;)
The Conversation -- June 12, 2024
Luke Broadwater of the New York Times: "House Republicans on Wednesday muscled through a measure recommending that Attorney General Merrick B. Garland be held in contempt of Congress for failing to comply with a subpoena. The G.O.P. acted over Democratic opposition after the Justice Department declined to provide audio recordings of President Biden's interview with the special counsel investigating his handling of classified documents. By a nearly party-line vote of 216 to 207, the House called on the Justice Department to compel the executive branch to produce the materials.... In a statement, Mr. Garland said it was 'deeply disappointing that this House of Representatives has turned a serious congressional authority into a partisan weapon.'... Just one Republican, Representative David Joyce of Ohio, the leader of a mainstream G.O.P. group on Capitol Hill, voted 'no.'... The Justice Department has already made public a transcript of Mr. Biden's interview with [special counsel Robert] Hur, but House Republicans argue they need the recordings to continue their impeachment investigation and examine the president's mental fitness.... Mr. Biden last month asserted executive privilege to deny House Republicans access to recordings. That move was intended to shield Mr. Garland from prosecution."
Nia-Malika Henderson of Bloomberg: "On one of the worst days of his life, President Joe Biden showed the best of who he is. He affirmed his faith in his son, Hunter Biden, who was convicted on three felony gun charges. And he affirmed his faith in the justice system that held his only living son to account. Not only that, but hours after his son was found guilty, the president delivered a forceful speech on gun control that underscored his deep humanity, decency, and determination to stay focused on the problems of average Americans rather than drown in bitterness, self-pity, revenge and victimization. He spoke of hope in the face of loss, comforting those who've lost loved ones with his own story of grief. It was yet another stark and important contrast with ... Donald Trump, who believes that his self-created legal problems are matters of the state. Trump has vowed revenge if he returns to the White House, and Biden has said he respects the outcome of his son's trial." Firewalled.
Kathleen Culliton of the Raw Story: "... Donald Trump has funneled nearly $5 million from his presidential campaign coffers into his private businesses, according to a new financial analysis..., Forbes reported Wednesday.... Forbes analysis of Federal Election Commission records found $4.2 million funneled to Trump's aviation company Tag Air. Trump's private jet -- which he claims is better than Air Force One but experts say is comparable to a flying Staten Island ferry -- has been transformed into 'something of a charter service,' Forbes reports.... Trump's 2024 campaign has also spent $332,000 at his social club Mar-a-Lago.... The campaign spent $20,000 at the Miami golf resort Trump National Doral, $36,000 a Trump hotel in Las Vegas, according to the report. 'Add it all up -- the $4.6 million from the 2024 campaign and millions more from Trump's other groups -- and his businesses have collected about $7 million in total since the 2020 election," the analysis concludes."
Alex Woodward of the Independent: "A fundraising email blast from the chief political action committees supporting Donald Trump shared a troubling new message: 'haul out the guillotine.' The email went on to blast 'sicko' Kathy Griffin for her 2017 image holding a mock-severed Trump head and instead accused his Democratic rivals of wanting to behead him. 'The SAD and HORRIFIC TRUTH is that this is STILL the Sick Dream of every Trump-Deranged lunatic out there!' the message says. 'And it's not just me they want gone, THEY'RE REALLY COMING AFTER YOU! SICK SICK SICK!'"
Daniel Barnes & Zoe Richards of NBC News: "Former Trump adviser Steve Bannon asked a federal appeals court Tuesday to let him remain out of prison while he continues to appeal a nearly two-year-old conviction on criminal contempt of Congress charges. Bannon filed an emergency motion Tuesday evening asking the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit to overrule a lower court's order last week that he report to prison for four months on July 1. Bannon is asking the D.C. Circuit to quickly rule on his motion -- by next Tuesday -- to allow him time if necessary to appeal to the Supreme Court over his conviction on two counts of contempt of Congress in 2022, after he refused to answer questions from the House Jan. 6 committee." ~~~
~~~ Marie: Yo, Steve-o. If you can't do the time, don't do the crime.
