Friday Reads: Mugwump Edition
Posted: May 21, 2021 Filed under: morning reads | Tags: January 6 2021 was an Insurrection! 15 Comments
Good Day Sky Dancers!
It seems Republicans in the Beltway would rather not think about the Trumpist insurrection on January 6, 2021. We’ve been told it was just a typical tourist outing. We get told we should get beyond it and work on issues and stuff which basically means using Fox propaganda to talk down any policy but catering to crazy right-wing Christianists and white nationalists or tax-cutting for huge corporations and billionaires. We were also told it wasn’t Trumpists. All that adds up to telling us to not believe our lying eyes reinforced by repeated videos playing showing something quite different. Also, don’t believe the stories of Capitol Officers impaled on flagpoles bearing flags stating said impaler supports the police.
Why even the target of the lynch mob–then Vice President Mike Pence–couldn’t get respect from his brother yesterday. This is from Newsweek: “Greg Pence, Mike Pence’s Brother, Votes Against Jan. 6 Commission, Calls It ‘Cover-up for Failed Biden Admin’.” Yup, I don’t get that statement either.
The brother of former Vice President Mike Pence is defending his House vote against a commission to investigate the violent attack on the United State Capitol that forced his brother into a secured location, calling it a “cover-up for the failed Biden administration.”
“I was here with him, he never left his post,” U.S. Representative Greg Pence, a Republican from Indiana, told reporters at the Capitol on Thursday. “We impeached the president weeks, days later and now here we are having an investigation? Sounds a little bassackwards, right?”
The 1/6 Commission, modeled after the panel assigned to review the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, would review the lead-up to the attack, Capitol security, and future measures that should be taken to prevent another Capitol security issue.
Intelligence doesn’t seem to run in that family.
And so we’re still living the big lie in states targeted for illegal vote recounts. Arizona’s been the laughing stock of the country since the Cyber Ninjas arrived to destroy ballots and search for bamboo in ballots. The Cyber Ninjas are taking it to those states along with rallies by your favorite lie shouting fascist. And you thought he was only around fleecing the government for Secret Service shananigans still. States that he will not admit he lost will see the Disgraced Former Guy at rallies.
Meanwhile, the US Senate has taken up the call for a bi-partisan investigation into the January 6 insurrection. Here are two thought pieces on that.
Haley Byrd Wilt writing for Uphill at the Dispatch has this headline: “GOP Senators Dig In Against January 6 Commission, Many say they still haven’t read the legislation. But they have problems with it.”
Most Senate Republicans are opposed to the House’s proposed independent commission to look into the January 6 attack on the Capitol and the events leading up to it. They’re just not exactly sure why.
In interviews with more than 20 GOP senators on Thursday, Republicans raised fears about how the commission would work, how long it would last, and whether it would amount to a partisan circus. The answers to many of these questions are in the text of the relatively straightforward, 19-page bill passed by the House this week. When pressed on the gap between the details of the bill and their portrayal of it, some senators simply admitted they hadn’t read the legislation.
“If you’re going to turn a commission into a political partisan weapon, you know, use it to subpoena people to embarrass them, use it to want to make allegations that might prove useful in the 2022 elections, you’re actually contributing to the problem,” said Florida Sen. Marco Rubio—who initially expressed more openness to the commission in a conversation with The Dispatch on Monday night. “My general feeling is that if we can have a serious examination of the events leading up to, occurring, and in the aftermath of that day, we should do it,” Rubio said at the time, notably splitting with Republican leaders who called for the commission to also look into violence largely unrelated to January 6. He said Thursday he still hasn’t ruled out the possibility of supporting the commission, but he sounded a lot more skeptical.
“I’m worried about what it would do to our country to have a so-called independent commission that ultimately turns into a partisan political weapon that continues to exacerbate these tensions and divide people even more,” he said. “Because in a way, it sort of contributes to the very environment that made that day possible.”
Rubio’s concern that the commission will issue political subpoenas is addressed by the legislation: The commission would be evenly divided, with five members appointed by Democratic leaders and five appointed by Republican leaders. For Democrats to issue any subpoena, at least one of the five Republican members would have to agree to it. This was a key demand from GOP leaders—that their appointees would essentially have the power to veto subpoenas. That massive concession from Democrats hasn’t made much of an impression on Republican senators, though.
“Well, I’m still going through all the details of it,” Rubio said when The Dispatch pointed out how the commission would be structured and how subpoenas would be issued. “Honestly, we’ve got so much going on here. This is something the House just passed.”
“I haven’t even read it,” Rubio added. “I mean, it just came over. But just my overarching concern is I can already see the shadow of how this is going to be used for a political purpose, and I’m not interested in formalizing some partisan political weapon by either side.”
The bill text has been publicly available since last Friday. The two parties debated the contours of the commission for four months. It would take maybe a couple of minutes for a staffer to outline the important details for their boss—or just a few minutes longer for a lawmaker to actually read the legislation itself. There’s also, of course, a famous precedent that the bill can be compared with: The original September 11 commission legislation.
WASHINGTON, DC – JANUARY 06: A Capitol police officer looks out of a broken window as protesters gather on the U.S. Capitol Building on January 06, 2021 in Washington, DC. Pro-Trump protesters entered the U.S. Capitol building after mass demonstrations in the nation’s capital during a joint session Congress to ratify President-elect Joe Biden’s 306-232 Electoral College win over President Donald Trump. (Photo by Tasos Katopodis/Getty Images)
This lead to a look and a threat of Filibuster and Fillibuster reform. This is from Burgess Everett at Politico: “Filibuster brawl amps up with GOP opposition to Jan. 6 panel
The filibuster has been on hiatus since Joe Biden took over. Senate Republicans are about to change that — over a bipartisan commission to probe the Capitol riot.
After more than four months of letting their power to obstruct lie unused in the Senate, the 50-member Senate GOP is ready to mount a filibuster of House-passed legislation creating an independent cross-aisle panel to investigate the Jan. 6 insurrection. If Republicans follow through and block the bill, they will spark a long-building fight over the filibuster’s very existence.
