Tracy Chapman at the 2024 Grammys.
I can tell you from experience that being a woman musician is challenging. You rarely get to display your complete set of talents. This has been especially true of the Grammy Awards recognition. Last night, Joni Mitchell, a constant inspiration of my musical journey other than my concert pianist mother, finally got to perform on that Grammy stage.
My dad traded my flute for a guitar in the 8th grade, and I taught myself to play and pick “Both Sides Now.” That was 1968. She sang it last night at the age of 80. Judy Collins first made it famous, but it was all Joni. I saw Joni perform at my first Jazz Fest in New Orleans in 1995 before I started playing around town and doing sound for the Fest. I cannot tell you how much I wanted to see her live. I watched how she did all those alternative tunings. I played her album ‘Free Man in Paris’ in my first year at university. There I was, watching those fingers work their magic as close as I could get. I’d already worn the tracks off of ‘Blue’.
In 2024, the Grammys lived up to their often-dubious claim to being “music’s biggest night,” with highs like Tracy Chapman and Luke Combs’ “Fast Car” duet, lows like the shocking arrest of Killer Mike, and whoas like Album of the Year winner Taylor Swift announcing a new album titled The Tortured Poets Department. But for me, the highlight of the evening was a quieter, if no less historic moment: Joni Mitchell taking the Grammy stage for the first time, at 80, to perform her classic ballad “Both Sides, Now.” I’d like to think Swift—the woman of the hour, night, and year, as well as a Joni superfan who calls Mitchell’s Blue her favorite album—would agree.
The song began as a piano playing through darkness, out of which Mitchell emerged, spotlit and facing backstage in a regal Victorian chair. Decked out in her signature beret and braids, and surrounded by crystal chandeliers, she used a bejeweled cane to keep time. And as she sang the opening lines, voice deeper now than that of the soprano who trilled its high notes on her 1969 album Clouds, her throne revolved until she was staring straight at the audience. Seated around Mitchell, like acolytes at her feet, were younger musicians—Brandi Carlile, Jacob Collier, Allison Russell, SistaStrings, Blake Mills, and Lucius—accompanying her with guitar, strings, woodwinds, and backing vocals. She didn’t strain her voice, but she sounded strong and clear.
Joni Mitchell at the 2024 Grammys
If Joni ruled my guitar picking in the sixties and seventies, Tracy Chapman grabbed me in the 1980s. I jumped on singer-songwriter Tracy Chapman’s ‘Give Me One Reason’, a track from Chapman’s 1988 album, with a 5-year-old daughter sitting beside me. When I moved to New Orleans and started performing again, that older and mouthier daughter corrected my timing several times. Given my lack of interest in country music, some singer I’d never heard that recorded her song shared the stage with Mitchell at the Grammies last night. Her album that enriched my life has never been re-released. I bet it will now. It topped the iTunes Chart after her Grammy performance. She looks and sounds better than ever!
“Fast Car,” the folk anthem by Tracy Chapman, is continuing to have its renaissance moment.
Chapman joined country singer Luke Combs for a rare performance of the song at Sunday’s Grammys ceremony. Moments after, “Fast Car” shot to No. 1 on the iTunes Top Songs chart. Her 1988 debut album, Tracy Chapman, also sat at No. 1.
Chapman’s original song peaked at No. 6 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart following its release. She has performed the song on the Grammy stage before, when she won best female pop vocal performance for it at the 1989 Grammys.
Combs’ version peaked at No. 2 on the Hot 100 chart after it was released last year and was nominated for a Grammy this year, though it did not win.
Chapman was not listed as an official performer this year, and the crowd cheered loudly when she appeared onstage, providing one of the most powerful moments at a Grammys show that was packed with memorable moments. Artists Taylor Swift and Jelly Roll were seen standing and singing along, and Chapman herself beamed with a smile.
Chapman’s album won plenty of Grammy honors at the time.
Chapman has won four Grammys in the past, three of which were tied to her self-titled album, which included “Fast Car.” For that, she won Best Contemporary Folk Album, Best Female Pop Vocal Performance, and Best New Artist in 1989.
And yes, Taylor was there. A shot of her standing, dancing, clapping, and singing ‘Fast Car’ is viral today. ‘I became a Swifty’ with her 2014 hit ‘Shake it off’. It got a lot of play during Hillary’s campaign. She was a Hillary supporter but never quite got around to “endorsing’ her. Here’s a typical headline for that time of my life. “Can Hillary Clinton Shake It Off?” was all over the media. It was a meme-worthy song once Clinton stood on a town hall stage with Stalking Donnie Dotard and actually shook off his hateful rhetoric.
Swift won her 4th Album of the Year last night with intense competition. This is from People Magazine. “Taylor Swift Makes History as She Wins 4th Album of the Year at 2024 Grammys: ‘Unbelievably Blown Away’.”
Taylor Swift was awarded album of the year at Sunday’s awards show in Los Angeles for her album Midnights, making her the only artist to ever win album of the year four times. Midnights, Fearless, 1989 and Folklore have all won the achievement.
Next up for Swift is watching The Super Bowl and more grief on all those nutty conspiracy theories from the left-hand tail of the MAGA IQ charts. Don’t even ask where the mean sits for these freaks of nature. She’s reportedly turned down performances for its Half Time Program several times, according to Fortune.
I would like to honor these two women in the category of causing all other female artists to have hope and awe. They are Annie Lennox and the late Sinead O’Connor. I love to tell this story of what the neighborhood kids said about me when I was in the skinny as hell and even balder stage of having chemotherapy in 1980. They went around telling everyone that I was a big music star! They thought I was Sinead! That’s the best compliment I’ve ever gotten!
This is from Rolling Stone. “Annie Lennox Calls for Gaza Ceasefire During Sinéad O’Connor’ Grammys Tribute.”
ANNIE LENNOX CALLED for a ceasefire in Gaza during her tribute to Sinéad O’Connor at the Grammys.
After performing “Nothing Compares to U” on Sunday, the singer became the first artist to call for a ceasefire in Gaza at a major awards show this year.
“Artists for a ceasefire. Peace in the world,” Lennox said with her fist in the air, as an image of O’Connor displayed in the background.
Fans celebrated the Eurythmics icon for making the bold statement and honoring O’Connor in the “most meaningful and honest way.” O’Connor, who was also known for speaking up, famously ripped an image of the Pope to call out the Catholic church’s approach to clergy child sex abuse while performing on Saturday Night Live in 1992.
Oh, Annie of THAT voice! She killed it. The song written by Prince has one of the more gut-wrenching melodies and lyrics you’d ever want to croon.
So, anyway, that’s all I want to do today. I am glad that these female singer-songwriters are finally getting their due at the Grammys. Okay, I’ve shared my inner fan girl and inspirations with you. You probably need more coffee now.
Have a great week! And go on! Listen to their music!
Here’s a bonus: Annie with the Queen of Soul singing that funky music in 1985. It’s Aretha!!!
Happy Groundhog Day to those who celebrate. John Buss, @repeat1969
When I get around friends these days, the topic of conversation isn’t so much about Mardi Gras Parades or the usual stuff in their lives. It’s about how challenging it is to deal with anyone they know in the Kool-Aid Cult or simply trying to watch the day’s news. Open any list of today’s news items, and it will return you to bed. I’ve had conversations with everyone, from a friend since sixth grade to folks I’ve just met in front of my house. Just gazing at any social media site makes me wonder what Star Trek Timeline I landed in. Is it possible I will also bump into the evil Spock?
But you don’t have to ask me.
Ask Elmo. Why Is Elmo a Topic on the Evening and Morning News Shows? He showed up on social media asking how everyone felt, and they told him. This is from CNN and AJ Willingham. The Screen Capture from yesterday got 5.4 million views. I retweeted it. I wasn’t alone. “Elmo asked people online how they were doing. He got an earful.” The Elmo beat is mainstream now.
When Elmo posted a kind-hearted check-in this week on X, formally known as Twitter, he may have assumed he’d be shielded by these social mores. But he comes from “Sesame Street,” which is no place for lies.
“Elmo is just checking in!” he wrote. “How is everybody doing?”
Thousands of replies and a few interventions from his “Sesame Street” pals later, and it was pretty clear: The people are not doing well, Elmo!
It’s not surprising. The world is experiencing a grinding war in Ukraine, potential famine in Gaza and a seemingly endless drumbeat of mass shootings in the US. Many young Americans are struggling with anxiety and depression as the country faces a well-documented mental health crisis. And in many places we’re in the middle of a cold, dark winter.