~~~~~~~~~~
David Lynch of the Washington Post: "The global economy is in better shape than it was at the start of the year, thanks largely to the performance of the United States, the World Bank said in its latest forecast Tuesday. But the sunnier outlook could cloud over if major central banks -- including the Federal Reserve -- keep interest rates at elevated levels.... While Americans' unhappiness with high prices remains a key vulnerability for President Biden's reelection bid, the World Bank now expects the U.S. economy to grow at an annual rate of 2.5 percent, nearly a full percentage point higher than it predicted in January. The United States is the only advanced economy growing significantly faster than the bank anticipated at the start of the year."
ProPublica Cracks the IRS. Jesse Eisenger, et al., of ProPublica: "ProPublica has obtained a vast cache of IRS information showing how billionaires like Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk and Warren Buffett pay little in income tax compared to their massive wealth -- sometimes, even nothing.... The data provides an unprecedented look inside the financial lives of America's titans.... It shows not just their income and taxes, but also their investments, stock trades, gambling winnings and even the results of audits. Taken together, it demolishes the cornerstone myth of the American tax system: that everyone pays their fair share and the richest Americans pay the most. The IRS records show that the wealthiest can -- perfectly legally -- pay income taxes that are only a tiny fraction of the hundreds of millions, if not billions, their fortunes grow each year." Thanks to RAS for the link. (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ Marie: Although the specifics here may make for blockbluster news (and surely somebody's head will roll), as the authors themselves note, "Experts have long understood the broad outlines of how little the wealthy are taxed in the United States...." Trump and Republicans, of course, want to cut these billionaires' tax liability even more (and, yes, less than zero is possible), while Democrats like Elizabeth Warren and President Biden (and even billionaire Warren Buffett) want to tax the rich and ultra-rich more. If you want a good example of stupid, you will find it animated in the form of "typical Republican voter."
New York Times reporters liveblogged results from Tuesday's primary elections. Here are a few:
Chris Cameron: "Candidates [were] on the ballot on Tuesday in five states: South Carolina, Nevada, Maine, North Dakota and Ohio...."
Richard Fausset: "A 22-year-old who participated in the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol lost his bid to unseat a Republican incumbent in the South Carolina House of Representatives. The defeat of Elias Irizarry in the state primary on Tuesday is the latest in a number of losses that riot participants have suffered at the ballot box in recent months.... The incumbent, Randy Ligon, will not face a Democratic challenger in the general election, and will serve a fourth term in office."
Mitch Smith: "Representative Kelly Armstrong won the Republican nomination for governor of North Dakota, The Associated Press said on Tuesday, defeating the state's lieutenant governor, Tammy Miller, and positioning himself as the strong favorite in the general election.... On the campaign trail, both candidates emphasized their support for ... Donald J. Trump and, as one debate moderator put it, tried to 'out-conservative the other.'"
Ernesto Londoño: "Voters in North Dakota approved a ballot measure that sets a maximum age for representing the state in Congress, The Associated Press said on Tuesday. Experts said they believed North Dakota was the first state to impose such a requirement on members of Congress, though they said the measure is likely to be challenged in court.... A Supreme Court case in 1995 established that states cannot add eligibility restrictions beyond those in the Constitution."
Annie Karni: "Representative Nancy Mace, Republican of South Carolina, on Tuesday defeated a well-funded primary challenger, putting her on track to win a third term. Her resounding victory also dealt a major blow to former Speaker Kevin McCarthy's efforts to exact political retribution against those who voted to oust him. Ms. Mace, 46, who once leaned center on social issues, won a Democratic seat in 2020 and claimed that all of ... Donald J. Trump's accomplishments had been 'wiped out' by his behavior on Jan. 6, 2021. But she has made a hard tack to the right over the past year as she has tried to game out her political future."
Kellen Browning: "Sam Brown, an Army veteran who was the heavy favorite in the Nevada Republican primary race for Senate even before ... Donald J. Trump's last-minute endorsement, won the nomination on Tuesday, according to The Associated Press. He will face Senator Jacky Rosen, the state's Democratic incumbent, in one of the most closely watched Senate contests of the year."