The filibuster has spent months of lurking in the background of the Senate’s daily business, but the battle over the chamber’s 60-vote threshold will erupt as soon as next week. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer is plotting to bring the House’s Jan. 6 commission bill to the floor and daring Senate Republicans to block it.
And GOP opposition is hardening by the day. According to interviews with more than a half-dozen Republicans on Thursday, there is almost no path to even opening up debate on the bill — much less passing it.
“I don’t think there will be 10 votes on our side for it,” said Sen. Mike Braun (R-Ind). “At this stage, I’d be surprised if you’re gonna get even a handful.”
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has been circumspect about his use of the filibuster, leaving the tool untouched so far this Congress as his conference has advanced Democratic bills confronting hate crimes, planning water infrastructure and increasing American competitiveness. But the Jan. 6 commission — and talking about former President Donald Trump for months on end — is a bridge too far for the GOP.
So, an armed insurrection that threatened the lives of this new brand of mugwumps wasn’t a bridge too far for them. Say we had a 9/11 attack and nobody gave a damn enough to look into it?
So, there are a few former republicans around watching all of this with absolute fear and loathing. Michael Gerson is not a guy I usually quote but here we go.
The Washington Post: “Opinion: The threat of violence now infuses GOP politics. We should all be afraid.”
He’s obviously never defended a women’s clinic from right to lifer’s, or a Unitarian church, or had his kids stalked by them either. I’ve been subjected to this stuff since the 1980s when Pat Robertson and the like got all Republican on us. It’s been there for a long time. I remind you I was considered an apostate republican in 1992 for supporting Roe V Wade, the Equal Rights Amendment, and marching through streets with lesbians celebrating women’s suffrage. They’ve been at this for decades.
I still can’t believe what they’ve put Hillary Clinton through for decades. Over 30 freaking Benghazi hearings that find nothing and we can’t get an investigation into folks trying to start a Civil War over a total lie?
So, Former Guy!! This is another fine mess you’ve gotten us into! At least he can’t do this anymore. Via CNN: “Trump administration secretly obtained CNN reporter’s phone and email records — Washington (CNN)The Trump administration secretly sought and obtained the 2017 phone and email records of a CNN correspondent, the latest instance where federal prosecutors have taken aggressive steps targeting journalists in leak investigations.”
Wow, that’s a total disregard for the First Amendment. I have a feeling we’ll hear more about what kinds of things Barr and the former guy did strictly against the Constitution and law.
Meanwhile, we’re still standing. Have a good weekend! Be safe!
Monday Reads: Supreme Court Blues
Posted: May 17, 2021 Filed under: Afternoon Reads | Tags: abortion rights 12 Comments
The Absinthe Drinker (1901), Pablo Picasso
Good Morning Sky Dancers!
Losing the Supreme court to radical religionists is the fruit of the evil Republican tree of base pandering. I can’t help but think we may see the demise of the NRA and could possibly see movement on laws ridding the system of dark money and the influence of billionaires with agendas. However, the fact we have so many religious extremists on the court now may mean fights long fought and won will be taken to the streets again.
The system of court appointments was radically played by Mitch McConnell and no amount of precedent is going deter these radicals he placed on the court. The Doctrine of stare decisis is one of the most traditionally conservative ideals in our system. The fact it was ignored this term and will likely be ignored next term should make Senator Collins feel like Benedict Arnold.
Mississipi is nearly last in everything good and first in everything bad including infant mortality. So, why not increase that infant mortality rate a lot by restricting abortions after 15 weeks when a lot could still go very wrong with a pregnancy? Also, medical science does not consider a beating heart to be a sign of sentient life. Ask any 6th grader who can get dead frog’s heart to beat with a few hits of that crazy new modern invention electricity!
Pablo Picasso – The Sleepy Drinker, 1902
This is from Robert Barnes writing for The Washington Post: “Supreme Court to review Mississippi abortion law that advocates see as a path to diminish Roe v. Wade.”
The Supreme Court announced Monday that it will review a restrictive Mississippi abortion law that opponents of the procedure say provides a clear path to diminish Roe v. Wade’s establishment of the right of women to choose an abortion.
Abortion opponents for months have urged the court’s conservatives to seize the chance to reexamine the 1973 precedent. Mississippi is one among many Republican-led states that have passed restrictions that conflict with the court’s precedents protecting a woman’s right to choose before fetal viability.
In accepting the case, the court said it would examine whether “all pre-viability prohibitions on elective abortions are unconstitutional.” That has been a key component of the court’s jurisprudence.
The Mississippi law would ban almost all abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy, with narrow exceptions for medical emergencies or fetal abnormalities. It has not gone into effect because a district federal judge and a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit said that it could not be squared with decades of Supreme Court precedents.
“In an unbroken line dating to Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court’s abortion cases have established (and affirmed, and reaffirmed) a woman’s right to choose an abortion before viability,” Judge Patrick Higginbotham wrote for the appeals court. “States may regulate abortion procedures before viability so long as they do not impose an undue burden on the woman’s right but they may not ban abortions.”
The court has now accepted for the term that begins in October two issues dear to conservatives: gun rights and the ability of states to restrict abortion. It is what they had hoped for once the court reached a 6-to-3 conservative majority with the addition of Justice Amy Coney Barrett, a conservative nominated by President Donald Trump.
Get ready for the reality of Handmaid’s Tale.
The Vox tweet above links to an article written by Ian Millhiser. I cringe reading the words “biggest threat” and realize they’ve used a woman to bring us down.
The Supreme Court announced on Monday that it will hear Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, a challenge to a Mississippi law that prohibits nearly all abortions after the 15th week of pregnancy. That means that Dobbs will be the first abortion case to be fully briefed and argued before the Supreme Court since Justice Amy Coney Barrett’s confirmation last October.
Barrett is an outspoken opponent of abortion, and she joined a Court that almost certainly already had five votes to roll back abortion rights before her confirmation gave Republicans a 6-3 majority on the Supreme Court.
Last June, four justices voted to uphold a Louisiana anti-abortion law that was virtually identical to a Texas law that the Supreme Court struck down in 2016. Conservative Chief Justice John Roberts cast a surprising vote in that June case, June Medical Services v. Russo, to strike down Louisiana’s law. But Roberts’s opinion emphasized that he disagreed with many of the Court’s seminal abortion rights decisions, and that he only voted the way he did in June Medical out of respect for the principle that the Court should not simply ignore a ruling that it handed down just a few years earlier.
