Place: Atlanta Ga., U.S.A. Date: 1993 Credit: The Carter Center
Good Day, Sky Dancers!
Before I start kvetching about Appeals Courts today, I’d like to join the country in its appreciation of Former First Lady Rosalynn Carter, who passed this weekend at 96. Former President Jimmy Carter got the very first vote I cast in a Presidential election. I was at University and remember those turbulent times well. The Israel-Palestine conflict was as ghastly then as it is now. Iran introduced itself by capturing U.S. hostages from our Embassy there. Inflation was roaring. Rosalynn Carter was the face of humanitarian efforts during that one term. She was also active in trying to get the ERA passed and brought a new perspective to the treatment of people with mental illness and the elderly. The Carters’ work with Habitat for Humanity is the stuff of legends. She was both a social justice warrior and a humanitarian.
This is the tribute given to her by NBC News’ Daniel Arkin.
Rosalynn Carter, the former first lady and humanitarian who championed mental health care, provided constant political counsel to her husband, former President Jimmy Carter, and modeled graceful longevity for the nation, died Sunday at her home in Plains, Georgia, according to the Carter Center.
In a statement, former President Carter said: “Rosalynn was my equal partner in everything I ever accomplished. She gave me wise guidance and encouragement when I needed it. As long as Rosalynn was in the world, I always knew somebody loved and supported me.”
Rosalynn Carter was widely regarded for her political shrewdness, drawing particular praise for her keen electoral instincts, down-to-earth appeal, and work on behalf of the White House, including serving as an envoy to Latin America.
She devoted herself to several social causes in the course of her public life, including programs that supported health care resources, human rights, social justice and the needs of elderly people.
“Twenty-five years ago, we did not dream that people might someday be able actually to recover from mental illnesses,” Carter said at a mental health symposium in 2003. “Today it is a very real possibility.”
“For one who has worked on mental health issues as long as I have,” she added, “this is a miraculous development and an answer to my prayers.”
Place: Afeta, Ethiopia Date: Feb. 13, 2007 Credit: The Carter Center
Five first ladies have paid tribute to the extraordinary woman who was visibly a partner to her husband’s presidency. “Her life is a reminder that no matter who we are, our legacies are best measured not in awards or accolades, but in the lives we touch,” Michelle Obama wrote. Secretary Hillary Clinton and her husband, the former President, characterized Mrs. Carter as a “champion of human dignity.
The Washington Post‘s Karen Tumulty characterizes Mrs. Carter this way.
But Rosalynn Carter arrived at a time when women’s roles were changing at every level of society. And, according to Paul Costello, who was her assistant press secretary, the new first lady took to heart a bit of counsel from her own outspoken predecessor. “Betty Ford gave her wise advice: Do what you want to do because no matter what you do, you will be criticized,” Costello told me.
Still, the first lady was taken aback by the stir she created when, in the second year of the Carter presidency, she began showing up at Cabinet meetings and quietly taking notes.
“Jimmy and I had always worked side by side; it’s a tradition in southern families, and one that is not seen as in any way demeaning to the man,” she wrote in her autobiography. “I also think there was a not very subtle implication that Cabinet meetings were no place for a wife. I was supposed to take care of the house — period.”
It was not the only time she felt frustrated with the expectations that came with her role. Less than a month after the inauguration, she held her first solo news conference to announce the formation of a presidential commission on mental health — an issue that would become her biggest cause.
“The next morning when I picked up the Washington Post to read about it I found not one word about the commission or the press conference,” she recalled. This newspaper instead ran a story about how the Carters had established a policy against serving hard liquor at White House functions.
But the first lady continued to press against the constraints, and in breaking her own path, she would make it easier for those who followed — including Hillary Clinton.
Rosalynn Carter traveled abroad and met with heads of state to discuss matters of substance, not for photo opportunities, and made it clear she was speaking for the administration in her public appearances. “Dinner guests at the White House have seen her interrupt the President — not rudely but unhesitatingly — usually to explain something more clearly than he had been doing,” the New York Times columnist Tom Wicker wrote in 1979.
Two crucial cases are coming from two very different Federal Appeals Courts today. The first one is on Voting Rights and came out of the 8th District. It’s basically forcing the outcome that Republicans have championed for some time and will likely find an accessible Advocate in the Supreme Court in its Chief Justice John Roberts. Hansi is the NPR reporter for this case. It’s terrible news. Most of the judges on the 8th circuit were appointed by Bush or Trump.
BREAKING: An 8th Circuit panel of federal judges has struck down the main path for enforcing the Voting Rights Act’s Section 2 protections for people of color, upholding a lower court ruling that says private individuals can’t bring lawsuits under the lawhttps://t.co/yUT8xItF1Gpic.twitter.com/SfTt7xunRh
The 8th Circuit just ruled that the NAACP is no longer allowed to sue under the Voting Rights Act. The decision came from two white male judges: Raymond Gruender (Bush) and David Stras (Trump). Lavenski Smith (Bush), the only Black judge, dissented.https://t.co/IsBLW96VLQpic.twitter.com/hvhoQA5Vry
A federal appeals court issued a ruling Monday that could gut the Voting Rights Act, saying only the federal government — not private citizens or civil rights groups — is allowed to sue under a crucial section of the landmark civil rights law.
The decision out of the 8th Circuit will almost certainly be appealed to the Supreme Court. But should it stand, it would mark a dramatic rollback of the enforcement of the law that led to increased minority representation in American politics.
The appellate court ruled that there is no “private right of action” for Section 2 of the law — which prohibits voting practices that discriminate on the basis of race
That, in practice, would severely limit the scope of protections in the act. For decades, private parties — including civil rights groups, individual voters and political parties — have brought Section 2 challenges on everything from redistricting to voter ID requirements.
Rosalynn Carter, wife of presidential candidate Jimmy Carter, appears on the ‘Meet the Press’ television talk show, September 26th 1976. She is wearing a ‘Carter/Mondale’ campaign badge. (Photo by UPI/Bettmann Archive/Getty Images)
We’re also seeing action from the Appeals Court in the DC circuit on their”Hearing on Trump gag order in federal 2020 election subversion case.” This is breaking and updating news from CNN.
After 2 hours and 20 minutes of oral arguments, the three-judge panel of the DC Circuit Court of Appeals appears inclined to restore the limited gag order in former President Donald Trump’s federal election subversion case, but may loosen some restrictions so he can more directly criticize special counsel Jack Smith.
None of the judges embraced Trump’s claims that the gag order should be wiped away for good because it is a “categorically unprecedented” violation of his free speech rights.
Yet they also posed sharp questions to prosecutors as they tried to find the boundary of where intense campaign-trail rhetoric crosses the line of undermining a criminal case.
The limited gag order from district Judge Tanya Chutkan – which was temporarily frozen by the appeals panel when they agreed to hear the case — restricts Trump’s ability to directly attack Smith, members of his team, court staff or potential trial witnesses. He is allowed to criticize the Justice Department, proclaim his innocence, can say that the case is “politically motivated.”