The tenor of the responses to Elmo reflect much of that — and some welcome dark humor in unburdening ourselves to a fuzzy puppet. Elmo’s query also led to some heartwarming conversations about emotional health and the importance of checking in with friends.
We are not OK, thanks
“Elmo each day the abyss we stare into grows a unique horror. one that was previously unfathomable in nature. our inevitable doom which once accelerated in years, or months, now accelerates in hours, even minutes. however I did have a good grapefruit earlier, thank you for asking.”
“Every morning, I cannot wait to go back to sleep. Every Monday, I cannot wait for Friday to come. Every single day and every single week for life.”
“Elmo I’m depressed and broke.”
“I’m at my lowest, thanks for asking.”
“Elmo I’ve got to level with you baby we are fighting for our lives”
And, one of the most brutally honest replies:
“Elmo I’m gonna be real I am at my f***ing limit.”
After a few hours of people trauma dumping on the Muppet, the official “Sesame Street” account called time with a follow-up post directing people to — yes, really — mental health resources.
Or, as someone else on X said, “Elmo sorry but this above Elmo’s pay grade.”
I didn’t add anything to the list, but I sure could’ve. We have an excellent economy, and the response of many major corporations is to price gouge us after four years of Trump, three years of COVID-19, and all the war news that’s never fit to print but must be. I was not okay as a kid watching the Vietnam War unfold on my parent’s black and white console TV or watching a bunch of Southern Cops use fire hoses on Black children my age on the same TV. At least it wasn’t 24/7, but we got newspaper delivery twice daily and the weekly news magazines. Still, seeing Donnie Dotard on TV and hearing that voice is worse. It’s like a peep show into the psycho ward at the Super Max prison for the criminally insane.
President Biden, whose approval rating has suffered amid high inflation, is beginning to pressure large grocery chains to slash food prices for American consumers, accusing the stores of reaping excess profits and ripping off shoppers.
“There are still too many corporations in America ripping people off: price gouging, junk fees, greedflation, shrinkflation,” Mr. Biden said last week in South Carolina. Aides say those comments are a preview of more pressure to come against grocery chains and other companies that are maintaining higher-than-usual profit margins after a period of rapid price growth.
Mr. Biden’s public offensive reflects the political reality that, while inflation is moderating, voters are angry about how much they are paying at the grocery store, and that is weighing on Mr. Biden’s approval rating ahead of the 2024 election.
Economic research suggests the cost of eggs, milk and other staples — which consumers buy far more frequently than big-ticket items like furniture or electronics — play an outsize role in shaping Americans’ views of inflation. Those prices jumped more than 11 percent in 2022 and 5 percent last year, amid a post-pandemic inflation surge that was the nation’s fastest burst of price increases in four decades.
Nothing is more traumatizing than watching a feeble dotard former guy and his absolutely deluded and mean followers sickeningly scream about their assumed grievances. It’s absolutely mood-killing. The economy is doing phenomenally. The Biden Administration has done everything that Economists know about running a good economy, and it’s going gangbusters in terms of employment and growth. Again, price-gouging is an issue, but only Congress can enact a law to curb that, and they won’t do anything that would make Biden look good. I mean seriously. They’ll kill us over selling out the Orange Snot Blossom. Biden spent 2023 shaming them in speeches, but that only goes so far.
But still, wow, the economy rocks. Just ask Hillary. The link is from Steve Benen at MSNBC. New report points to blockbuster U.S. job growth as 2024 begins. “By every metric, the latest jobs report points to a robust U.S. job market. The political implications have the potential to be dramatic.” The word ‘potential’ is essential. Will Fox News viewers ever see the results of Bidenomics?
Expectations heading into this morning showed projections of about 185,000 new jobs having been added in the United States in January. As it turns out, according to the new report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the job market managed to do much better than that. CNBC reported:
Job growth posted a surprise increase in January, demonstrating again that the U.S. labor market is solid and poised to support broader economic growth. Nonfarm payrolls expanded by 353,000 for the month, much better than the Dow Jones estimate for 185,000, the Labor Department’s Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Friday. The unemployment rate held at 3.7%, against the estimate for 3.8%.
What’s more, while January’s jobs report showed employers adding 353,000 positions last month, we also learned that wage growth continued to outpace inflation, and the unemployment rate remained at 3.7%. In fact, the jobless rate has been below 4% for 24 consecutive months — a streak unseen in the United States since the 1960s.
Also note, the jobs report that comes every year in early February is especially notable because it includes revisions for all of the previous year. With this in mind, we now know that 3.05 million jobs were created in 2023 — well above the previous 2.7 million estimate.
As for the politics, let’s circle back to previous coverage to put the data in perspective. Over the course of the first three years of Donald Trump’s presidency — when the Republican said the United States’ economy was the greatest in the history of the planet — the economy created roughly 6.35 million jobs, spanning all of 2017, 2018 and 2019.
According to the latest tally, the U.S. economy has created roughly 15.1 million jobs since January 2021 — more than double the combined total of Trump’s first three years.
In recent months, Republicans have responded to developments like these by pretending not to notice them. No one should be surprised if GOP officials keep the trend going today.
Biden and Nikki Haley are not holding back on attacking Donnie Dotard. Most of the funds raised by his supporters go to take care of his massive legal troubles. The Washington Post reported yesterday that “Trump spent more than $55 million in donor money on legal fees last year, filings show.” Given that Nikki now has a large donor base filled with Republican billionaires, his uneducated SDE base is really on the hook for it.
Former president Donald Trump is cruising toward the Republican presidential nomination after victories in Iowa and New Hampshire, but he is diverting enormous sums of donor money to his mounting legal fees as he faces multiple lawsuits and 91 felony charges across four criminal cases.
The new figures for his legal spending were outlined in campaign disclosures filed with the Federal Election Commission on Wednesday night. Trump’s advisers have said the money that is being spent on legal expenses is not only for Trump’s defense, but also for the lawyer fees for some of his advisers and associates. Here are a few early takeaways from the new filings:
Two of Trump’s committees, Save America leadership PAC and the Make America Great Again PAC, spent $55.6 million on legal bills in 2023, including $29.9 million in the second half of the year, according to the new reports released Wednesday.
According to Politico, Biden has many behind-the-door things to say about Trump. I say let Biden be Biden. “What Biden *really* says about Trump behind closed doors.”
President JOE BIDEN has a reputation for salty language behind closed doors. But it nearly slipped out in public during his speech at Valley Forge last month to mark the third anniversary of the Jan. 6 insurrection. Animated and angry, he derided DONALD TRUMP and his followers for drawing glee from political violence.
“At his rally, he jokes about an intruder, whipped up by the Big Trump Lie, taking a hammer to Paul Pelosi’s skull,” Biden said.
“And he thinks that’s funny,” the president continued. “He laughed about it. What a sick …”
Biden let his voice trail off as the crowd cheered and chuckled.
In private, he doesn’t stop short.
The president has described Trump to longtime friends and close aides as a “sick fuck” who delights in others’ misfortunes, according to three people who have heard the president use the profane description. According to one of the people who has spoken with the president, Biden recently said of Trump:
My thoughts exactly, Mr. President. “”What a fucking asshole the guy is.”
But you don’t have to take my or his word for it. Here are some recent examples reported in the news. This is from CNN. “Roberta Kaplan says Trump threw papers across table at Mar-a-Lago deposition because his legal team agreed to feed her lunch.” It gets worse.
Attorney Roberta Kaplan said former President Donald Trump threw papers across a table and stormed off during a deposition at Mar-a-Lago after learning that his legal team had agreed to provide her lunch.
Kaplan, who has represented clients in high-profile cases against Trump, including E. Jean Carroll, said on an episode of the “George Conway Explains it All (to Sarah Longwell)” podcast recorded Thursday that she rejected the former president’s request that they work through a lunch break because he believed the deposition was “a waste of my time.”
“And then you could kind of see the wheel spinning in his brain. You could really almost see it,” Kaplan told Republican strategist Sarah Longwell and conservative attorney George Conway, a longtime Trump critic. “And he said, ‘Well, you’re here in Mar-a-Lago. What do you think you’re going to do for lunch? Where are you going to get lunch?’”
Kaplan said she told him that his attorneys had “graciously offered to provide” her team with lunch — a common civil practice between opposing legal teams.