National Crime Blotter
Perry Stein, et al., of the Washington Post: "Hunter Biden was found guilty of felony gun charges in federal court Tuesday, ending a trial that exposed some of the ugliest moments in the life of the president's son and put on national display the first family's pain, heartache and regrets.... The jury deliberated for a little more than three hours before finding him guilty on all three counts. Biden nodded, but otherwise showed little emotion when the verdict was read. He then hugged each member of his legal team and said thank you. Biden walked out past the defendant's table, hugged and kissed his wife, Melissa Cohen-Biden, and left the courtroom, shaking the hands of friends and family along the way.... After the verdict, one juror told The Washington Post that he didn't believe Hunter Biden belonged in prison and that he felt bad that his daughter had to testify about her father's drug use." ~~~
~~~ Glenn Thrush of the New York Times: "A jury in Wilmington, Del., on Tuesday found Hunter Biden, President Biden's long-troubled son, guilty of three felony counts of lying on a federal firearms application in 2018, a grievous personal blow to the Biden family as his father enters the final months of a brutal re-election campaign. He could face up to 25 years in prison, but first-time offenders who did not use their weapons to commit a violent crime typically receive no jail time." This is the pinned item in a liveblog. Some other items in the liveblog appear in yesterday's Conversation.
Hannah Rabinowitz of CNN: Some jurors in the Hunter Biden case spoke to CNN about how the jury reached its verdict and their feelings about Biden and the case against him.
Lisa Kashinsky & Meredith McGraw of Politico: "Republicans are scrambling to prevent Hunter Biden's conviction on felony gun charges from undermining their argument that the judicial system is being weaponized against Donald Trump. They just can't agree on how. Trump's campaign cast the conviction of his rival's son on Tuesday as a 'distraction from the real crimes of the Biden Crime Family,' while some hard-line supporters dismissed the proceedings as 'fake.' House Speaker Mike Johnson argued that Hunter Biden's conviction 'doesn't' undercut Republicans claims of a two-tiered justice system because the evidence against him was 'overwhelming.' And still other Hill Republicans went so far as to describe the verdict as a 'step towards ensuring equal application of the law.'... 'It throws a bit of sand in the gears of people suggesting the Biden Department of Justice has been engineered to go after Trump,' said Jason Roe, a GOP strategist and former chair of the Michigan Republican Party. But, Roe conceded, 'one feature of the modern Republican Party is ignoring facts that don't support the argument and sometimes embracing the conspiracy theories that do.'" ~~~
~~~ Why, Mr. Roe, how could you possibly say that? ~~~
~~~ Jordain Carney of Politico: "House Oversight Chair James Comer is urging the Justice Department to launch a sweeping investigation into the Biden family in the wake of Hunter Biden being found guilty on three felony gun charges. 'Today's verdict is a step toward accountability but until the Department of Justice investigates everyone involved in the Bidens' corrupt influence peddling schemes that generated over $18 million in foreign payments to the Biden family, it will be clear department officials continue to cover for the Big Guy, Joe Biden,' Comer (R-Ky.) said in a statement after the verdict." ~~~
~~~ And This. Hadas Gold of CNN: "In the wake of Hunter Biden's conviction on federal gun charges Tuesday, right-wing media personalities sought to downplay the jury's decision, falsely claiming the case was a 'fake trial' designed to 'cover up' other supposed crimes committed by the president and his family. The reaction showcased how far to the fringes the right-wing and pro-Trump media ecosystem has drifted in recent years, with high-profile personalities defaulting to conspiracy theories and innuendo in response to inconvenient political news.... There is no evidence Joe Biden has received large sums of money from China or has otherwise gained wealth as a result of his son's business dealings abroad." ~~~
~~~ And This. Julianne McShane of Mother Jones: "In the moments following Hunter Biden's conviction on federal gun charges on Tuesday, Fox News celebrated the justice system doing its job. They sang the praises of the judge and jury. They delighted in the fact that Biden would face consequences. And they doubted President Joe Biden's repeated pledges that he will not pardon his son. In short: They reacted very differently from how they did when Donald Trump was found guilty in his hush-money trial.... Yet not everyone on the right was jubilant.... Stephen Miller, a senior advisor to Trump, posted to X: 'DOJ is running election interference for Joe Biden -- that's why DOJ did NOT charge Hunter with being an unregistered foreign agent (FARA) or any crime connected with foreign corruption. Why? Because all the evidence would lead back to JOE.'" ~~~
~~~ Marie: This is all so surprising, because naturally I thought when Hunter was convicted of a crime that most prosecutors would never have charged under the circumstances, all the wingers would be totally apologetic and at least concede that the DOJ was unfair to a Democratic President's son. Oddly enough, one of the usual suspects did come close: Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) said: "The Hunter Biden gun conviction is kinda dumb tbh." ~~~
~~~ digby also cites others' reactions to the verdict and their reporting on GOP responses. Unfortunately, she fails to credit the source (not for the first time) for some reactions. Like these: "Hunter Biden was convicted in the state of Delaware, where the Bidens decidedly have a 'home court' advantage -- for the people who say trump couldn't get a fair trial in NYC because they hate him, just look at Delaware. There was no ridiculous daily parade of same-suit-wearing Senators and members of Congress in the court; just Hunter's mom and family members." Read on.
