;)
The Conversation -- February 27, 2024
Jacob Bogage of the Washington Post: "President Biden and congressional leaders appeared to agree Tuesday to press forward to prevent a government shutdown, but in a gathering that one lawmaker [-- Chuck Schumer --] called the most intense Oval Office meeting of his career, officials remained divided on U.S. support for Ukraine as Russia begins to make battlefield gains in its two-year-old invasion."
Richard Fausset & Danny Hakim of the New York Times: "The judge overseeing the Georgia election interference case against ... Donald J. Trump brought a key witness back to the stand on Tuesday afternoon, as the judge weighs whether Fani T. Willis, the prosecutor who brought the case, has a disqualifying conflict of interest. The witness is Terrence Bradley, the former divorce lawyer and law partner of Nathan Wade, whom Ms. Willis hired to manage the case. The decision by Judge Scott McAfee of Fulton County Superior Court to seek more testimony from Mr. Bradley was a victory for Mr. Trump and his 14 co-defendants, who are trying to remove Ms. Willis, Mr. Wade and Ms. Willis's entire office from the high-stakes prosecution.... But 90 minutes into Tuesday's hearing, the defense had not achieved its goal of getting Mr. Bradley to contradict the two prosecutors about when the relationship began."
Feeling Good about the Economy? Thank an Immigrant. Rachel Siegel, et al., of the Washington Post: "Immigration has propelled the U.S. job market further than just about anyone expected, helping cement the country's economic rebound from the pandemic as the most robust in the world. That momentum picked up aggressively over the past year. About 50 percent of the labor market's extraordinary recent growth came from foreign-born workers between January 2023 and January 2024, according to an Economic Policy Institute analysis of federal data. And even before that, by the middle of 2022, the foreign-born labor force had grown so fast that it closed the labor force gap created by the pandemic, according to research from the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco.... Economists and labor experts say the surge in employment was ultimately key to solving unprecedented gaps in the economy that threatened the country's ability to recover from prolonged shutdowns."
Jordan Holman of the New York Times: "Macy's said on Tuesday that it would vastly reshape its strategy and retail footprint, closing about 150 Macy's stores over the next three years while expanding its upscale Bloomingdale's and Bluemercury chains. The moves put the stamp of the company's new chief executive, Tony Spring, on an effort to improve the profitability of the largest department store operator in the United States and stave off a potential takeover bid. It is the second major downsizing of the Macy's chain since 2020 and will leave the company with 350 stores, slightly more than half the number it had before the pandemic. Macy's said the 'underproductive locations' it planned to close accounted for 25 percent of the company's overall square footage but just 10 percent of sales."
Blayne Alexander, et al., of NBC News: "The former divorce attorney for Fulton County special prosecutor Nathan Wade is expected to resume testimony Tuesday afternoon at a hearing pertaining to the romantic relationship between Wade and District Attorney Fani Willis. Judge Scott McAfee, who is overseeing the Georgia election interference case against ... Donald Trump and his co-defendants, determined that some of Wade's communications with his former lawyer Terrence Bradley would not be covered by attorney-client privilege, according to an email chain obtained by NBC News."
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Marie: Late start today; I was posting links up till 9:00 am ET, so if you came by earlier, check again.
Erica Green & Catie Edmondson of the New York Times: "President Biden will convene the top four congressional leaders at the White House on Tuesday as lawmakers swiftly run out of time to strike a deal to avert another partial government shutdown. The president plans to discuss the urgency of legislation to keep federal funding going past midnight on Friday, as well as his requests for billions of dollars in aid for Ukraine and Israel, said Karine Jean-Pierre, the White House press secretary. 'A basic, basic priority or duty of Congress is to keep the government open,' Ms. Jean-Pierre said."
Missy Ryan of the Washington Post: "The Defense Department on Monday released a long-awaited review of senior officials' handling of Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin's recent hospitalizations, finding that there was 'no attempt to obfuscate' his cancer diagnosis and medical treatment, even though the Pentagon initially withheld it from the White House and public. An unclassified summary of the review did not identify any failures by Austin or his aides as they oversaw the transfer of top-level authority from Austin to his deputy several times while he was undergoing medical treatment in December and January. But the probe, which was conducted by a senior Pentagon official, said that Austin's staff was constrained by medical privacy laws and their own concern about their boss's privacy." ~~~
~~~ Marie: "Long-awaited"? Really? Austin's illness came to public attention only last month. "Long-awaited" were the Mueller report (three years after the offending behavior) and the DOJ's prosecution of the other guy's efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election (two-and-a-half years after the insurrection). Update: See also Akhilleus' commentary below: he notes that in the lede, Ryan writes that the "long-awaited" report is about "recent hospitalizations." Uh, how does that work?
