;)
July 19, 2023
Late Morning/Afternoon Update:
Marjorie Taylor Greene cuts a campaign ad for Joe Biden. MB: I opened the video with a brief intro to the ad; you can pretty much skip what-all comes after the ad:
Mary Ilyushina & Robyn Dixon of the Washington Post: "Russian President Vladimir Putin, facing an arrest warrant from the International Criminal Court over alleged war crimes in Ukraine, will not attend next month's summit of the BRICS group of nations in South Africa 'by mutual agreement,' South Africa's presidential administration said Wednesday. The agreement with the Kremlin puts an end to a diplomatic quandary for South Africa: As a member of the ICC, it would have an obligation to arrest Putin upon his arrival in the country."
Mary Ilyushina of the Washington Post: "Wagner boss Yevgeniy Prigozhin, in what appeared to be the first video of him since he led a short-lived rebellion in late June, said the Russian mercenary group will for now not fight in Ukraine and repeated his criticism that Russia's Ukraine invasion has been botched. The blurry clip, apparently filmed at dusk, showed a man resembling Prigozhin addressing a crowd of at least several hundred men in military fatigues. He vowed to continue operating the Wagner Group in Africa and turn the military of Belarus, his new host country, into 'the second army in the world.'"
Paul Waldman of the Washington Post: "From the moment he entered the White House in 2017, Donald Trump was at war with the government he led; as his close adviser Stephen K. Bannon said at the time, the administration's goal was the 'deconstruction of the administrative state.' It was a war Trump mostly lost. But as he campaigns for another term, his loyalists are planning to refight that war, and win.... Working through established conservative organizations and newer Trump-centric ones such as the America First Policy Institute, Trump's associates are developing a plan to concentrate federal authority in his hands.... The Heritage Foundation's massive plan for the next GOP administration states, 'Nothing is more important than deconstructing the centralized administrative state.'... 'A lot of Trump's frustration with what he called the deep state was as much as anything frustration towards his own political appointees,' says Donald Moynihan, a Georgetown University political scientist.... 'He has solved that problem,' because now he has 'thousands of vetted loyalists' ready to staff the executive branch."
It is a ghastly reality that the only job left that Donald Trump could get in this country is president of the United States. -- Tom Nichols in a Bulwark podcast
Travis Gettys of the Raw Story: "Former New York City police commissioner Bernie Kerik is preparing to sit down with special counsel Jack Smith's team.... [Donald] Trump pardoned Kerik, who rose to fame after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, after he pleaded guilty in 2010 to eight felony charges, including failure to pay taxes and lying to White House officials during a failed nomination to be the secretary Homeland Security. Kerik served three years in prison...."
Dan Mangan of CNBC: "... on Wednesday, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported that [Jack] Smith's prosecutors had subpoenaed surveillance video footage recorded at the State Farm Arena in Atlanta during vote counting there after the 2020 election. Trump's campaign lawyers had used surveillance footage from the vote count to argue without success in December 2020 that Georgia's presidential election was tainted by fraud." The Atlanta Journal-Constitution story is here.
Erica Orden of Politico: "A federal judge on Wednesday denied Donald Trump's bid for a new trial two months after a jury found that he sexually abused and defamed the writer E. Jean Carroll.... In a 59-page decision, U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan wrote that ... the former president's argument '... ignores the bulk of the evidence at trial, misinterprets the jury's verdict, and mistakenly focuses on the New York Penal Law definition of "rape" to the exclusion of the meaning of that word as it often is used in everyday life and of the evidence of what actually occurred between Ms. Carroll and Mr. Trump.'"
Ian Swanson of the Hill: "Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) announced on his podcast Tuesday he is introducing legislation to defund investigations into former President Trump led by special counsel Jack Smith."
Laura Sforza of the Hill: "A Pennsylvania woman accused of directing Jan. 6 rioters into the Capitol building with a bullhorn was found guilty on federal charges. Rachel Marie Powell, 41, was convicted of all charges brought against her, including eight felonies and one misdemeanor related to her actions during the Jan. 6, 2021, attacks on the Capitol, the U.S. Attorney's Office in Washington announced Tuesday. U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth heard testimony without a jury, and a sentencing hearing was scheduled for Oct. 17."
David Smith of the Guardian: "Robert Kennedy Jr, a long-shot Democratic candidate for US president, has a long history of racism, antisemitism and xenophobia, and should be denied a national platform, according to a damning report seen by the Guardian.... The Congressional Integrity Project, a political watchdog, called for Republicans to disinvite Kennedy after releasing a report that details his meetings with and promotion of racists, antisemites and extremist conspiracy theorists.... [For instance,] the Project details how Kennedy himself has frequently invoked Nazi Germany when pushing debunked theories about vaccines. He put out a video that showed the infectious disease expert Anthony Fauci with a moustache reminiscent of Adolf Hitler and used the word 'holocaust' to describe children he believes were hurt by vaccines in 2015."