“At which point there was a huge pile of documents, exhibits, sitting in front of him, and he took the pile and he just threw it across the table. And stormed out of the room,” Kaplan shared, adding that Trump specifically yelled at his lawyer Alina Habba for providing them lunch.
“He really yelled at Alina for that. He was so mad at Alina,” she said.
Kaplan continued: “He came back in and he said, ‘Well, how’d you like the lunch?’ And I said, ‘Well, sir, I had a banana. You know, I can never really eat when I’m taking testimony.’ And he said, ‘Well, I told you,’ — it was kind of charming. He said, ‘I told you, I told them to make you really bad sandwiches, but they can’t help themselves here. We have the best sandwiches.’”
His misogyny was worse in a prior case that Kaplan was handling.
Kaplan was deposing Trump at Mar-Lago in a lawsuit alleging the former president was involved with a fraudulent marketing company. A federal judge dismissed the suit last month.
In a separate anecdote, Kaplan detailed the end of the deposition when she was set to leave, saying that Trump told her: “See you next Tuesday” – a phrase that is often used as a derogatory euphemism directed at women.
“We come in the room and I say, ‘I’m done asking questions’ and immediately I hear from the other side, ‘Off the record. Off the record. Off the record.’ So they must have planned it. And he looks at me from across the table and he says, ‘See you next Tuesday,’” she recounted.
See you next Tuesday is derived from a combination of the letters c and u, which when pronounced aloud sound like “see you,” and the first letters of the words next and Tuesday. This forms an acronym rebus that, when taken together, stands for cunt. The phrase is sometimes typed out as c u next Tuesday.
So, here’s some more Donnie Dotard and friends-related links if you are so inclined.
Jose Pagliery / The Daily Beast:
Trump PAC Paid to Investigate Stupidity of Trump’s Own LawyersSuzanne Blake / Newsweek:
Republicans Want New Hampshire to Leave United StatesAna Swanson / New York Times:
Trump’s Tariffs Hurt U.S. Jobs but Swayed American Voters, Study Says
Oh, it’s a folly holiday with Donnie. No wonder it’s Donnie we abhor!!! (With apologies to Burt, the Chimney Sweep.)
What’s on your reading and blogging list today?
John Buss, @repeat1968
The first English Translation of Alexander de Tocqueville’s”De La Démocratie en Amérique” (Democracy in America )was translated into English by Henry Reeves in 1835. It was Reeves who translated a section of the work that coined the phrase “the great experiment”. for Tocqueville’s phrase “devaient essayer,” which better translates into something more like “would attempt to build”. It seems apt that confusion about what our country is and was about is not something novel. JJ texted me David Dayen’s latest at The American Prospect earlier today. DDay explains in his compelling long-form essay, “America Is Not a Democracy. The movement to save democracy from threats is too quick to overlook the problems that have been present since the founding.”
The question has been, what did we do to arrive at this situation today? Many historical events- notably the Civil War and the Whiskey Rebellion- were violent rebellions. Many are more recent and just don’t get play in modern history books. I’ve always thought that Donald Trump and the worst of his advisors have always found ways and, indeed, are now finding better ways to exploit the loopholes that were opened in the Constitution. The document has obvious nods to slaveholders and wealthy white men in its construction and details. It may not have been kingdom and aristocracy based on birth, but it certainly gave a few classes of individuals more democracy than others. Have a good conversation with the survivors of all of the Indian Wars and Slavery, and you’ll see it still rocks our form of government.
Trump is a more than worthy subject of concern for anyone hoping for democracy in 2025. Last time he was president, he actively resisted the peaceful transfer of power, a hallmark of despots the world over. To the extent he and his authoritarian-friendly advisers learned anything from the first term, it was how to neutralize obstacles to expanding power. His musing about being a “dictator on day one” is really not loose talk. The plans emanating from Team Trump to destroy the civil service, hire government lawyers to rubber-stamp unconstitutional actions and prosecute personal enemies, and even deploy troops on American soil are truly alarming.
But something troubles me about that term, “threat to democracy.” It has become a catchall phrase for resistance to conservative extremism, and specifically Trump. Yet the deficiencies in American democracy go back to the very founding, and the long arc of history hasn’t come close to correcting all of them. The larger crisis we now face is not solely attributable to an individual with malign intent for our government; it’s more about the system of government itself.
Exactly what part of democracy are we trying to save? Is it our democratic legislature, gerrymandered and malapportioned beyond recognition, with supermajority thresholds that deny rule even by that corrupted majority? Is it our democratic presidency, which Trump legally took over after losing the popular vote in 2016, and George W. Bush in the same fashion 16 years earlier? Is it our democratic judiciary, morphed into a super-legislature and habitually twisting the Constitution to advantage those with power, money, and influence?
Are we worried about a democracy that can be so easily purchased, where corporate lobbyists either win whatever they want on Capitol Hill, or win by regulatory change or international trade treaty whatever they don’t? Has this government, where the most important modification of our democracy’s original sin, the second-class citizenship of Black people, is now being steadily reversed by state legislatures and the courts, earned our support? Is there despair over losing something that has produced unequal opportunity, unequal justice, and the conversion of economic power into political power? Where can we find this democracy we need to fight to preserve?
No democracy perfectly distills the will of the people. But America is uniquely terrible at achieving democratic outcomes. It’s worth focusing our energies to repair that, because the alternative really is too grim to contemplate. But there are only a few options here. We can defend “democracy” as an amorphous concept that this country has almost never lived up to. We can uncover escape hatches, short-term circumventions of the rules, either to disqualify Trump and the threat he represents, or to take action on policy challenges. We know the names of these band-aids: budget reconciliation, the Electoral Count Reform Act, the 14th Amendment.
But we don’t deserve to live as political Houdini figures, trying constantly to work our way out of shackles imposed on us by our own system of government. If a political movement is going to style itself as the savior of democracy, it should also speak plainly about the myriad deficiencies in our democracy, and what it would actually take to fix them.
Spend some time with it if you can. I did this morning. Here are some other reads to put into that framework. Phillip Bump writes about what’s going on at the Texas Border. It’s a horrifying event that will not reflect well on our future history.
Interest from the political right in policing the border is itself a long-established pattern. In 2006, after incidents involving self-appointed, right-wing border patrols had attracted national news attention, the Congressional Research Service compiled a report noting that vigilante efforts to confront border crossers extended back more than a century. The report also noted that such organized efforts, when not in violation of state or federal laws, had the right to exist.
In another social media post on Saturday, Trump exaggerated the danger posed by immigrants to the United States, 45 percent of whom in December were families or children traveling alone.
“Today we have a catastrophe waiting to happen. It is the WORST BORDER IN THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD,” he wrote. He added: “There is now a 100% chance that there will be MAJOR TERROR ATTACKS IN THE USA. CLOSE THE BORDER!”
This is the mix in play at the moment: Trumpian rhetoric, antagonism to federal law enforcement and armed individuals taking matters into their own hands, particularly at the border.
BB and I have both written about this situation last week. My MagRat Governor is one of those sending our Guard to interfere with the Federal Agents there. Greg Sargent updates us on how Trump and MAGA Republicans are trying to tank a border deal so Trump can make political hay from it.
The concerning words there are “ethnonationalist savagery.” This is from his new home at The New Republic. “GOP Senator Reveals the Sick Truth About the Trump-MAGA Border Scam. It’s not just that a deal might help Biden. It’s that a compromise bill now could prevent Trump and Stephen Miller from doing a much harsher bill later.”
Republican Senator James Lankford, who is leading negotiations over a border security bill, is discovering to his great shock that Donald Trump and MAGA Republicans are not operating entirely in good faith. Lankford went on the Sunday shows and appeared to admit that they are trying to kill his bill to deny President Biden a bipartisan victory.
That triggered a flurry of social media excitement. But his appearances revealed something deeper about this whole affair: Trump and MAGA Republicans can’t allow this bill to pass, not just for crass political reasons, but because it might succeed on the substance, denying them an opening to pass hideously onerous restrictions later.
Lankford’s first reveal came on Fox News Sunday, when he was asked why on Earth he’d act on the border if it might help Biden (on Fox, this is not a negative, just a statement of the obvious). Lankford noted that Republicans themselves demanded that funding for Ukraine and Israel be tied to border policy changes, and said he is merely trying to deliver what they asked for.
“Now, it’s interesting, a few months later, when we’re finally getting to the end, they’re like, ‘Just kidding, I actually don’t want a change in law because it’s a presidential election year,’” Lankford said, alluding to the open declaration from some Republicans that any compromise will deny Trump a weapon against Biden.