Tracey Tully & Benjamin Weiser of the New York Times: "On Tuesday..., cross-examination [of the prosecution's star witness against Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.)] began with a blistering volley of questions aimed at undermining the testimony of Jose Uribe, a disgraced insurance broker who pleaded guilty in March to conspiring to bribe Mr. Menendez with a Mercedes-Benz and is cooperating with federal prosecutors.... Mr. Uribe, 57, acknowledged that he had lied to [customers, to a bank and to the federal government], leading [Menendez attorney Adam] Fee to call him a 'sophisticated liar' who was willing to put his family members in legal jeopardy to cover up his crimes. Mr. Uribe, who also pleaded guilty in 2011 to insurance fraud charges in New Jersey, maintained his composure during hours of aggressive cross-examination, even as he avoided answering many questions by claiming he had 'no recollection' of certain events."
Presidential Race
If you could reason with Trump's supporters there would be no Trump supporters. -- Sundae Gurl
Ed Mazza of the Huffington Post: "Former Republican House Speaker Paul Ryan tore into ... Donald Trump on Tuesday, saying he won't be voting for him and calling out his lack of character and principles. 'If you put yourself above the Constitution, as he has done, I think that makes you unfit for office,' he told Fox News host Neil Cavuto.... Ryan also blamed Trump for GOP election losses in recent years. 'He's cost us a lot of seats,' Ryan said. 'He cost us the Senate twice. He cost us the House because he is nominating, he is pushing through the primaries people who cannot win general elections but who pledge fealty to him.' Ryan, who added that he doesn't support President Joe Biden either, said voters have been given 'terrible choices' for the Nov. 5 election."
Catherine Rampell of the Washington Post: Donald Trump is "already preparing to constitutionally nuke Congress. So far, lawmakers in his party seem to be welcoming their own obliteration.... In recent months, Trump has said explicitly that sometimes he won't spend money the way Congress -- which controls power of the purse, per the Constitution -- instructs him to. He and his advisers have described plans to use 'impoundment,' a technical term meaning to withhold funds that Congress has appropriated for specific purposes. 'Restoring the Impoundment Power,' Trump's campaign website says, will help 'stop unnecessary spending' and 'crush the Deep State.'... Trump could unilaterally zero out any program he doesn't like, or whose recipient has angered him, regardless of Congress's instructions.... Trump's targets for budgetary nuking include clean-energy subsidies, international aid programs and funding for the World Health Organization. He told Fox News last week that he might cut the entire Education Department, Interior Department and 'the environmental agencies,' too." ~~~
~~~ Marie: Yeah? So? As far as I can tell, Congressional Republicans have no desire whatsoever to legislate. When Democrats control either house or the presidency, their job is to obstruct. When Republicans control a house, they generally accede to the wishes of a Republican president. So it's hardly surprising that they're willing to roll over and play dead for Trump again. It's what they do.
Ethics Are So Wrong. Zoe Richards, et al., of NBC News: "Sen. Lindsey Graham, the top Republican on the Judiciary Committee, plans to block an effort by Senate Democrats to unanimously pass a Supreme Court ethics bill Wednesday on the Senate floor.... Graham's objection means the bill won't be able to move forward, because any senator can block a request. It isn't clear whether the measure will come up for a vote under the normal process, but Senate Majority LeaderChuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said he's considering it. Even before Graham made his comments, Democrats doubted the legislation would advance.... The Democratic-led Judiciary Committee advanced the Supreme Court Ethics, Recusal, and Transparency Act on a party-line vote nearly a year ago, but it can't break a filibuster on the Senate floor without 60 votes. Democrats have 51 members, and no Republican is on board with the bill."