Stella Kim & others of NBC News have some details about the nitwit who bolted across the DMZ into North Korea. The kid is not your model soldier.
~~~~~~~~~~
** Maggie Haberman, et al., of the New York Times: "... Donald J. Trump has been informed that he could soon face federal indictment for his efforts to hold onto power after his 2020 election loss, potentially adding to the remarkable array of criminal charges and other legal troubles facing him even as he campaigns to return to the White House. Mr. Trump was informed by his lawyers on Sunday that he had received a so-called target letter from Jack Smith, the special counsel investigating his attempts to reverse his defeat at the polls, Mr. Trump and other people familiar with the matter said on Tuesday. Prosecutors use target letters to tell potential defendants that investigators have evidence tying them to crimes and that they could be subject to indictment. 'Deranged Jack Smith' sent Mr. Trump a letter on Sunday night informing him he was a 'TARGET of the January 6th Grand Jury' investigation, Mr. Trump said in a post on his social media platform. Such a letter 'almost always means an Arrest and Indictment,' wrote Mr. Trump, whose campaign is rooted in accusations of political persecution and a promise to purge the Justice Department and Federal Bureau of Investigation of personnel he sees as hostile to him and his agenda....
"The target letter cited three statutes that could be applied in a prosecution of Mr. Trump by Mr. Smith's team, a person briefed on the matter said. They include a potential charge of conspiracy to defraud the United States and a broad charge related to a violation of rights, the person said.... At least two grand juries in Washington have been hearing matters related to Mr. Trump's efforts to stay in office.... Mr. Trump spent much of Tuesday promoting a scorched-earth political strategy, consulting with allies in Washington including Speaker Kevin McCarthy and Representative Elise Stefanik, a New York Republican...." ~~~
~~~ Yesterday, the New York Times ran a liveblog of developments in this story. The link to the liveblog has been moved to the main story above. MB: I posted parts of some of the entries on yesterday's page. It appears that the remarks reporters made on the liveblog have otherwise been "disappeared."~~~
~~~ The AP story is here. The NBC News story is here. (Also linked yesterday.)
~~~ Katelyn Polantz & Jeremy Herb of CNN: "'Deranged Jack Smith, the prosecutor with Joe Biden's DOJ, sent a letter (again, it was Sunday night!) stating that I am a TARGET of the January 6th Grand Jury investigation, and giving me a very short 4 days to report to the Grand Jury, which almost always means an Arrest and Indictment,' Trump posted on Truth Social." MB: Hilariously, Trump seems upset that Smith sent target letters on Sundays, Trump's day of prayer. (Probably amuses the two Corinthians, too.) (Also linked yesterday.)
CNN's liveblog of developments contains quite a number of interesting points: "... Donald Trump reached out to some of his top allies on Capitol Hill to discuss how they're going to go on offense against the special counsel's investigation, according to sources familiar with the conversation." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ CNN: "Will Russell, a close adviser to ... Donald Trump is expected to appear before a grand jury in Washington, DC, on Thursday in the special counsel's investigation into the aftermath of the 2020 election, two sources familiar with the matter told CNN. Russell, who has testified to the grand jury at least twice before, served as a special assistant to the president as well as deputy director of advance and trip director in the Trump White House. He has continued to work for Trump after he left office. His appearance indicates there will be additional activity in the grand jury, which is meeting today at the federal courthouse in Washington, DC." ~~~
~~~ CNN: "In the Department of Justice's criminal investigation into efforts to overturn the 2020 election leading up to the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol, a key issue for prosecutors will be looking into ... Donald Trump's intent and his direct role, a CNN senior legal analysts said." ~~~
~~~ CNN: "The [target] letter caught Trump's team off guard, who had not been anticipating Smith to potentially bring charges this month, or against Trump. The letter indicates he could do so soon."
~~~ Sources have confirmed to both the NYT & CNN that Trump received a target letter.
~~~ The Washington Post story, by Perry Stein, is here. The story has been updated.
Gideon Rubin of the Raw Story: "The special counsel's letter to Donald Trump alerting the former president that he's the target of Jack Smith's investigation over efforts to overturn the 2020 election lists conspiracy and obstruction among the federal statutes under which Trump is likely to be charged, Rolling Stone reports. The letter doesn't include sedition or insurrection as statutes under investigation by the special counsel, an unnamed source told the outlet.... The letter identifies three federal statutes: Conspiracy to commit offense or to defraud the United States; deprivation of rights under color of law; and tampering with a witness, victim, or an informant, according to the report." This reporting jibes with a portion of the New York Times report on the contents of target letter.