That alone is revealing enough. But it gets more interesting when viewed alongside what Lankford said on CBS’s Face the Nation. Anchor Margaret Brennan aired video of Trump urging Republicans to sink the deal, declaring: “I’d rather have no bill than a bad bill.”
Judd LeGum calls it the “Second Insurrection.”
Access to Shelby Park is important to federal authorities because it is used as a “staging area for policing and interdiction operations along the Rio Grande.” This includes the use of a boat ramp in the park to access the Rio Grande.
Texas’ seizure of Shelby Park and refusal to allow federal officials access have created an extremely dangerous situation. On January 12, three migrants — a woman and two children — drowned in the Rio Grande near the park. When Border Patrol agents went to Shelby Park to address the situation and help other migrants in distress, guardsmen from the Texas National Guard refused to let them enter, saying “they had been ordered not to allow Border Patrol access to the park.”
The legal battle between Texas and the federal government over Shelby Park began when Texas sued the federal government for cutting and removing some of the razor wire it installed along the Rio Grande. Border Patrol argued that the razor wire was putting its agents and migrants legally entitled to claim asylum at risk. Texas argued that the federal government was illegally destroying its property. The state eventually won an injunction from the Fifth Circuit of the United States Court of Appeals, prohibiting the federal government from disturbing Texas’ razor wire. The federal government, however, appealed to the Supreme Court. On January 22, in a brief order, the Supreme Court sided with the federal government and lifted the injunction.
Texas’ response to the Supreme Court order has been alarming. Abbott issued a statement stating that “[t]he federal government has broken the compact between the United States and the States.” Compact theory was championed by John C. Calhoun, one of the staunchest defenders of slavery. It essentially views states as “independent sovereigns” that are free to reject federal authority. It was used to justify the “nullification” of federal laws and, ultimately, secession from the union by Southern states.
The bill these folks want is nothing short of sending the “savages” to hell if need be. Meanwhile, while learning about the rule of law, Trump’s performances continue to be off-the-wall. This is from The Daily Beast. “Trump Throw Tantrum Over Court Monitor’s Financial Bombshell. ‘JAVERT LIKE QUEST’. A lawyer for the Trumps slammed Judge Barbara S. Jones in a court filing Monday morning, vehemently denying Trump lied about a missing $48 million loan.” Who would think we’d get a Les Mis reference from the Trump Lawyer Camp?
Now that the retired federal judge babysitting the Trump Organization has uncovered potential tax fraud at the company, the Trumps responded over the weekend by tasking their own accountant as a monitor that monitors the court monitor.
In an indignant court filing Monday morning, a lawyer for the Trumps for the first time launched an all-out attack on Judge Barbara S. Jones—calling her latest report on the family company an absolute lie, a cheap attempt to justify her government-mandated job, and a last-minute ploy to bolster the New York Attorney General’s bank fraud case that just wrapped up.
“Further oversight is unwarranted and will only unjustly enrich the monitor as she engages in some ‘Javert’ like quest,” he wrote, making a reference to the fictional French law enforcement officer in Victor Hugo’s Les Misérables, who’s defined by his obsessive pursuit and lack of empathy.
The Trumps also complained about the $2.6 million they’ve had to pay Jones to do her job, dismissing her findings wholesale.
“That the monitor seeks to now perpetuate this folly is beyond the pale,” wrote Clifford S. Robert, who represents the Trump family.
The counterpunch comes just days after Jones revealed a bombshell about former President Donald Trump’s finances. In the run-up to the AG’s trial against the Trumps for lying about real estate values, New York Supreme Court Justice Arthur F. Engoron ordered that a court monitor watch over the sprawling family company to ensure it doesn’t shift or hide assets ahead of a potentially huge judgment that could cripple the business empire. Since then, Jones has issued nearly half a dozen reports indicating that, for the most part, all is well.
That is, until Friday, when she updated Engoron with a report that, as The Daily Beast first reported, suggested Trump lied for years about a supposed personal loan he made to one of his own companies—sleight of hand that may have allowed him to dodge taxes on nearly $50 million in income.
“When I inquired about this loan, I was informed that there are no loan agreements that memorialize the loan, but that it was a loan that was believed to be between Donald J. Trump, individually, and Chicago Unit Acquisition for $48 million,” she wrote.
E Jean’s $83 million was the center of discussion at Good Morning America Today. She will also appear on the Rachel Maddow Show tonight. She appeared on GMA with her fantastic lawyer, Robbie Kaplan. This is from The Guardian. “E Jean Carroll aims to give defamation money ‘to something Trump hates’. Former Elle columnist tells Good Morning America: ‘If it’ll cause him pain for me to give money to certain things, that’s my intent’.” Irony is not dead.
E Jean Carroll intends to spend the $83m awarded to her in her defamation trial against Donald Trump on something the former president “hates”, she revealed just days after the judgment.
On Friday, the jury in Carroll’s case decided that she should receive $18.3m in compensatory damages and $65m punitive retribution in the case pitting her against Trump. Of the $18.3m, Trump was told to pay Carroll $11m to fund a reputational repair campaign and $7.3m for the emotional harm caused by statements he made against her in 2019.
Carroll and her legal team did not speak to reporters as they left court but broke their public silence on Monday in an interview with Good Morning America.
Alongside her lawyer Roberta Kaplan, Carroll told host George Stephanopoulos that Friday’s win had left her overcome with “elation”.
“It filled me up … It was almost painful,” she said, adding: “Today, I’m very happy.
Stephanopoulos asked her to give the public an idea as to how she planned to spend the millions of dollars she’s won, and Carroll provided a clear outline.
“I’d like to give the money to something Donald Trump hates,” Carroll said. “If it’ll cause him pain for me to give money to certain things, that’s my intent.”
Carroll also said that she would perhaps explore giving to “a fund for the women who have been sexually assaulted by Donald Trump”.
Trump went on his Truth Social platform to decry Friday’s decision as “absolutely ridiculous” and said he would be filing an appeal.
“Our Legal System is out of control, and being used as a Political Weapon,” Trump’s Truth Social post said in part. “THIS IS NOT AMERICA!”
Pointing to Trump’s combative response, Stephanopoulos asked Carroll’s attorney whether or not their side expected to collect the money awarded to them. Kaplan said that she was “pretty confident”.
“We might not get it right away. But one way or the other, he owns a lot of real estate. It can be sold. We will collect the judgment,” Kaplan said.
In the weeks leading up to the trial, Carroll revealed that she wasn’t sleeping or eating in anticipation of facing the former president.
There are a few things to like about this new “normal,” although most of it sucks eggs. The Justice Department is detaining a former IRS contractor for leaking the Tax Records of Trump and other toxic Billionaires. This is from NBC News. “Ex-IRS contractor sentenced to 5 years in prison for leaking Trump tax records. Charles Littlejohn had pleaded guilty to leaking thousands of tax records, including for Trump and billionaires like Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk.” I don’t suppose this could be considered whistle-blowing.
The former Internal Revenue Service contractor who leaked the tax records of former President Donald Trump to The New York Times as well as the tax records of billionaires like Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk to ProPublica was sentenced Monday to five years in prison.
Charles Littlejohn pleaded guilty in October, and prosecutors sought the statutory maximum of five years in federal prison, saying that he “abused his position by unlawfully disclosing thousands of Americans’ federal tax returns and other private financial information to multiple news organizations.” Prosecutors said that Littlejohn “weaponized his access to unmasked taxpayer data to further his own personal, political agenda, believing that he was above the law.”
Littlejohn was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Ana C. Reyes at a hearing at the federal courthouse in Washington. He will also have to pay a $5,000 fine.
“You can be an outstanding person and commit bad acts,” Reyes said. “What you did in targeting the sitting president of the United States was an attack on our constitutional democracy,” she added.
Reyes compared Littlejohn’s actions to other recent attacks and threats against elected officials as well as to Jan. 6 defendants she has recently sentenced. She described his actions as a deliberate, complex, multiyear criminal scheme, but said she believed he “sincerely felt a moral imperative” to act as he did.
Littlejohn’s attorney argued that he had committed the offense “out of a deep, moral belief that the American people had a right to know the information and sharing it was the only way to effect change” and that he believed he was right at the time.
I imagine if we compare the trial of this man to Trump, we’d get a huge contrast in what it’s like to be treated like a criminal. But just about any other criminal in the system will be treated less humanely than the former guy. They’d have shot him by now if he was black. Are rights applied differently real rights in a real democracy? Asking for a friend.