The appellate judges, who are all Democratic appointees, heard the case on an expedited schedule and are expected to issue a ruling soon.
First Lady Rosalynn Carter on stage with Willie Nelson at the White House, 1978 Identifier
I believe that Jack Smith is more concerned about the attacks on his family than himself, but we shall see.
The Guardian discusses how recent data has shown that the Upper 1% of global wealth holders are responsible for destroying the World’s resources via carbon emissions. This study was done by Oxfam. “Richest 1% account for more carbon emissions than poorest 66%, report says. ‘Polluter elite’ are plundering the planet to point of destruction, says Oxfam after comprehensive study of climate inequality”
The most comprehensive study of global climate inequality ever undertaken shows that this elite group, made up of 77 million people including billionaires, millionaires and those paid more than US$140,000 (£112,500) a year, accounted for 16% of all CO2 emissions in 2019 – enough to cause more than a million excess deaths due to heat, according to the report.
For the past six months, the Guardian has worked with Oxfam, the Stockholm Environment Institute and other experts on an exclusive basis to produce a special investigation, The Great Carbon Divide. It explores the causes and consequences of carbon inequality and the disproportionate impact of super-rich individuals, who have been termed “the polluter elite”. Climate justice will be high on the agenda of this month’s UN Cop28 climate summit in the United Arab Emirates.
The Oxfam report shows that while the wealthiest 1% tend to live climate-insulated, air-conditioned lives, their emissions – 5.9bn tonnes of CO2 in 2019 – are responsible for immense suffering.
Using a “mortality cost” formula – used by the US Environmental Protection Agency, among others – of 226 excess deaths worldwide for every million tonnes of carbon, the report calculates that the emissions from the 1% alone would be enough to cause the heat-related deaths of 1.3 million people over the coming decades.
Over the period from 1990 to 2019, the accumulated emissions of the 1% were equivalent to wiping out last year’s harvests of EU corn, US wheat, Bangladeshi rice and Chinese soya beans.
The suffering falls disproportionately upon people living in poverty, marginalised ethnic communities, migrants and women and girls, who live and work outside or in homes vulnerable to extreme weather, according to the research. These groups are less likely to have savings, insurance or social protection, which leaves them more economically, as well as physically, at risk from floods, drought, heatwaves and forest fires. The UN says developing countries account for 91% of deaths related to extreme weather.
The report finds that it would take about 1,500 years for someone in the bottom 99% to produce as much carbon as the richest billionaires do in a year.
LAGRANGE, GA – JUNE 10: Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter and his wife Rosalyn attach siding to the front of a Habitat for Humanity home being built June 10, 2003 in LaGrange, Georgia. More than 90 homes are being built in LaGrange; Valdosta, Georgia; and Anniston, Alabama by volunteers as part of Habitat for Humanity International’s Jimmy Carter Work Project 2003. (Photo by Erik S. Lesser/Getty Images)
Throughout much of the Western world’s history, the wealthiest have been viewed in their communities as a potentially unfavorable presence, and they have attempted to allay this sentiment by using their riches to support their societies in times of crises like plagues, famines or wars.
This symbiotic relationship no longer exists. Today’s rich, their wealth largely preserved through the Great Recession and the Covid-19 pandemic, have opposed reforms aimed at tapping their resources to fund mitigation policies of all kinds.
This is a historically exceptional development. Helping foot the bill of major crises has long been the main social function attributed to the rich by Western culture. In the past, when the wealthiest have been perceived to be insensitive to the plight of the masses, and especially when they have appeared to be profiteering from such plights (or have simply been suspected of doing so), society has become unstable, leading to riots, open revolts and anti-rich violence. As history has the unpleasant feature of repeating itself, we would do well to consider recent developments, including legislators’ inability to increase taxes on the rich, from a long-term perspective.
Let us begin with the consideration that the presence of very rich, or even superrich, individuals has always been somewhat troubling for Western societies. Medieval theologians regarded the rich as sinners and thought that the building of large fortunes should have been discouraged. At the very least, the rich were expected not to appear to be wealthy and to provide generous bequests to charitable institutions to the benefit of their souls.
But with time, as new economic opportunities in trade and in finance led to the accumulation of fortunes of unprecedented size, the increased presence of extremely wealthy individuals within the community could no longer be dismissed as an anomaly. From the 15th century, and beginning with the most economically developed areas of Europe such as central-northern Italy, the rich were assigned a specific social role: to act as private reserves of money into which the community could tap in times of dire need.
Nobody made this point better than the Tuscan humanist Poggio Bracciolini. In his treatise “De avaritia” (“On avarice”), completed in 1428, he argued that cities that follow the tradition of instituting public granaries to build up food reserves should also be well provided of “many greedy individuals, in order … to constitute a kind of private barn of money able to be of assistance to everybody.”
US First Lady Rosalynn Carter plays basketball with members of the Harlem Globetrotters outside the White House, Washington DC, March 1980. They are teaching her how to spin a basketball on her fingertip. (Photo by Diana Walker/Getty Images)
As with all good economics treatises, this one brings home the numbers, story, and background. Private jet travel is one of the biggest culprits.
His legions of fans call him “the madman” and “the wig” due to his ferocity and unruly mop of hair. He refers to himself as “the lion.” He thinks sex education is a Marxist plot to destroy the family, views his cloned mastiffs as his “children with four paws” and has suggested people should be allowed to sell their own vital organs.
A few years ago, Milei was a television talking head whom bookers loved because his screeds against government spending and the ruling political class boosted ratings. At the time, and up until mere months ago, hardly any political expert believed he had a real shot at becoming president of South America’s second-largest economy.
But Milei, a 53-year-old economist, has rocked Argentina’s political establishment and inserted himself into what has long been effectively a two-party system by amassing a groundswell of support with his prescriptions of drastic measures to rein in soaring inflation and by pledging to crusade against the creep of socialism in society.
This analysis is from the Washington Post. “Argentina set for sharp right turn as Trump-like radical wins presidency.” Argentina is now off the list for where in the Western Hemisphere one might go to escape a second Trump Presidency.
A radical libertarian and admirer of Donald Trump rode a wave of voter rage to win Argentina’s presidency on Sunday, crushing the political establishment and bringing the sharpest turn to the right in four decades of democracy in the country.
Javier Milei, a 53-year-old far-right economist and former television pundit with no governing experience, claimed nearly 56 percent of the vote in a stunning upset over Sergio Massa, the center-left economy minister who has struggled to resolve the country’s worst economic crisis in two decades. Even before the official results had been announced Sunday night, Massa acknowledged defeat and congratulated Milei on his win.
Trump also congratulated Milei. “I am very proud of you,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform. “You will turn your Country around and Make Argentina Great Again!”
Voters in this nation of 46 million demanded a drastic change from a government that has sent the peso tumbling, inflation skyrocketing and more than 40 percent of the population into poverty. With Milei, Argentina takes a leap into the unknown — with a leader promising to shatter the entire system.
In his first speech as president-elect, Milei told Argentines that “the model of decadence has reached its end. There is no turning back.”