With Barrett on the Court, the four dissenters in June Medical no longer need Roberts’s vote to make significant incursions on reproductive freedom. And the legal issue in Dobbs is sufficiently distinct from the one in June Medical that Roberts is unlikely to vote with his liberal colleagues again on those grounds.
The legal issue in Dobbs is straightforward. A2018Mississippi law prohibits all abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy, “except in a medical emergency or in the case of a severe fetal abnormality.” Notably, this law applies even before thefetus is viable — meaning that it is capable of surviving outside the uterus. But, as the Supreme Court has repeatedly affirmed, “a State may not prohibit any woman from making the ultimate decision to terminate her pregnancy before viability.”
Paul Cézanne – Still Life with Skull, 1895-1900
I’m finally linking to The Bulwark which is something I thought I’d never do. Politics make strange bedfellows indeed. “The GOP’s Telltale Signs of Authoritarianism.”
Having been established as the GOP’s undisputed ruler, Trump is encountering some of the headaches and tensions common to all autocrats. The first and most obvious is the lack of a clear succession principle. In 2020, the party proudly defined itself as an organization devoted to Trump, forgoing the creation of a party platform beyond ‘We ❤ Trump.’ No wonder other notables who would seem to have their own independent bases of support, like Nikki Haley and Sen. Mitch McConnell, can’t bring themselves to quit him, and dissidents like Reps. Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger face de facto excommunication. How could any of them make a claim to become the new leader of the party if the party only exists to serve the current leader? Because actively opposing Trump is impossible, Republicans with presidential ambitions have no choice but to ingratiate themselves with him in the hope of gaining an advantageous position in the squabble for his endorsement should he choose not to run.
Another issue common to both authoritarian regimes and the Trump-era Republican party is the paucity of trustworthy, honest information. Most autocrats struggle to figure out who is telling them the truth and who is a yes-man—the incentives of lower-level officials to inflate their success to their superiors are infamous. Trump embraces the problem, eschewing anyone who dares to give him bad news.
And then, of course, there’s the brain drain. One of the problems of strangling and restricting a society for political expediency is that there are always other options. The people with the most human capital—extraordinary abilities, intelligence, skills, etc.—are the most likely to defect. The Soviet Union and its allies leaked talent at an extraordinary rate. Judging by how many former Republican luminaries have publicly broken with Trump, the Republican party, or both, its brain drain could be even quicker.
The Republican party has shed many of its legal, economic, foreign policy, and political experts—the very people who enabled it to govern. Its new leading legal light is Rudy Giuliani. Its foreign policy guru is . . . maybe Sen. Rand Paul? (Sorry, Mike Pompeo.) Its most accomplished economist is Larry Kudlow.
The Trumpist “intellectual” movement is a bit like the Soviets’ ersatz space shuttle—it never really got off the ground.
“Le Viaduct de L’Estaque,”, George Brach, 1908
Republicans are blinding by superstitions and lies. The Guardian caught one congress critter in a doozy of a lie. “Photo emerges of Republican barricading chamber doors during US Capitol attack after he compared rioters to ‘tourists’. ‘Do Georgians always barricade doors against normal, everyday tourists?’ one critic asked.”
A photo has emerged of Andrew Clyde, the Republican congressman who claimed “there was no insurrection” and compared US Capitol rioters to “tourists”, barricading the House chamber during the attack.
“The Rep. Clyde news reminded me of this,” Roll Call photographer Tom Williams tweeted this week, and included a picture of the Georgia congressman in a group of eight men pushing a piece of furniture against doors to the chamber.
Speaking on Wednesday to the House Oversight Committee, Rep. Clyde downplayed the actions of the pro-Trump mob who stormed the Capitol on 6 January as “a normal tourist visit”. The violent attack left five dead including one police officer.
“As one of the members who stayed in the Capitol, and on the House floor, who with other Republican colleagues helped barricade the door until almost 3pm from the mob who tried to enter, I can tell you the House floor was never breached and it was not an insurrection,” Mr Clyde told the committee.
“It was not an insurrection, and we cannot call it that and be truthful.”
Mr Clyde’s remarks were lambasted by lawmakers and law enforcement experts. Fred Wellman, the executive director of the Lincoln Project and a former commanding officer of US forces in Iraq, wrote: “How craven is Rep. Clyde to say there was no insurrection?”
“He helped barricade the doors from the ‘tourists.’ They know lying to the MAGA mob equals money. That’s all that matters.”
Also issuing a retort, House speaker Nancy Pelosi referred to death threats against her and former vice president Mike Pence, during a press conference on Wednesday.
It’s really difficult to keep up with all the lies and even more difficult to understand the people that believe them. Republicanism and Religion are helluva drugs to paraphrase Rick James. Well, that’s enough of shining light on the politically insane. I’m off to use Dial soap to get rid of the stupid cooties.
What’s on your reading and blogging list today?
Maskless Friday Reads
Posted: May 14, 2021 Filed under: just because, morning reads | Tags: face masks, Post-Pandemic Reality, Storming Mar-a-Hog-OH! 11 Comments
“The Twins, Kate and Grace Hoare” the sisters wear face coverings as they prepare for an outing with their elegant dog .John Everett Millais (1829–1896)
The Fitzwilliam Museum
Good Day Sky Dancers!
I’m off to the hospital this afternoon for a series of those “baseline” tests which basically signal that I can look forward to going downhill from whatever peak they establish. I will be wearing a mask there and on the way there and back home in my Lyft ride. It’s a different reality this month. I’m drinking my coffee reading about Louisiana teens getting their vaccinations today. The media is showing yesterday’s presser picture of the day which is basically a shot of President Biden and Vice President Harris mask-free.
Last year, masks were everywhere. This includes the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, eastern England that closed during the peak of the pandemic and masked some of its collection for view on its website. Today’s art comes from the coverage given the show by CNN in June of 2020..
