a location separate from the Washington office he used after leaving the Obama administration, according to a person familiar with the matter.... The classification level, number and precise location of the additional documents was not immediately clear. It also was not immediately clear when the additional documents were discovered and if the search for any other classified materials Biden may have from the Obama administration is complete." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

     ~~~ Glenn Thrush of the New York Times: "On Wednesday, the White House press secretary, Karine Jean-Pierre, refused to address the issue, saying it would be inappropriate to comment on a matter under review by the Justice Department.

~~~ Tommy Christopher of Mediaite: "President Joe Biden got an assist on Fox News when Karl Rove broke out the whiteboard to show how Biden's classified documents issue is much less serious than the probe into ... Donald Trump's handling of classified docs.... [Rove said,] "... there are differences. For example, how many documents in Biden's case, there appear to be about 10. In the case of President Trump, hundreds.... We don't yet know how the documents got to the Biden office connected with his activities on behalf of the University of Pennsylvania. We know that President Trump ordered the removal of the documents to Mar-a-Lago.... When ... the Biden people found out about it, they called immediately, called the appropriate authorities and turned them over. We spent a year and a half watching the drama unfold in Mar-a-Lago, and it had to end in a police search to recover the documents. But still..., this is going to create lots of headaches for the Department of Justice in deciding how to handle President Trump's issues, because now they have an issue that, in, at least in the minds of a lot of ordinary Americans, are going to be conflated as being roughly the same." (Also linked yesterday.)

Zach Montague of the New York Times: "Jill Biden, the first lady, had outpatient surgery on Wednesday to remove three skin lesions, two of which doctors determined to be cancerous. The White House physician, Dr. Kevin C. O'Connor, said in a statement that the tissue from two sites -- above her right eye and on her chest -- was tested and confirmed to be basal cell carcinoma, a common and relatively unaggressive form of skin cancer. All the cancerous tissue was removed, Dr. O'Connor said, and doctors did not expect any further procedures to be necessary. A third, similar lesion was also removed from the first lady's left eyelid, but tests were still being conducted to check for cancer, according to the statement."

Niraj Chokshi & Mark Walker of the New York Times: "... flights across the country were halted because the Federal Aviation Administration's system to alert pilots to safety issues went down. The F.A.A. said on Wednesday night that it had traced the outage to a damaged database file and that there was no evidence that it was caused by a cyberattack. The disruption was the latest example of serious problems in the aviation system and at the F.A.A., the agency responsible for safely managing all commercial air traffic that critics say has long been overworked and underfunded.... The F.A.A. has struggled to quickly update systems and processes, many of which were put in place decades ago, to keep up with technological advancements and a sharp increase in the number of flights and passengers."

Luke Broadwater of the New York Times: House Republicans "have made it clear that their primary mission in the 118th Congress will be investigating the Biden administration, including inquiries they say could lead to the potential impeachment of President Biden and several cabinet members. Preparing to use their new subpoena power, Republicans have already created three special investigative committees or subcommittees, but they expect to carry out many more inquires under existing committees they now control. Some of the investigations may involve multiple panels, and top Republicans are jockeying for the biggest and most prominent pieces.... Republicans have already introduced a host of impeachment articles against the president and members of his cabinet.... Here is a road map of the investigations[.]" ~~~<

~~~ Luke Broadwater of the New York Times: "The House Oversight Committee took its first significant action under new Republican leadership on Wednesday, pressing the Treasury Department for information about President Biden's family finances and demanding that Twitter executives appear before lawmakers next month to address accusations that they sought to hide information about the Bidens' business dealings. Representative James R. Comer, Republican of Kentucky and the new chairman of the committee, has pledged for months to investigate Mr. Biden's family and its business connections. His staff members obtained the contents of a laptop owned by Hunter Biden, the president's son, whose business activities are under federal investigation. But now that Mr. Comer has subpoena power, he is in a position to expand and escalate his inquiry." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: We probably should have stopped treating Republicans as a political party a long time ago. When a group's "primary purpose" is to tear down government rather than to form a government, when in fact the group can barely manage to form a government because the flamethrowers are concerned they won't get big enough torches, when the majority of the group supports a coup & a number of them countenance or excuse violence in executing the coup, I don't think that group can be considered a political party in the traditional sense. They're revolutionaries or agitators or anarchists or or something. You can probably think of a better term. ~~~

~~~ For instance, here's their idea of legislation: ~~~

~~~ Annie Karni of the New York Times: "Republicans used their new power in the House on Wednesday to push through legislation that could subject doctors who perform abortions to criminal penalties, underscoring their opposition to abortion rights even as they stopped short of trying to ban the procedure. The measure, the second policy bill Republicans have brought to the floor since taking control, has no chance of passage in the Democratic-controlled Senate. Its consideration was an early effort by the G.O.P. to appeal to its conservative base.... The House approved the bill on Wednesday almost entirely along party lines, on a vote of 220 to 210. One Democrat, Representative Henry Cuellar of Texas, joined Republicans in favor and another, Representative Vicente Gonzalez, also of Texas, voted 'present.'" The Guardian's report is here. MB: In other words, a completely unserious effort despite its pretense of intimidating doctors & depriving women of reproductive rights.