“Enough of the impoverishing power of the caste,” he said. “Today we once again embrace the model of liberty, to once again become a world power.” His supporters joined him in shouting: “Long live freedom, damn it!”
Milei will take office on Dec. 10, the 40th anniversary of Argentina’s return to democracy after the fall of its military dictatorship.
Wielding chain saws on the campaign trail, the wild-haired Milei vowed to slash public spending in a country heavily dependent on government subsidies. He pledged to dollarize the economy, shut down the central bank and cut the number of government ministries from 18 to eight. His rallying campaign cry was a takedown of the country’s political “caste” — an Argentine version of Trump’s “drain the swamp.”
Why are so many people becoming dictator-curious and looking to the likes of Hitler and Mussolini again? Plus, these folks are raping the planet. It’s discouraging. I hope we can find a new model for Thanksgiving this year where we can celebrate with others and be thankful for what we have. I also hope it isn’t based on stealing your host’s land, committing genocide, and destroying their cultural practices.
Have a good Turkey Day! And it’s time we pass the John Lewis Voting Rights Act!
What’s on your reading and blogging list today?
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Have you noticed that a good deal of Republican Politicians need some serious intervention and more than a few psychiatric evaluations? As part of my training to be a teacher at university, I was trained to spot issues and quickly send the individual off to the District’s psychologist. I can’t say I know what happens after you get diagnosed with, say, a significant personality disorder or two, but I do know how to recognize symptoms and get the person’s help. It was a massive effort in ’70s education colleges since School Districts could be held accountable for not diagnosing student needs and getting them help as soon as possible. Perhaps it’s time to introduce a similar methodology to aides, staff, and those working daily with Republican officeholders. The amount of abnormal behavior screams at you from your television screen daily. I remember Nixon’s paranoia well, but it didn’t seem like a larger pattern in the party then.
Leave it to Ozzy.
All aboard Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha Ay, ay, ay, ay, ay, ay, ay Crazy, but that’s how it goes Millions of people living as foes Maybe it’s not too late To learn how to love And forget how to hate Mental wounds not healing Life’s a bitter shame I’m going off the rails on a crazy train I’m going off the rails on a crazy train Let’s go
The Washington Monthly starts at the very head of the rotting fish. “Has Trump Gone Even Crazier? Forget parsing every Biden utterance. The likely GOP nominee is forgetting where he is, stumbling over words, and waxing full fascist.” This is written by James D. Zirin.
While neither Trump nor Biden projects John F. Kennedy’s vigor, Trump, 77, has been even more bizarre of late—doddering and disoriented in a new way.
Listen to what he has been saying lately.
He has repeatedly confused Biden and Obama, even calling Obama the current president. Doctors often ask stroke victims who is the current president to test mental acuity. We all misspeak. But put this in the context of many other indicia of cognitive decline.
Trump doesn’t know where he is. On the stump in Sioux City, Iowa, he said hello to Sioux Falls, which is in South Dakota. Okay, not that big a deal. Of course, his aides later said the teleprompter got it wrong. I wonder whether the aides are still in his employ. Perhaps they are moving boxes in Mar-a-Lago.
Misidentifying world leaders. He described Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, whom he admires, as the “great leader of Turkey.” Recep Tayyip Erdogan is authoritarian like Orban but with an Islamic hue rather than a Christian nationalist drag. Trump has said that Hungary shares a border with Russia. Seven countries border Hungary, but not Russia.
Referring to Kim Jong-Un, the hereditary dictator who rules North Korea, Trump said he was in charge of a country of 1.4 billion people, obviously confusing the Hermit Kingdom of 26 million with the Middle Kingdom of 1.4 billion.
But it’s not just misidentification. It’s the cadence and slurring of speech, too. Trump is having trouble with names. “On purpose” came out as “on perfect.” Adherents of Karl Marx came out as “markers,” not Marxists. He warned that Biden is drifting us into World War II.
Perhaps more worrisome than Trump’s mental miscues is the fact that his authoritarian tendencies have veered into even more fascistic territory, and his insults have become even more intemperate, which is saying something. (Recall that after the first 2016 presidential debate, he flogged Megyn Kelly with a reference to menstruation.) Special Counsel Jack Smith is “deranged.” While this might be understandable since Smith has indicted Trump in a Washington, D.C. federal court for using illegal means to overturn the 2020 election results and in Florida for mishandling classified documents, the bile has boiled over into invective against Smith’s wife and family, whom he insists “despise me much more than he does.”
Trump called Nancy Pelosi a “crazed lunatic” and continued to joke about the hammer assault on her 83-year-old husband, Paul, by a crazed, seemingly pro-Trump intruder who was convicted on multiple felony accounts on Thursday.
From bad to wurst. In a Veterans Day speech in New Hampshire, Trump called his political enemies “vermin,” channeling the dehumanizing language of OG fascists Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini and arguing paradoxically—and paranoically—that the pests are also “radical left thugs” who pose a greater threat to the United States than Russia, China, or even North Korea. He promised to “root out” the vermin if he regained power.
And, if you dare call out the reference to vermin or blood as Hitlerian, his spokesman threatens that your “entire existence will be crushed when President Trump returns to the White House.”
Jewish and Latino groups, as well as an untold number of columnists, have condemned his statement that undocumented immigrants were “poisoning the blood of our country,” the kind of volk talk that sounded better in the original German.
Deranged people, as we all have learned, can be dangerous. While it can be hard to diagnose if the unhoused man who regularly yells at you at the street corner has just plateaued or will be given to a violent attack, Trump’s policy pronouncements have become more incendiary and more insane, if that were possible.
The list of policy pronouncements should have a chilling effect on any person who values the U.S. Constitution. But, crazy is at all levels of U.S. Federal and State Republican officials.
A shadow looms over the world. In this week’s edition we publish The World Ahead 2024, our 38th annual predictive guide to the coming year, and in all that time no single person has ever eclipsed our analysis as much as Donald Trump eclipses 2024. That a Trump victory next November is a coin-toss probability is beginning to sink in.
Mr Trump dominates the Republican primary. Several polls have him ahead of President Joe Biden in swing states. In one, for the New York Times, 59% of voters trusted him on the economy, compared with just 37% for Mr Biden. In the primaries, at least, civil lawsuits and criminal prosecutions have only strengthened Mr Trump. For decades Democrats have relied on support among black and Hispanic voters, but a meaningful number are abandoning the party. In the next 12 months a stumble by either candidate could determine the race—and thus upend the world.
This is a perilous moment for a man like Mr Trump to be back knocking on the door of the Oval Office. Democracy is in trouble at home. Mr Trump’s claim to have won the election in 2020 was more than a lie: it was a cynical bet that he could manipulate and intimidate his compatriots, and it has worked. America also faces growing hostility abroad, challenged by Russia in Ukraine, by Iran and its allied militias in the Middle East and by China across the Taiwan Strait and in the South China Sea. Those three countries loosely co-ordinate their efforts and share a vision of a new international order in which might is right and autocrats are secure.