I’m not sure I’m completely ready to give up my mask yet. I listened to the same conversation between Rachel Maddow and Lawrence O’Donnell. I’m pretty sure I will still wear it for my trips to the corner stores. My other outings were solo dog walks so they were always maskless but with a mask in the pocket. Yesterday, Temple and I celebrated our 7th Templeversary. That’s the day I called up the Bunkie pound and said I want to adopt that dog! Today, we look forward to walks without worrying about outfits with pockets!
So, we the vaccinated, rarely need to wear masks according to the CDC. This is from David Leonhardt at the New York Times.
John Everett Millais’ “The Bridesmaid” (1851) with a decorated facemask to match her decorative dress. Credit: The Fitzwilliam Museum/FME, Cambridge
The C.D.C.’s intricate list of recommended Covid behavior has baffled many Americans and frightened others, making the guidance less helpful than it might have been.
Yesterday, the agency effectively acknowledged it had fallen behind the scientific evidence: Even though that evidence has not changed in months, the C.D.C. overhauled its guidelines. It said fully vaccinated people could stop wearing masks in most settings, including crowded indoor gatherings.
The change sends a message: Vaccination means the end of the Covid crisis, for individuals and ultimately for society.
If you’re vaccinated, you can safely get together with family and friends, mask-free. You can nuzzle your grandparents or your grandchildren. You can eat in restaurants, go to the movies and attend religious services. You can travel. If you’re vaccinated, Covid joins a long list of small risks that we have long accepted without upending our lives, like riding in a car, taking a swim or exposing ourselves to the common cold.
I’m still having a bit of reaction when even a friend I know is well vaccinated crossed the street with his dog to greet Temple and me. I knew full well he got it back a few months ago and likely before me. It was the same reaction my neighbor had to me last month when we both got fully vaccinated and met up for a neutral ground chat. She reached for her mask and said we’re okay. We’d spent most of the year having small dinners on her porch or dining room properly socially distanced with hand sanitizer and the entire routine. It’s easy to move forward along these lines.
I’m thrilled my youngest is going to see her very pregnant sister over Memorial Day. The thought of getting on planes with strangers from the feral Trumpist outback still frightens me. I had a year of knowing who was crazy and who was prudent with that mask and I’m not sure I’m ready to give that up.
“La Liseuse” (The Reader) by Belgian painter Alfred Émile Léopold Stevens in 1860, as imagined in the pandemic. Credit: The Fitzwilliam Museum/FME, Cambridge
Russell Berman–writing for The Atlantic–asks “Is This the End? The CDC’s surprising mask announcement was not just a public-health milestone.”
It had not, of course. There were, as always, plenty of caveats to the CDC’s guidance. Masks should still be worn on public transportation and in high-risk settings such as doctor’s offices, hospitals, and nursing homes. The majority of Americans remain unvaccinated and should continue to mask up. Tens of thousands are testing positive for the coronavirus every day, and hundreds are still dying from it. Cases are surging in India and other parts of the world.
So, no, the pandemic isn’t over, but the significance of the CDC’s shift was unmistakable, and the nation’s senior political leaders made sure the public didn’t miss it. Inside the Oval Office, President Joe Biden and the Republican lawmakers with whom he was meeting took off their masks, Senator Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia told reporters outside the White House. On the Senate floor, Senator Susan Collins of Maine—who earlier this week chastised Walensky over the CDC’s “conflicting” mask guidance—triumphantly waved hers in the air. “Free at last,” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, previously a fastidious mask-wearer, declared at the Capitol. Conservatives have mocked Biden, who has been fully vaccinated for months, for wearing a mask even when it clearly offered no discernible health benefit, including while walking alone to and from his helicopter. So when Biden spoke later in the afternoon in the White House Rose Garden, it was notable that he wasn’t wearing one. His remarks carried an air of celebration, if not quite finality. “Today,” he said, “is a great day for America in our long battle with the coronavirus.”
“The daughters of Sir Matthew Decker,” painted by Dutch artist Jan van Meyer in 1718. Credit: The Fitzwilliam Museum/FME, Cambridge
So, I do want to make this post mostly about what seems to be a turning-the-corner moment in our history of Covid-19. I even have a friend taking his usual group of college students to Seville Spain this summer to take in the music and the opera. He’s at the Student Health Center getting his vaccine passport because that’s what the Spanish Government requires for visitors. The private universities here are requiring their students to show up on campus in the fall with proof of vaccine this fall. They intend to be open. The Louisiana University and Lousiana State University are still pandering to the backwoods goons in the Lousyana outback. So, it’s still political just as Berman states.
We get the news today that all of the Democratic Congress is vaccinated which surprises no one. (Via CNN)
“No,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said when asked if the rule mandating masks unless a member is speaking on the House floor would be modified. She then asked, “Are they all vaccinated?”The answer, among Democrats across both chambers, is a 100% vaccination rate. For Republicans, it’s a different story — with at least 44.8% of House members vaccinated and at least 92% of senators.In a follow-up to a March House-wide survey and interviews with members, CNN has confirmed that 312 of the 431 members of the House — just over 72% of the 431-member body — have now received a Covid-19 vaccination. Of that, all 219 House Democrats have reported being vaccinated. Among the Republican conference, 95 of the 212 members — 44.8% — have said they are vaccinated.One hundred and twelve Republican offices did not respond to multiple CNN inquires.
One House Republican, Rep. Tom Massie of Kentucky, said he is not vaccinated.
There’s one other thing that popped up on my radar yesterday. Trump may be prepared to order Florida Governor Ron DeSantis to protect his ass from extradition to New York for prosecution. It appears that may be evident. So, the speculation is wtf is going on here, and can Florida actually do that? From the South Florida Sun-Sentinel: “If New York indicts Florida resident Donald Trump, could DeSantis save him from extradition?”
Trump bought and renovated Mar-a-Lago, in Palm Beach, long before he became president, and in 2019 he declared it was officially his residence after he decided he no longer wanted to call his native New York home. Born in Queens, Trump built an image of himself as a savvy Manhattan real estate mogul.
Since Jan. 20, he’s run his post-presidency from there, issuing statements and delivering occasional speeches to groups of guests in which he rails about the 2020 election. Trump continues to falsely claim the only reason President Joe Biden won is because of widespread voter fraud.
If Vance’s office secures an indictment of Trump while he’s at Mar-a-Lago, the question could land in DeSantis’ lap.
