;)
The Conversation -- June 7, 2024
Cleve Wootson, et al., of the Washington Post: "President Biden returned to Normandy on Friday to hail the U.S. Army Rangers who scaled the cliffs of [Pointe du Hoc] eight decades ago in defense of freedom and democracy, part of a speech aimed at a U.S. audience that echoed the central themes of his reelection bid.... Biden leaned ... into one of the domestic aims of his visit to France: to draw a sharp contrast with his predecessor and chief political rival, Donald Trump.... 'They stormed the beaches alongside their allies. Does anyone believe these Rangers want America to go it alone today?' Biden said. 'They fought to vanquish a hateful ideology of the '30s and '40s. Does anyone doubt they would move heaven and earth to vanquish hateful ideologies of today?'" ~~~
~~~ ** Dana Milbank of the Washington Post: "The 80th anniversary of D-Day on Thursday provided the contrast that should define the election. President Biden went to Normandy and spoke about American greatness. Donald Trump went to Phoenix and called the United States a 'failed nation' and a 'very sick country.'... Biden hailed NATO, the 'greatest military alliance in the history of the world,' and vowed to defend Ukraine.... Trump hailed a modern-day tyrant, Hungary's Viktor Orban ('strong man, very powerful man'), complained about 'endless wars' and 'delinquent' Europeans, and vowed to 'spend our money in our country' -- including by 'moving thousands of troops, if necessary, currently stationed overseas to our own borders.'" Read on.
Abbie VanSickle of the New York Times: "Justice Clarence Thomas acknowledged on Friday additional luxury travel he had accepted from a conservative billionaire, amending a previous financial disclosure to reflect trips he had taken to an Indonesian island and a secretive all-male club in the Northern California redwoods. The trips, taken in 2019, were earlier revealed by ProPublica, but it is the first time that Justice Thomas has included them on his financial disclosures. Other Supreme Court justices chronicled their gifts, travel and money earned from books and teaching.... Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. was granted an extension this year, said the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts... Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson reported receiving four concert tickets valued at about $3,700 from Beyoncé and $10,000 of artwork for her chambers from the Alabama artist and musician Lonnie Holley. The financial disclosures, released yearly, are one of the few public records available about the justices' lives, providing select details of their activities outside the court....
"When his form was released to the public, Justice Thomas included an unusual addendum, a statement defending his acceptance of gifts from Harlan Crow, a real estate magnate in Texas and a donor to conservative causes. He had 'inadvertently omitted' information on earlier forms, the statement said, which also sought to justify his decision to fly on private jets. He stated that he had been advised to avoid commercial travel after the leak of the draft opinion overturning Roe v. Wade." Politico's report was here. ~~~
~~~ To: Administrative Office. From: Clarence & Sam: So we couldn't get our gift disclosure forms in on time -- including some stuff from five years ago -- because we were flying around the globe and stopping at luxury resorts, all paid for by billionaire buddies of ours who have business before the Court, and it's all necessary for our safety since there are some dangerous broads out there who are even meaner than Ginni & Martha-Ann just because we took away their rights to bodily autonomy, and we are advised (passive voice!) they might be mean to us if they catch us at the commercial airport where the riffraff go. So maybe we'll tell you later about what fun we had with the globetrotting, and maybe we'll bring you a souvenir from our luxury travels if you like those shampoos in tiny plastic bottles. ~~~
~~~ ** Update. Gabe Roth of Fix the Court --the organization that yesterday reported that Clarence Thomas mostly likely has received about $4.2MM in gifts over the past two decades -- appeared on MSNBC Friday. Roth said that Thomas' amended financial disclosure is itself a violation of ethics rules because Thomas did not include any of the transportation -- yachts and private jets -- that got him to and from the exotic places he now finally has reported -- five years after the fact and after ProPublica exposed those particular luxury vacays.
Ann Marimow of the Washington Post: "A retired federal judge has delivered an unusually stark warning about the Supreme Court and the future of the planet and democracy, which he says is imperiled by a conservative majority that is amassing power for itself while weakening minority voting rights and making it harder for the federal government to protect the health and safety of Americans. In a memoir published this month, David Tatel joined other retired judges who have been publicly critical of the Supreme Court at a time when public opinion and confidence in the institution is at historic lows and as some justices have been consumed by ethics controversies.... The 82-year-old judge, a leading candidate for the high court during the Clinton administration, writes that he stepped down from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit in January in part because he was tired of having his work reviewed 'by a Supreme Court that seemed to hold in such low regard the principles to which I've dedicated my life.'" ~~~
~~~ Marie: I would not be surprised if other judges retire (or have retired) because they're sick of having their well-wrought decisions overturned by a cabal of partisan hacks. That, too, is a danger to democracy.