Because maga Republicans have been planning his second term for months, Trump 2 would be more organised than Trump 1. True believers would occupy the most important positions. Mr Trump would be unbound in his pursuit of retribution, economic protectionism and theatrically extravagant deals. No wonder the prospect of a second Trump term fills the world’s parliaments and boardrooms with despair. But despair is not a plan. It is past time to impose order on anxiety.
The greatest threat Mr Trump poses is to his own country. Having won back power because of his election-denial in 2020, he would surely be affirmed in his gut feeling that only losers allow themselves to be bound by the norms, customs and self-sacrifice that make a nation. In pursuing his enemies, Mr Trump will wage war on any institution that stands in his way, including the courts and the Department of Justice.
This nutter is from Louisiana and believe me, the majority of us are super embarrassed by him. The YouTube below is about Representative Clay Higgin’s “Ghost Bus” comment to the Director of the FBI. Higgins evidently believes that January 6th was a false flag operation by the deep state in the Homeland Security Department. FBI Director Christopher Ray had to remind him that the FBI was not part of that Department.
Seeking leniency for a January 6 rioter charged with assaulting police, the Louisiana Republican congressman Clay Higgins – a former law enforcement officer himself – saluted the man’s “good character, faith and core principles”.
In video taken during the attack on Congress on 6 January 2021, the rioter was seen to say: “It’s going to be violent and yes, if you are asking, ‘Is Ryan Nichols going to bring violence? Yes, Ryan Nichols is going to bring violence.’”
Nichols, in an affidavit, admitted posting the video, attacking officers with pepper spray and urging rioters on with shouts including, “This is not a peaceful protest”
In court in Washington last week, Nichols, of Longview, Texas, pleaded guilty to two charges: obstruction and assaulting, resisting or impeding police and obstruction of an official proceeding.
More than 1,000 arrests have been made over the attack and hundreds of convictions secured, some for seditious conspiracy. Donald Trump, who incited the riot as he attempted to overturn his 2020 presidential election defeat by Joe Biden, faces 17 charges related to his election subversion, four federal and 13 at state level in Georgia.
Nine deaths have been linked to the attack staged by the former president’s supporters, including law enforcement suicides.
Higgins’ own website describes him as having “spent much of his career dedicated to uniformed service [as] an army veteran and law enforcement officer”. It also says he is “widely regarded as one of the most conservative members of Congress”.
Nonetheless, in a letter dated 7 November, he asked the US district judge in Nichols’s case, Royce C Lamberth, to show leniency when passing down sentence.
“Sir,” Higgins wrote. “I submit to you this letter in support of Ryan Taylor Nichols. He is a man of good character, faith, and core principles.
“I humbly ask that he receive fair consideration of the whole of circumstances regarding his case, condition, and background. He has already served nearly two years in the District of Columbia jail in pretrial confinement, which has been destructive to his physical (liver issues) and mental health (PTSD).”
Nichols had been under house arrest since 22 November 2022 and had “not sought to flee nor shown any indication of dangerous activity”, Higgins said.
He added: “Prior to his arrest, Mr Nichols had no criminal background and served honorably in the United States Marine Corps. He continued to serve domestically in a search and rescue capacity, even being publicly recognised for his heroic actions on national television.”
So, that cartoon sums up Higgin’s views of thugs pretty well. I’m sure you can all name at least 5 crazy Republicans in Congress. Now, add Higgins to that list. Right Wingers with money, businesses, and platforms that serve as Republican enablers and donors are equally as nuts these days. I’ve heard more than a few references to Henry Ford’s wingnuttery and the bat shit crazy Elon Musk. Musk is placing NAZI propaganda on X quite close to the ads he relies on for revenues. This is from MediaMatters for America. “As Musk endorses antisemitic conspiracy theory, X has been placing ads for Apple, Bravo, IBM, Oracle, and Xfinity next to pro-Nazi content. CEO Linda Yaccarino previously claimed that brands are “protected from the risk of being next to” toxic posts.” This is reported by Eric Hananoki.
Update (11/16/23): IBM released a statement to the Financial Times saying that it has “suspended all advertising on X while we investigate this entirely unacceptable situation.” Media Matters will update if the other major companies in this report take any similar actions.
As X owner Elon Musk continues his descent into white nationalist and antisemitic conspiracy theories, his social media platform has been placing ads for major brands like Apple, Bravo (NBCUniversal), IBM, Oracle, and Xfinity (Comcast) next to content that touts Adolf Hitler and his Nazi Party. The company’s placements come after CEO Linda Yaccarino claimed that brands are “protected from the risk of being next to” toxic posts on the platform.
Yaccarino has been trying to bring advertisers back to the platform by claiming it’s safe for business. She’s also claimed that X (formerly Twitter) has been “demonstrating its absolute commitment to combating antisemitism on the platform” and that “antisemitism is evil and X will always work to fight it on our platform.”
But her boss last night endorsed the pernicious antisemitic conspiracy theory that Jewish people are supporting “hordes of minorities” who are “flooding” into the country to replace white people. That conspiracy theory was the same one that motivated the deadly 2018 Tree of Life synagogue shooting.
During all of this Musk-induced chaos, corporate advertisements have also been appearing on pro-Hitler, Holocaust denial, white nationalist, pro-violence, and neo-Nazi accounts. Yaccarino has attempted to placate companies by claiming that “brands are now ‘protected from the risk of being next to’ potentially toxic content.”
But that certainly isn’t the case for at least five major brands: We recently found ads for Apple, Bravo, Oracle, Xfinity, andIBM next to posts that tout Hitler and his Nazi Party on X
Elon Musk has publicly endorsed an antisemitic conspiracy theory popular among White supremacists: that Jewish communities push “hatred against Whites.”
That kind of overt thumbs up to an antisemitic post shocked even some of Musk’s critics, who have long called him out for using racist or otherwise bigoted dog whistles on Twitter, now known as X. It was the multibillionaire’s most explicit public statement yet endorsing anti-Jewish views.
ICYMI: Musk was responding to a post Wednesday that said Jewish communities “have been pushing the exact kind of dialectical hatred against whites that they claim to want people to stop using against them.” The post also referenced “hordes of minorities” flooding Western countries, a popular antisemitic conspiracy theory.
It’s the kind of post you can find easily on X these days, and likely would have gone unnoticed had Musk, with more than 160 million followers, not re-shared the post with the comment: “You have said the actual truth.”
The antisemitic conspiracy theory — which posits that Jews want to bring undocumented minority populations into Western countries to reduce White majorities in those nations — is often espoused by hate groups.
It’s the same conspiracy echoed in the final written words of Robert Bowers, the convicted murderer of 11 people at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh in 2018. His last social media post said that a Jewish nonprofit dedicated to aiding refugees “likes to bring invaders in that kill our people.” The mass shooting was the deadliest attack against Jews in American history.
Musk, in subsequent posts, expounded on his views. He wrote that he does not believe hatred of White people extends “to all Jewish communities.” But then he singled out the Anti-Defamation League, claiming that it promotes racism against White people.