Florida statutes state that “When a demand shall be made upon the Governor of this state by the executive authority of another state for the surrender of a person so charged with crime, the Governor may call upon the Department of Legal Affairs or any prosecuting officer in this state to investigate or assist in investigating the demand, and to report to him or her the situation and circumstances of the person so demanded, and whether the person ought to be surrendered.”
To the extent DeSantis can do anything to help Trump — or appear to help Trump — it’s hard to envision DeSantis easily going along with New York and allowing extradition of the former president. Going along with extradition would infuriate Trump’s MAGA supporters — the very people DeSantis needs for his own re-election next year and any future presidential candidacy. Helping to fight it would undoubtedly earn praise from those same people.
You can read more on this from The Insider. I am beginning to think Florida is a third rate banana republic right now. It’s embarassing.As the Manhattan district attorney’s criminal investigation into former President Donald Trump enters its final stages, officials in Florida are preparing for “thorny extradition issues that could arise” from a statute in the Sunshine State, Politico Playbook first reported on Thursday.
Two officials involved in the “contingency plans” told Politico that law-enforcement personnel in Palm Beach County were looking at what to do if Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr.’s investigation results in an indictment while Trump is at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida.
State law allows Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis — a staunch Trump ally — to step in and investigate whether a “person ought to be surrendered” if they’re indicted, Politico said.
Trump is residing at his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey, for the next few months.
I wonder if they’re fortifying his Florida palace like a drug cartel lord. Maybe he can get some hints from El Chapo.
Okay, that’s enough for me. I need to shower and shower, dress, and mentally prepare myself for post-pandemic wandering. Let us know how your doing with the new reality. Anyone else feeling hesitant like me?
What’s on your reading and blogging list today?
Monday Reads: Modernizing Policy to the 21st Century and Beyond!
Posted: May 10, 2021 Filed under: just because | Tags: Arizona recount, kingfish, Louisiana, oil hack, sanctuary state for oil and gas 10 Comments
Helen Frankenthaler, Mountains and Sea, 1952.
Good Day Sky Dancers!
It’s pouring here again and flooding. This seems to be the new state of affairs as Climate Change goes beyond noticeable in more places than the Maldives and the gone, gone gone, beyond barrier islands and glaciers of the planet. Our infrastructure here in New Orleans was made for 1910, not 2021, and certainly not for this kind of constant extreme weather which we might as well start calling our weather all the time.
Oh, and by the way, attacks on our country are more than just the North Korean government lobbing missiles into the air with pictures of the stern face of Dear Leader in its government-run press. We just had a cyberattack on the Oil Pipeline infrastructure that look’s like the kind of thing the Last Guy’s bestie Putin likes to do.
Meanwhile, the Republicans are debating every policy like it’s 1959. Are we certain the interstate highway system isn’t a sign that Eisenhower has been co-opted by Commies? So, what’s stopping us from getting some new-fangled, up-to-date, technologically, and scientifically consistent policies based on what’s real?
Oh, yeah, Joe Manchin and Republicans …
So, let’s look at that attack on our oil infrastructure.
And enjoy the artwork of Helen Frankenthaler active in the 1950sl, m.
The federal government issued a rare emergency declaration on Sunday after a cyberattack on a major U.S. pipeline choked the transportation of oil to the eastern U.S.
The Colonial Pipeline, responsible for the country’s largest fuel pipeline, shut down all its operations Friday after hackers broke into some of its networks. All four of its main lines remain offline.
The emergency declaration from the Department of Transportation aims to ramp up alternative transportation routes for oil and gas. It lifts regulations on drivers carrying fuel in 17 states across the South and eastern United States, as well as the District of Columbia, allowing them to drive between fuel distributors and local gas stations on more overtime hours and less sleep than federal restrictions normally allow. The U.S. is already dealing with a shortage of tanker truck drivers.
Helen Frankenthaler, Open Wall, 1953
There are declared emergencies in 17 states and DC. From Axios:
Why it matters: Friday night’s cyberattack is “the most significant, successful attack on energy infrastructure” known to have occurred in the U.S., notes energy researcher Amy Myers Jaffe, per Politico.
- The Department of Transportation’s Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration issued a regional emergency declaration for 17 states and Washington, D.C., to keep fuel supply lines open.
The big picture: Colonial Pipeline carries 45% of fuel supplies in the eastern U.S. Some 5,500 miles of pipeline has been shut down in response to the attack.
- While gasoline and diesel prices aren’t expected to be impacted if pipeline operations resume in the next few days, fuel suppliers are becoming “increasingly nervous” about possible shortages, Bloomberg notes.
What’s happening: The emergency declaration covers: Alabama, Arkansas, D.C., Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas and Virginia.
Painted on 21st Street “Untitled” (1951), in a show at Gagosian on Helen Frankenthaler’s early period.
Darkside –a Russian Criminal group–is considered the hacker per NBC. “Russian criminal group suspected in Colonial pipeline ransomware attack. The group, known as DarkSide, is relatively new, but it has a sophisticated approach to extortion, sources said.”
The system, which runs from Texas to New Jersey, transports 45 percent of the East Coast’s fuel supply. In a statement Sunday, the company said that some smaller lateral lines were operational but that the main lines remained down.
“We are in the process of restoring service to other laterals and will bring our full system back online only when we believe it is safe to do so, and in full compliance with the approval of all federal regulations,” the company said.
Raimondo said on CBS’ “Face the Nation” that the effort to restart the network was “an all-hands-on-deck effort right now.”
“We are working closely with the company, state and local officials to make sure that they get back up to normal operations as quickly as possible and there aren’t disruptions in supply,” she said, adding: “Unfortunately, these sorts of attacks are becoming more frequent. They’re here to stay.”
A White House official said Sunday that the Energy Department is leading the government’s response. Agencies are planning for a number of scenarios in which the region’s fuel supply takes a hit, the official said.
On Saturday, Colonial Pipeline blamed the cyberattack on ransomware and said some of its information technology systems were affected. It said it “proactively” took “certain systems offline to contain the threat.”