Danny Hakim & Rowan Gerety of the New York Times: "Mark Meadows, the former White House chief of staff, pleaded not guilty on Friday in an Arizona election interference case, the latest development in the criminal prosecutions playing out in five battleground states over efforts to keep ... Donald J. Trump in power in 2020. Arizona is the second state, after Georgia, to charge Mr. Meadows in connection with his conduct after the 2020 election. He is accused of taking part in an effort to reverse Mr. Trump's loss in Arizona, and, like other defendants, faces charges of conspiracy, fraud and forgery."
Eileen Sullivan, et al., of the New York Times: "Lawyers for Hunter Biden called his daughter Naomi to the witness stand on Friday as they sought to challenge the government's argument that he had lied about his drug use on a federal firearms application in 2018. It is part of the defense's broader effort to undercut the contemporaneous text messages, bank records as well as Mr. Biden's own words that prosecutors have introduced in an effort to show that his spiral into an unrelenting addiction to crack cocaine extended to the months and weeks before and after he bought the gun. But that strategy appeared to falter under cross-examination, with government lawyers eliciting anguished, and excruciating, details about their relationship at the time. After she left the stand, she briefly hugged Mr. Biden.... The defense argues that the question [on the firearms application] is worded in the present tense, and that the government cannot prove that on the day he acquired the gun, Oct. 12, 2018, Mr. Biden was using crack cocaine.... Even as the prosecution relied on Mr. Biden's former partners to detail a habit that spiraled into drug-fueled partying and a cross-country odyssey in faltering efforts to get sober, the women also acknowledged that neither had seen Mr. Biden in the month that he bought the gun."
The New York Times' live updates of developments Friday in the Israel/Hamas war are here.
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CNN is liveblogging today's events that follow up on yesterday's D-Day remembrances.
When Heroes Meet. Orlando Mayorquín of the New York Times: At Omaha Beach Thursday, "an American World War II veteran in a blue cap, seated in a wheelchair with a blue blanket draped over his lap, was introduced to President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine by Justin Trudeau, the Canadian prime minister. 'You’re the savior of the people,' the veteran, Melvin Hurwitz, 99, of Frederick, Md., told Mr. Zelensky after pulling the Ukrainian leader into an embrace. 'You bring tears to my eyes.' 'No, no, no, you saved Europe,' Mr. Zelensky responded.... Their embrace mirrored a connection that President Biden made explicit in his remarks at the ceremony, in which he cast the allied effort to repel the Russian invasion of Ukraine as an extension of the battle for freedom in Europe that unfolded on Normandy's beaches eight decades ago. 'We know the dark forces that these heroes fought against 80 years ago,' Mr. Biden said, addressing a crowd of thousands.... 'They never fade,' Mr. Biden added. 'Aggression and greed, the desire to dominate and control, to change borders by force -- these are perennial. The struggle between dictatorship and freedom is unending.'"
Stephen Collinson of CNN: "President Joe Biden is in Europe, warning of totalitarian evil and the dangers to democracy.... Donald Trump is back home, seeking a favor from Russian strongman Vladimir Putin, mulling revenge and trashing US elections. The former president is making his 2024 opponent's case -- that the West is being challenged by unprecedented threats to the rule of law from hostile forces outside and in. But Trump's strength also suggests that the centerpiece of Biden's trip -- an homage on Friday in Normandy to one of former President Ronald Reagan's greatest speeches -- may fall on many deaf ears back in America. The former president is showing in every speech and public appearance that the seduction of demagoguery, the demonization of outsiders and the language of extremism is as potent now as it was before World War II." ~~~
~~~ Stephen Collinson of CNN: "... at no point since June 6, 1944, has the unshakable US leadership of the West and support for internationalist values been so in question. Democracy is facing its sternest test in generations from far-right populism on the march on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean.... Trump's 'America First' philosophy has taken deep root in the Republican Party that once prided itself on winning the Cold War. The ex-president tried to overturn US democracy to stay in power four years ago. And some GOP figures led by the ex-president now appear to have more empathy for Putin than liberal European democracies that the United States rebuilt after World War II. And the monthslong delay in funding Biden's most recent aid package for Ukraine raised doubts that Washington will always stand up for democracy in Europe and against aggression by autocrats." (Also linked yesterday.)