Marcy Wheeler provides a redacted version of Trump's Liars Social post announcing receipt of a target letter (well, okay, a TARGET letter) to spare you "the whining and lies." Thanks to unwashed for the link. (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ Philip Bump of the Washington Post, on the other hand, read Trump's whole damned post, which ran to nearly 800 words: "His lengthy statement, offered with his idiosyncratic grammar and capitalization, offers a wide-ranging litany of excuses, rationalizations and attacks, few of which actually address what is likely to be the focus of the criminal probe. The approach appears to be the one that Trump has deployed often previously: throw out every possible bit of flotsam to which those inclined to be sympathetic can cling.... The lengthy rant is worth parsing closely, though, because it is also replete with misinformation and false claims that demand contextualization." MB: Kind of a fun read, anyway, right down to that "perfect phone call" Trump made to Georgia's secretary of state asking the secretary to find exactly enough votes to wipe out Joe Biden's win in the state.
They Are Not Serious People. Shane Goldmacher & Maggie Haberman of the New York Times: "Like so much of the Trump presidency itself, the extraordinary has become so flattened that Mr. Trump's warning on Tuesday that he was facing a possible third indictment this year ... drew shrugs from some quarters of his party and a muddled response from his rivals.... Some opposing campaigns' strategists all but ignored the development. And on Capitol Hill, Mr. Trump's allies quickly resumed their now-customary defensive positions.... 'We have yet again another example of Joe Biden's weaponized Department of Justice targeting his top political opponent, Donald Trump,' Representative Elise Stefanik, the No. 4 House Republican, told reporters on Capitol Hill. When Mr. Trump and Ms. Stefanik spoke by phone on Tuesday, the former president ... discussed ways to use the Republican-led House committees to try to attack the investigations.... Few prominent elected officials were as directly affected on Jan. 6 as former Vice President Mike Pence. But even he declined to suggest that Mr. Trump should be prosecuted and said the election should be how the matter is arbitrated."
Tierney Sneed, et al., of CNN: "US District Judge Aileen Cannon signaled she is likely to push back the start of a trial in the Mar-a-Lago classified documents case beyond the mid-December date proposed by federal prosecutors -- but appeared deeply skeptical of arguments from Donald Trump's lawyers that he couldn't get a fair trial while running for president.... During [a] hearing in Fort Pierce, Florida, Cannon said a proposal from federal prosecutors that the trial of Trump and his aide be held in mid-December was 'a bit rushed.' Cannon did not decide on a trial date but said she plans to 'promptly' issue an order on the matter. The judge also pressed the Trump legal team to commit to a timeline for at least some of the steps in the pre-trial process.... Trump himself did not attend to the hearing on Tuesday. [Walt] Nauta, a bodyman and aide to the former president, did appear for the hearing with his two attorneys." Includes some helpful background info. The New York Times story is here. (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ Marie: I was wondering why it took Trump a day-and-a-half to announce receipt of his TARGET letter. Then a teevee pundit (sorry, can't recall who) gave the answer: he wanted to use the probable impending charges during yesterday's hearing on the classfied docs case as part of his excuse menu for why the trial should be delayed till he can pardon himself. And, sure enough according to the Haberman, et al., report linked above,: "Two of Mr. Trump's lawyers, Todd Blanche and Christopher M. Kise, briefly mentioned the new target letter at a pretrial hearing in Florida on Tuesday on the documents case." ~~~
~~~ There is some question, BTW, as to whether or not the president's pardon power under the Constitution includes a self-pardon. It seems to me an easy way Trump could get around that would be to make his vice-president the President for a Day under a provision of the 25th Amendment, during which day the veep would pardon Trump.
Jane Timm of NBC News: "Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel announced Tuesday that she has filed charges against 16 people who signed paperwork falsely claiming that ... Donald Trump had won the 2020 election as part of a scheme to overturn the results.... The 16 people being charged in Michigan allegedly met [in December 2020] in the basement of the state's Republican Party headquarters and signed multiple certificates claiming they were 'the duly elected and qualified electors for president and vice president of the United States of America for the state of Michigan,' Nessel said in recorded remarks. 'That was a lie. They weren't the duly elected and qualified electors, and each of the defendants knew it,' she continued.... The documents were later sent to the U.S. Senate and the National Archives 'with the intent that Vice President Pence would overturn the results of the election, using the false electoral slate,' Nessel said. Nessel said the 'false electors' are being charged with eight felony counts each, including forgery." The New York Times story is here. (Also linked yesterday.)