Get Out! Michael Gold & Grace Ashford of the New York Times: "Dozens of Republican officials in New York State, including four recently elected congressmen, urged Representative George Santos to resign on Wednesday in a fracturing of local party support for Mr. Santos. Their call represented a sharp break from congressional Republican leaders, who insisted they would not push the embattled congressman to resign.... House Speaker Kevin McCarthy said that he not only would resist calls to push Mr. Santos out, but that he planned to seat him on a congressional committee. 'The voters elected him to serve,' Mr. McCarthy told reporters in Washington, adding that Mr. Santos 'has to answer to the voters and the voters can make another decision in two years.'" This is an update of a story liked earlier. (Also linked yesterday.)

     ~~~ Not Surprisingly.... Joe Anuta & Julia Marsh of Politico: "Rep. George Santos refused to resign Wednesday despite a parade of Republican Nassau County officials demanding he step down." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

~~~ Brian Schwartz of the CNBC: "A member of George Santos' political team had a plan to raise money for the Republican congressman's campaign: Impersonate the chief of staff of now House Speaker Kevin McCarthy. Wealthy donors received calls and emails from a man who said he was Dan Meyer, McCarthy's chief of staff, during the 2020 and 2022 election cycles, according to people familiar with the matter. His name was actually Sam Miele, and he worked for Santos raising money for his campaign, according to one GOP donor who contributed to Santos' campaign.... 'We were duped,' said a Republican political strategist close to GOP donors and the leadership of the Republican Jewish Coalition." MB: Shall this too pass, Kevin? (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

     ~~~ Scott Wong, et al., of NBC News: "House Speaker Kevin McCarthy said Wednesday that embattled freshman GOP Rep. George Santos, who is facing growing calls to resign after admitting to fabricating much of his personal biography, should not be seated on any top committees.... Although Democrats and some Republicans have said Santos should not receive any committee assignments at all, McCarthy confirmed later in the day that Santos would serve on at least one." MB: So is that it, Kevin? No plum committee assignments? Harsh! (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

~~~ Isaac Stanley-Becker & Emma Brown of the Washington Post: "Rep. George Santos (R-N.Y.) ... received payments as recently as April 2021 from a financial services company accused by the Securities and Exchange Commission of a 'classic Ponzi scheme,' according to a court-appointed lawyer reviewing the firm's assets. Santos did not divulge any income from the company, Florida-based Harbor City Capital, on a financial disclosure form required of all federal candidates. The payments the lawyer described to The Washington Post, which have not been previously reported, indicate that Santos received money at least a month after he has said he left the firm -- and mere weeks before registering a business called the Devolder Organization that he has claimed as the basis for his wealth.... A key unanswered question is how Devolder made its money." ~~~

~~~ Steve M. notices George Santos lied about being one of the very first New Yorkers to test positive for Covid-19. He said he was rushed to Elmhurst Hospital where he "was isolated in a plastic bubble with an air filter, because the hospital had 'run out of isolation rooms.'" It's hard to know just when this was supposed to have happened, because George kept changing the dates, & none of his claims fits too well into the fact that he seemed quite healthy when he appeared on Fox Business during the time he was supposed to be fighting off a severe case of Covid. Oh, and he said he had a brain tumor, which he later forgot about. MB: To me, it seems cruel to pretend you suffered from maladies that cause real suffering for real people. ~~~