The Washington Post Editors note that a better way to deal with the border crisis than President Biden's executive order limiting grants of asylum was the bipartisan bill that Trump nixed. Biden agrees, though the Post editors don't say so.
They Never Stop. Lauren Gurley & Jeff Stein of the Washington Post: "Conservative policymakers influential with ... Donald Trump are discussing how to use a little-known labor law to impose sweeping restrictions on private-employer-covered abortions.... The Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, has publicly called for using federal labor law to limit the ability of private employers to provide coverage that includes abortions in states with abortion restrictions. Trump insiders have also discussed these ideas, according to one person with direct knowledge of the talks. The proposed change could make it vastly more difficult for residents of states with abortion bans to obtain abortions by traveling out-of-state, legal experts say. This comes as out-of-state travel for abortions doubled between the first half of 2020 and the first half of 2023, according to data from the Guttmacher Institute...." ~~~
~~~ Marie: Let me think. Who will this hurt the most? The daughters of Trump's rich friends or poor &middle-class women? And how to Republicans get away with backing unpopular anti-abortion, even anti-contraception policies? Let's check. ~~~
~~~ Amanda Marcotte of Salon: "... as they learned from convicted felon Donald Trump, the way to hide what you're up to is simple: Lie. Lie a lot.... Republicans use two big, interlocking lies to conceal an anti-contraception agenda from the public. First, they deny they intend to take birth control away, by limiting their definition of 'birth control' to condoms and the rhythm method. To justify that shell game, they lie about how the most popular and effective forms of birth control work, claiming they are 'abortion.' They ping-pong between these two lies, so that the fact-checkers can never keep up."
National Crime Blotter
Tierney Sneed & Hannah Rabinowitz of CNN interviewed attorneys and consulted court dockets to develop a profile of Judge Aileen Cannon. She has "a penchant for letting irrelevant legal questions distract from core issues, a zero-tolerance approach to any technical defects in filings, and a struggle with docket management that allows the type of pretrial disputes that other judges would decide in weeks go unresolved for months. 'She is not efficient,' said one attorney who practices in south Florida. 'She is very form over substance.' Another attorney described her as 'indecisive.' A third attorney who's had cases before Cannon said, 'She just seems overwhelmed by the process.'" ~~~
~~~ Marie: Some attorneys described Cannon as excessively detail-oriented, but I don't know how detail-oriented a judge is who forgets to swear in prospective jurors or closes her courtroom to the public in violation of a defendant's constitutional right to a public trial. That's pretty basic stuff. I still blame the senior judge for the district for letting an inexperienced trial judge preside over a case of international significance where the defendant is a manipulative bastid. Cannon herself of course should have known she was not up to the job, but people -- especially Republican people -- are not always capable of self-evaluation.
Spencer Hsu of the Washington Post: "A federal judge on Thursday ordered former Trump political adviser and right-wing podcaster Stephen K. Bannon to report to prison by July 1 to begin serving a four-month prison term for contempt of Congress after an appeals court in May upheld his conviction. Federal prosecutors had asked the judge to lift the hold on his sentence arguing that no substantial legal questions remain over Bannon's two-count conviction for refusing to provide documents or testimony to a House committee probing the Jan. 6, 2021, attack after a panel of the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit rejected Bannon's appeal on all grounds." The ABC News story is here. (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ Marie: Looks as if Steve-o has devoted too much effort to fighting his conviction and not enough energy to finding out if he will be allowed to wear multiple shirts under that orange jumpsuit. But yes, yes, of course I'm sad and the prisons are overcrowded and this was a nonviolent crime and so on and so forth. ~~~
Brett Samuels of the Hill: "Former President Trump on Thursday fumed over a federal judge ordering his longtime ally Steve Bannon to report to prison, calling for members of the House panel that investigated the Jan. 6, 2021, riot to be indicted. Trump called it a 'Total and Complete American Tragedy' that Bannon and Peter Navarro, another former aide, have been ordered to prison for separately refusing to comply with the congressional investigation led by the now-disbanded House Jan. 6 committee. The former president claimed in a Truth Social post that members of the House panel had committed crimes, asserting they 'deleted and destroyed all material evidence.' 'The unAmerican Weaponization of our Law Enforcement has reached levels of Illegality never thought possible before,' Trump posted. 'INDICT THE UNSELECT J6 COMMITTEE FOR ILLEGALLY DELETING AND DESTROYING ALL OF THEIR "FINDINGS!"'"