Kaitlan Collins of CNN: "Special counsel Jack Smith's team has contacted former Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey, who[m] Donald Trump pressured to overturn the 2020 election, a source familiar with the outreach confirmed first to CNN. A spokesman for Ducey confirmed the outreach from Smith's team, which has not been previously reported.... As Ducey was certifying the election results in November 2020, Trump appeared to call the governor -- with a 'Hail to the Chief' ringtone heard playing on Ducey's phone. Ducey did not take that call but later said he spoke with Trump, though he did not describe the specifics of the conversation. Ducey, behind closed doors, said that the former president was pressuring him to find fraud in the presidential election in Arizona that would help him overturn the election, a source with knowledge told CNN earlier this month after The Washington Post first reported the news. There was no recording made of that call, a source familiar with the matter said."
** Trump, International Religious Antiquities Thief. Brad Reed of the Raw Story: "Israeli newspaper Haaretz reports that Israeli officials have been trying without success to get [Donald Trump] to return government-owned antiquities that were sent to the White House in 2019 on the condition that they be returned shortly afterward. Not only were the artifacts not returned, but they were taken down to the former president's resort after he left the White House in 2021. According to Haaretz, the artifacts included 'ancient ceramic candles which are part of Israel's national treasures collection' and were shipped to the White House to be used at a Hanukkah candle-lighting event that was attended by Trump personally." MB: So is this what Trump meant by golf shirts & shoes when he described the contents of the boxes? I have to give credit where credit is due: after all this, the extent of Trump's venality still occasionally manages to astound me.
Real News
Cecilia Kang & David McCabe of the New York Times: "The Biden administration's top antitrust officials unveiled tougher guidelines against tech mergers on Wednesday, signaling their deepening scrutiny of the industry despite recent court losses in their attempts to block tech deal-making. Lina Khan, the chair of the Federal Trade Commission, and Jonathan Kanter, the top antitrust official at the Department of Justice, released draft guidelines for merger reviews that for the first time include a focus on digital platforms and how dominant companies can use their scale to harm future rivals. The guidelines -- which generally provide a road map for whether regulators block or approve deals -- show the Biden administration's commitment to an aggressive antitrust agenda aimed at curtailing the power of companies like Google, Meta, Apple and Amazon."
Sheryl Stolberg of the New York Times: "The Biden administration is taking steps to impose a 10-year ban on funding for the Wuhan Institute of Virology, the Chinese research laboratory at the center of a heated debate over the origins of the coronavirus pandemic, according to a memo made public by a House subcommittee on Tuesday evening and an official familiar with the issue. The memo, written by an official in the Department of Health and Human Services, said the institute had failed to comply with repeated requests from the National Institutes of Health for laboratory notebooks and other documents necessary to establish its safety practices." CNN's report is here.
Michael Shear of the New York Times: "President Biden met with President Isaac Herzog of Israel on Tuesday at the White House, a diplomatic overture to one of America's key allies amid tensions between the Biden administration and Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel's prime minister.... [Mr. Biden] gave Mr. Herzog a fist bump and called the relationship between the United States and Israel 'simply unbreakable.' Mr. Herzog said he brought 'greetings and gratitude' from 'all sides of the political spectrum' in Israel." (Also linked yesterday.)
House Republicans Continue Childish Antics. Karoon Demirjian of the New York Times: "The House on Tuesday overwhelmingly passed a resolution pledging unfailing support for Israel, condemning antisemitism and declaring that the country is neither racist nor an apartheid state, in an implicit rebuke of Democrats who have criticized the nation ahead of an address by its president to a joint session of Congress. Republican members raced to put the resolution on the floor this week after Representative Pramila Jayapal, Democrat of Washington and the head of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, called Israel 'a racist state,' prompting condemnations from leaders of both parties. Ms. Jayapal later walked back her comments, saying that she had not meant to condemn the idea of Israel but only the policies of its current government, but the G.O.P. pushed ahead with the vote anyway.... Ten Democrats declined to back the resolution, which passed by a vote of 412 to 9, with one voting 'present.' Ms. Jayapal supported it." ~~~
~~~ Ishaan Tharour of the Washington Post: "The irony is that [Pramila] Jayapal, who supports a two-state solution for Israelis and Palestinians and opposes the expansion of Israeli settlements, represents what's becoming a more mainstream position, certainly among Democratic voters.... But Republican lawmakers in Washington have seemingly yoked their agenda to the far-right Israeli settler movement and influential right-wing pro-Israel groups in the United States.... When it comes to the Palestinians, the GOP mainstream has long soured on the two-state solution and can't countenance any talk of rights for millions of Palestinians living under military occupation because they aren't even willing to recognize the fact of the occupation.... At a Christian Zionist forum this week held outside Washington, a stream of Republican presidential hopefuls all stressed their embrace of maximalist vision of Israel."
Philip Bump of the Washington Post: Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.), who purports to be investigating "the Biden family' for wrongdoing, can't stop making a fool of himself. And Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) can't stop showing Comer to be the fool that he is. MB: I suppose it's an unfair fight: Raskin has the facts on his side.