~~~ Azi Paybarah of the Washington Post: "George Santos allegedly told a Republican official he was a star on the volleyball team in college. The problem with that anecdote? The freshman GOP lawmaker from New York never attended the college for which he claimed to have played.... 'George Santos's campaign last year was a campaign of deceit, lies and fabrication,' Nassau County Republican Chairman Joseph G. Cairo Jr. said at a news conference on Long Island. Among those lies, Cairo said, was Santos bragging about his athletic prowess. 'He told me that, I remember specifically, "I'm into sports a little bit," that he was a star on the Baruch volleyball team and that they won the league championship,' Cairo said."MB: Reminds me of when I captained the U.S. women's team that won Olympics silver in 2008 & 2012. The good news for George, or Anthony, or whatever his name is: he won't be kicked out of Congress for lying about volleyball. ~~~

~~~ Nicholas Fandos of the New York Times: "When Representative George Santos of New York first expressed interest in running for a suburban New York City House seat in 2020, the Nassau County Republican Committee sent him a standard vetting questionnaire and asked to see his qualifications. The résumé Mr. Santos handed over was impressive.... If the Nassau Republicans had dug into any of the claims, they would probably have found that much of Mr. Santos's account was baldly fabricated. Instead, without another candidate interested in the race, they ... took Mr. Santos's word and offered their full backing, re-upping in 2022 to help deliver him to victory. The episode marks an early example of a yearslong pattern of political deception, when Mr. Santos lied to his own party and faced no immediate repercussions." The Times proves a copy of the two-page document. MB: The failure of scrutiny here is mindblowing. My rep here has quite a solid resumé, but I have no doubt I can make up an even more impressive one. Get ready to address me as Congresswoman. (Also linked yesterday.)

They're Coming to Take Your Stove Away! Maxine Joselow of the Washington Post: "Republicans and allies of fossil fuels are rallying behind the humble gas stove, a staple in millions of U.S. kitchens that has emerged as a flash point in the nation's ongoing culture wars and a source of conservative resistance to President Biden's environmental agenda. The controversy was ignited when a member of the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) ... said in mid-December that the commission will consider regulating indoor air pollution from gas stoves. On Monday, Commissioner Richard L. Trumka Jr., a Democrat, said in an interview that he had not ruled out a ban on the appliances, prompting the agency to pivot Wednesday and clarify it was not planning a ban.... Trumka's comment prompted loud complaints from Republicans on Capitol Hill, who claimed that the commission was trying to snatch the stoves from the 40 million homes that rely on gas, even though any regulations would only affect new appliances.... While the issue has become ensnared in partisan politics, scientists say a growing body of research shows that gas stoves pose a threat to the planet and public health." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: I'm not sure Maxine spends much time in the kitchen. You can buy a gas stove -- for your home, not for commercial use -- for $20,000 & change.

Josh Dawsey, et al., of the Washington Post: "A wide-ranging subpoena sent to Trump campaign officials last month shows new areas of investigative interest as part of the Justice Department's extensive Jan. 6 criminal probe, according to a copy reviewed by The Washington Post, and lawyers say a grand jury focused on the day's events and related fundraising has increased its activities in recent months.... One part of the four-page legal document asks recipients to reveal if anyone other than themselves are paying for legal representation -- and if so, to provide a copy of the retention agreement for that legal work.... The subpoena shows the Justice Department is interested in other Trump entities besides the Save America PAC -- which The Post and others reported earlier this year was a subject of inquiry by investigators."

Adam Liptak of the New York Times: "Six months after the Supreme Court struck down a New York law that placed strict limits on carrying guns outside the home, the court refused to block a new law enacted in response to that ruling. The court's brief, unsigned order gave no reasons, which is typical when the justices act on emergency applications. Challenges to the new law remain pending before the federal appeals court in New York. In a statement, Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr., joined by Justice Clarence Thomas, said the law 'presents novel and serious questions.' But he added that the appeals court should address those questions first, so long as it does so promptly.' (Also linked yesterday.)