X did not respond to requests for comment.
This confuses me to no end because other than the late Sammy Davis, Jr., I thought all European Jews were white. I just don’t get this weird view of race and gender where some right wing nut gets to have purity standards based on some genetic code only they seem to know. I hope this sinks X for good but all that will do is likely get an even more outrageous set of hate crimes against our Jewish population. I have issues with the Bibi’s government and with the entire concept of Zionism but for goodness’ sake, having policy differences with a nation does not mean I hate its people. It certainly doesn’t mean I blame any American Jewish person for what the approach is now to the West Bank either. I also do not blame the population of the West Bank or Gaza on the actions of Hamas. All this right winger craziness torched to a burnt earth strategy by messianic cults just makes me very sad.
So, we need to address the continuing saga which is Congressman George Santos. He appears to be the only Drag Queen that right wing Republicans want to keep around. After he announced he would not be running for reelection this week, he likely believed his expulsion was less likely. That’s not a good assumption, gurl! The AP has this breaking news headline. “Ethics chairman launches a new bid to expel George Santos after a withering report on his conduct.”
The chairman of the House Ethics Committee announced Friday he has filed a resolution to force a vote on expelling Rep. George Santos, R-N.Y., from Congress, one day after the committee issued a withering report detailing substantial evidence that Santos converted campaign donations for his own personal use.
Santos easily survived an expulsion vote earlier this month as lawmakers in both parties stressed the need to allow due process, as Santos is also facing nearly two dozen charges in federal court. But the release of the committee’s findings has generated new momentum for ousting the scandal-plagued freshman. Shortly after the report was released, Santos announced he would not seek reelection.
“The evidence uncovered in the Ethics Committee’s Investigative Subcommittee investigation is more than sufficient to warrant punishment and the most appropriate punishment, is expulsion,” said Rep. Michael Guest, R-Miss.
Stein’s Candidacy: Mary Trump also weighed in on Jill Stein’s announcement that she would run for office in 2024 on behalf of the Green Party. Calling her a “pro-Putin hack,” Mary Trump noted that she played a spoiler to Hillary Clinton’s presidential run in 2016.
“She had no chance of winning; and the only candidate whose chances she was going to hurt was Hillary Clinton. That was precisely the point,” Mary Trump said.
The psychologist said her stance against Stein was not simply because of the enormous damage she did eight years ago, but also because in those intervening years, she has done nothing. “She’s a fraud whose only purpose seems to be lining her own pockets in the service of undermining the only party that has a shot at saving American democracy,” the ex-president’s niece said.
Look Ahead: Mary Trump also said the focus in the coming weeks would be “Whether or not Donald’s mental decline is worsening or just becoming more obvious as the stressors in his life compound” and “Will the corporate media focus, in a serious and sustained way, on his multiplying verbal gaffes and cognitive errors.”
The psychologist noted that Donald Trump’s dangerous rhetoric has been ramping up and he was not only echoing Hitler but was also sometimes quoting the German dictator. While Hitler promised to “get rid of the communist vermin,” the ex-president in his “Veteran’s Day” message promised to get rid of “the radical left thugs that live like vermin within the confines of our country.
Yes, once again I’m reporting all the news that no one really wants to hear. I just want to keep scaring everyone into voting for anyone but these crazy people.
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After years of avoiding Covid, I finally came down with it. I have no idea how I caught it, because I stayed in my apartment all last weekend. But somehow I did get it, and it’s not fun. So I’m just going to post some stories, and then go back to bed.
We may have dodged Hurricane Season, but I’m unsure how to characterize a season with a Salt Water Wedge that’s making more than a few communities downriver use bottled water. What comes out of the faucet isn’t drinkable down there. It’s combined with these eerie Marsh Fires. They’ve now broken through to remove the brushy, dead foliage left by the drought. Currently, there is a coastal flooding warning on our radar. I’m sitting high and dry here on the banks of the Mississippi, watching the dismal Republican pols and candidates miss the natural disasters while inventing their own. Climate change, anyone?
John Buss, @repeat1968
Many of us are now on the Trumpist list known as ‘Vermin.’ If this sounds less Orwellian and more Hitler-like to you, it should. This is from Michael Tomasky at The New Republic. “It’s Official: With
“Vermin,” Trump Is Now Using Straight-up Nazi Talk. He’s telling us what he will do to his political enemies if he’s president again. Is anyone listening?”
We’ve all often wondered whether Donald Trump understands the historical import of what comes out of his mouth. He’s so ill-informed, so proudly ignorant, that it’s easy to think that when he hurls a historical insult, he just doesn’t know.
I feel pretty safe in saying that we can now stop giving him the benefit of that particular doubt. His use—twice; once on social media and then repeated in a speech—of the word “vermin” to describe his political enemies cannot be an accident. That’s an unusual word choice. It’s not a smear that one just grabs out of the air. And it appears in history chiefly in one context, and one context only.
Before we get to that, let’s just record what he wrote and said. On Saturday at 10:25 a.m., he posted on Truth Social: “In honor of our great Veterans on Veteran’s Day, we pledge to you that we will root out the Communists, Marxists, Fascists, and Radical Left Thugs that live like vermin within the confines of our country, lie, steal, and cheat on Elections, and will do anything possible, whether legally or illegally, to destroy America, and the American dream.” Then, at a rally in New Hampshire later that day, he repeated those words essentially verbatim—promising to “root out … the radical left thugs that live like vermin within the confines of our country”—and doubled down on it: “The real threat is not from the radical right; the real threat is from the radical left, and it’s growing every day, every single day. The threat from outside forces is far less sinister, dangerous, and grave than the threat from within. Our threat is from within.”
This is straight-up Nazi talk, in a way he’s never done quite before. To announce that the real enemy is domestic and then to speak of that enemy in subhuman terms is Fascism 101. Especially that particular word.
Mom and Dad were back in Kansas City, MO, right before he deployed to England.
My Dad and Mother would be 100 this year. As I frequently shared here, my Dad was in the Army Air Corps during World War 2. He and his unit were responsible for bombing targets in France, Belgium, and Germany so the troops on the group and the parachuters could get to Germany. One of the results of these missions was freeing those who remained in Concentration Camps. That would include people of the Jewish Faith, Homosexuals, and intellectuals. People were often teased with “Godwin’s Law” because it couldn’t happen again or here. Right?
Godwin’s law, short for Godwin’s law (or rule) of Nazi analogies,[1] is an Internet adage asserting that as an online discussion grows longer (regardless of topic or scope), the probability of a comparison to Nazis or Adolf Hitlerapproaches 1.[2]
Well, this Trump Speech was not “reductio ad Hitlerum“. Dad’s crew on the bomber included a Jewish American from a small town in Washington State as well as a Puerto Rican American from New York City. BB’s Dad was a small-town Middle of America professor who spent time in the Pacific Theatre. Everyone in the military represents everyone you could possibly meet in the US population, from indigenous Americans to those who are newly immigrated. How dare this man speak like this on a day when we remember those who have sacrificed much for our democratic Republic? Which of them would be on Trump’s “vermin” list?