Glenn Kessler of the Washington Post: In a campaign video dated March 9, 2020, Tommy Tuberville pledged, "I stand with our veterans and I'm going to donate every dime I make when I'm in Washington, D.C., to the veterans of the state of Alabama. Folks, they deserve it. They deserve it a lot more than most of us." "A U.S. senator earns $174,000 a year. We're assuming that Tuberville was proposing to donate only his salary, not the substantial earnings he makes from his investments. (He has an estimated net worth of $20 million.) With Tuberville now having served 2½ years as senator, that would amount to a total of $437,000 in potential donations." There is no evidence Tuberville has donated any of his senatorial salary to veterans. Marie: But, gosh, something about his charitable foundation being under audit. Gee, that excuse sounds so familiar.
Presidential Race 2024
At the moment, he is seeing this broadly as a threat to his freedom, and his advisers have been -- in private conversations -- pretty blunt that they see it as he has to win the election, and that is how he guarantees that he does not face jail time. Now, again, it only takes one juror in any of these cases. He has not been convicted of anything. But the fact that they're looking at an election to the highest office in the land as some kind of an insurance policy or an out for him, really affects and, I think, colors the entire presidential race. -- Maggie Haberman, speaking on CNN yesterday about the special counsel's target letter to Donald Trump
If you're wondering what a second Trump presidency would look like, or at least aspire to be, there's this: ~~~
~~~ Charlie Nash of Mediaite: "'Think of President Xi. Central casting, brilliant guy...,' said Trump during [an Iowa 'town hall' yesterday hosted by Sean Hannity]. 'Well, he runs 1.4 billion people with an iron fist. Smart, brilliant, everything perfect.'... In 2018 [Trump] praised the Chinese leader for becoming 'president for life.'... 'President for life. And he's great. And look, he was able to do that. I think it's great. Maybe we'll give that a shot someday.'" MB: "Someday" could begin in January 2025.
Still a Weenie. Jonathan Weisman & Maya King of the New York Times: "Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, with his poll numbers sagging and his opponents circling, defended his struggling campaign on Tuesday, saying on CNN that he had been 'taking fire nonstop' but was putting together the political operation he needed to win the early nominating states next year and vault to the presidency. His afternoon appearance in a rare interview in the mainstream news media seemed intended to reset his White House campaign.... But a major shift in tone or strategy from Mr. DeSantis, either toward the former president or in the issues he focuses on, did not appear in the offing. He remained deferential to [Donald] Trump.... Speaking with the CNN host Jake Tapper in an interview recorded earlier in the day, Mr. DeSantis dodged questions on his support for a national abortion ban, whether he would commit U.S. troops to defend Taiwan and how to end the war in Ukraine." CNN's story is here.
Gawon Bae, et al., of CNN: "An American believed to have been detained in North Korea after crossing the inter-Korean border during a tour is a US Army soldier, a US official told CNN on Tuesday. He was detained during a Joint Security Area tour after crossing the demarcation line separating North and South Korea, according to the United Nations Command, which oversees the border area. A US defense official said the service member is a junior enlisted soldier assigned to US Forces Korea and was not in uniform when he crossed into North Korea. The official also added that he was on a tour as a civilian." (Also linked yesterday.)
Oh, for Pete's Sake. Henry in China. Vivian Wang of the New York Times: "Henry A. Kissinger, the 100-year-old former secretary of state who has pushed the United States to take a more conciliatory approach to China, has made a surprise visit to Beijing, meeting with China's top foreign policy official and its defense minister. The reception for Mr. Kissinger, who more than 50 years ago helped pave the way for diplomatic ties between the United States and China during President Richard M. Nixon's administration, was warmer than those for current American officials who have visited Beijing recently to try and stabilize U.S.-China relations."
"An Inconvenient Truth." David Gelles of the New York Times: "It's been 17 years since former Vice President Al Gore raised the alarm about climate change with his documentary, 'An Inconvenient Truth.' Since then, he's been shouting from the rooftops about the risks of global warming more or less nonstop. But the events of the past few weeks have Gore even more worried than usual. 'Everywhere you look in the world, the extremes have now seemingly reached a new level,' he told me in an interview.... This summer, the extreme weather chaos that Gore predicted in 'An Inconvenient Truth' seems to have arrived all at once.... Despite the apocalyptic weather news, Gore is also hopeful. Clean energy is cheaper than ever, and electric vehicle sales are surging, turbocharged by government subsidies. Put that all together, and Gore thinks developed economies could draw down their emissions with surprising speed." ~~~
~~~ Marie: "Every night on the TV news is like taking a nature hike through the Book of Revelation," Gore told Gelles. This has me wondering if some perverse, right-wing, evangelical climate-change deniers don't welcome the climate crisis and see it as a precursor to the so-called Second Coming: it's all God's plan.