Helen Frankenthaler, Abstract Landscape, 1951
I think having Arizona QAnon crazies search for bamboo in ballots is just really missing the threat and mark. Don’t you? Well, read this Vice article about the QAnon plan to steal Arizona for Trump and be relieved our justice department has been called in.
A group of Arizona citizens, including one Republican Congressional candidate, is asking the state’s Supreme Court to invalidate all election results since 2018 and remove all elected officials from their offices immediately.
And who should replace the ousted election officials? Well, the citizens who filed the lawsuit, of course.
The legal petition claims all officials elected in Arizona since 2018 are “inadvertent usurpers” because the elections they won were conducted by vote-counting equipment that was not properly certified.
The plaintiffs claim the evidence to back up this staggering claim will be provided in the lawsuit’s appendix, which unfortunately they had not submitted at the time of writing.
The plaintiffs claim that the court has the authority to void the terms of the named officials—which include Gov. Doug Ducey and Secretary of State Katie Hobbs—and install themselves as appropriate replacements.
“When in the past citizens have been appointed by the Governor to finish out a Senate term due to unusual circumstances, the Governor has typically chosen pedigreed, well-known politicians, but this is not necessary. Any Arizona resident meeting the minimum qualifications is entitled to and has the right be appointed to a seat in unusual situations,” the lawsuit claims.
The legal filing is the latest harebrained effort by pro-Trump and QAnon supporters in Arizona to get the results of November’s election overturned. There is currently an audit of 2.1 million votes being conducted in Maricopa County. The GOP-sanctioned recount is being conducted by a Florida-based company called Cyber Ninjas, which has no experience conducting audits.
I can’t imagine a more embarrassing state to live in at the moment than Arizona. I live and have lived in pretty embarrassing states so I’m an authority on that.
The U.S. Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division is asking Arizona Senate President Karen Fann to respond to concerns the department has about the security of ballots and potential voter intimidation as the Senate’s contractors perform an audit of November’s presidential election in Maricopa County.
In a letter sent to Fann on Wednesday, Pamela S. Karlan, principal deputy assistant attorney general in the division, asked for Fann’s response to its concerns with an explanation of “the steps that the Arizona Senate will take to ensure that violations of federal law do not occur” during the audit.
The department’s concerns may have been prompted in part by a letter it received Thursday from three organizations, including the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, asking the department to dispatch federal monitors to oversee the audit. That letter raised the same concerns that the department said it has, regarding the security of ballots and potential voter intimidation.
Helen Frankenthaler, March 1960.
Anyway, don’t even get me started on Louisiana where the lege is trying to make us a “sanctuary state” for oil and gas. This is basically an industry that is killing us while making a few people quite rich.
A state lawmaker wants to make Louisiana a “fossil fuel sanctuary state,” quixotically asserting special sovereignty to nullify any federal law, regulation or tax that in any way harms the oil and gas industry.
Rep. Danny McCormick, a Republican from Oil City, a town of about 1,000 residents in northwest Louisiana, says his House Bill 617 is a “preemptive effort” to protect the industry from the future policies of President Joe Biden’s administration.
“What he’ll do, I can’t answer yet,” McCormick said Wednesday, shortly after the bill was introduced in the House Natural Resources and Environment Committee. “There may be no limit to his attacks on the fossil fuel industry.”
The bill was partially inspired by the cities and other local jurisdictions that defied the immigration policies of former President Donald Trump’s administration. These so-called “sanctuary cities” refused to hand over immigration detainees for deportation.
Okay, so that’s pretty embarrassing for the state of Louisiana.
Anyway, I’ve just about had it with folks trying to redefine the future as back to the past. State legislatures are Trumpier than the country can afford. Phillip Bump of WAPO puts it this way: “Refusal to accept reality is doing unquestionable damage to democracy”. There are dangers out there but it’s not bamboo in ballots or transgender children.
The challenge, of course, is that the ramifications of rejecting the results of an election are obviously more dire than not having a chance to compete in a singing competition. Trump is both leveraging and accentuating a pattern of refusing to acknowledge defeat that poses real dangers for the American democratic system.
Trump’s refusal to acknowledge that he lost hinges on myriad assertions that something dubious or suspicious happened during the 2020 presidential contest. The sheer volume of claims is itself often cited as evidence that something needs to be done about election security, a claim that’s a bit like advocating legislation for mandated chimney locks given how many Americans (most of them under the age of 7) believe in Santa Claus.
There remains no credible evidence of the 2020 results being influenced or shifted in any way that would suggest widespread fraud. (Quite the opposite.) But there is a substantial industry predicated on claiming that voting results are suspect, claims into which Trump and others could tap.
Helen Frankenthaler’s “Weeping Crabapple.” 2009
Well, there’s a business well-suited for devils and demons. There are no communists under your beds but there are a lot of disturbed politicians in your statehouses. Greg Sargent reminds us that the GOP has been radicalizing for some time. It’s interesting to note that we’re on our second McCarthy in the House supporting conspiracy theories.
This is not the act of a “coward” who “fears Trump,” and would vouch for the integrity of the election if only he could do so without consequences.
Rather, it is the act of someone who is fully devoted to the project of continuing to undermine confidence in our elections going forward.
This is for purely instrumental purposes. Republicans are employing their own invented doubts about 2020 to justify intensified voter suppression everywhere. Banks neatly crystallized the point on Fox, saying those doubts required more voting restrictions — after reinforcing them himself.
Indeed, with all this, Republicans may be in the process of creating a kind of permanent justification for maximal efforts to invalidate future election outcomes by whatever means are within reach.
I’ve already detailed the possibility that a GOP-controlled House could refuse to certify a contested state’s election results in 2024. Brian Beutler suggests other ways Republicans could use official power to undermine legitimate outcomes, such as institutionalizing “sham audits” like the Arizona one or punishing state officials who certify Democratic victories.
So, it’s not fear itself we should fear these days. That ought to keep you up at night. There’s tons of technology to hack our creeky old infrastructure. There are also all these chemicals and fossil fuels that are killing everything. Can’t we just forget the good old days and move forward to face the new? Well, we could if we keep our democracy and get back to reality.
Anyway, time for Dakinikat Downer to go grade some papers and trying to calm any students that feel for DogeCoin. Just when I thought bitcoin was the only Ponzi Scheme preying on our children. Elon Musk strikes again!