The Difference Between a President & a Crime Boss. Zolan Kanno-Youngs of the New York Times: "President Biden said on Thursday that he would not grant Hunter Biden a pardon if he was convicted in his felony gun trial, a rare comment from Mr. Biden about the legal troubles facing his son. When asked during an interview with ABC News whether he would accept the outcome of the trial of his son, who faces charges including lying on an application to obtain a gun in October 2018, Mr. Biden said, 'Yes.'... When the topic turned to ... Donald J. Trump and his recent felony conviction, Mr. Biden said his opponent needed to 'stop undermining the rule of law.'" The ABC News story is here. MB: When he was posing as president, Trump pardoned a number of his partners in crime, notably Paul Manafort, Roger Stone & Steve Bannon, even though none of them met the standards for pardons. ~~~
~~~ Glenn Thrush, et al., of the New York Times: "Hallie Biden, a former girlfriend of Hunter Biden and widow of his brother, Beau, took the stand on Thursday, telling jurors that she saw him buy, stash and smoke vast amounts of crack cocaine in the fall of 2018 when he claimed to be drug-free on a firearms application.... Ms. Biden said she discovered the gun at the center of the case when she was rifling through Mr. Biden's vehicle the morning after he showed up at her house.... Prosecutors then showed surveillance video of her tossing the gun only to return later and frantically try to recover it.... The sheer amount of unflattering evidence assembled by [special prosecutor David] Weiss is intended to prove that Mr. Biden knowingly lied when he claimed not to be taking drugs when he bought the handgun. But it has, in the view of even some Biden family critics, moved far beyond that goal -- into a publicly humiliating trial of the president's troubled son for an offense that, while a crime, is seldom prosecuted as a stand-alone charge for someone with no prior criminal record who has been sober for years." (Also linked yesterday.)
Presidential Race
Jay Root & Rebecca O'Brien of the New York Times: "A group aligned with President Biden is challenging Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s New York ballot petition, saying his campaign lied about his New York residency. The group, Clear Choice, says he long ago moved to the West Coast and has virtually no connection to the address listed on his petitions -- an address of a longtime friend, where Mr. Kennedy's independent presidential campaign acknowledges he has never actually lived.... He has used the same address in a number of other states where he is filing to run.... A Board of Elections spokeswoman, Kathleen McGrath, said a determination of residency would be 'outside the ministerial scope' of the board's review of petitions.... Mr. Kennedy's running mate, Nicole Shanahan, also lists California as her home.... Under a Constitutional quirk, presidential and vice-presidential candidates who hail from the same state are ineligible to receive its electoral votes."
Amy Wang of the Washington Post: "... Donald Trump said Wednesday that seeking prosecutions of his political opponents would be 'wrong' but that he also would have 'every right' to do so if reelected, the latest way Trump has lashed out since a jury convicted him on 34 felony counts ... last week.... 'Look, when this election is over, based on what they've done, I would have every right to go after them,' he added. 'And it's easy because it's Joe Biden and you see all the criminality.'"
Vermont. Jane Timm of NBC News: "The Vermont Republican Party is prohibited from backing a candidate with a felony conviction, according to the party's publicly posted rules. That is now a bit of a problem.... According to the Internet Archive, the posted rules were changed by March 2022 to allow the state committee to exempt a candidate from the rule by majority vote.... Former U.N Ambassador Nikki Haley won all of Vermont's delegates but suspended her campaign in March; she has since endorsed Trump. The party rules dictate that delegates to the RNC are not bound if a candidate withdraws or suspends their campaign.... In a statement, the Democratic National Committee suggested Vermont Republicans instead support President Joe Biden in November." MB: A good solution.
Gabriel Cortez & Kevin Breuninger of CNBC: "Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas accepted millions of dollars' worth of gifts over the past two decades on the bench, a total nearly 10 times the value of all gifts received by his fellow justices during the same time, according to a new analysis. Thomas received 103 gifts with a total value of more than $2.4 million between 2004 and 2023, the judicial reform group Fix the Court said in a report Thursday. In contrast, Thomas' fellow justices over the same period accepted a total of just 93 gifts worth a combined value of only about $248,000.... Samuel Alito accounted for the lion's share of that value.... Fix the Court identified another 101 'likely gifts' -- with a total estimated value of almost $1.8 million that Thomas received in the form of free trips and lodging.... Counting those gifts, Thomas' total two-decade haul is valued at nearly $4.2 million."