ProPublica gets a lot of money, and they have spent a fortune investigating Clarence Thomas, for example. You know, everything he's ever done in his entire life.... [They have] done some of that to me, too.... They look for any little thing they can find, and they try to make something out of it. -- Justice Sam Alito, to Lauren Windsor, June 3 ~~~
Yes, yes, "any little thing." Like a half-million-dollar vacation, or a quarter-million-dollar travel bus. Petty, petty partisans! -- Marie ~~~
~~~ Daniel Hampton of the Raw Story: "Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito believes news organizations -- specifically calling out the investigative news organization ProPublica -- [are] out to get him.'... That's according to a new recording from liberal documentary maker Lauren Windsor that were obtained Tuesday by Rolling Stone. In the audio, recorded June 3 at an event hosted by the Supreme Court Historical Society, the questioner asks the justice why he feels the nation's highest court has been 'attacked' and 'targeted by the media' in recent years. Alito replied: 'They don't like our decisions, and they don't like how they anticipate we may decide some cases that are coming up. That's the beginning of the end of it,' he said.... 'There are groups that are very well-funded by ideological groups that have spearheaded these attacks. That's what it is.'"
Jesse Wegman of the New York Times: Samuel "Alito has long made clear his special solicitude for religious claims, whether before the court or on the flagpole outside his house. Still, it should shock us to hear him lay out his worldview so bluntly -- and to a woman he never met before. It shows an utter lack of regard for the court's delicate posture of neutrality in the constitutional system and American society.... He is also in good company in the upper reaches of government. Recall that House Speaker Mike Johnson ... told an interviewer..., 'Go pick up a Bible off your shelf and read it. That's my worldview.' Perhaps we should be grateful that these aspiring theocrats have fully ripped off the mask. Why submit to the sinful compromises demanded by a pluralistic society when you can just impose your (and God's) will by fiat? In that regard, this is really the Alito court." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ Marie: This is a good place to emphasize that Bible Mike doesn't know WTF he's talking about. If he did "go pick up a bible off the shelf and read" more than a few passages, he would know that the Christian Bible does not by any stretch express a definable, cohesive worldview. It is a book with many authors, many editors, written and revised over centuries, with all the contradictions and oddities one would expect of such a miscellany. And the contradictions are not a neat dichotomy between the Old Testament and the New. Within each testament, indeed, often within a single book, there appears a god of diverging attributes and attitudes, a savior messiah disagreeing with something he supposedly said in the previous chapter, and so on. If Bible Mike "goes and picks up a bible off the shelf and reads it," his worldview will depend upon the verse he lands on.
Uh, Onward, Christian Soldiers. Elizabeth Dias & Lisa Lerer of the New York Times: "... the core of the idea expressed to [Justice Samuel] Alito, that the country must fight the decline of Christianity in public life, goes beyond the questions of bias and influence at the nation's highest court. An array of conservatives ... has openly embraced the idea that American democracy needs to be grounded in Christian values and guarded against the rise of secular culture. They are right-wing Catholics and evangelicals who oppose abortion, same-sex marriage, transgender rights and what they see as the dominance of liberal views in school curriculums. And they've become a crucial segment of ... Donald J. Trump's political coalition, intermingled with the MAGA movement.... Justice Alito ... is embracing language and symbolism that line up with a much broader movement pushing back against the declining power of Christianity as a majority religion in America."
You need a democracy to have effective capitalism. If you don't, you get cronyism. You get oligarchy. You get crony capitalism. You get arbitrary and capricious administration to the law, which reduces people's tendency to invest in your country. -- Words of Wisdom, from the most unlikely sources, the Mooch a/k/a Anthony Scaramucci ~~~
~~~ Jamelle Bouie of the New York Times: "... democracy under capitalism is necessarily of limited scope. We have the power and capacity to regulate and structure the market, but the fundamental questions -- of production and surplus, of ownership and social reproduction -- are beyond the reach of democratic decision-making as presently constituted. But even the weak grasp of capitalist democracy is too strong for, well, capitalists.... According to Sam Sutton, writing in Politico, several Wall Street executives and Silicon Valley venture capitalists who backed Donald Trump and then spurned him after the Jan. 6 insurrection have now returned to the fold, with open arms and open wallets. They are, he writes, 'looking past qualms about his personality and willingness to bulldoze institutional norms and focusing instead on issues closer to the heart: how he might ease regulations, cut their taxes or flex U.S. power on the global stage.'... [But] the truth is that regimes of corrupt, personalist rule -- in which authoritarians wield the state to reward friends, punish enemies and secure their fortunes -- are much less prosperous than the alternative."