Lauren Herstik & Glenn Thrush of the New York Times: "Alexander Smirnov, the former F.B.I. informant charged with falsely claiming that President Biden and his son Hunter had accepted bribes, will be held in custody indefinitely because he poses a significant flight risk, a judge in California ruled on Monday.... Judge Otis D. Wright II of Federal District Court found fault with a decision by a federal magistrate in Las Vegas who last week released Mr. Smirnov, 43, a confidential informant since 2010, and dismissed the argument by prosecutors that he would try to escape to Russia. Prosecutors working for David C. Weiss, the special counsel investigating Hunter Biden, offered new details about the circumstances of Mr. Smirnov's rearrest last week in the office of his lawyer.... A prosecutor for Mr. Weiss, Leo Wise, explained that the sheer number of guns [officers found during a search of the condo where Smirnov lived] prompted Justice Department officials to make an arrest at [Smirnov's lawyer's] office, rather than Mr. Smirnov's home, which they believed would not be safe." CNN's report is here.
The Trials of Trump & the Trump Gang
There has never been a case in American history in which a former official has engaged in conduct remotely similar to Trump. -- Prosecutors' surreply to a Trump filing in the classified documents case ~~~
~~~ Alan Feuer of the New York Times: "Federal prosecutors on Monday rejected ... Donald J. Trump's claims that he was unfairly charged with holding on to classified documents after he left office, saying that his case bore no comparison to the one in which President Biden was cleared of wrongdoing.... In rebuffing what was known as a 'selective prosecution' claim by Mr. Trump, the prosecutors said that while many government officials over the years had taken classified materials with them after leaving office -- often inadvertently, but occasionally willfully -- Mr. Trump's case remained unique because of the extent to which he had 'resisted the government's lawful efforts to recover them.... In their 12-page filing, the prosecutors dismissed as a 'conspiracy theory' a separate claim that Mr. Trump has raised in his own defense -- that Mr. Biden had 'secretly directed' the classified documents case and used the special counsel who filed the indictment, Jack Smith, as a 'puppet' and a 'stalking horse.'" ~~~
~~~ Kyle Cheney of Politico: "Special counsel Jack Smith said Monday that President Joe Biden's handling of classified documents -- which earned him a scolding from special counsel Robert Hur -- is not 'remotely' similar to the 'deceitful criminal conduct' of Donald Trump.... In fact, Hur's report underscored why Trump is facing criminal charges and Biden is not, they noted." ~~~
~~~ The prosecutors' reply, via the courts, is here.
Zach Schonfeld & Ella Lee of the Hill: "Former President Trump's lawyers in his hush-money case on Monday demanded a New York judge block key witnesses from testifying in Trump's first criminal trial set to begin next month. Trump attorney Todd Blanche moved to block testimony from Michael Cohen, Trump's ex-fixer, and two women he paid to stay quiet about affairs they alleged with Trump: Porn actress Stormy Daniels and former Playboy model Karen McDougal.... The 47-page motion attacks the witnesses' credibility at length, casting Cohen as a 'liar' and suggesting Daniels would offer 'false' and 'salacious' testimony. Trump's lawyers also took aim at how prosecutors have described the hush money payments as a 'catch-and-kill' scheme to quash negative information about Trump in advance of the 2016 presidential election." ~~~
~~~ Jonah Bromwich, et al., of the New York Times: "Manhattan prosecutors on Monday asked the judge overseeing the criminal case against Donald J. Trump to prohibit the former president from attacking witnesses or exposing jurors' identities. The requests, made in filings by the Manhattan district attorney's office, noted Mr. Trump's 'longstanding history of attacking witnesses, investigators, prosecutors, judges, and others involved in legal proceedings against him.'... The gag order in the Manhattan case, if the judge approves it, would bar Mr. Trump from 'making or directing others to make' statements about witnesses concerning their role in the case. The district attorney, Alvin L. Bragg, also asked that Mr. Trump be barred from commenting on prosecutors on the case -- other than Mr. Bragg himself -- as well as court staff members.... In a separate filing..., prosecutors asked that Mr. Trump be barred from publicly revealing [the jurors' identities. And although Mr. Trump and his legal team are allowed to know the jurors' names, Mr. Bragg asked that their addresses be kept secret from the former president." Politico's report is here. ~~~
~~~ Bragg's motions are here, via Politico. The Politico story describes the motions as a "30-page court filing," but in fact, with adenda -- which detail Trump's attacks on participants in court proceedings against him and the resulting threats made to these participants -- the entire filing is 331 pages.
~~~ Marie: Obviously, the D.A.'s asks are perfectly reasonable, but it remains stunning that ordinary citizens must be protected from a dangerous former POTUS*. He's a mobster & a monster. ~~~
~~~ Oh, And This. Matthew Chapman of the Raw Story: "Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis and special prosecutor Nathan Wade were slammed with harassing phone calls over the weekend after one of ... Donald Trump's attorneys put their contact information in a public court filing, according to a new report.... The attorney, Steven Sadow, says he made a mistake in sharing unredacted phone records with a reporter, and 'when I realized the error, I immediately contacted him and told him explicitly not to disclose them to anyone else and not to publish the cell phone numbers or any other protected information,' reports [Zachary] Cohen [of CNN in a tweet]. However, Cohen reports that 'cell phone records "with personal identifying information" still appeared on social media, per the DA's response' to the motion filed by Trump's team on Friday."