Time for Our Macroeconomics Refresher Class. Paul Krugman of the New York Times: "The United States government is more than $34 trillion in debt.... First, while $34 trillion is a very large figure, it's a lot less scary than many imagine if you put it in historical and international context. Second, to the extent debt is a concern, making debt sustainable wouldn't be at all hard in terms of the straight economics; it's almost entirely a political problem. Finally, people who claim to be deeply concerned about debt are, all too often, hypocrites -- the level of their hypocrisy often reaches the surreal.... Today, debt as a percentage of G.D.P. isn't unprecedented, even in America: It's roughly the same as it was at the end of World War II.... Governments, unlike individuals, never have to pay off their debt. How did we pay off the debt from World War II? We didn't. Federal debt when John F. Kennedy took office was slightly higher than it had been in 1946. But debt as a percentage of G.D.P. was way down, thanks to growth and inflation." Read on.
Oliver Darcy of CNN: "Right-wing conspiracy theorist Alex Jones on Thursday moved to liquidate his personal assets, agreeing to demands from the families of Sandy Hook victims whom he owes more than $1.5 billion in damages over his lies about the 2012 school massacre. The seismic move paves the way for a future in which Jones no longer owns Infowars, the influential conspiracy empire he founded in the late 1990s. Over the years, Jones has not only used the media company to poison the public discourse with vile lies and conspiracy theories, but also to enrich himself to the tune of millions of dollars.... His lawyers said in a filing that there was 'no reasonable prospect for a successful reorganization' and that continuing down the path would only result in additional expenses incurred by Jones." ~~~
~~~ Marie: So Alex Jones may soon pay a portion of what he owes to victims of his cruelty, Steve Bannon is going to jail and Felonious Don can't shoot anyone on Fifth Avenue. It looks as if we're in a moment when the bad guys have to pay at least a tiny price for their misdeeds. And yet. And yet. Their accomplices keep on keepin' on, plotting to avenge the villains and making new and unconscionable mischief, leaving us with no choice but to be the heroes of our own fates.
Annals of "Journalism," Ctd.
Sarah Ellison & Elahe Izadi of the Washington Post: "Washington Post Publisher and CEO William Lewis is drawing scrutiny after press reports described him as attempting to dissuade journalists -- including those at The Post -- from covering his involvement in a long-running British phone-hacking lawsuit. The accounts emerged following the abrupt resignation of The Post's executive editor, Sally Buzbee, who, after three years in the job, stepped down Sunday without public explanation, and Lewis's announcement of a major restructuring of the newsroom. Reports about his involvement with news coverage at The Post -- which Lewis denied sparked concern for the appearance of violating traditional firewalls that keep corporate media bosses from influencing decisions made by news editors."
Yeah, the Guy's a Jerk. Katie Robertson & Benjamin Mullin of the New York Times: "Will Lewis, the chief executive of The Washington Post, repeatedly offered an exclusive interview to an NPR reporter if the reporter agreed not to write about allegations against Mr. Lewis in a phone-hacking scandal in Britain, according to an account by that reporter published on Thursday. David Folkenflik, a veteran media reporter for NPR, wrote that a spokesperson for Mr. Lewis confirmed the offer in December. That spokesperson declined to comment when approached again Thursday, according to NPR. 'In several conversations, Lewis repeatedly -- and heatedly -- offered to give me an exclusive interview about the Post's future, as long as I dropped the story about the allegations,' Mr. Folkenflik wrote." ~~~
~~~ David Folkenflik of NPR: "The Washington Post has written twice this spring about allegations that have cropped up in British court proceedings involving its new publisher and CEO, Will Lewis. In both instances Lewis pushed his newsroom chief hard not to run the story." ~~~
~~~ Marie: Hmmm, it looks as if it's kind of difficult to engineer a cover-up when you work for, you know, a journalistic enterprise. Being called out on the front page of your own paper would be a case in point.
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California. Jillian Sykes & Jeffrey Kopp of CNN: "A California judge on Thursday dismissed multiple state charges -- including attempted murder -- against David DePape, who was sentenced in federal court last month for a violent 2022 attack on Paul Pelosi, husband of Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi.... DePape was previously convicted in federal court of one count of assault on the immediate family member of a federal official, and a second count of attempted kidnapping of a federal official. DePape's defense team previously argued that he should not be charged twice for the same acts, saying that would amount to double jeopardy."