Have a good week! We’ll be here!
What’s on your reading and blogging list today?
Friday Reads: Push the Policy through NOW!
Posted: May 7, 2021 Filed under: Afternoon Reads | Tags: Post Trump Pandemic Recovery 17 Comments
The Dance by André Derain, 1906,
Good Day Sky Dancers!
There was a pretty huge job fair in New Orleans this week alongside a first visit by President Biden to check out our dilapidated Sewage and Water infrastructure. Our covid-19 cases have dropped and it’s a rare day when I see a death among the new case numbers. It seems we should be recovering a bit more robustly.
We have eased some of our restrictions and there are inklings of brass bands returning to the streets to perform in distanced, open-air spaces. However, the last few weekends of music I heard was the thumping of the worst of the worst from an ongoing illegal rave party at an abandoned gas station at the abandoned Navy Base. Last night, it went on until sunrise. That kind of represents a type of Post Trump Dystopia Nightmare still lingering.
Bacchus dance, Andre Derain, 1906
Yes, Raves are so 1990s but for some reason, they’re back! I noticed that some Chinese Space debris is supposed to fall to earth today and I can’t help but wonder if I can psychically move the falling debris to take out that spot on the Mississippi so it can be reinhabited by something other than humans with opioid issues. That seems appropriately Post Trump Dystopian Nightmarish also.
The economy is actually doing gangbusters despite the somewhat dismal unemployment numbers released today. The Investment class should be quite happy with market performance. Something is still stuck somewhere. Frankly, I think that as a nation, we’re all just tired. I would like to add that American women are both tired and fed up so getting back to the old frantic normal seems less appealing all the time. Why does the American normal always wear a lot of us out?
Washington Post columnist Catherine Rampell has some analysis over the dreary April Numbers. It matches up with the anecdotal evidence one of my friends provided when she couldn’t believe that the New Orleans Job Fair was poorly attended even though there were lots of jobs and wages offered were up. Rampell writes: “Behind the April jobs report: Is there a shortage of jobs or a shortage of workers?”
No two ways about it: The April jobs report was extremely disappointing. And it’s likely to heat up the debate, now preoccupying the White House, over whether government policy might be subtly discouraging unemployed people from returning to work.
Economists and analysts had been expecting around a million jobs to be added on net in April, given the rising share of vaccinated Americans and relaxation of restrictions on business. Instead, employers created a measly 266,000 positions, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Friday. Job growth for March was revised downward, too.
The size of the jobs deficit — the difference between how many jobs there are today vs. pre-pandemic — remains quite large, with employment in April still 8.2 million jobs, or 5.4 percent, below the peak from February 2020. If April’s hiring pace were to continue indefinitely, it would take 2½ more years before we regained all the jobs we had pre-covid (and we actually want more jobs than that, given population growth).
The disappointing numbers are almost certain to strengthen the narrative that there’s a labor shortage.
What do I mean by that? Unemployment is still elevated, at 6.1 percent in April compared with 3.5 percent in February 2020. So at first blush, that would suggest that there are still a lot of excess workers needing jobs. For about a month, though, a debate has been raging about whether there are too few workers willing to accept the jobs on offer. Restaurants and other small businesses have complained about their inability to hire, which is being disproportionately blamed on (depending on your politics) either Big Government’s too-generous unemployment benefits, or stingy employers’ reluctance to raise wages.
The industry that has been complaining the loudest about an inability to find workers, accommodation and food services (think hotels, restaurants, bars, etc.), accounted for nearly all of the hiring in April — 241,400 new jobs. This might suggest that their complaints are much ado about nothing.
Again, my friend Aine’s analysis of her experience here fits in with that narrative. Most of the employers at the fair were hotels, restaurants, and your usual array of dreary, hard, low paying service jobs. The Hilton Hotel is unionized but that’s not the norm around the outrageous right to work plantation mentality of the Republican Majority here who are now screaming that unemployment benefits, rent moratoriums, and Covid relief checks are keeping every one home.
Andre Derain The Promenade 1906
So, yes I’m an economist although I’m a financial economist and have minimal exposure to advanced labor economics. My narrative however is a bit more on the behavioral side.
We’re all than a bit more than worn out but the women who make up these types of jobs are more worn out and fed up than usual. We’ve born the brunt of both the Pandemic and the Trumpist regime. Exhaustion and a huge degree of being fed-up have depleted our enthusiasm to go out and be underpaid, underappreciated, and not supported for being mothers or caregivers of our elderly relatives. Yes. Joe has a plan for that. Do it now.
You can see this in the economic analysis–hold that thought–plus pop culture. This headline greeted me from The Guardian: “The day of ‘female rage’ has dawned – and Kate Winslet is its fed-up face”. The piece is written by Emma Brockes about a new Amazon Series featuring Winslet as a small town, Pennslyvania policewoman called “Mare of Easttown”.
Her success with viewers is also a question of timing. The aftershocks of MeToo won’t wear off for many years, and still the stories keep coming. In the past month alone we heard of alleged abuses by Hollywood producer Scott Rudin, and the almost unbelievably novelistic horror of Blake Bailey, lauded biographer of Philip Roth, being the subject of multiple accusations of rape and sexual assault, resulting in the book being hastily withdrawn.
We’ve had it. We’re done with it. Those years of Trump compulsively commenting on women’s looks, the intensity of demands made of women handling families and jobs throughout the pandemic, and the fact that women over 40 – particularly those in flannel and Timberlands – are still expected to remain largely invisible, have created a condition for this show to hit home. The absolute I’m-over-it energy of the heroine channels some broader snap in a willingness to go along with all this and a yearning for some reflection of how many are feeling.
It’s not even anger; much has been made of “female rage” in the past few years, but to my mind it’s more muted and long-suffering than that. It’s irritability, crossness, the oh-for-God’s-sake complete lack of surprise when the latest outrage comes along, with the occasional florid meltdown. In one scene, a middle-class character sensitively counsels Mare to open her heart to the daughter-in-law with whom she’s about to get locked in a custody battle. Instead, she storms over to her house, mocks her addiction, threatens to see her in court, then frames her for a crime she didn’t commit. I mean, it’s not ideal. But one appreciates a certain emotional truth.