Michael Sisak of the AP: "Donald Trump has appealed his $454 million New York civil fraud judgment, challenging a judge's finding that he lied about his wealth as he grew the real estate empire that launched him to stardom and the presidency. The former president's lawyers filed notices of appeal Monday asking the state's mid-level appeals court to overturn Judge Arthur Engoron's Feb. 16 verdict in Attorney General Letitia James' lawsuit and reverse staggering penalties that threaten to wipe out Trump's cash reserves.... [MB: Separately (I surmise),] Trump said Engoron's decision, the costliest consequence of his recent legal troubles, was 'election interference' and 'weaponization against a political opponent.' Trump complained he was being punished for 'having built a perfect company, great cash, great buildings, great everything.'" ~~~
~~~ Trolling Trump. Lee Moran of the Huffington Post: "New York Attorney General Letitia James is publicly keeping tabs on the interest accumulating on the hundreds of millions of dollars that Donald Trump has been ordered to pay following the civil fraud trial that James' office brought against the former president and his Trump Organization in New York. James has been posting daily updates on X of the running total of Trump's liability in the case.
** Lying to Investigators? Check. Intent? Oh Yeah. Em Steck, et al., of CNN: "Kenneth Chesebro, the right-wing attorney who helped devise the Trump campaign's fake electors plot in 2020, concealed a secret Twitter account from Michigan prosecutors, hiding dozens of damning posts that undercut his statements to investigators about his role in the election subversion scheme, a CNN KFile investigation has found. Chesebro denied using Twitter ... or having any 'alternate IDs' when directly asked by Michigan investigators last year during his cooperation session, according to recordings of his interview obtained by CNN. But CNN linked Chesebro to the secret account [BadgetPundit] based on numerous matching details.... The Twitter posts reveal that even before the 2020 election, and then just two days after polls closed, Chesebro promoted a far more aggressive election subversion strategy than he later let on in his Michigan interview.... Chesebro has not been charged with any crimes in Michigan and sat for an hourslong interview with the state attorney general's office in early December. In his retelling to Michigan prosecutors, Chesebro has cast himself as a moderate middleman who was duped by Trump's more radical lawyers.
"Asked about the secret tweets..., a spokesman for Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel, said in a statement to CNN, 'Our team is interested in the material and will be looking into this matter.'... Ryan Goodman, a law professor at New York University, who reviewed the posts for CNN, [said,] 'The Twitter posts strongly suggest Chesebro committed the crime of making false statements to investigators ... his entire cooperation agreement may now fall apart.'"
~~~ Marie: Do you suppose Kenny Boy also lied to Georgia prosecutors who gave him that sweet plea deal?
Kyle Cheney & Josh Gerstein of Politico: "An attempt by D.C. bar authorities to force former Justice Department attorney Jeff Clark to fork over documents -- part of an effort to potentially disbar the ... Donald Trump ally -- would violate his Fifth Amendment rights, a D.C. appeals court panel ruled Monday. In a brief order, the three-judge panel of the D.C. Court of Appeals agreed that the investigators' effort to subpoena documents from Clark 'infringes on Mr. Clark's Fifth Amendment right not to be compelled to be a witness against himself.'"
Jonathan Allen & Zoe Richards of NBC News: "Authorities in Palm Beach County, Florida, responded to Donald Trump Jr.'s home Monday after he was sent an envelope containing a death threat and white powder.... The spokesperson [for the County Fire Rescue squad] said that test results to identify the white substance were inconclusive but that officials on the scene did not believe it was deadly.... 'It's just become a little bit too commonplace that this sort of stuff happens,' he told the [Daily Caller]. 'It doesn't matter what your politics are, this type of crap is unacceptable.'" MB: You might want to tell that to Dad, Donnie. See NYT story linked above, in which Jonah Bromwich reports, "In an affidavit released Monday, the head of his security detail listed some of the worst of the dozens of attacks directed at [Manhattan D.A. Alvin] Bragg last year, including racial slurs and death threats," as a result of Daddy's repeated spoken & written unhinged rants against Bragg.
Presidential Race
He's about as old as I am, but he can't remember his wife's name. -- President Biden, on Donald Trump ~~~
~~~ Trump Is Old. Peter Baker & Michael Shear of the New York Times: "President Biden has come up with a new defense against claims that he is too old to run for another term: At least he knows who his wife is.... As he expands his efforts to reassure voters that he is fit for another four years, Mr. Biden took a turn on the talk show circuit, using an appearance on 'Late Night With Seth Meyers' on NBC to poke his challenger, former President Donald J. Trump, on his own struggles with memory.... [When Trump appeared to refer to his wife as 'Mercedes' during a speech over the weekend, he] was addressing Mercedes Schlapp, a former White House adviser whose husband, Matt Schlapp, the chairman of the American Conservative Union, hosts the conference, according to the former president's spokesman, Steven Cheung." ~~~
~~~ Marie: Nice save, Steve-o. But I still suspect Trump confused Melanie with Mercedes. They're both attractive women with longish brown hair, and Mercedes is as cruel & irresponsible as Melanie I-Really-Don't-Care-Do-U Trump. According to Schlapp's Wiki page, "In May 2018, Schlapp defended White House aide Kelly Sadler after she joked that John McCain's opposition to CIA Director nominee Gina Haspel was irrelevant because 'he's dying anyway'." ~~~
~~~ More here, with Amy Poehler, too!