This is from the Washington Post. “Trump calls political enemies ‘vermin,’ echoing dictators Hitler, Mussolini, On Veterans Day, the former president vowed to “root out” his liberal opponents, drawing backlash from historians who say his rhetoric is reminiscent of authoritarians.” It’s reported by Marianne LeVine.
The former president’s speech in Claremont, N.H., echoed his message of vengeance and grievance, as he called himself a “very proud election denier” and decried his legal entanglements, once again attacking the judge in a New York civil trial and re-upping his attacks on special counsel Jack Smith. In the speech, Trump once again portrayed himself as a victim of a political system that is out to get him and his supporters.
Yet Trump’s use of the word “vermin” both in his speech and in a Truth Social post on Saturday drew particular backlash.
“The language is the language that dictators use to instill fear,” said Timothy Naftali, a senior research scholar at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs. “When you dehumanize an opponent, you strip them of their constitutional rights to participate securely in a democracy because you’re saying they’re not human. That’s what dictators do.”
Ruth Ben-Ghiat, a historian at New York University, said in an email to The Washington Post that “calling people ‘vermin’ was used effectively by Hitler and Mussolini to dehumanize people and encourage their followers to engage in violence.”
“Trump is also using projection: note that he mentions all kinds of authoritarians ‘communists, Marxists, fascists and the radical left’ to set himself up as the deliverer of freedom,” Ben-Ghiat said. “Mussolini promised freedom to his people too and then declared dictatorship.”
Steven Cheung, a Trump campaign spokesman, told The Post “those who try to make that ridiculous assertion are clearly snowflakes grasping for anything because they are suffering from Trump Derangement Syndrome and their entire existence will be crushed when President Trump returns to the White House.”
Cheung later clarified that he meant to say their “sad, miserable existence” instead of their “entire existence.”
Liz Cheney ripped into the RNC after this speech. This is from The Hill, “Liz Cheney says RNC chair ‘collaborating’ with Trump’s ‘Nazi propaganda’.” This is written by Miranda Nazzaro.
Former Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) ripped Republican National Committee (RNC) Chair Ronna McDaniel for dodging questions Sunday about former President Trump’s “vermin” comments, which Cheney described as “Nazi propaganda.”
“When @GOPChairwoman refuses to condemn the GOP’s leading candidate for using the same Nazi propaganda that mobilized 1930s-40s Germany to evil, it’s fair to assume she’s collaborating,” Cheney wrote in a post on X, formerly Twitter. “History will judge Ronna McDaniel and every republican who is appeasing this dangerous man.”
Since we’re on the subject of disrespecting Americans serving in our Military, I have one bit of reasonable, possible bi-partisan effort to stop the temper tantrum reign of Tommy the Willfully Stupid.
Tomorrow, the Senate will consider a rules change that would eliminate Tommy Tuberville’s blockade on military promotions.
Moreover, the ability of a single traitorous Senator to paralyze the government this way could become a thing of the past.https://t.co/kecC6L2NLf
The committee on Tuesday will vote on a plan to allow consideration of about 350 pending nominations in a single parliamentary move, a dramatic change in precedent for the chamber. The proposal is expected to easily pass out of the committee but will face more problems in the full Senate, where Republican cooperation will be needed for final approval.
Tuberville, an Alabama Republican, has held up fast-track consideration of routine senior military promotions and confirmations since the spring over his objections to the Defense Department’s abortion access policy. In recent days, several GOP colleagues have pressured him to relent on the holds, citing cascading leadership difficulties caused by the move.
But Tuberville thus far has rebuffed those requests. Tuesday’s rules committee meeting is designed to force a resolution on the issue, with Democratic leaders (and a number of top Pentagon officials) insisting the standoff has already lasted too long.
Don’t forget about all the domestic and abroad disturbances that require a US presence. We still have a looming government shutdown. The Republican Party representatives cannot govern. This is from CNN.
New House Speaker Mike Johnson may already be losing his first big clash with the hard-right lawmakers who are making the Republican majority and the nation ungovernable as time races down to yet another federal funding cut-off.
The Louisiana conservative, who was just lifted from obscurity to second in line to the presidency, may soon find himself in the position that doomed his predecessor Rep. Kevin McCarthy — needing Democratic votes to keep the government open.
A funding deadline of Friday night means Washington again faces a wild ride of shutdown brinkmanship caused by extreme GOP lawmakers who either cannot or don’t want to help run the country. The imbroglio is not just harming America’s image as a functioning democracy abroad. It has already wasted every week of the House majority party’s term since the summer and threatens to further weaken the key swing-district members critical to the GOP’s hopes of keeping the gavel in next year’s election.
The move could head off the Washington holiday-season tradition of shutdown dramas and mammoth all-encompassing spending bills. But the chances that a GOP majority that has trouble passing any bill could deliver on this intricate plan seem very low.Given the House’s record, Johnson may simply be setting the country up for two government shutdowns rather than one.
While the two-step approach appears to be a concession to the far right — which abhors what it calls “clean” continuing resolutions, or CRs, that keep government open temporarily at current spending levels — Johnson’s approach may already have backfired since it lacks the sweeping cuts that hard-right Republicans demanded even though they have no chance of getting them past a Democratic-run Senate and White House. “It’s a 100% clean. And I 100% oppose,” Freedom Caucus member and Texas Rep. Chip Roy wrote on X, conjuring up exactly the showdown that cost McCarthy his job.
Johnson’s task is so difficult because the tiny GOP majority means he can lose only a handful of members on any bill and still pass it with only Republican votes – hence the need to get help from Democrats on some issues and the consequent risk of further alienating far-right members of his conference.
The Marsh Fires aren’t getting as much play on the national level as the forest fires up north, but believe me, if you live downwind of them, you feel them. They’ve been trying to get masks to people here with asthma and problems breathing. I’ve felt like I’ve had one big sinus infection the entire time, but other than a few pain relievers and allergy medicine, there’s not much you can do. I hope we’ve gotten our share of FEMA and federal disaster relief for this because if they shut the government down, there will be a lot of hurt all over the state.
Have a great week! I hope all our active military and veterans got the recognition and respect they deserve for Veteran’s Day!
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A lucky cat was rescued by firefighters after falling 100ft (30m) down a mineshaft in Cornwall – and it was all thanks to a quick-thinking dog.
After six days of searching, Mowgli’s owner Michele Rose said she had “almost given up hope” of finding her missing pet.
But she said she saw her dog Daisy “going berserk”, running in and out of woods near their home in Harrowbarrow.
Daisy’s intervention led to the rescue of her feline friend, Ms Rose said.
Daisy guided her along a footpath toward the Prince of Wales old mine workings, she said, before “stopping dead in her tracks” next to the mineshaft.
“Daisy is a superstar, she’s an amazing dog.
“Without Daisy doing that Mowgli could still be down there, that’s for sure,” Ms Rose said.
“She was persistent in making me follow her, it was amazing.”
The RSPCA and Cornwall Fire and Rescue were called but it was “too dark” on the first night to access the mineshaft, the RSPCA said.