Beyond the Beltway
Louisiana. Jack Forrest of CNN: "Louisiana's legislature utilized its Republican supermajority Tuesday to enact a ban on gender-affirming care for most minors, overriding its Democratic governor who had vetoed the bill. The law will take effect January 1, 2024. Gov. John Bel Edwards [D], who vetoed House Bill 648 last month, said in a statement that he expected the courts to overturn the legislation, describing it as 'a bill that needlessly harms a very small population of vulnerable children, their families, and their health care professionals.' The state House and Senate voted 76-23 and 28-11, succeeding in blocking Edwards' move with the two-thirds majority in each chamber needed to overpower the governor."
Way Beyond
Israel. Patrick Kingsley of the New York Times: "Despite temperatures climbing higher than 90 degrees Fahrenheit in some parts of [Israel], tens of thousands of Israelis held dozens of rallies across central Israel on Tuesday to protest Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's plan to finalize a law next week that would limit the power of the Supreme Court. In what has become a regular weekly episode of disruption, demonstrators marched through several cities in a renewed effort to stop the government proceeding with a binding vote on the law in Parliament, which is likely to come on Monday. This is the 28th consecutive week of protest against the judicial plan.... They thronged the platforms of major train stations, waving Israeli flags, creating a sea of blue and white next to railways across central Israel. They blocked highways, tunnels and an access road to the headquarters of the Israeli military. They rallied outside the homes of government ministers, banged on the glass doors of the Tel Aviv stock exchange and chanted outside a branch of the United States Embassy." (Also linked yesterday.)
Ukraine, et al. The Washington Post's live briefing of developments Wednesday in Russia's war on Ukraine is here: "Russia attacked the key Ukrainian port city of Odessa with missiles and drones overnight, its regional governor said, marking the second consecutive night of attacks. Six people were injured, including a 9-year-old boy, authorities said. Russia previously said its Tuesday attack was in retaliation for the deadly explosion on the Crimean Bridge. A spokesperson for the U.N. secretary general said 'there are a number of ideas being floated' to help Ukrainian grain reach global markets after Moscow pulled out of the Black Sea Grain Initiative, a deal that allowed millions of tons of essential food products to be exported from Ukraine's southern ports.... President Biden will discuss the repatriation of Ukrainian children with a papal envoy this week in Washington, the White House said. Kyiv estimates that thousands of children have been taken to Russia or Russian-occupied territory."
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Reader Comments (18)
The main topic of conversation at our last neighborhood potluck was
CBDCs.
I, of course, had no idea what they were talking about so one of the
attendees sent me an article claiming it is Biden who is behind this.
I then found an article that countered that statement, one that claimed
that it was being studied by the Biden administration, not that Biden
was pushing it or even believed it should be implemented.
When I sent her the article I had found, she said it was fake news.
I didn't wish to alienate her because she's the neighbor who supplies
us with stuff like New York bagels, and other goodies. (She also
previously worked for one of Betsy's companies as advertising
executive in Europe and was passed over for promotion so sued the
company for 3 million dollars and won).
Hope this isn't old news but I don't recall reading of it on RealityChex.
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/ron-desantis-promises-ban-cbdcs-
165534149.html?.tsrc=daily_mail&uh_test=0_00
@Forrest Morris: Like you, I had never heard of CBDC (Central Bank Digital Currency), and like you I did a lightning-fast review of the Googles, only to learn that the Federal Reserve cannot issue CBDC without authorizing legislation.
Apparently, CBDC is one of those right-wing things, and Ron DeSantis has promised that when he is president*, he will ban the use of CBDC. It would appear that's not something a president* can do, although s/he could veto legislation that would authorize it, subject of course to a veto override. Anyway, if the Biden administration is "behind it" as your neighbors claim, administration officials can only promote CBDC, not implement it without Congressional authorization.
Giftors of "real" bagels or not, it seems to me your neighbors' concerns are kind of out there. I have never attended a neighborhood party where everybody spoke in arcane acronyms.
Forrest,
And here I thought that CBDC was MTG code for Sharia Law....
And I thought it stood for that old rock group "Cheeky Boy Band Clan" so popular before it was discovered they were all females in disguise. As for your neighbor with the bagels––-tread lightly.
CBDC? Wasn’t that that punk rock club in the Village? Cool place. I saw Patti Smith there once.
Oh, wait. That was CBGB.
Never mind.
You people are just not serious!!! Before you know it Hunter Biden will be controlling the world's economy with Chinese cryptocurrency created on his laptop!
Is that why Kissinger went to China? Did he take Hunter Biden with
him? Does Hunter even have a laptop? Is Kissinger carried on a
stretcher like those old Egyptians were?
So many questions and no answers.
PS: PD, I'd do anything for fresh New York bagels. Well-----almost
anything.