** It's primary election day in Michigan today for both Democrats & Republicans. On the GOP side, Trumpbots like those featured below will be voting. Thanks to RAS for the lead: ~~~
~~~ IOKIYAR, Trumpity Doo-Dah Edition:
~~~ Michigan. Anjali Huynh of the New York Times: "In the run-up to Michigan's presidential primary on Tuesday, President Biden has stayed out of the state, where he is facing a campaign from liberal activists frustrated with his enduring support for Israel in the war in Gaza.... Representative Ro Khanna of California last week assumed the unofficial role as mediator between Democrats disaffected by Mr. Biden's Middle East policies and Biden allies like himself. He met with students, Arab American leaders and progressive voters, many of whom said they were, at least for now, withholding their support from Mr. Biden. He was blunt about his takeaway. 'We cannot win Michigan with status quo policy,' Mr. Khanna, who has pushed for a cease-fire, said in an interview, adding that a shift should come in 'a matter of weeks, not months.'" More on President Biden's Israel/Palestine policy linked below. ~~~
~~~ Marie: IMO, if the Biden administration can deliver on a significant cease-fire, critics like Rashida Tlaib (here) & Beto O'Rourke (here) will end up looking like the foolish, counterproductive naifs they are. It's about carrots & sticks, kids. While I appreciate (and to an extent share) the underlying impetus of objections to Biden's Israel/Palestine policy, helping Donald Trump win the presidential election will hurt Palestinians a lot more than anything Joe Biden will ever do. Remember the Abraham Accords?
Michigan. Azi Paybarah of the Washington Post tries to explain why "Michigan will hold a Republican presidential primary on Tuesday, but that contest won't award all the state's delegates -- the GOP also will hold a state convention days later to award the rest." It's not entirely clear that a voter can participate in both contests -- well, all three contests, because the Michigan GOP is so messed up that rival party chairmen are holding dueling conventions unless a court decides this week who the "real leader" is. MB: Whatever happens, apparently Trump will win all or most of the state's delegates. As Mercedes/Melanie might say, "I really don't care, do U?"
Karen Tumulty of the Washington Post: Rona Romney McDaniel's tenure as chair of the Republican National Committee has been "marked by one electoral failure after another: the 2018 midterms that returned the House to Democratic control and ended the GOP's one-party rule in Washington; Trump's defeat in 2020 that was coupled with the Democrats taking back the Senate; the expected 'red wave' that failed to materialize in 2022, giving the GOP only the thinnest and most ungovernable of majorities in the House.... Last year saw the RNC's lowest annual fundraising total in a decade.... Meanwhile, many Republican state parties ... have disintegrated into a dysfunctional MAGA-fueled mess.... It is unfair to put the blame for the RNC's deterioration since then at McDaniel's feet.... For instance, it wasn't McDaniel but Trump who squandered the GOP's chances of taking back the Senate in 2022 by endorsing fringe candidates across the map. The real problem is that the Republican Party is no longer recognizable ... as a political party at all. It is being turned into a subsidiary of the Trump Organization."
Adam Liptak of the New York Times: "The Supreme Court seemed skeptical on Monday of laws in Florida and Texas that bar major social media companies from making editorial judgments about which messages to allow. The laws were enacted in an effort to shield conservative voices on the sites, but a decision by the court, expected by June, will almost certainly be its most important statement on the scope of the First Amendment in the internet era, with broad political and economic implications. A ruling that tech platforms have no editorial discretion to decide which posts to allow would expose users to a greater variety of viewpoints but almost certainly amplify the ugliest aspects of the digital age, including hate speech and disinformation. Though a ruling in favor of big platforms like Facebook and YouTube appeared likely, the court also seemed poised to return the cases to the lower courts to answer questions about how the laws apply to sites that do not seem to moderate their users' speech in the same way, like Gmail, Venmo, Uber and Etsy.” ScotusBlog's analysis, by Amy Howe, is here.
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Alabama. Moira Donegan of the Guardian: "... the concept of embryonic personhood, now inscribed in Alabama law, poses dangers well beyond the cruelty it has imposed on the hopeful couples who were pursuing IVF in Alabama, before their state supreme court made that impossible. If embryos and fetuses are people, as Alabama now says they are, then whole swaths of women's daily lives come under the purview of state scrutiny.... Embryonic personhood would also ban many kinds of birth control, such as Plan B, IUDs, and some hormonal birth control pills, which courts have said can be interpreted as working by preventing the implantation of a fertilized egg. (In fact these methods work primarily by preventing ovulation, but facts are of dwindling relevance in the kind of anti-abortion litigation that comes before Republican-controlled courts.)... Even before the Alabama court began enforcing the vulgar fiction that a frozen embryo is a person, authorities there had long used the notion of fetal personhood to harass, intimidate and jail women -- often those suspected of using drugs during pregnancies -- under the state's 'chemical endangerment of a child' law...."