Annals of "Journalism," Ctd. Elahe Izadi & Sarah Ellison of the Washington Post use the front page for some navel-gazing: "What [owner Jeff] Bezos wants from and for The Post has remained the compelling question through a week of internal turmoil, during which his handpicked new publisher and CEO, William Lewis, abruptly replaced the newspaper's first female executive editor and announced a reorganization of the newsroom -- the exact plans for which remain unclear -- in a bid to boost earnings." (Also linked yesterday.)
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Florida. Patricia Mazzei of the New York Times: "Key parts of a Florida law that bans gender transition care for minors and imposes hurdles on adults seeking such care are unconstitutional, a federal judge ruled on Tuesday. Judge Robert L. Hinkle of Federal District Court in Tallahassee sided with advocacy groups and three families who had said that the law stripped them of parents' rights to make medical decisions for their transgender children. In a 105-page order, Judge Hinkle said that 'gender identity is real' and that a 'widely accepted standard of care' includes puberty blockers and hormone treatments that Florida unlawfully banned. 'The State of Florida can regulate as needed but cannot flatly deny transgender individuals safe and effective medical treatment -- treatment with medications routinely provided to others with the state's full approval so long as the purpose is not to support the patient's transgender identity,' Judge Hinkle wrote." ~~~
~~~ Marie: Explain to me again why legislators and judges are horning in on family medical care decisions. Oh yeah, Ron DeSantis thought bullying vulnerable teenagers would compensate enough for his multiple personality disorders that voters would want him to be POTUS. DeLusional.
Virginia. Karina Elwood of the Washington Post: "The Virginia NAACP and five students are suing a school board that voted last month to restore the names of two schools previously named for Confederate leaders, saying the decision creates a discriminatory educational environment for Black students. The federal complaint filed Tuesday says the reversal denies Black students an equal opportunity to education by forcing them to attend a school named after Confederate leaders.... The Shenandoah County School Board voted 5-1 last month to revert the name of Mountain View High to Stonewall Jackson High School. In addition, Honey Run Elementary School was renamed Ashby Lee Elementary School after Robert E. Lee and Turner Ashby."
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Israel/Palestine, et al. The New York Times' live updates of developments Wednesday in the Israel/Hamas war are here.
Vatican. Emma Bubola of the New York Times: "Pope Francis repeated an anti-gay slur during a meeting with priests in Rome on Tuesday, Italian news outlets reported, the same offensive term he was accused of using two weeks ago. The Vatican, in summarizing the gathering, said only that the pontiff had cautioned about admitting gay men into Roman Catholic seminaries. The Vatican did not address the reports by two of the most prominent news agencies in Italy, ANSA and Adnkronos, that he had again used the word 'frociaggine,' an offensive Italian slang term referring to gay men. The reports cited anonymous sources they said had been present at the meeting."
News Ledes
We are in what I view as a new global world war for control of the search for truth. We have to mobilize our truth-seeking strength to survive, for America and democracy to survive. -- Howard Fineman, 2024 ~~~
~~~ New York Times: "Howard Fineman, a witty, encyclopedic political reporter who dominated the fast-evolving world of Washington journalism for nearly 40 years, moving effortlessly from daily news coverage to the pages of Newsweek magazine to cable news punditry and later to the frontiers of online journalism, died on Tuesday at his home in Washington. He was 75."
CNBC: "The consumer price index showed no increase in May as inflation slightly loosened its stubborn grip on the U.S. economy, the Labor Department reported Wednesday. The CPI, a broad inflation gauge that measures a basket of goods and services costs across the U.S. economy, held flat on the month though it increased 3.3% from a year ago, according to the departments Bureau of Labor Statistics."