OK: Here's something serious: Louis Menand wrote a long piece ( in the New Yorker) on Neoliberalism but I'll just give you the conclusion;
"It is the rise in inequality abetted by the neoliberal system that poses the most immediate threat to civil society. Wolf ( Martin Wolf- "The Case of Democratic Capitalism") doubts whether the United States will still be a functioning democracy at the end of the decade. Either way, the sun has set on neoliberalism. Both parties have drifted closer to something like mercantilism; the language of the market has lost its magic. “Bidenomics” entails immense government spending; meanwhile, a new cadre—protectionists, crony capitalists, ethno-nationalists, and social and cultural provincials—has been rewriting party platforms. Republicans eagerly lambaste Big Tech and clash with “woke” corporations, more intent on fighting a culture war than on championing commerce. People used to pray for the end of neoliberalism. Unfortunately, this is what it looks like."
Forrest,
Back when I lived in NY, one of my favorite foods was a hot bagel from street vendors. With mustard, natch. Given that this was circa 1979-80-81, and given the general air quality in those days (my rule was, if I went out to run and couldn’t see the buildings 20 blocks away, I bagged the run), it was probably mustard and carcinogens. But I’m still around so it couldn’t have been that bad.
Loved those bagels.
I am so far behind everyone-- I never even heard of CBetc, and I don't know what neoliberalism is. And the sad thing is, I don't even care. I figure anything big happening right now I have a stake in, or can protest, or whatever, but I am running out of time. Soon I may be in the "home" and the biggest thing of the day will be sitting in my wheelchair at the door to the lunchroom at 4pm, waiting for dinner...
I am only jesting, but it seems to me most of my generation should enable the middle-aged and the youth to take over. This is all so insane, I wonder why we bother. Just listening to reporters telling all about the nazi Steven Miller and his groupies planning to remake or destroy our governmental bodies makes my blood run cold. No longer can we be satisfied by simply avoiding visiting the red states-- now, one after another, each state and its congressional reps and senators is a chamber of horrors, start to finish. We need to starve them. No more money/grants/tax breaks.
Now Donald the Bastard has stolen antiquities from Israel, kinda like the Hobby Lobby people...why can't the FBI visit the Orange Goon and get them back?
Forrest, honey, lotsa bagels in the world-- don't mess with the idiot lady in your 'hood.
I may start reading Emptywheel regularly when Marie re-enlists in the fight to get the damn house built correctly. I sorta pity those workers...they won't know what hit them...
Not only did the Donald steal antiquities from Israel, here's some old
gnus that I don't recall hearing about at the time.
Seems he also stole $750,000.00 worth of art from the US Embassy
in France.
The thing is, he didn't know they were replicas, on display while the
real art is in vaults to prevent it from being stolen by thieves (Trump
family).
Evidently it's still at Mar-a-Lago, probably piled in a hidden chamber
with top secret documents.
https://www.theartnewspaper.com/2020/09/08/the-art-of-the-steal-
trump-swipes-dollar750000-worth-of-art-from-the-us-embassy-in-
francebut-none-of-it-is-the-real-deal
(Just like his presidency*).
The home building project should turn into a money maker for Marie. Run it as a community college course, Reading Architectural Drawings 101 - 108, charging appropriate tuition for each term.
@Forrest Morris: I am redeemed! I did link to a story on The Great Trump Art Heist back in early September 2020:
Trump Skipped Cemetery Visit to Swipe Art Forgeries, Smuggle Them on AF1. Daniel Politi of Slate: "After Trump's cemetery trip was canceled, the president suddenly had a few hours to kill inside the U.S. ambassador's historic residence in Paris and it seems that during that time he took a particular liking to a few pieces of art. The next day, he ordered a Benjamin Franklin bust, a Franklin portrait and a set of figurines of Greek mythical characters be loaded on Air Force One to go back to Washington with him, reports Bloomberg.... 'The President brought these beautiful, historical pieces, which belong to the American people, back to the United States to be prominently displayed in the People's House,' White House spokesman Judd Deere said in response to questions from Bloomberg News.... But the truth is that they were fakes and replicas. The figurines that now sit in the Oval Office are from the early 20th century by an artist who was trying to claim they were from the 16th or 17 centuries. The figurines have little value and are really '20th century fakes of wannabe 17th century sculptures,' according to an art dealer.... White House officials ended up borrowing the original portrait [of Ben Franklin] from the National Portrait Gallery and hanging it up in the Oval Office rather than the replica Trump brought back from France."
At the time, I labeled it the most hilarious story of the week. It's still hilarious. And it certainly makes a person suspect that there is more in those boxes than golf shoes & precious Israeli artifacts.
Note to Right-wing Rich People: Nail down the artwork if Trump is coming to dinner. Replace valuable sculptures with Hummel figurines.
“Beauty is truth, truth beauty,—that is all ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.”