Florida, Where DeSantis Rules. AP: "Florida's highest court on Thursday rejected an effort by a suspended state attorney to get reinstated after she was removed from office last year by Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis in his second suspension of a Democratic prosecutor. Supreme Court justices voted 6-1 to deny a petition from suspended State Attorney Monique Worrell of the 9th Judicial Circuit, which serves metro Orlando. The majority of justices said they disagreed with her arguments that DeSantis' reasons for suspending her were too vague or that the suspension infringed on her lawful exercise of prosecutorial discretion. DeSantis claimed Worrell failed to prosecute crimes committed by minors and didn't seek mandatory minimum sentences for gun crimes, putting the public in danger in her central Florida district." ~~~
~~~ Chris Geidner, the Law Dork: "On a 6-1 vote Thursday, the Florida Supreme Court gave its governor all-but-unfettered power to remove locally elected prosecutors -- a power that could quickly render Floridians' 'freedom' to 'vote' for a prosecutor a fiction unless federal courts step in.... Voters still elect prosecutors in Florida. That is the law. But, under Thursday's ruling, the governor is free to overturn that on a whim."
Florida. Noreen Marcus of the Florida Bulldog: DeSantis loyalists appear to be guiding [a Tampa grand jury] to make a case against the federal government's pandemic policies.... In a report filed on May 21, the ... grand jury investigating 'any and all wrongdoing related to the COVID-19 vaccine' tags federal public health officials with responsibility for an unspecified number of drug overdoses. The drug in question is Ivermectin, a parasite-fighting paste for animals that, according to the jury's unnamed sources, was 'well-tolerated by most patients' though ineffective for treating the novel coronavirus.... The grand jury report makes this bizarre, convoluted argument: Early in the pandemic, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases rejected Ivermectin as a COVID-19 treatment; some desperate sufferers believed it was a 'miracle drug' the government was lying about; because most doctors didn't dare prescribe Ivermectin, patients obtained it on their own but didn't know how to use it. Some of them overdosed. Therefore, the jury concluded, public health officials who trashed Ivermectin caused the overdoses." The grand jury's target appears to be Dr. Anthony Fauci, who headed the NIAID and whom Gov. Ron DeSantis has vilified. Thanks to RAS for the link.
New York. Corey Kilgannon of the New York Times: "Rex Heuermann, who was arrested last summer and has been accused of murdering four women in the Gilgo Beach serial killings on Long Island, was indicted Thursday on murder charges in the deaths of two more women. Mr. Heuermann, 60, who has pleaded not guilty to all charges in connection with the first four women's deaths, has remained in jail for nearly a year awaiting trial. In the meantime, investigators turned to the six other victims -- four women, a man and a toddler -- whose remains, like those of the first four women, were found along Ocean Parkway by Gilgo Beach." (Also linked yesterday.)
How low can they go? It may surprise you. ~~~
~~~ Pennsylvania. Leo Sands of the Washington Post: "Two former law enforcement officers who defended the U.S. Capitol from rioters during the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection were jeered by state GOP lawmakers as they visited Pennsylvania's House of Representatives on Wednesday, according to several Democratic lawmakers present. Former U.S. Capitol Police officer Harry Dunn and former sergeant Aquilino Gonell were introduced on the floor Wednesday as 'heroes' by House Speaker Joanna McClinton (D) for having 'bravely defended democracy in the United States Capitol against rioters and insurrection on Jan. 6.' As the two men -- both of whom were injured by rioters on Jan. 6 -- were introduced, the House floor descended into chaos. According to Democratic lawmakers, several GOP lawmakers hissed and booed, with a number of Republicans walking out of the chamber in protest." (Also linked yesterday.)
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U.K. I'd Rather Be on Teevee. Noah Keate of Politico: "Rishi Sunak apologized after he ditched D-Day commemorations in France to do a TV interview instead -- sparking a furious backlash. The Conservative prime minister, who is fighting to stay in office ahead of a July 4 general election, said he regretted allowing the event to be 'to be overshadowed by politics' and admitted it was a 'mistake' to hop back across the Channel early. The prime minister attended Thursday's memorial event at Ver-sur-Mer in northern France -- but did not take part in the late afternoon ceremony at Omaha beach, instead leaving Foreign Secretary David Cameron and Defense Secretary Grant Shapps to represent the British government. Labour Leader Keir Starmer -- battling to replace Sunak in the election -- was in attendance."