Florida. Never Mind. Lori Rozsa of the Washington Post: "Republican legislators in Florida hit the pause button on a bill that would have given any 'unborn child' new protections after opponents raised concerns it would impact women's reproductive rights in ways similar to the Alabama IVF ruling. The bill had passed easily through most committees in the Republican-led legislature until Democrats began raising concerns last week that the proposal was so broad that it might also impact in vitro fertilization treatments. The legislation sought to define a fetus as an 'unborn child' shielded by civil negligence laws.... Opponents called it an effort to establish 'fetal personhood' that would put abortion providers and people who help women obtain an abortion at risk of being sued.... [Florida GOP] lawmakers pulled a Senate Rules Committee hearing for a companion bill off the calendar on Monday. The committee is not scheduled to meet again this session, which ends March 8, making it unlikely that the bill will advance."
Missouri, et al. Incubator Chattel. Elura Nanos of Law & Crime: "A Missouri lawmaker [State Rep. Ashley Aune (D)] says it is time to end an archaic law that forces pregnant women to stay in potentially dangerous marriages. HB 2402 amends the state's existing divorce law to remove the requirement that a pregnant woman wait until she gives birth in order to get divorced and to specifically state that 'pregnancy status shall not prevent the court from entering a judgment of dissolution of marriage or legal separation.' In Missouri, as in Texas, Arizona, and Arkansas, the current law requires that a pregnant woman has given birth before any child custody or child support order is finalized."
New York. Patrick Svitek of the Washington Post: "Lawmakers in the Democratic-led New York state legislature Monday rejected a new congressional map proposed by an independent redistricting commission, the latest political twist in a state that could play a large role in determining which party wins control of the House. The New York Senate voted down the map proposal Monday afternoon, followed by the lower chamber. The rejection of the map is likely to spark a legal challenge ahead of the state's June 25 primary.... A spokesman for [U.S. House Minority Leader Hakeem] Jeffries [D-N.Y.] said on Feb. 16 that state lawmakers needed to 'meticulously' scrutinize the proposal, particularly whether it protected 'historically under-represented communities.'... The New York congressional map has been under scrutiny since 2022, when Democrats drew one that was heavily favorable to themselves and the state's highest court struck it down as unconstitutional." CNN's report is here.
New York. Joseph Goldstein of the New York Times: "The 93-year-old widow of a Wall Street financier has donated $1 billion to a Bronx medical school, the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, with instructions that the gift be used to cover tuition for all students going forward. The donor, Ruth Gottesman, is a former professor at Einstein, where she studied learning disabilities, developed a screening test and ran literacy programs. It is one of the largest charitable donations to an educational institution in the United States and most likely the largest to a medical school. The fortune came from her late husband, David Gottesman, known as Sandy, who was a protégé of Warren Buffett and had made an early investment in Berkshire Hathaway, the conglomerate Mr. Buffett built. The donation is notable not only for its staggering size, but also because it is going to a medical institution in the Bronx, the city's poorest borough. The Bronx has a high rate of premature deaths and ranks as the unhealthiest county in New York."
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Hungary/Sweden/NATO. Andrew Higgins of the New York Times: "Hungary's Parliament voted on Monday to approve Sweden as a new member of NATO, allowing the Nordic country to clear a final hurdle that had blocked its membership and held up efforts by the military alliance to isolate Russia over its war in Ukraine. The measure passed after a vote of 188 for and only 6 against in the 199-member Parliament, which is dominated by legislators from the governing Fidesz party of Prime Minister Viktor Orban. On Friday, after his Swedish counterpart, Ulf Kristersson, made a visit to Budapest, the Hungarian capital, Mr. Orban declared the end of a monthslong spat with Sweden over its membership of NATO."
Israel/Palestine, et al.
The New York Times' live updates of developments Tuesday in the Israel/Hamas war are here.
Peter Baker & Michael Shear of the New York Times: "President Biden said on Monday that he believed negotiators were nearing an agreement that would halt Israel's military operations in Gaza within a week in exchange for the release of at least some of the more than 100 hostages being held by Hamas. Speaking with reporters during a stop in New York, Mr. Biden offered the most hopeful assessment of the hostage talks by any major figure in many days, suggesting that the war might be close to a major turning point. 'I hope by the end of the weekend,' he said when asked by reporters when he expected a cease-fire to begin. 'My national security adviser tells me that we're close. We're close. We're not done yet. My hope is by next Monday, we'll have a cease-fire.'" The AP's story is here.
Jon Stewart proposes some solutions, but the first two seem a bit sketchy:
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Reader Comments (17)
That “long awaited” reference to a Pentagon review of the handling of Defense Secretary Austin’s “RECENT hospitalizations” is one more example of lazy journalism.
I have never found Missy Ryan’s reporting to be truly bad, certainly not in the manner of Faux fiction writing, and I understand that reporters can be rushed sometimes, and that Ryan, being assigned to the Pentagon, works in that bubble where there is a constant clamoring for news, but come on, “long awaited” is not just a dreary, high school journalism phrase, it’s also, given the highly charged political climate, a loaded one as well, intimating that there might have been some hinky foot dragging along the way.
But considering that it is the Pentagon, a review of such a high stakes situation in a matter of a few weeks is like a fast food drive through.