Beyond the Beltway

Arkansas. Gov.-Mrs. Huckleberry Gets Down to Important Business. Nicole Acevedo of NBC News: "Within hours of being sworn in as the new governor of Arkansas, Sarah Huckabee Sanders signed an executive order Tuesday banning the term 'Latinx' from official use in the state government. It is one of the first, if not the first, executive order of its kind, Tabitha Bonilla ... of ... Northwestern University, told NBC News. It was one of seven orders signed by Sanders, a Republican, right after taking the oath. The other ones focused on prohibiting Arkansas schools from teaching critical race theory, budgeting and spending as well as other government affairs. Most of these executive orders are consistent with the rhetoric Sanders campaigned on -- except for the one banning Latinx, a gender-neutral alternative to Hispanic or Latino." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: I suppose it comforts some people to know that Republicans at the state level are no more interested in governance than are those supposedly running the federal government.

California Senate Race. Nicholas Wu of Politico: "Rep. Barbara Lee has told her fellow lawmakers she's running for Senate in California, according to two sources familiar with the situation. She informed her colleagues in a closed-door Congressional Black Caucus meeting on Wednesday.... Asked later Wednesday about her plans, Lee said in a brief interview she'd officially announce 'when it's appropriate....Right now, in respect to [Sen.] Dianne Feinstein and the floods and what I'm doing, I'm doing my work. And we'll let them know when I intend to go to the next step. But now's the time not to talk about that,' she said."

California. Sam Levin of the Guardian: "A cousin of Black Lives Matter co-founder Patrisse Cullors was killed by Los Angeles police after he got in a traffic accident and officers who showed up repeatedly Tased and restrained him in the middle of the street, according to body-camera footage and his family's account. Footage from the 3 January encounter released on Wednesday showed that Keenan Anderson, a 31-year-old high school teacher and father, was begging for help as multiple officers held him down, and at one point said, 'They're trying to George Floyd me.' One officer had his elbow on Anderson's neck while he was lying down before another Tased him for roughly 30 seconds straight before pausing and Tasing him again for five more seconds."

Virginia Special State Election. Zoe Richards of NBC News: "Democrat Aaron Rouse has won a special election for a state Senate seat in Virginia after his Republican opponent conceded in a race that was widely viewed as a proxy fight over abortion. Rouse, a former NFL player who has served on the Virginia Beach City Council for the past few years, flipped a GOP seat that had been held by Jen Kiggans until she won a congressional seat in November. Rouse defeated Republican Kevin Adams, a retired lieutenant commander in the Navy.... Democrats will have a 22-18 majority in the state Senate, and Rouse is expected to provide a crucial vote against efforts by Gov. Glenn Youngkin and GOP legislators to pass a bill that would ban abortion after 15 weeks of pregnancy, instead of the current threshold of around 26 weeks."

Way Beyond

Iran. Farnaz Fassihi of the New York Times: "Iran's judiciary announced on Wednesday that a former deputy defense minister had been convicted and sentenced to death on charges of spying for Britain, where he had lived for a decade as a dual national. Alireza Akbari, who had served the Islamic Republic in senior roles until his departure to Britain, was arrested in 2019 in Iran on allegations of being a 'super spy' for MI6, Britain's foreign intelligence service, and passing it classified national security information, according to a statement released Wednesday by Iran's intelligence ministry."

Ukraine, et al. The Washington Post's live briefing of developments Thursday in Russia's war on Ukraine is here. The Guardian's live updates for Thursday are here. The Guardian's summary report is here.

News Ledes

CNBC: "Inflation closed out 2022 in a modest retreat, with consumer prices in December posting their biggest monthly decline since early in the pandemic, the Labor Department reported Thursday. The consumer price index, which measures the cost of a broad basket of goods and services, fell 0.1% for the month, in line with the Dow Jones estimate. That equated to the largest month-over-month decrease since April 2020, as much of the country was in lockdown to combat Covid. Even with the decline, headline CPI rose 6.5% from a year ago...."

Washington Post: "Constantine II, the last king of Greece, who rose to the throne in 1964 as a youthful monarch celebrated for an Olympic gold medal in sailing, but whose reign effectively ended three years later when he fled into exile after clashing with a military junta, died Jan. 10 at a hospital in Athens. He was 82.... He lived for decades in London and was a cousin of King Charles III, a godfather to Prince William and part of the extended family line of Greece-born Prince Philip. The former king traveled as Constantine de Grecia under a Danish passport as a result of his family's shared lineage with a branch of Denmark's royal family -- in addition to his marriage to a former Danish princess, Ann-Marie. His sister Sophia is the wife of the former Spanish king Juan Carlos." And I am Marie of Romania.