News Lede
CNBC: "The U.S. economy added far more jobs than expected in May, countering fears of a slowdown in the labor market and likely reducing the Federal Reserve's impetus to lower interest rates. Nonfarm payrolls expanded by 272,000 for the month, up from 165,000 in April and well ahead of the Dow Jones consensus estimate for 190,000. At the same time, the unemployment rate rose to 4%, the first time it has breached that level since January 2022."
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Presidential checklist
DeSantis
"A law Florida Republican Governor Ron DeSantis signed after the 2020 election has caused a significant decrease in the amount of voters who can receive mail-in ballots ahead of the 2024 election, according to Politico.
Per Politico, "The plunge occurred after GOP Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a wide-ranging election law in 2021 that required all standing vote-by-mail requests to be canceled after the 2022 elections. Both parties and election supervisors have tried over the last several months to build up awareness of the change, but it’s not clear if that message is sinking in with voters."
Florida used to allow vote-by-mail requests to remain valid for two election cycles, but GOP legislators changed the law in the session following the 2020 elections. Starting in 2023, mail-in ballot requests expired at the end of December following a general election. The law signed by DeSantis was part of a wave of changes that Republicans made in the aftermath of the election where former President Donald Trump made false claims about widespread voter fraud."
Is he a cat?
The commemoration of D-Day provided an opportunity to see how real leaders behave. The president of the United States and the President of Ukraine offered a distinctly and dramatically different approach to serious and somber events than the narcissistic whining snowflake who previously darkened the doorway of the White House. Biden and Zelensky embraced, literally and figuratively, both the men who answered the call to stand up to fascism so long ago, and the principles of democracy they fought for and for which so many died.
They rejected Trump’s assertion that these men and their comrades were “suckers”, a giveaway to the operating principle underlying all Trump’s actions and thoughts: what do I get out of this? What’s in it for me? Is there money to be made here?
In the film “The Godfather”, the brother Michael, who enlists in the marines at the start of WWII, is upbraided by another brother who asks why he wants to go fight for strangers instead of sticking with the family.
Trump doesn’t even ask that. At least Sonny Corleone believed that family came first. Trump doesn’t even hit that mark. His long held, sole principle is “I come first. Me. The Donald. Not my dad, whom I bilked when he was suffering from dementia. Not my kids, and certainly not my wives, all of whom I cheated on, because I come first. Not my country, oath of office, rule of law, the constitution: me.
In that regard he’s not even as good as a mobster.
Mark Twain, in his novel of time travel, technological innovation, patriotism, social class structures, and Justice, “A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court”, offers his own thoughts of how a true leader might act.
To Twain’s protagonist, Connecticut engineer, Hank Morgan (The Boss), King Arthur, at first acquaintance, seems a likable, but ignorant and superstitious oaf. Accepting Hank’s challenge to leave Camelot behind, dress in peasant clothes and actually get to know his subjects, Arthur shows the heart of a great king, a true leader.
The countryside has been beset by a plague, a pandemic, if you will. The king is greatly moved by the suffering he sees up close. Approaching a hovel where the travelers find a dying mother surrounded by her dead children, the king ignores warnings that the sickness is terribly contagious. He takes the dying woman in his arms and comforts her in her last moments of life. Hank recognizes that here indeed is someone deserving of the title king.
Trump, when faced with the exact same test of leadership, failed miserably. Worse, he exacerbated the effects of the pandemic by first pronouncing it a hoax, then suggesting “cures” that killed. He comforted no one but himself.
Yesterday, Forrest suggested, humorously, that Trump probably thought D-Day was about him: Donald Day. He was right on the money. To Trump, every day is Donald Day.
And he wants four more years to ram that down our throats.
When the former Oval Office Occupier had his chance to go to WW1 military cemeteries in France, he chose not to go because there was light rainfall and instead went and “reclaimed” artwork from the ambassador’s residence.
https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-took-art-us-ambassador-france-home-canceling-wwi-event-2020-9?amp
@NiskyGuy: I can't access the Business Insider story you linked, so maybe it also says, as this ArtNet story does, that the pieces Trump scarfed from ambassador's residence were all fakes; i.e., copies and replicas.
I hope Trump doesn't come to my house because I really do have a genuine fake painting of the Mona Lisa. I bought it on eBay because I had a long hall lined with paintings & drawings of women -- original oils, acrylics as well as lithos -- except for one blank spot. So when I saw that La Gioconda, I decided a bit of kitsch would be just right to fill in the blank.