Why use it at all? It’s one of those overused, cliched catch phrases signaling that someone is mailing it in:
“Shots rang out”
“Clinging to life”
“Battle brewing”
“Clashed with police”
“Bottom line”
“Checkered career”
“Parent’s worst nightmare” (an astounding bit of laziness if things truly are that bad…)
And…
“Long awaited”
Just say “Hey, the Pentagon released their review today. Here ya go.” Period.
One more quick thought about lazy reporting.
I’m guessing the demise of copy editing plays some role in hackneyed journalism. Just think about it:
You have “long awaited” and “recent” in the same sentence. How does that work? A good editor would spot that right away, and fix an obvious bit of weirdness in a report coming in on a deadline.
Christian Nationalism on steroids…
An On the Media podcast looking into the background of the recent ruling in Alabama, based not on the Constitution, but on a certain interpretation of the Bible, exposes Christian Nationalism’s planned takeover of the entire country.
Brooke Gladstone interviews Matthew Taylor, a senior scholar at the Institute for Islamic, Christian, & Jewish Studies, who provides a frightening picture of what’s going on under the hood in the world that awaits us should Trump get re-elected. In fact, even if he doesn’t, there is plenty to worry about.
The day Alabama released its ruling that embryos are children, an interview with the Chief Justice of the Alabama Supreme Court, Tom Parker, with a guy calling himself a prophet of the New Apostolic Reformation (a scary bunch, when you look hard enough) was uploaded to rave reviews from the Savonarolas.
In this interview, Parker makes clear that he sees his job on the Supreme Court as a vital part of a movement to take control of the country for Jesus.
“In the interview on [the prophet, Johnnie] Enlow’s program — which was uploaded the same day as the ruling was issued — Parker claimed that ‘God created government’ and said it’s ‘heartbreaking’ that ‘we have let it go into the possession of others.’ Parker then invoked the Seven Mountain Mandate, saying, ‘And that's why he is calling and equipping people to step back into these mountains right now.’”
This Seven Mountain Mandate is some invented bullshit based on the concept of Dominion Theology, which Parker, and many others now in government and media, subscribe to.
“The seven areas that the movement believe influence society and that they seek to influence are family, religion, education, media, entertainment, business, and government. They believe that their mission to influence the world through these seven spheres is justified by Isaiah 2:2 ‘Now it shall come to pass in the latter days that the mountain of the Lord's house shall be established on the top of the mountains.’
Followers believe that by fulfilling the Seven Mountain Mandate they can bring about the end times.” (Per Wikipedia)
According to Taylor, the belief is that these seven mountains are currently controlled by satanic demons and it is their job as Christian warriors to take them over, by force, if necessary.
And “by force” is in no way metaphorical.
“[the] movement called the New Apostolic Reformation—a network of politically ambitious church leaders, pulled largely from a kind of Christianity called Neo-Charismatic Pentecostalism. NAR leaders (typically known as ‘apostles’) have been credited with stoking the large and influential Christian nationalist contingent at the Jan. 6 insurrection.”
The NAR are also vehemently pro-Trump. He has met with many of their leaders. He has their full support.
Their plans for taking control of the government are already in motion. Back to Tom Parker:
“Parker also claimed that God ‘is equipping me with something for the very specific situation that I’m facing,’ and responded affirmatively when Enlow asked if ‘the holy spirit is there’ when he’s ‘arbitrating a session’ and performing his job as chief justice.”
So the Holy Spirit is instructing Parker on how to make legal rulings.
Not scary enough?
Wikipedia lists prominent followers of the Seven Mountain Mandate:
Mike Johnson, Republican Congressman from Louisiana and Speaker of the House
Rafael Cruz, pastor and father of Senator Ted Cruz (they left out the part about him killing Kennedy)
Paula White, spiritual advisor to Donald Trump
Andrew Wommack, evangelical leader
Lauren Boebert, US House member. (I guess public hand jobs is a Holy Spirit thing now?)
Michele Bachmann, U.S. representative for Minnesota's 6th congressional district from 2007 until 2015.
Tom Parker, Chief Justice of the Alabama Supreme Court.
They’re not coming for us. They’re already in the house, and one of them runs the House. Next time you scratch your head over some whack job move by Bible Mike, remember where he’s coming from. And where he’s trying to take us. Also remember: zealots cannot be reasoned with.
One other thought about this new apostolic bullshit.
As the saying goes, you have a right to your own opinions, but not your own facts.
These people have the right to believe what they want, but not to force those beliefs on the rest of us. Such an attempt is profoundly undemocratic, as well as unconstitutional (ie, illegal).
But we now have had multiple rulings with the force of law behind them made by judges who subscribe to the notion that the entire country, whether Christian or not, must abide by and be ruled by their belief system.
When you read things like the entire Republican congressional contingent supporting a total ban on abortion, that’s what’s going on. The Dobbs decision, as well as the Alabama decision, are based on RELIGIOUS beliefs, not settled law, not science, not facts, not precedence (and sorry, Sammy, something scrawled on parchment by the Sheriff of Nottingham in 1213 ain’t a precedent).
The hatred of democracy now in full force on the right certainly arises from a lust for control without accountability, but it also has strong ties to Christian fundamentalism. In that way it’s no different than the Sharia Laws that Faux screamers are always on about.