Comments

[Marie Burns]

There was some discussion at the end of yesterday's thread on what the record-keeping mechanism for classified documents is. My guess is the agency that sends out a classified document (and probably a lot of agencies do) records to whom or where (a particular SCIF?) the document went. But after that, I envision a chaotic, slipshod "system" of keeping track of where a particular copy of a particular document goes. Some offices & individuals probably have well-established procedures & are quite good at following the paper; others are probably Trumpish.

While I would think that many documents say something like, "It Is a Federal Crime to Copy This Document or Any Part of It," others may not contain a warning. That would apply to most docs that are classified after the fact. As we learned from Hillary's Emails!!!, classified documents also go out as attachments to emails, and there's no stopping a third party from copying those docs. Then you have big shots like Donald Trump or Joe Biden whom few would be willing to question about their purloined papers. So there are going to be A LOT of unrecorded classified docs out there, for one reason or another.

IOW, even a good system, generally well-followed, will never be fail-safe.

[Ken Winkes]

Just as the Pretender represented and embodied a further distillation of latter day Republicanism--its mendacity, its anger, its greed, its entire absence of principle--I see Santos further purifying the brand.

The Pretender had at least some substance behind him: his father's money.

Santos, on the other hand, is an entirely empty suit filled with a tissue of brass and bravado. Below the surface, there is nothing to him.

As such, Santos is the perfect representative of Republicanism: literally all show and no substance. They are all actors, playing a role to a simple-minded audience.

And since it has entirely abandoned serious policy, it's hard to picture where the party will go from here.

Likely farther in the direction of more noise and more guns..

By abandoning by policy and principle,.it has left itself no where else to go.

[Marie Burns]

@Ken Winkes: Your commentary reminds me of the brilliance of Republican gaslighting. By making life harder for ordinary Americans, Republicans give them something real to gripe about. But by raising so-called "cultural issues," Republicans divert the hoi polloi's attention -- and wrath -- from the real problems to fake ones: "woke" culture, Latinx, critical race theory as taught to 6-year-olds, dangerous local librarians, rigged elections & so forth.

I get how an inexperienced young woman (played by Ingrid Bergman) could be gaslighted by a suave older man (Charles Boyer character), but I don't get how millions of Americans could be so collectively stoopid.

[Dan]

Interesting family tree of Constantine II. Royal incest?
Dan, Third Duke of Earl.

[Akhilleus]

George and the Liars

Waaaahhh….we were duped and now that lying Santos fellow has to go.

Crocodile tears are flowing on the right with each new revelation of George Santos’ lies (now he has/had/may have had cancer—Jesus!).

The real problem is that Santos’ lies are front and center and point to the fact that lying is endemic among Republicans. They are a party of liars. They lie about everything, all the time.

And not for nothin’ but Santos’ lies about graduating from college and being a successful businessman are nothing compared to the lies spread on a daily basis by the rest of these charlatans. Yes, lying about being a descendant of Holocaust survivors is a particularly nasty lie, but few people heard it and it didn’t get anyone killed. Screaming about Trump’s Big Lie did.

For the most part Santos’ inventions are local. The lies of the election deniers have spread even as far as Brazil. Republicans’ lies about women, abortion, immigrants, public health, education, library books, the LGBTQ community, the economy, Putin, Trump, white nationalists, Nazis, racists, Antifa, election workers, all have serious and often deadly consequences. Santos is a piker compared to the likes of KKKarlson, Gosar, Greene, Cruz, Jordan, McCarthy, and of course, Trump and his grifting, chiseling lie-spewing spawn.

Recall the lies about how Democrats were going to unleash 87,000 armed IRS agents to break down doors and go after small businesses and reg’lar ‘mericans. Think about how people died because of their lies about Covid. What about those lies about rising crime? The fact is that crime in red states that guaranteed guns for everyone experienced the highest crime rates. And consider how many Americans die every day because of their lies about guns.