New York Times: "Jerry West, who emerged from West Virginia coal country to become one of basketball's greatest players, a signature figure in the history of the Los Angeles Lakers and a literal icon of the sport -- his is the silhouette on the logo of the National Basketball Association -- died on Wednesday. He was 86."
New York Times: "Morrie Markoff, a supercentenarian blogger and scrap-metal sculptor who was believed to be the oldest man in the United States and whose brain has been donated for research on what is known as super-aging, died on June 3 at his home in downtown Los Angeles. He was 110."
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Reader Comments (14)
It feels like such a novel concept again that the jury in Hunter's case feel safe enough to immediately speak out and give their thoughts on what they just went through. The fact that Trump was a threat to his jurors' lives should have been more of a story. His terrorism is so overlooked by the media.
Trump already stole money from Congress and used it to pay for his border wall that Congress had deliberately not funded. Congress did little to nothing in response. Him "nuking" the budget is just a continuation of what he got away with in his first term. It apparently wasn't a big deal the way it was covered then and I'm sure if he takes over the budget from Congress it will again be a non-frontpage story for possibly a day. Then it will just be our new normal like all Trump stories.
Things big and little, but on the right, mostly little…
Medieval Hit Man Sam describes obscene levels of iniquitous and unethical conduct on his part as “a little thing”.
In his Faux interview with former R Squeaker, Paul Ryan, Neal Cavuto asked what prompted Ryan to change his mind about the Fat Felonious Fascist. “Was it the Jan.6 thing?” as if he were talking about an unpaid parking ticket. You mean the deadly attempted overthrow of the government to override the Constitution and illegally maintain power? That old thing?
What constitutes a big thing to PoT apparatchiks? Rule of law taking precedence over the wishes of a career criminal and traitor? Yeah, boy, is that horrible.
The Rich
"While Donald Trump’s felony conviction for falsifying business documents is hurting him with independent voters, it has only increased his popularity with a demographic cohort that is much smaller in number—but still has an outsize role to play in election outcomes: the super-rich.
“Ultra-wealthy Republican donors are rallying behind former US President Donald Trump following his historic trial and criminal conviction.” Indeed, for some tycoons, Trump’s courtroom troubles are reasons for supporting him. For Shaun Maguire, a partner in the powerful Silicon Valley firm Sequoia Capital, Trump’s long list of indictments was a “radicalizing event.”
Aside from Maguire, the BBC lists other extremely wealthy Trump supporters, including casino owner Miriam Adelson, hedge fund manager Bill Ackman, fracking pioneer Harold Hamm, and Blackstone Group CEO Steve Schwarzman."
Just asking questions like a common Tucker, do these traitors and idiots meet the definition of terrorist financiers?
Trump's coworkers, Trump cabinet members 40/44 have refused to endorse him.
Sinclaire
"Public Notice and Judd Legum’s Popular Information assembled another stew of cookie-cutter commentaries from right-wing Sinclair Broadcasting’s local talking heads. Sinclair repackaged talking points from the Wall Street Journal’s widely panned June 4 article, “Behind Closed Doors, Biden Shows Signs of Sipping,” questioning Joe Biden’s mental fitness. The sourcing is questionable. Conveniently, repetition obliterates questions:"
Guardian
"Book about book bans banned by Florida school board
Ban This Book by Alan Gratz banned in Indian River county after opposition from parents linked to Moms for Liberty"
Sinclaire: Behind closed doors, Biden shows signs of sipping.
Is that a misspelling? Did he mean slipping?
I show signs of sipping every evening while cooking dinner. That
doesn't make me unable to complete dinner-and serve it-and eat it,
so that shouldn't make Biden unable to hold office.
Sinclair: someone on teevee this morning said they didn't understand how a large organization like Sinclair managed to write a script for the intro of blabbing about the Wall Street article, after playing a mashup of the many identical phrases of the intro...Duh, stupid head-- it's SINCLAIR. They have been in the tank for wingers for probably the last 25 years. I can barely stomach watching Colbert on a Sinclair station from Harrisburg. I wish the media darlings would do their homework, even the ones who were not born when this long descent into winger madness began. I'm sure the young people running things these days think we are decrepit, but my memories of this crap began in the 60s (I was oblivious and in elementary school in the 50s--) and we know whom to question and discount, including Sinclair. Grrrr.