@Akhilleus wrote, "The [New Apostolic Reformation] are also vehemently pro-Trump. He has met with many of their leaders. He has their full support."
How does Trump even communicate with these people? I know I would be lost if they started talking to me about the Seven Mountain Mandate. What? The seven hills of Rome? I don't even know the reference point, much less the point of the "mandate."
And this is a guy who claimed he does go to church where he "drinks his little wine and has his little cracker." He doesn't speak the same "body and blood" language the NAR do (maybe he's thinking NRA). Does he bring a translator, like Obama's "anger translator" Luther?
Absent a translator, I'd have to guess the "conversations" Trump has with these people are like the "conversations" two-year-olds have with each other when they're learning to talk. They express ideas (though the toddlers' ideas are probably more comprehensible than the Seven Mountains Mandate), but they don't really converse. So a "conversation" would go like this:
Toddler 1: "I'm making a house in the sand."
Toddler 2 (response): "I have a puppy."
So ...
Tom Parker: "The holy spirit is equipping me with something for the very specific situation that I’m facing."
Donald Trump (response): "Nothing beats the Bible, even 'The Art of the Deal.'"
Akhilleus' use of "intimate" as a transitive verb, in his post above about the Austin health report, caused me to look it up. Idle curiosity.
And Lo!, we find an example of how the English language is sometimes unintelligible to ESL learners and no-longer extant copy editors, rest their souls.
The first use has verb "intimate" mean "hint", and that's the way that Akhilleus used it today. But the second vt use has the meaning "announce." Which is pretty much the opposite of "hint."
Maybe a good editor of Akhilleus' post could have blue-pencilled something like "he hinted in his announcement." But that is really two different actions contained in one phrase. Not the same.
So ... if I were an ESL learner, I would just underline "Use 1" and black out "Use 2", and move on, having already learned that the contradictions in English cannot always be reconciled and that there are other things to worry about more profitably. Like, whence can we get more copy editors?
From my essay on religion:
Throughout human history, the principal function of organized religion has been to legitimate power. From the Pharaohs of Egypt, to the God-Kings of the Aztecs and Incas, to the Celestial Emperors of China, to the God’s anointed Crowned Heads of Europe, ruling by divine right. Cowing the ignorant and superstitious mob to obedience with threats and promises of supernatural rewards and punishments. And, on occasion, sending the ovine masses off to slaughter and be slaughtered, by the millions, to secure and aggrandize that power.
The Thirty Years War was one of the greatest catastrophes in the history of Western Civilization. In that war, and the resulting plagues and famines, nearly a fifth of the population of Europe died.
The War was followed by a period known as The Enlightenment — The Age of Reason. The authors of American Democracy were sons of The Enlightenment. They were deists and free thinkers almost to a man. The Thirty Years war was a more recent event, to them, than the American Civil War is to us. Their first concern was that those horrors not be repeated here.
@Akhilleus & @Patrick:
I suspect many a copy editor has been "replaced" by a computer spell-check, and a spell-check program can't discern the difference between "long-awaited" and what the writer might have meant had she had time to think about it -- like "much-anticipated." Different meaning entirely, but probably what Ryan was "feeling."
Weirdly, I have a copy editor of my own, although you can't tell by Reality Chex, because my copy editor works for me only in a private, personal capacity. In fact, he works only in gmail (and to a lesser extent in my Word knockoff Open Office). Sometimes he's a little creepy. When I'm typing along in gmail, the program anticipates what I may write next, sometimes in longish phrases or clauses. What's creepy is that the program is right maybe 40% of the time. When I write a more-or-less formal business email in which business-letter jargon is an element, that percentage of gmail's "correct guesses" goes up, and an email may nearly writes itself.
Democracy
"Tennessee House advances bill to ban reappointing lawmakers booted for behavior
The proposal is one of several restrictions being considered after the GOP’s high-profile expulsion proceedings last April against Democratic state Reps. Justin Jones and Justin Pearson. It would bar what happened after: Jones and Pearson were reappointed and quickly went back to work."
The Onion - satire
"Pharmacist Denies Woman Birth Control Pills On Grounds That He’s Her Son From Future
Shocked by the healthcare professional’s refusal to fill her prescription, local woman Claire Murphy was reportedly denied birth control pills Tuesday on the grounds that the pharmacist was her son from the future. “I’m sorry, ma’am, but for moral and ethical reasons, I cannot give you a prescription that would prevent me from being born,” said the pharmacist, who claimed that today was the date of his conception, and therefore, in accordance with his rights under the law, he would not provide her with any contraceptives."
@D in MD: You're right of course, but religion has other important functions. I would guess its original function was to explain "what is." Why does the sun set? Why are there floods? and all.
While almost all religions are certainly used to control the hoi polloi, by establishing "god-given" rules and scaring the wits out of believers (as well as those forced to adhere to the beliefs of others), many religions are also used to comfort us poor creatures: we don't really die; we go to an after-life. God is watching over us; Jesus loves me, this I know. The Christian religion has long been a refuge for Black Americans, who are still not equal to White Americans, at least in practice. They're all equal Sunday morning.