The next morning the team, led by RSPCA animal rescue officer Stephen Findlow, spotted Mowgli, who was 100ft down – but remarkably uninjured – and he was pulled to safety.
The family has another cat, Baloo, who greeted Mowgli after he was pulled up.
Ms Rose said she adopted kittens Mowgli and Baloo in December 2022 and oversaw a gentle introduction to Daisy, who was already resident.
She added: “Daisy was already a year old when the kittens arrived and they have all been inseparable ever since.
“She is quite matriarchal and puts up with them, they love her and she’s very protective of them.”
NILES, Ill. — Police in Niles, Illinois — a suburb of Chicago — expressed satisfaction with a pilot program begun in August to “deputize” five feral cats to control the rat population, a police official told Pioneer Press. Now, the department says it is looking to extend the program.
The cats have lived around the 7800 block of Nordica Avenue for about three years under the care of a resident. The Niles police department recruited the cats because they are a natural deterrent to rats, according to Niles Police.
Earlier in the year, Niles officials passed a wildlife ordinance to curb rat problems in the village. According to the village’s website, the Community Development Department tracks and investigates rat complaints and inspects alleys and properties. The department gives out free rat traps to residential properties.
By James Pelham, 1800s
Niles Police Sergeant Dan Borkowski told Pioneer Press through email that the department reviewed complaint data from the Development Department and resident feedback and decided to continue and expand the feral cat program. Borkowski said the department had yet to determine where the cats will be placed because it’s contingent on cat availability and host families to take care of the cats.
Borkowski said they would keep the cats in a more defined territory. The village’s animal control officer gave Sarwat Hakim, the resident who has been watching over the feral cats, three makeshift, tarped shelters for the felines….
Hakim said the cats usually stay in the neighborhood or head off into the forest preserves, where they hunt for rats.
Hakim said before the cats were in the neighborhood, she used to see a lot of rats and rat traps. She hasn’t seen a rat trap in the neighborhood for about a year, which she is a fan of because she worries about kids potentially playing with them.
Hakim said she started caring for one feral cat three years ago when it kept returning for food. The cat gave birth to 15 cats, most of which were put up for adoption, with four of the cats staying behind.
“They’re so united you wouldn’t believe it,” said Hakim.
Hakim said she and her daughter-in-law feed the cats chicken in the morning, canned tuna for lunch and dinner, with cat food, both dried and canned, served as a snack. The cats also like to drink milk, she said.
“I hope nobody harms them and lets them stay because they’re benefiting us getting rid of the rats,” she said.
One can think of the claims presented by House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) as though they are the experiments of a ninth-grade physics class.
The assignment is simple: Build a contraption that will ensure an egg survives a fall from the roof of the school. So Comer and his friends get together and sketch out little parachutes and agree that the parachutes will work great and talk about how cool the different little parachutes are.
They build the parachutes and take them over to Fox News’s desk and Fox News takes the eggs and puts them in the parachute and holds it one hand over the other and lets go: the egg survived! What a parachute! Going to hype this parachute for a few days until you come up with a new one.
Sometimes, though, Comer or one of his buddies has to take the egg to the actual roof. Maybe Comer thinks some of the parachutes will actually work; probably he knows that a lot of them won’t. But either way, the teacher holds them over the edge of the building and subjects them to reality.
Ssssssssssplat. Over and over and over again. Different eggs and different parachutes but the same result.
Thanks to his incessant chatter about his parachutes and how cool they are, Comer has — despite this pattern — built a reputation with his peers as a really great parachute-maker. A lot of them have only heard Comer talk about his parachutes or have only seen the Fox News tests of the parachutes, so they really think he’s got it, he’s a master of Newtonian physics. Asked to head to the roof for their own tests, they simply grab the parachutes that Comer’s made. Bad move.
So what happened when another Republican Congressman tried to use Comer’s “evidence” in a non-Fox appearance?
On Thursday morning, Rep. Greg Murphy (R-N.C.) put some to the test. Murphy appeared on CNN to discuss subpoenas issued by Comer’s Oversight Committee to President Biden’s son Hunter and the president’s brother, James Murphy sits on the House Ways and Means Committee, which, along with Oversight and Rep. Jim Jordan’s (R-Ohio) Judiciary Committee, is tasked with leading the stalled impeachment investigation into the president.
Murphy was asked by host John Berman whether he would vote to hold the Bidens in contempt should they not comply with the subpoena. “Absolutely,” Murphy replied. Then he got out the parachute.
WC Mills, Gentleman in a top hat reading with his cat beside him
“You know, here’s the deal, John,” he said with the confidence of a guy who has never seen Comer’s physics experiments at work. “It’s very, very clear. Why … would Hunter and Jim create 20 shell companies to not — to be legal? We’ve seen time and time again — and Representative Comer has proved this — there was money, influencing peddling that Biden had during his last couple of years as vice president. And then after, right afterwards, they wanted to gain the money back.”
Sssssssssplat.
Comer likes to talk about the “shell companies,” ignoring that a number are simply corporate entities like one that serves as the structure for Hunter Biden’s law firm and another that’s a consulting company he ran. The Washington Post examined each of these “20 shell companies” finding that — despite Murphy’s insinuations — they were created because this is how business structures often work. (Comer tends not to talk about the much more extensive web of corporations controlled by the Trump Organization, which might have given Murphy pause.)
What happened when Murphy tried to explain what Joe Biden did that was criminal?
Comer also has not by any stretch proved that there was influence peddling by Joe Biden. That’s the crux of what he wants to prove and what his investigations are pointed toward. He’s shown, with an abundance of evidence, the already-obvious efforts by Hunter Biden to leverage his last name as he sought out business deals — but has also accrued numerous sworn statements from former Hunter Biden partners that Joe Biden wasn’t involved in the effort. (Among those drawing that line was Devon Archer.)
Berman, however, took the conversation in a different direction. He asked Murphy why he’d vote to hold Hunter or James Biden in contempt when he voted against holding former Trump adviser Stephen K. Bannon in contempt in 2021 after Bannon failed to provide testimony to the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol.
“Well, I think it’s a little bit different when you have a president of the United States,” he said. “We have somebody who’s not an elected official. You know, the president of the United States was selling his influence, his son was selling his influence—”
“It’s a little bit different of standards, John, when you have somebody who’s in elected office,” Murphy continued, “versus somebody who’s not in elected office.”
Berman then asked what elected office Hunter Biden held. Oops!
Unfortunately for Rep. Comer, it turns out that he also lent money to his brother.
House Oversight Committee chair James Comer (R-KY) on Wednesday subpoenaed President Joe Biden’s brother, James Biden, who Comer has implicated in unsubstantiated allegations of “shady business practices” in the Biden family.
Comer has in particular been trying to make hay out of two personal loan repayments from James Biden to his brother, for $40,000 and $200,000—with all transactions occurring in 2017 and 2018, when Joe Biden was neither in office nor a candidate.