Well, this is getting long, and I need to eat some lunch. I hope y’all have a good week!
What’s on your reading and blogging list today?
“Thanks, Dakinikat, for putting this in my head; I couldn’t sleep last night.” John Buss @repeat1968
It’s yet another crazy day with Donnie Dotard! Have you ever heard of one person indicted on 91 felonies in 2 state courts and several Federal venues out running amok on bail? There are so many articles out there that show how unfit this man is for office, and it’s not even funny! Let’s start out with this one at The Independent. Trump’s temper tantrums should land him in a jail cell and he almost did. “Donald Trump storms out of closing arguments in E Jean Carroll trial, The former president continued to attack the woman suing him for defamation after his testimony on Thursday.”
Roughly 20 minutes after walking into the courtroom, Donald Trump stormed out of closing arguments in a civil trial to determine how much money he owes E Jean Carroll for repeatedly defaming her.
The former president arrived in federal court in Manhattan on Friday morning after briefly testifying in his defence on Thursday afternoon, after which he unleashed more attacks and potentially defamatory statements about the former Elle magazine columnist.
In her closing statement, Ms Carroll’s attorney Roberta Kaplan told jurors that the former president “acts as if these rules of law just don’t apply to him.”
His attacks didn’t stop after he was found liable for defamation and sexual abuse in a $5m jury verdict, she noted.
“Not at all,” Ms Kaplan said. “Not even for 24 hours.”
Mr Trump then stood up from the defence table, where he was seated next to attorney Alina Habba, and walked out of the hearing, to which he had arrived late.
“The record will reflect that Mr Trump just rose and walked out of the courtroom,” US District Judge Lewis Kaplan said.
Mr Trump returned to the courtroom for defence closing arguments from Ms Habba.
As he returned to the courtroom, his Truth Social account fired off several posts repeating incendiary and potentially defamatory claims about the case, claiming he is a victim of “extortion” and falsely labelling the case a “Joe Biden-directed Election Interference Attack” against him.
I really feel for this judge who has had to deal with this idiot for more than time than would be humanly possible for most people. Adam Klasfeld–The Messenger–reports this. “Judge Threatens to Send Trump Lawyer Alina Habba ‘in the Lockup’ at E. Jean Carroll Trial. The blockbuster remark came moments before closing arguments in Trump’s second trial in a case brought by E. Jean Carroll.”
A federal judge threatened Donald Trump’s attorney Alina Habba with jail time on Friday, after the former president’s lawyer kept contesting a ruling after it had been issued.
“You are on the verge of spending some time in the lockup,” senior U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan warned. “Sit down.”
The bombshell remark came moments before the start of opening statements in Trump’s second trial in a case brought by writer E. Jean Carroll.
Before the jury was let into court, Carroll and Trump’s attorneys had debated the boundaries for their closing arguments. Habba’s co-counsel Michael Madaio had sought to arguing about what he could display in a slideshow to jurors before his summations began, and Carroll’s legal team objected to the presentation of messages that were not entered into evidence.
Judge Kaplan sided with Carroll’s legal team, and Madaio unsuccessfully tried to urge the judge to reconsider his ruling. That’s when Habba jumped up and pressed on, insisting that she had to make a record. She stopped pushing her case after Kaplan threatened her with incarceration.
The jury then entered, and Carroll’s lead attorney Roberta Kaplan — who shares a name with but isn’t related to the judge — began her closing arguments.
His cognitive decline has been evident these days. This is from The New Republic. “Cognitive Decline? Listen to Trump Try to Describe Missile Defense. “Ding, ding, ding, boom, whoosh!”.”
Donald Trump took the road less traveled on Monday, opting to use sounds and shapes rather than words to explain what he had in mind for America’s military.
During a campaign stop in Laconia, New Hampshire—the last rally before the state’s Republican primary—Trump announced that under his leadership, the country would copy and paste Israel’s Iron Dome defense system over our own national borders. That idea, by the way, has previously earned him ridicule even by the likes of Fox News.
“I will build an Iron Dome over our country, a state-of-the-art missile defense shield made in the USA,” Trump said. “We do it for other countries. We help other countries, we build, we don’t do it for ourselves.”
But then, things got weird as Trump tried once again to assert his “extremely stable genius” status.
“These are not muscle guys here, they’re muscle guys up here, right,” Trump said, gesturing to his arms and then his head.
“And they calmly walk to us, and ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding.… They’ve only got 17 seconds to figure this whole thing out. Boom. OK. Missile launch. Woosh. Boom,” he added.
The stunning performance comes after the 77-year-old bragged that he “aced” a cognitive test that required him to correctly identify a giraffe, tiger, and whale. According to Trump, that means his “mind is stronger now than it was 25 years ago.” In reality, that test is meant to measure dementia or cognitive decline, and it has never included the combination of animals Trump keeps mentioning.
Trump’s cognitive decline has been in question recently after the GOP front-runner was spotted with mysterious red sores on his hands. Trump has also been making increasingly nonsense remarks during his campaign tangents—last week, the former president said he would stop banks from “debanking” Americans—and confusing major players in American politics. During another campaign speech, Trump switched up former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and his only rival in the GOP race, former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley, several times, blaming Haley for the events of January 6 while claiming she turned down extra security. (The House committee assigned to probe the attack found no evidence to support Trump’s claim, which he has previously leveled at Pelosi.)
Trump’s political performances are just altogether weird. They are completely inappropriate–once again–for any one running for any office let alone the U.S. Presidency. This is from Stephan Robinson writing at Public Notice. “Trump’s stubborn defiance of normal political gravity. Trump’s Haley/Pelosi gaffe would’ve ended most campaigns. For him it was just another Friday.”
One week ago tonight in New Hampshire, Donald Trump confused Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley with former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi — and it wasn’t a mere slip of the tongue.
Trump went on a full-length tear accusing his primary opponent of failing to secure the Capitol on January 6, despite the fact Haley wasn’t even in government at the time. (What Trump was trying to say still would’ve been a grotesque lie even if he’d gotten the names right.)
“You know, by the way, they never report the crowd on January 6,” he began. “You know, Nikki Haley, Nikki Haley, Nikki Haley. Do you know that they destroyed all of the information, all of the evidence, everything. Deleted and destroyed all of it. All of it. Because of lots of things, like Nikki Haley is in charge of security. We offered her security, 10,000 people, soldiers, National Guard, whatever they want, they turned it down. They don’t want to talk about that.”
That sad spectacle would’ve devastated any normal candidate’s campaign. Several political commentators from Pod Save America co-host Dan Pfeiffer to David Corn at Mother Jones noted on social media with almost rueful resignation that had Biden done this, it would’ve dominated the news cycle. Alas, Trump is different. His staff didn’t even really try to clean the gaffe up, and he beat Haley in New Hampshire by double digits a few days later. How is that possible?
Indeed, how is this possible? I love this analysis.
The media grades Trump on an infinity curve
Although most media outlets did state categorically that Trump mixed up Haley with Pelosi, they failed to connect it to a larger narrative. Instead, they just … moved on. Compare this to the “Rubio bot” aftermath when the New York Times declared, ”How a Debate Misstep Sent Marco Rubio Tumbling in New Hampshire.” Journalist Molly Jong-Fast wondered, “Donald Trump confused Nancy Pelosi with Nikki Haley and Joe Biden with Barack Obama. Where are the ‘is Donald Trump too old’ think pieces?” But that might also miss a larger point: A narrative that Trump is “too old” or has “lost a step” since 2016 minimizes his threat. He’s not even trying to hide that he aspires to become a dictator.
Trump has interfered with current Congressional negotiations on the situation at the border just because the chaos suits his campaign goals. This is utter madness. This happens as the Governor of Texas has decided to ignore a Supreme Court Ruling. This is from U.S News & World Report as reported by the Associated Press.
A politically treacherous dynamic is taking hold as negotiators in Congress work to strike a bipartisan deal on the border and immigration, with vocal opposition from the hard right and former President Donald Trump threatening to topple the carefully
Senators are closing in on the details of an agreement on border measures that could unlock Republican support for Ukraine aid and hope to unveil it as soon as next week. But the deal is already wobbling, as House Speaker Mike Johnson faces intense pressure from Trump and his House allies to demand more sweeping concessions from Democrats and the White House.
“I do not think we should do a Border Deal, at all, unless we get EVERYTHING needed to shut down the INVASION of Millions & Millions of people,” Trump posted on social media this week.