There is, perhaps, one amusingly and I guess unavoidably false note in all this. Early on in the show, Mare meets a suave, middle-class character played by Guy Pierce, and reluctantly agrees to go out on a date with him. She throws on some makeup, finds a dress and a hairbrush, and – stepping out of her house – hey-ho, it’s Kate Winslet. Even that, I sense, we’ll give her. It goes badly; the guy’s a douche. She shrugs and goes home.
The Dancer,Andre Derain, c.1910
So, a lot of us have gone home for a while. Now, let me get back to a Brookings study last year on the impact of Women during the Covid-19 outbreak and shutdowns. It’s a grab bag of social sciences analyses by Nicole Bateman and Marth Ross: “Why has COVID-19 been especially harmful for working women?”
COVID-19 is hard on women because the U.S. economy is hard on women, and this virus excels at taking existing tensions and ratcheting them up. Millions of women were already supporting themselves and their families on meager wages before coronavirus-mitigation lockdowns sent unemployment rates skyrocketing and millions of jobs disappeared. And working mothers were already shouldering the majority of family caregiving responsibilities in the face of a childcare system that is wholly inadequate for a society in which most parents work outside the home. Of course, the disruptions to daycare centers, schools, and afterschool programs have been hard on working fathers, but evidence shows working mothers have taken on more of the resulting childcare responsibilities, and are more frequently reducing their hours or leaving their jobs entirely in response.
Problems facing women in the labor market have never been hidden, but they have been inconvenient to address because they are so entrenched in the basic operations of our economy and society. The low wages associated with “pink collar” occupations have long contributed to the feminization of poverty, and the chronic shortage of affordable, high-quality childcare reflects outdated notions of women’s societal roles, how the economy functions, and child development. COVID-19’s massive disruption to employment, childcare, and school routines has crippled the economy and pushed millions of women and families to the financial brink. This moment provides an important opening to rethink how policy supports women’s roles as financial providers and parents.
This is exactly the kind of plans that Elizabeth Warren, Hillary Clinton, and other women leaders have been pushing for years. These policy prescriptions have been adopted into the larger Biden-Harris policy efforts to promote better infrastructure. The Republicans, however, are dead set against all of it and are hellbent on institutionalizing Trumpism. We’re already seeing laws at state levels that courts already settled scuttling like bottom feeders towards a stacked Supreme Court. A huge number of these laws restrict the progress of women and minorities.
You may see the very different narratives offered by the two parties. Let’s explore the HuffPo article: “Unemployment Benefits Are Not Creating A Worker Shortage. While some employers may be struggling to hire for one reason or another, economists say generous unemployment benefits are not the cause.”
At the time, millions of workers were losing their jobs every week, and nobody knew how bad things would get. But a few weeks after the initial lockdowns, businesses started recalling workers, millions returned to their jobs despite the extra benefits, and the jobless rate plunged. A spate of academic studies found the extra benefits weren’t stopping people from going back to work after all.
At $300 per week, the federal supplement is half what it was last year, but the criticism is twice as intense even though the previous doomsaying didn’t pan out.
“People get paid more not to work than to work,” Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) told HuffPost, referring to the extra federal benefits. “Economists talk about that, but anecdotally, it’s clear.”
It’s true that the benefits amount to more than prior wages for some workers. It’s just that the extra money doesn’t seem to have held workers back.
The unemployment complaint fits a broader Republican argument that Democrats under President Joe Biden are out to destroy the American work ethic with their proposals for new parent benefits and affordable child care.
“Think about what the Democrats have done,” Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), the House Republican leader, tweeted over the weekend. “They have demonized work so Americans would become dependent on big government.”
While some employers may be struggling to hire for one reason or another right now, economists say generous unemployment benefits are not the cause.
If demand for workers were exceeding supply, then the price of labor would be shooting up. But as Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said last week, overall wage growth hasn’t increased. “We don’t see wages moving up yet, and presumably we would see that in a really tight labor market,” Powell said at a press conference. “And we may well start to see that.”
For now, unemployment remains elevated, at 6%, compared to 3.5% before the pandemic, and there were 4 million more unemployed people in March 2021 than in February 2020. That data reflects people who are trying to find jobs, not those who have removed themselves from the workforce for a number of reasons, like a lack of child care. Yet some business owners still say there are no willing workers out there.
Chef Andrew Gruel, owner of the Slapfish restaurant franchise, took to Twitter last week to declare “there are no employees available in California.” Gruel said his eateries were offering $21 per hour but couldn’t find any takers. The top reason? “They are making enough on unemployment and would rather not work.”
William Spriggs isn’t buying that. The chief economist at the AFL-CIO labor federation, Spriggs said it is “self-evident” that millions of people are trying to find work. Just because an employer hasn’t found them yet ― at the wages the employer is willing to pay ― doesn’t mean the workers aren’t out there.
Then, there’s this on the horizon. It’s also been the topic of the day among a lot of my friends that have not had the benefit of working at home like me. An economy–with lots of market-related rigidities–can be very slow on the rebound. Labor markets are notoriously rigid and sticky.
Estaque, Andre Derain, 1905
It’s not that I’m not excited about all the policies and traveling around that both Biden and Harris have done showing the need. I’m worried that if we don’t get it done now that the Republicans will come roaring back through voter suppression and more lies and we’ll be stuck, once again, in a place where everything and everyone has broken, while the money and the fun go to the very rich and powerful. Well, that and the homeless opioid rave unattended until something catches fire and the next one or dozen of them die from their addictions.
Meanwhile, the short-term Air Bnbs will bring tourists. The streets will still flood. I will still be working here with a half-ass internet connection for which I pay Cox a small fortune. I just don’t want to miss the opportunity we have at the moment and I’m all too familiar with the lessons of the first few Obama years. I don’t want a repeat.
So, sorry for being a bit of a Debbie Downer today but I just am beginning to see history repeat itself. The schadenfreude of broke and broken Guiliani is just not enough for the country. We’ve got to realize the Republicans are a lost cause still hanging on to the mentality of The Lost Cause. Move on without them!
Have a great weekend! What’s on your reading and blogging list today?
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