As for this risible claim that they were duped by George Santos, it’s been well documented that they knew about his lies but looked the other way:

“‘We knew from our research that George Santos’s past was full of deceptive claims and shady financial dealings — and we worked hard to make this known and hold him accountable,’ Evan Chernack, [Santos’ Democratic opponent, Robert] Zimmerman’s former campaign manager, told The Intercept. ‘There’s simply no way that Republicans in D.C. weren’t aware of these same red flags.’”

They just didn’t care. It gave them one more seat in the House and a chance to own those evil New York libs.

Santos needs to go because he’s a poster boy for the tsunami of Republican lies. And once more, his lies haven’t killed anyone. Their lies do, and have.

And will.

[Akhilleus]

It’s all legal (like)!

In Kentucky, the state Republican Party (supporters of the Big Lie, by the way) had a nice Christmas present in their giant stocking, $1 million from drug giant Pfizer to build the state Party of Lies guys a brand spankin’ new clubhouse.

The money will help build the R’s a new party headquarters from which to spin more lies and rig more elections.

But is shit like this even legal?

Didn’t used to be. But guess who changed that law last year? And now…surprise, surprise, surprise! Who could ever have predicted that those nice people at Pfizer would help out like that? Of course they don’t want anything in return. Noooooo.

So yeah, it’s legal.

Now.

https://apnews.com/article/us-republican-party-frankfort-kentucky-8a03b755230133c3e996c809a9d6d7c9

[NiskyGuy]

From My kevin's "victory" speech:

"What we do here today, next week ... will set the tone for everything that follows."

"...A government that us held accountable, where Americans get the answers they want, need, and deserve" as the Rs' first bill is to slash funding for IRS customer service agents.

"...lower the price of groceries, gas, cars, housing..."

I fail to see the connection between the above stated priorities and the actual first two bills submitted, or the announced committee assignments and subcommittee formation.

[Ken Winkes]

Now that classified documents have been found in Biden's Delaware home, it seems harder all the time to draw a clear distinction between Biden's situation and the Pretender's.

Not that that is no distinction, but the lines seem to me increasingly blurred.

Agree with Marie and others that there must be dozens, hundreds, thousands? of variously classified papers wandering around loose, due mostly to a broken system. First, that of over-classification and second, the inability of the sprawling bureaucracy to track so many pieces of paper that originate so variously and travel so many paths.

Still, politically, the situation is not good for the Dems and will likely cause Garland to adjust his thinking about the Mar-a-Lago matter. It would mine.

Don't like this bit of news a whit, but am happy I don't have to thread the needle Garland now holds in his hand.

As Marie said in another connection: stoopid!

[RAS]

I heard one lawyer on tv use the analogy for the classified documents cases to the difference between a getting in a fender bender to driving down a crowded sidewalk. This was before the latest reporting, but it still looks like an honest mistake versus the deliberate theft of classified government documents.

[Patrick]

The strange thing about Biden's classified paper woes is that, at all times he was VP, he had competent and experienced staff. They should have known that what goes over in the locked pouch, needs to come back in the locked pouch, and it is staff's job to ensure controls. There is no justification for "temporarily" filing classified material in unapproved locations. And if they found him taking things in his briefcase for night reading, they should have read him the riot act. He seems to be a responsible person not prone to shooting messengers.

If he carried docs home routinely, and could not be dissuaded, the WH should have provided him a military courier for the Amtrak ride. Problem solved, and not too expensive compared to lots of alternatives.

Unfortunately, the Secret Service will not handle, or even notice, document control for their protectees. Witness Mar a Lardo.

[Jeanne]

I am so angry...at Biden's staff!!! How dare they NOT be proactive with Biden's papers from the time Dumpster stole his...and apparently nothing was done. Red flags-- I am so angry we have to listen to this balderdash now that we didn't a week ago. Patrick is much more with it than I about protocols, but I just don't understand why papers could end up in Biden's garage...grrrrrrr. This is Katzenjammer kids-level mistakes made by Biden and his staff years ago.

[RAS]

You'd also think that after watching what happened to Hillary Clinton over the private server BS that they would be extra conscient of dealing with classified documents.

I also do not trust any Trump DOJ people to do a fair and honest job. But Garland keeps putting them in charge of investigations involving the administration. It reinforces the idea of the DOJ as being partsan and says that only open opposition to the party in power (when it's Democrats) can be trusted to provide a reliable outcome, or at least adequate cover.