It’s a familiar political dynamic, one that has repeatedly thwarted attempts to reform U.S. immigration law, including in 2013 when House Republicans sought to pin illegal immigration on a Democratic president and in 2018 when Trump helped sink another bipartisan effort. The path for legislation this time around is further clouded by an election year in which Trump has once again made railing against illegal immigration a central focus of his campaign.
Well, it done wobbled. This report is from CNN. “GOP senators seethe as Trump blows up delicate immigration compromise.”Election-Year Politics Threaten Senate Border Deal as Trump and His Allies Rally Opposition,” What role is there in current policy for a deranged, convicted rapist, and insurrectionist who has been indicted 91 times for his crimes against our country? He’s also pushing Policies friendly for Putin’s ugly regime.
Senior Senate Republicans are furious that Donald Trump may have killed an emerging bipartisan deal over the southern border, depriving them of a key legislative achievement on a pressing national priority and offering a preview of what’s to come with Trump as their likely presidential nominee.
In recent weeks, Trump has been lobbying Republicans both in private conversations and in public statements on social media to oppose the border compromise being delicately hashed out in the Senate, according to GOP sources familiar with the conversations – in part because he wants to campaign on the issue this November and doesn’t want President Joe Biden to score a victory in an area where he is politically vulnerable.
Senate GOP Leader Mitch McConnell acknowledged in a private meeting on Wednesday that Trump’s animosity toward the yet-to-be-released border deal puts Republicans in a serious bind as they try to move forward on the already complex issue. For weeks, Republicans have been warning that Trump’s opposition could blow up the bipartisan proposal, but the admission from McConnell was particularly striking, given he has been a chief advocate for a border-Ukraine package.
Now, Republicans on Capitol Hill are grappling with the reality that most in the GOP areloathe to do anything that is seen as potentially undermining the former president. And the prospects of a deal being scuttled before it has even been finalized has sparked tensions and confusion in the Senate GOP as they try to figure out if, and how, to proceed – even as McConnell made clear during party lunches Thursday that he remains firmly behind the effort to strike a deal, according to attendees.
“I think the border is a very important issue for Donald Trump. And the fact that he would communicate to Republican senators and congresspeople that he doesn’t want us to solve the border problem because he wants to blame Biden for it is … really appalling,” said GOP Sen. Mitt Romney of Utah, who has been an outspoken critic of Trump.
He added, “But the reality is that, that we have a crisis at the border, the American people are suffering as a result of what’s happening at the border. And someone running for president not to try and get the problem solved. as opposed to saying, ‘hey, save that problem. Don’t solve it. Let me take credit for solving it later.’”
GOP Sen. Todd Young of Indiana called any efforts to disrupt the ongoing negotiations “tragic” and said: “I hope no one is trying to take this away for campaign purposes.”
How do we get rid of this meddlesome former guy? The Border Standoff now includes multiple Governors defying a Supreme Court ruling as I mentioned above. This is playing with fire. PBS News Hour has this headline. “Border standoff between Texas, feds intensifies as governor defies Supreme Court ruling.” My stupid-ass governor as well as others are joining in the defiance. This is from a transcript of an interview of Stephen Vladeck, a professor at the University of Texas School of Law by Laura Barron-Lopez.
Laura Barron-Lopez:
And Governor Abbott is claiming that he has this authority under the U.S. Constitution because the federal government isn’t protecting Texas against a — quote — “invasion.” That’s the way he’s been describing it.
Is this a reasonable interpretation of the Constitution?
Steve Vladeck:
No, and in two different respects.
I mean, the first is that, obviously, an influx of asylum seekers, however many we’re talking about, is not what the founders had in mind when they used the word invasion. But, Laura, second, even if you’re not persuaded by that, the clause Governor Abbott’s relying on in Article 1, Section 10 of the Constitution was dealing with the specific scenario of the ability of states to respond to invasions until federal authorities were able to respond.
This is the time in American history when the federal military was small. It was very spread out. It took weeks to travel. Congress was usually out of session. There’s no support in our history, there’s no support in founding or other materials for the idea that states can decide for themselves that they’re under invasion, and, even if the federal government disagrees, that somehow it’s the state’s determination that would control.
Laura Barron-Lopez:
Recently, three migrants drowned in the Rio Grande in this section that Border Patrol agents have been trying to access.
And all this comes as a number of Republican governors still say that they support Texas, that they stand by Texas. What are the larger implications of this standoff between Texas and the federal government?
Steve Vladeck:
I mean, the larger implications are pretty staggering.
It’s not just the specter of a physical confrontation between federal and Texas officials along the border in Eagle Pass. It’s also basically a relegation of a debate that we had in American law for the first 70 years of this country about the ability of states to effectively nullify those federal laws that they disagreed with, that they thought were unconstitutional.
For better or for worse in our constitutional system, federal law supersedes state law, even when we don’t like how the federal government is or is not enforcing those federal laws. The remedies for those disagreements are not to allow every state to go out on their own and to have their own policies.
The remedies, if you really have a problem with the policies, is to change the people who are making them. Otherwise, it’s a federal system, Laura, in name only.
Laura Barron-Lopez:
And Governor Abbott also claims that the federal government has — quote — “broken the compact with states.”
Where have — what do you think he means by that? And have states in the past used that language to justify defying the federal government?
Steve Vladeck:
Yes, I mean, the compact theory of the Constitution is a pretty outlier view, especially these days, about the way the Constitution was formed.
The basic premise is that the federal government, the constitutional system we have was formed by the states, and, therefore, the states can control its terms. That was the argument on which the Southern states predicated secession and helped to precipitate the Civil War. There’s a reason why we tend not to hear that much of it these days.
Again, I mean, I think there’s a lot of folks who are going to have strong views about whether the Biden administration is or isn’t doing what’s best for the country at the border. But the way to air those disagreements is through the federal electoral process.
In a world in which states can follow this version of the compact theory as a justification for interfering with federal authority, what’s to stop California from doing that to the next Republican president? What’s to stop Vermont from doing that to the next Republican president? And then we’re talking about a system in which the states have all the power, and the federal government is basically impotent to do anything.
Laura Barron-Lopez:
And Governor Abbott also claims that the federal government has — quote — “broken the compact with states.”
Where have — what do you think he means by that? And have states in the past used that language to justify defying the federal government?
Steve Vladeck:
Yes, I mean, the compact theory of the Constitution is a pretty outlier view, especially these days, about the way the Constitution was formed.
The basic premise is that the federal government, the constitutional system we have was formed by the states, and, therefore, the states can control its terms. That was the argument on which the Southern states predicated secession and helped to precipitate the Civil War. There’s a reason why we tend not to hear that much of it these days.
Again, I mean, I think there’s a lot of folks who are going to have strong views about whether the Biden administration is or isn’t doing what’s best for the country at the border. But the way to air those disagreements is through the federal electoral process.
In a world in which states can follow this version of the compact theory as a justification for interfering with federal authority, what’s to stop California from doing that to the next Republican president? What’s to stop Vermont from doing that to the next Republican president? And then we’re talking about a system in which the states have all the power, and the federal government is basically impotent to do anything.
This is another example of hour Republicans are basically trying to destroy our system of government. It’s coming from all sides. I’m not sure this will all end even if Trump manages to choke on McDonald’s fries and head off to a different hell realm out of our reality.
What’s on your reading and blogging list today?
Here we are, faced with choice
Shutters and walls or open embrace
Like it or not, the human race
Is us all
History is what it is
Scars we inflict on each other don’t die
But slowly soak into the DNA
Of us all
Of us all
Us all
I pray we not fear to love
I pray we be free of judgement and shame
Open the vein, let kindness rain
O’er us all
O’er us all
O’er us all
Us all
Songwriters: Bruce Cockburn
Welcome back to the fold, DeSantis. John Buss, @Repeat1968
We no longer have Ron DeSantis to kick around! Well, we’ll still kick him around for a least a few more days here. He’s such an easy target. DeSantis ended his bizarro world campaign with a hat tip to a fake Churchill Quote just before bending the knee. This is from The Daily Beast. Jake Lahut has the coverage. “DeSantis Campaign Uses Fake Churchill Quote in Final Message. “The International Churchill Society once referred to it as “a double misquote” in a blog post on the same set of words.” I’m pretty sure SNL will have a heyday with this one. His campaign was as misbegotten as his personality. Do all Republicans appear to have Personality Disorders, or is it just my take from the few courses I took at University?