Mock Paper Scissors blog notes that the volk working on Project 2025 (i.e., DiJiT Day One Diktatmacher) have some thoughts on maybe mandatory service for recent high school graduates -- you know, the draft. Part of that is the idea of having HS seniors take a standard military aptitude test to determine what kind of soldiering they would be best at.
"... Christopher Miller, who led the Pentagon during the chaotic closure of Trump’s tenure in Washington, detailed his vision for the ASVAB [Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery, a standardized test developed by the Defense Department decades ago to help the military funnel recruits into occupations that match their skills and intellect] ..."
Notwithstanding the merits of national service, the idea of getting meaningful information from a mandatory "military aptitude test" given to HS kids who are not necessarily motivated to be all they can be is asking for Garbage In Garbage Out. Think of the Sweathogs from "Welcome Back Kotter" taking that test. But equally important, realize that any "military general aptitude" multiple choice test is easy to game, for any average -IQ kid. If you WANT to go to Officer Candidate School, you can see what answers will put you on that list. If you WANT to be on the "low military aptitude" list, you can see those answers too.
I still recall taking the OQI (Officer Qualification Inventory) test in 1968, which had multiple choice questions like:
"Which would you rather do on a Saturday afternoon:
a) find a good book to read
b) train for a marathon in the rain
c) go for a drive
d) give a quiche party "
Not really. But close to like that. A HS kid could have a lot of fun with a test like that. And the test takers who sincerely WANT to be in the military and answer accordingly would all find themselves in the Infantry the week after HS. That type of test will ONLY work if the test population is comprised of people who are already seeking to join. Open it to all HS seniors subject to draft and you get The Sweathogs.
BTW, DiJiT disavows the P2025 idea of national service. At least that's consistent with his personal history.
It makes sense that the right-wing cancel culture would ban a book about book banning. The author of the book, Alan Gratz, is an excellent writer and a favorite of my 13 year old. We’ve read a number of his books together. He typically writes about the experiences of kids in times and places of great stress or historical import.
His book “Refugee”, following refugee families and children in different time periods, has one of the best and most emotional endings of any book I’ve ever read. We talked about that book for days. Gratz is also not a bug-eyed winger. He doesn’t advocate putting immigrant babies in cages or flooding the Rio Grande with crocodiles and poisonous snakes as Trump has advocated, so it makes sense that they’d go after him.
The other day I heard an interview with a knuckle dragging winger who was screaming that there’s no such thing as a book ban in this country. His point was that it’s unfaaaair to say wingers “ban books” because, as he points out, if kids want to find horrible stuff, they can get it online or (ready for this?) PBS.
His claim was that banning can only be done by the government. Nope. Sorry. The definition includes things that are officially prohibited. If a school department or school board, under pressure from haters, or on their own, issues a decree stating that Book A is to be removed from school library shelves, that is an official prohibition: a book ban.
Guess I’ll turn on PBS and see what kind of salacious stuff I can find on America’s Test Kitchen. Oooh! Deviled egg recipe! Shouldn’t that be banned? DEVIL eggs?
Per Patrick’s military aptitude test:
Questions presented to Donald Trump:
Would you rather:
A. Serve your country
B. Fake having some indeterminate foot problem so you can weasel out of military service, stay home, grope women, pretend to be smart, inherit daddy’s money, and be an asshole.
We know which one he picked.
New investigation demanded by the Treason Morons, Gym&Jim:
What is Joe Biden sipping??? Subpoena! Fox interviews!
Sipgate!
Patrick,
A story.
Yes, I remember the ASVAB. I first encountered it at the Oakland induction center in 1968.
A college friend who was at the same draft physical took the test at the same time place and time. The test administrator didn't like his score, he said, because it was too high on all the test's factors. So the administrator unilaterally lowered it, striking a blow for average by regressing him to the mean.
Knowing my friend as well as I did and do , it's likely his story was true. He never met a test he didn't like.
Later, I administered ASVAB to people seeking a billet in work training programs that were part of Johnson's war on poverty. It was to be used as a counseling tool, but I don't remember that I ever found it a useful one.