But don't kid yourself about Enlightened "reason." The deists found a way to "reason" themselves right into Black = 3/5ths White. White Woman = Chattel. When Sam Alito writes an opinion to govern us all, he thinks he's just as "reasonable" as you think you are. What passes for reason often is based on what I would consider fairly reprehensible premises. The Enlightenment notion of the "rational man" is pretty much B.S.
By contrast, for many people, it's their religious beliefs that convince them Sam is an ass. The moral compass that guides them derives from religious teachings. Sam's principles, of course, come from religious teachings too -- not sure if it's Opus Dei or the Inquisition -- but definitely religious!
When it comes to human behavior and human modes of coping, nothing is as straightforward as you seem to suggest.
Everyone: thanks for the interesting remarks on religion. I grew up in southern states, attempted to fit in to really primitive viewpoints, and ultimately made my way to Unitarianism, my mom's longtime go-to. These people described above, Tom and the rest, fit in to the scary viewpoints of minorities being "less than" in every way possible, and that includes those not in the special religious clubs mostly attended by bigots, holy rollers and scumbags. I started hearing about Dominionism some years back, and they sound like doom--and I want no part of any of it. I am against the Orange Monster's fake religiousness (bowed head, surrounded by religious nuts in the biz--) and this pig in charge of everything Aladamnbana, but also those into casual religious blabbing (Jesus brought up a lot even while his teachings are ignored these days--) and those who feel they are upstanding citizens because they attend crapola churches and revivals and so forth. My mom was right: the religious right is always wrong.
Sometimes it's hard to remember just what the Georgia criminal case against Trump exists. It seems that the Georgia GOP is working on a different priority as per Mike Luckovich: https://www.gocomics.com/mikeluckovich/2024/02/27
Marie,
Re: Trump and the Dominion Theology types…
I suspect they don’t care that his relationship to the Ten Commandments is not unlike that of a hardcore drunk to abstinence. He’s useful in that they see him as a tool to get what they want, total control and the ability to smite their perceived enemies (all of us).
They can put up with all the “two Corinthians walked into a bar” jokes because he gets them in the room. Not only that, he puts people who do understand them in power and he doesn’t get in the way of letting them do their Jesus business.
I’ve read that they look upon his voluminous sins and sniff “Who amongst has not sinned?” or say things like “Who are we to question god’s chosen one?” Of course their kindness to sinners only extends to themselves and crooks like Trump who side with them. You’ll never hear them letting some black kid off the hook should he be arrested, even wrongly, because, well, he must have done some SOMETHING wrong.
They don’t need to have deep theological conversations with the Orange Monster, they just need him to go after those they hate. And for Trump’s part, they might as well be speaking Martian. He really doesn’t give a shit what anyone says after they tell him how wonderful he is.
Marie,
The creepiness of Gmail’s predictive text feature (Google used to call it Smart Reply, I don’t know if that’s still the case) has been noticed since it was introduced. I assiduously avoid it, for a number of reasons, one being because, as my wife might suggest, I have a kind built in antagonism to authority, especially being told what to do or say. But there’s also the tendency to want to avoid stock phraseology (see above, my mini rant about hoary cliches used in too much reportage). I’d much rather come up with something on my own. Granted, there’s only so many ways to sign off along the lines of “sincerely”, without dipping into antiquated forms similar to “blah, blah, blah, your humble servant…”
Nonetheless, we are in that world now, a world beset by AI. Smart Reply supposedly operates by suggesting standard phrases, but it also is designed to remember your particular writing peccadilloes. If you are an inveterate !!! user, the closing “Thanks” will be exclamated upon, “Thanks!” if not, you get the stripped down “Thanks”.
Which reminds me that the wonders of ChatGPT currently being touted are less wonderful than one might hope for. Large language models basically scrape a multitude of sources and give you back what’s already out there. It’s like momma bird feeding baby bird something already semi-digested, maybe even something baby bird spit out yesterday.
This isn’t all bad, it’s just nothing original. But like any technology, it can be used for both good and evil. Elon Musk’s large language GPT rip off uses, as it’s database of ideas, everything spewed out across his re-Nazified Xitter. Just imagine the response you’ll get when you ask for a few paragraphs on black history.
Anyway, I’m kinda criticizing something I really haven’t tried yet. I know you can supposedly ask it to write a review of the Civil War as composed by Dr. Seuss:
They fight, they fight, state’s right they say,
But what they mean is slaveray.
Or something.
I might ask for an overview of the history of semiotics written like the “Who’s on first” routine. Not sure how it’ll work in “ideological metonymic paradigms”, but it might be fun to find out.
Marie,
The distinction I was trying to make, however poorly, is between those who believe themselves to be infallible, and those who's views are debatable. Certainly people have reasoned themselves into countless horrors, but there is at least hope of correction, or at least compromise.
And speaking of compromise: no one actually thought that a slave was 3/5 of a person. The reality is a bit more complicated, and a lot more interesting. At the Constitutional Convention, the slave states wanted all of the slaves to be counted as citizens, and the free states wanted none to be counted. The result was the "three fifths compromise." see:
Through digby
"Josh Marshall had some smart thoughts about the Michigan race tonight where this is a huge topic on cable news today and consequently, where the results will be seen through the lens of the Gaza war:"