The Ron DeSantis large language model appeared to hallucinate on Sunday, with the campaign running an apparently fake Winston Churchill quote as the title of the candidate’s drop-out announcement video.
It was a fitting touch for a campaign whose launch was a glitchy mess on Twitter, ending with another farce on the same site now called X.
“Defeat is never fatal. Victory is never final: it is the courage to continue that counts,” the quote attributed to Churchill by the DeSantis campaign read.
Unfortunately, Churchill not only never said that, but he didn’t even say the next closest quote that’s more commonly falsely attributed to him—amounting to what the International Churchill Society once referred to as “a double misquote” in a blog post on the same set of words.
According to the Churchill remembrance outfit, the former British prime minister and military leader never said anything close to the phrase that the DeSantis campaign attributed to him.
“Ok, one more toon drop in celebration of the glorious crash and burn that was Awkward Himmler’s campaign of cringe.” Jesse Duquette.
I’m not sure these days how some of these folks even made it out the door for kindergarten, let alone a public career. Bye, Felicia!
NBC News has this analysis of the crash and burn. “‘A total failure to launch’: Why Ron DeSantis was doomed from the start. Muddled messages, hiring too many staffers and even a puzzle — how it all went wrong for DeSantis’ presidential bid.” I thought this guy was the worst candidate I’ve ever seen. No amount of high-paid staffers and public relations gurus can correct that. I really wonder about the brains of those Dark Money Billionaires that got behind him. I think a toddler could slice and dice this disaster.
Iowa was supposed to be make-or-break for Ron DeSantis.
The Florida governor essentially moved his campaign there late last year, and Never Back Down, his allied super PAC, spent tens of millions of dollars knocking on doors in the state.
“We’re going to win Iowa,” DeSantis declared on NBC’s “Meet the Press” on Dec. 2
But in the week before the all-important caucuses, Scott Wagner, the recently installed head of the super PAC, was doing something that aides found puzzling: He was literally doing a puzzle.
In the headquarters of Never Back Down in West Des Moines, Iowa, Wagner was, according to some of his staff, spending a significant amount of time in the precious final few days constructing a peaceful 1,000-piece jigsaw puzzle of a landscape.
In a photo taken on Jan. 9, shared with NBC News by a Never Back Down team member, others in the room were hunched over their laptops.
“Staffers are putting their dedication and devotion to electing Gov. DeSantis and they come in and the CEO, the chairman of the organization, is sitting there working on a puzzle for hours,” said a Never Back Down staffer who was there.
Another Never Back Down staffer also said Wagner worked on it for “hours” in the week before Iowa.
Let me reconsider the value of those “high-paid staffers and public relations gurus.” My guess is they’ll never put Humpty DeSantis back together again. This guy probably put that “Churchill” quote in the final speech.
The fact that one of the top people in charge of securing a win for DeSantis in Iowa was spending time on something unrelated to the caucuses was emblematic of the mismanagement and wasted efforts that many of DeSantis’ own supporters say have plagued the campaign from the very beginning.
In a comment to NBC News, Wagner noted that the “office puzzle” was “there when we arrived” and “became a sense of pride for the entire team and everyone chipped in a few minutes a piece to get it done.”
“I could not be more proud of every person in our Iowa office. I came out to work with our Iowa team and our incredible COO Jordan Wiggins in person for the final two week push in Iowa and I came away with a group of people I would go to war with any time, anywhere. We worked non-stop together on operations in terrible weather conditions,” he said, adding, “The operation worked nearly 24/7 throughout for the Gov and was absolutely seamless. I am so proud of what we achieved in Iowa and will achieve beyond.”
Desantis quit and then endorsed Orange Caligula. This is from the New York Times. “Ron DeSantis Ends Campaign for President. The Florida governor, who once appeared to be Donald Trump’s most daunting challenger, ran a costly, turbulent campaign that failed to catch on with Republican voters.” Is it just me, or do all these headlines sound like something that should be in a film noir review?
Mr. DeSantis’s devastating 30-percentage-point loss to Mr. Trump in the Iowa caucuses last Monday had left him facing a daunting question: Why keep going? On Sunday, he provided his answer, acknowledging there was no point in soldiering on without a “clear path to victory.”
“I am today suspending my campaign,” Mr. DeSantis said in a video posted after The New York Times reported he was expected to leave the race, adding: “Trump is superior to the current incumbent, Joe Biden. That is clear. I signed a pledge to support the Republican nominee, and I will honor that pledge. He has my endorsement because we can’t go back to the old Republican guard of yesteryear.”
Tell that to all those folk still pissing themselves and lying about the presidency of Ronald Reagan.
Peter Wehner–writing at The Atlantic–has the bigger picture. “The Party of Malice. Donald Trump has made the Republican Party cruel, xenophobic, exclusionary, and bigoted.” Ya think? But, after all that’s what they were going for with the Southern Strategy, right? Ronald Reagan announced his presidency with a slap in the face-like hint. Republicans have been after this a long time since John Brown and Abe Lincoln’s bodies have been moldering in the grave. Reagan read it like the C-level actor he was over and over. But back to the current state of the party.
You knew it was coming.
As soon as former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley emerged as the main threat to Donald Trump in the battle for the Republican nomination, it became inevitable that she would be targeted by him. Any front-runner would do the same thing. But Trump did it with his typical touch.
Last week, Trump reposted on his Truth Social account a conspiracy theory that Haley, who was born in South Carolina, was not qualified to be president because her parents, born in India, were not U.S. citizens at the time of her birth. In fact, the Fourteenth Amendment establishes that any person born on American soil is a citizen of the United States and therefore can serve as president.
Last Tuesday, Trump decided to ratchet up the racism a few notches. On Truth Social, he wrote this about his former ambassador to the United Nations:
Anyone listening to Nikki “Nimrada” Haley’s wacked out speech last night, would think that she won the Iowa Primary. She didn’t, and she couldn’t even beat a very flawed Ron DeSanctimonious, who’s out of money, and out of hope. Nikki came in a distant THIRD! She said she would never run against me, “he was a great President,” and she should have followed her own advice. Now she’s stuck with WEAK POLICIES, and a VERY STRONG MAGA BASE, and there’s just nothing she can do!
That was three days ago. Dark Brandon isn’t waiting for the New Hampshire Primary tomorrow.
Why wait for Haley to throw in the towel? They have attacked Trump in a series of new ads. This is from The Hill. “Biden campaign features OB-GYN who left Texas for abortion in new ad.”
President Biden’s reelection campaign on Monday dropped an ad to mark the 51st anniversary of Roe v. Wade that features an OB-GYN who couldn’t receive an abortion in Texas after the landmark law was overturned
The 60-second ad, entitled “Forced,” is narrated by Dr. Austin Dennard, an OB-GYN in Texas and mother of three, who placed the blame squarely on former President Trump, the GOP front-runner in the 2024 election, for having to leave the state for the procedure.
Dennard said in the ad she had a planned pregnancy two years ago and learned the fetus had a fatal condition with no chance of survival.
“In Texas, you are forced to carry that pregnancy and that is because of Donald Trump overturning Roe v. Wade. The choice was completely taken away. I was to continue my pregnancy, putting my life at risk,” she added.
The ad went live Monday in battleground states and will broadcast nationally during the season premiere of ABC’s “The Bachelor.” It will also run on channels like HGTV, TLC, Bravo, Hallmark, Food Network, and Oxygen, according to the Biden campaign.
It hits right at the heart of Trump being in charge of turning women into walking coffins. That will be one of the core issues of 2024. But also, Dark Brandon and company have gone for Trump’s jugular. His mental decline is oblivious. They even dare to use Nikki against him.
Other issues haunt Trump. He’s got all those court appearances and trials. This is from Ankush Khardori, who is writing for Politico. “Polls Show Trump Could Be Doomed If He’s Convicted. Will a Trial Happen in Time? Here’s the real timeline for Trump’s criminal trials. “
The results in Iowa last week were a win for Donald Trump, but they also underscored that the former president’s ongoing legal troubles are among his biggest liabilities in a rematch with Joe Biden.
Nearly a third of Republican caucusgoers told pollsters that Trump would not be “fit” for the presidency if he is convicted of a crime — a sizable defection that, if it held, would likely doom Trump’s general election chances.
Polling in this area is challenging, so it is best to take this figure with a considerable grain of salt. Some portion of these people, for instance, may believe Trump would literally be incapable of serving as president if convicted of a crime — perhaps because he would immediately be hauled off to prison or disqualified — which is not true, and which they would eventually come to learn if things moved in that direction.