Johnny Keats smithed some seriously good words in his short life, none more famous than this last line from his Grecian urn ode.
If the inverse is true, ugliness is lies, lies ugliness, then man, there are a pack of ugly bastards roaming the country these days. Lies and lying are de rigueur for membership in the Party of Traitors (for what is a traitor but a consummate liar?).
Mis, dis, and all other versions of information designed to befuddle, besmirch, hornswoggle, con, and remake reality to suit their vile agendas infect the body politic like ravenous cancers. Plenty of journalists and commentators have given up on the idea of truth ever gaining a serious foothold again.
Trump is a hero sent by Jesus, Nazis are good people, immigrants are rapists who need to be murdered, women demanding equality are whiny harridans. It never ends.
So here’s our old pal Aristotle with an EZ guide to telling what’s true, or not. Ready?
“To say of what is that it is not, or of what is not that it is, is false, while to say of what is that it is, and of what is not that it is not, is true…”
Yeah. And that, my friends, is why more people don’t read philosophy.
But what Ari means is if a thing is so, and you say it’s so, you’re telling the truth. If a thing is so and you say it’s not, you’re a lying sumbitch.
This is the correspondence theory of truth (all you pragmatists and Richard Rorty fans out there hold your fire…I’m making a simple point and I ain’t getting into the weeds on this). A thing, or a statement is true if it corresponds to facts in the real world. “Nazis are good people” does not. Neither does almost everything from the mouth of the Orange Monster.
And here’s the thing. These people lie so much, about so many things, it’s clear that they have no interest in reality or facts. This isn’t a news flash if you’ve been paying attention, but the real world has a way of countermanding lies about its nature. Right now, southern red states are undergoing once in a millennia heat waves, this fall the hurricanes should be nothing short of Biblical, impacting the homes and lives of people who have been spreading lies about the environment.
The down side, of course, is that we all pay for the consequences of their affinity for ugliness.
Aristotle didn’t mention that, but Keats, in his roundabout way, did.
@Akhilleus: Many politicians are not very good at telling the truth. But the Republican party no longer bothers to ferret out real scandals about Democrats. They don't even try to twist and massage facts into fake scandals. Instead, they just make up stuff out of whole cloth.
They produce fake whistleblowers (or don't produce them, like when one of their fake whistleblowers goes on the lam as a fugitive from U.S. justice), they introduce all manner of crackpot "experts," and they make what reporters call something like, "unsubstatiated assertions," which they represent as "facts." These "unsubstantiated assertions" quickly harden into "facts" to be used as "corroborating evidence," as when pence cited the Durham report as proof that the DOJ & FBI were picking on Trump.
Marie,
As soon as I read about the Great Fatty Art Heist in Forrest’s comment, I remembered that story and I’m sure I read about it here on RC.
A crook and a thief, but a stupid one. Our former president*. So proud!
Lawyers all around but only two for Trump.
But he’s gone through so many, right? And at this point, what respectable lawyer wants to attach him or herself to the Typhoid Mary of jurisprudence.
I heard a comedian some years ago opine on the Lorne Greene character on the old TV show Bonanza:
“Ben Cartwright is a widower with three sons, all by different wives who all died. This guy is the kiss of death!”
That’s Trump for lawyers, two of whom are on the verge of disbarment right now.
But here we are with Fatty’s two lawyers complaining that the stolen documents case is overwhelming, too much stuff to go through, so, pretty please, can we move the trial to 2045?
So hire new lawyers. Trump always brags about how rich he is. Get a bunch of new lawyers on the job. Oops! But that’s what he doesn’t want. More lawyers means they could be ready for trial before rapture, and that ain’t a good thing, ‘specially if you’re guilty. Foot dragging is the order of the day. And those two lawyers? They haven’t even begun the process of getting security clearance to see those stolen documents, even though the judge told them to do this asap. Of course her direct direction wasn’t as quite as directly direct as that. They have plenty of wiggle room to delay, delay, delay.
They don’t want to go to trial either. And Judge (loose) Cannon will likely help by moving the trial back further and further, a week here, a month there, next a year or two or three.
All I can say to that is “Come on down, Fani Willis!”
There’s gotta be SOMETHING this fat fuck can be found guilty of somewhere. The guy is a one-man crime wave, fer crissakes.
The fundamental fact about dictatorship is that it's always been a fall-back position for leaders who don't have the people's support. They have no choice but to rule by force because democracy doesn't work for them.
In short, in a democracy, even a diluted representative one like ours, autocracy is an admission of failure.
The Right Wingers have known this for some time. Now desperate, likely because it's obvious to so many what they have been up to, they are no longer content to nibble at democracy's edges. They are attacking it in full view.
I'd hope it's the last ditch assault from a failing campaign. The Right hasn't yet taken all our votes away.