I think Trump would really go for my Mona Lisa because it's a little larger than the original, and if Trump grabbed it, he would probably boast that his Mona Lisa was better than the Louvre's, just as he reportedly bragged that the knockoff Ben Franklin bust he swiped is better than the original.
Not only did Cadet Bone Spurs refuse to go to the Aisne-Marne American Cemetery, where US troops from WWI are laid to rest, he did so for two reasons, corroborated by multiple sources.
First, it was windy and rainy and he didn’t want the orange bird’s nest on his fat head to get mussed (he later lied about not going because the military helicopter waiting to take him couldn’t fly in the rain, an excuse that must have surprised military pilots who didn’t realize they could have stayed home and watched TV if it was raining).
More shockingly, he derided the American war dead as “losers”, and whined that he shouldn’t have to visit because of that, per his chief of staff, John Kelly. He also referred to the 1,800 US Marines who died at Belleau Wood as “suckers”.
Belleau Wood is widely considered the battle that made the modern Marine Corps. The quote “Come on, you sons of bitches, do you want to live forever?” was shouted as Marines stormed after German troops at Belleau Wood. The Germans called them Devil Dogs. The name stuck. This is the battle that confirmed for General Black Jack Pershing that American troops were every bit as battle ready as the French and British forces who questioned Americans’ ability to fight.
Trump probably hears “Devil Dogs” and thinks someone’s bringing him a little treat.
His answer to the question posed to valiant Marines that day at Belleau Wood would have been “To hell with that. You losers go. I’m staying in my tent and checking out French porn.”
What a guy.
Marie,
The absolute inability of that Fat Loser to ever acknowledge a mistake is the stuff of low comedy. He’s like a Commedia dell’arte character who falls into a pile of shit and proclaims it’s really the softest, most comfortable bed in the world…not even kings have it as good.
Not only is he unable to admit error, he makes sure to rejigger his stupidity as a world class genius move. “Hey, that cheap knockoff statue of Ben Franklin I stole is waaay better than the original.”
I knew a guy once who responded to anything someone said with a story that proved his experience was so much better.
“I met Eric Clapton once.”
“Really? Well Eric—I call him Eric—gave me his favorite guitar once.”
“My buddy bought a 1965 Sting Ray last week!”
“I owned the original Sting Ray made in 1965. I sold it for a million dollars.”
“We went to Washington and saw the original Declaration of Independence! It was so cool!”
“My father was best friends with a guy at the Library of Congress. He let me take the original Declaration home for a week.”
It became a running joke. We’d make shit up just to see what he’d say…
“I saw a flying saucer last night!”
“I rode in a flying saucer once. They tried to abduct me.”
This is Trump. Sad and embarrassing. And everyone knows it but him.
I’m sure Coke Can Pubic Hair Clarence, as well as Medieval Hit Man Sam and Little Johnny Bobby think everything should be jake now that Thomas had admitted what a lying piece of grifter shit he is, and now everyone should just shut up asking about the litany of astounding ethical and legal lacunae.
He will no doubt channel Queen Ann Romney who snapped “We’ve given you people all you need to know!” when asked by one of her lowly subjects about problematic tax return data, as if she were correcting a servant who begged for too much information about the canapés for that evening’s soirée.
He figures that should take care of everything. Now! On to Trump immunity, banning contraception, and making gay marriage illegal again. Oh yes, and don’t forget Christian Nationalism. Gotta support that. Also, more destruction of democracy.
AK: you say that Dumpiepants "doesn't know" that he isn't ALL THAT, and that everyone else knows that he is an embarrassing piece of sht...I think he does know how truly horrible he is-- why else does he even bother to comb that rat's nest on his head? He is very insecure and concerned that others don't know how great he is-- that's the psycho part of him. That is his sole mission: letting us all know that he is irretrievably sad and pissed off if we do not revere him as a god. That sadness leads to his glorification of himself at every given opportunity. He has the rabble in the palm of his fat little hands, and they prop him up at every opportunity. I am concerned about the sheer numbers of uneducated dumbbells in this country, some celebrities and elected officials, that are simply too stupid (hello, Tuber--) to realize what a loser this guy is. I am not discounting the absolute hatred they have for everyone in every group on the left, to the point of carrying guns every day in case some liberal blows his nose in the general vicinity of a MAGAt-- they will all be ready to blow anyone away. Meanwhile, Fatso sits on his throne in his diaper and THIS is the idiot that they want to represent the country. He does know he is a pig, and he feels sure that no one else does.