But what is clear is that some lingering courtroom questions are now essential electoral questions as well: When will Trump’s myriad trials take place? And can any jury deliver a verdict before this November?
The answers are crucial to understanding how the 2024 campaign could ultimately unfold. Over the coming year, federal and state prosecutors, defense attorneys and judges — including the Supreme Court — will have to maneuver amid an inflexible political calendar. Here’s the timeline for how it’s likely to go.
Hurry! … Oops, too late. The Disgraced Former Guy running again and again and again. John Buss,@repeat1968
Khadori argues that “Among All Trump’s Trials, the Jan. 6 Case Is Key. For both political and legal reasons, the most important case is the Justice Department’s prosecution over Trump’s effort to overturn the 2020 election.” You may read more at the link.
This one story is from The Washington Post, where Trump’s antics have been outrageous. ” In Judge Kaplan’s court, Trump plays with fire. “
In the high-stakes world of presidential trials, there are no judges like Lewis A. Kaplan.
At 79, after decades on the bench, the senior judge is one of the most well-regarded legal minds in New York. And he has a unique history that makes Donald Trump’s courtroom behavior over the past
Trump is on trial in a civil case as writer E. Jean Carroll seeks damages from Trump, who has been found liable for defaming her when he made disparaging remarks denying he sexually assaulted her decades ago in a department store.
Trump has claimed that he intends to testify in the case on Monday — which would probably produce a dramatic courtroom showdown. But it’s unclear whether Trump will really show up. For one thing, he has made similar claims in the past, then not appeared. For another, Tuesday is the New Hampshire primary, and Trump is again running for president.
If he does testify, legal experts said, his time on the witness stand could be something akin to a suicide mission.
Over the past week, Kaplan’s handling of the damages trial in Lower Manhattan shows how different a federal courtroom is from most other parts of public life — even state court, where Trump and his lawyers had more leeway to squabble with a judge overseeing a different civil trial in another New York courthouse over the past several months. Kaplan has not tolerated similar behavior, and Trump has railed on social media that the federal judge is “a totally biased and hostile person.”
The former president claimed that he only lost a previous lawsuit brought by Carroll over the sexual assault and a different set of defamatory commentsbecause he didn’t appear in court personally. Kaplan oversaw that lawsuit, too.
In recent weeks, Trump has been attending more court hearings than he needs to, seemingly deciding that the best way to fight his legal critics — and win the GOP nomination — is to try to shout them down. He has spoken out of turn in the courtroom and denounced the proceedings.
Legal experts warn that if he does so on the witness stand in Kaplan’s courtroom, he could end up humiliated and threatened with contempt of court.
Robert Katzberg, a veteran New York white-collar criminal defense lawyer, said Kaplan is “the worst possible draw for Trump,” not because of any personal or political bias, but because of the type of judge he is.
“He’s really smart and takes no guff from either side. He expects lawyers to be professional and toe the line, and if they do not, holds them accountable,” said Katzberg, who is now consulting counsel for Holland & Knight.
“Even if you had the most pro-Trump judge in America overseeing the trial, Donald Trump should not testify. Multiply that by a million with Lewis Kaplan on the bench,” he said. “Given both his lack of any relevant facts as to the only issue remaining — the damages suffered by Ms. Carroll — and Donald Trump’s inability to control himself emotionally, he is begging not only to be debased before the jury, but contempt citations will be looming large.”
Media outlets are already taking notice of Biden’s ads and the basic look of Trump in Court. So are Political Cartoonists! This is from The Guardian. “Video released of petulant Trump in civil fraud trial deposition. Smirking, pouting and defiant ex-president bragged about properties and claimed he prevented nuclear war with North Korea.”
Months before Donald Trump’s defiant turn as a witness at his New York civil fraud trial, the former president came face to face with the state attorney general who is suing him when he sat for a deposition last year at her Manhattan office.
Video made public on Friday of the seven-hour, closed-door session last April shows the Republican presidential frontrunner’s demeanor going from calm and cool to indignant – at one point ripping into the lawsuit of the attorney general, Letitia James, against him as a “disgrace” and “a terrible thing”.
Sitting with arms folded, an incredulous Trump complained to the state lawyer questioning him that he was being forced to “justify myself to you” after decades of success building a real estate empire that is now threatened by the court case.
Trump, who contends James’s lawsuit is part of a politically motivated “witch-hunt”, was demonstrative from the outset. The video shows him smirking and pouting as the attorney general, a Democrat, introduced herself and told him that she was “committed to a fair and impartial legal process”.
James’s office released the video on Friday in response to requests from media outlets under New York’s Freedom of Information Law. Trump’s lawyers previously posted a transcript of his remarks to the trial docket in August.
James’s lawsuit accuses Trump, his company and top executives of defrauding banks, insurers, and others by inflating his wealth and exaggerating the value of assets on annual financial statements used to secure loans and make deals.
Judge Arthur Engoron, who will decide the case because a jury is not allowed in this type of lawsuit, has said he hopes to have a ruling by the end of January.
Friday’s video is a rare chance for the public at large to see Trump as a witness.
Sahil Kapur of NBC reports this headline as Democratic candidates look poised to flip some seats. ‘It’s embarrassing’: Republicans worry they have no achievements to run on in 2024. Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, has openly questioned whether the GOP deserves to keep the House majority, lamenting the lack of accomplishments this Congress. He’s not alone.” Ah, poor widdle babies.
When Congress began the new year, Rep. Andy Biggs gave a television interview and made a startling confession: House Republicans have done nothing they can run on.
“We have nothing. In my opinion, we have nothing to go out there and campaign on,” the Arizona Republican said on the conservative network Newsmax. “It’s embarrassing.”
Anchor Chris Salcedo responded with a bemused chuckle. “I know,” he said. “The Republican Party in the Congress majority has zero accomplishments.”
The exchange captured a dynamic that looms over Republican lawmakers heading into the 2024 election: They’ve passed little substantive legislation since winning the majority in 2022 and struggled to do the basics of governing with a Democratic-led Senate. Their first year was instead marked by fractiousness and chaos, complicating the party’s pitch to voters this fall. The challenge is accentuated by likely GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump making “retribution” against his enemies, rather than shared policy goals, the centerpiece of his comeback bid as he continues to spread fabricated claims that the 2020 election was stolen from him.
With 10 months until Election Day, Republicans still have a few opportunities to salvage what has been a historically unproductive congressional session and pass new laws in the divided government.
A spending deal between House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., gives the GOP a chance to achieve spending cuts. A potential Senate immigration deal gives them an opportunity to toughen asylum and border laws. And a bipartisan tax bill that overwhelmingly passed through committee on Friday presents a rare opening to deliver tax breaks for GOP backers in the business community.
Yet none of those measures are guaranteed to become law. Right-wing members, including Biggs, are rebelling against some of them for being insufficiently conservative. The emerging immigration bill’s prospects may hinge on Trump, who is seeking to wield chaos at the border as a weapon against President Joe Biden in the general election.
The tax bill faces some skepticism from Senate Republicans and fierce opposition from the business-aligned Wall Street Journal editorial board, which complained that it would “give Democrats a huge policy victory” on the child credit. “Republicans haven’t done much in the 118th Congress, and in their scramble to compensate they may now do real policy harm,” the paper wrote.
It’s not looking like Trump or Republicans have the momentum right now, even though polls don’t reflect that. I’m waiting until at least Super Tuesday to really take any poll seriously. I’m just focused on the insane weather around me right now. It’s supposed to get better tomorrow. I hope you have some bright and sunny days! No matter where you are, it will not be bright or sunny during the election 2024 season.
What’s on your reading and blogging list today?
peej
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ecocatwoman
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Mama Lopez
peggysue22
quixote
skydancingguestblogger
Mona (aka Wonk the Vote)
Memeorandum Crooks and Liars Democracy NOW The UK Guardian
The Sky Dancing banner headline uses a snippet from a work by artist Tashi Mannox called 'Rainbow Study'. The work is described as a" study of typical Tibetan rainbow clouds, that feature in Thanka painting, temple decoration and silk brocades". dakinikat was immediately drawn to the image when trying to find stylized Tibetan Clouds to represent Sky Dancing. It is probably because Tashi's practice is similar to her own. His updated take on the clouds that fill the collection of traditional thankas is quite special.
You can find his work at his website by clicking on his logo below. He is also a calligraphy artist that uses important vajrayana syllables. We encourage you to visit his on line studio.
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