By Escha van den Bogerd
But if Comer genuinely believes these transactions clear the “shady business practices” bar, he might want to consider a parallel inquiry into his own family.
According to Kentucky property records, Comer and his own brother have engaged in land swaps related to their family farming business. In one deal—also involving $200,000, as well as a shell company—the more powerful and influential Comer channeled extra money to his brother, seemingly from nothing. Other recent land swaps were quickly followed with new applications for special tax breaks, state records show. All of this, perplexingly, related to the dealings of a family company that appears to have never existed on paper.
But unlike with the Bidens, Comer’s own history actually borders a conflict of interest between his official government role and his private family business—and it’s been going on for decades.
While Comer and House GOP allies have tried to cast the Biden transactions as evidence of unsavory and possibly impeachable offenses, multiple news organizations—including CNN, The Wall Street Journal, FactCheck.org, and the conservative-leaning Washington Examiner—have all thrown cold water on the notion that the payments are evidence of anything other than a brother helping a brother.
Click the link to read the rest.
Speaking of conflicts involving people holding high-level positions, The Washington Post’s Ruth Marcus has an op-ed about serious ethics issues for Clarence and Ginni Thomas: The Crystal Clanton case shows a system failure.
Well, so much for getting to the bottom of the story of Crystal Clanton, the judicial law clerk accused of sending racist texts. And so much for all the talk about having Supreme Court justices abide by the code of conduct that covers other federal judges. In this case, at least, the mechanism to enforce that code turned out to be toothless. The judicial discipline system is better at self-protection than self-policing.
To review: Clanton is a protégé of Justice Clarence Thomas and Ginni Thomas. She met Ginni Thomas while working at the conservative youth group Turning Point USA. Her employment was terminated in 2017 after the New Yorker’s Jane Mayer unearthed texts apparently sent by Clanton: “I HATE BLACK PEOPLE. Like f— them all … I hate blacks. End of story.” Clanton told Mayer in an email that “I have no recollection of these messages and they do not reflect what I believe or who I am and the same was true when I was a teenager.” (Clanton was 20 when the texts were sent in 2015, and evidence suggests that this was not an isolated episode).
After leaving Turning Point, Clanton went to work for Ginni Thomas and lived in the Thomas’s home for almost a year. She attended George Mason University’s Antonin Scalia Law School and, with enthusiastic backing from Clarence Thomas, secured one of the most prestigious judicial clerkships in the country, for William H. Pryor Jr., chief judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit. Pryor, a reliable “feeder” of clerks to Thomas and other conservative justices, recommended Clanton for a district court clerkship, with Judge Corey Maze of Alabama, before she joined his chambers.
Girl with cat, by Merle Keller
And she appears to be en route to the high court. “It is certainly my intention to consider her for a clerkship should she perform as I expect and excel in her clerkships,” Thomas has written.
When the news of Clanton’s clerkships surfaced in 2021, Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee filed an ethics complaint; the matter was assigned to the 2nd Circuit to handle. Chief Judge Debra Ann Livingston dismissed the complaint without even appointing a special committee to look into the facts, as provided for under the rules and suggested by the 11th Circuit judge who conducted the initial review.
Livingston did not examine the underlying question of whether Clanton sent the racist texts. Rather, she found only that Pryor and Maze “performed all of the due diligence that a responsible judge would undertake” before hiring Clanton. The judges, she said, were “in possession of information that the allegations were false — that the anonymous sources relied on in the media accounts were not trustworthy,” and that “they have been repeatedly informed that the allegations of racist text messages and remarks are not true.”
In fact, there were on-the-record sources and screen shots of the texts. Turning Point spokesman Andrew Kolvet confirmed to me that Clanton was “terminated from Turning Point after the discovery of problematic texts.”
House Speaker Mike Johnson has three flags hanging outside his office: the American flag, the Louisiana state flag, and a flag representing a movement that wants to turn the United States into a religious Christian nation.
Normal stuff, you know?
The flag is white with a green evergreen tree in the middle and the phrase “An Appeal to Heaven” at the top. A report published Friday by Rolling Stone confirmed that the flag is outside his district office in Washington.
The flag was originally used as a banner during the Revolutionary War, but over the past decade, it has been embraced by a sect of Christianity called the New Apostolic Reformation, or NAR. A central tenet of NAR’s belief system is that it is God’s will for Christians to take control of all aspects of U.S. society—including education, arts and entertainment, the media, and businesses—to create a religious nation.
The NAR fully embraced Donald Trump when he announced he was running for office, endorsing him early on and helping endear him to other Christian movements. As a result, the Appeal to Heaven flag has become popular among Trump supporters.
The flag has appeared in photos of far-right politicians and election deniers such as Doug Mastriano, the Trump-endorsed candidate for Pennsylvania governor. Mastriano lost to Democrat Josh Shapiro.
The flag was also everywhere at the January 6 insurrection. Rolling Stone estimated that there may have been hundreds of Appeal to Heaven flags throughout the mob.
It should not be surprising that Johnson subscribes to the NAR belief system. He has a well-documented history of opposing abortion access, LGBTQ rights, and environmental policy on the grounds that they are non-Christian.
But it’s upsetting and deeply concerning that he is able to embrace it so openly without so much as a slap on the wrist. What’s more, Rolling Stone’s revelation comes just days after the House of Representatives censured Rashida Tlaib for her comments about Israel and Palestine.
F.B.I. agents seized Mayor Eric Adams’s electronic devices early this week in what appeared to be a dramatic escalation of a criminal inquiry into whether his 2021 campaign conspired with the Turkish government and others to funnel money into its coffers.
The agents approached the mayor after an event in Manhattan on Monday evening and asked his security detail to step away, a person with knowledge of the matter said. They climbed into his S.U.V. with him and, pursuant to a court-authorized warrant, took his devices, the person said.
The devices — at least two cellphones and an iPad — were returned to the mayor within a matter of days, according to that person and another person familiar with the situation. Law enforcement investigators with a search warrant can make copies of the data on devices after they seize them.
A lawyer for Mr. Adams and his campaign said in a statement that the mayor was cooperating with federal authorities, and had already “proactively reported” at least one instance of improper behavior….
The surprise seizure of Mr. Adams’s devices was an extraordinary development and appeared to be the first direct instance of the campaign contribution investigation touching the mayor. Mr. Adams, a retired police captain, said on Wednesday that he is so strident in urging his staff to “follow the law” that he can be almost “annoying.” He laughed at the notion that he had any potential criminal exposure.
The Mayor’s attorney says that Adams is not personally under investigation. We’ll see, I guess.
The federal investigation into Mr. Adams’s campaign burst into public view on Nov. 2, when F.B.I. agents searched the home of the mayor’s chief fund-raiser and seized two laptop computers, three iPhones and a manila folder labeled “Eric Adams.”
Mr. Adams responded to news of the raid by abruptly returning from Washington, D.C., where he had only just arrived for a day of meetings with White House and congressional leaders regarding the migrant influx, an issue he has said threatens to “destroy New York City.”
On Wednesday, he said his abrupt return was driven by his desire to be present for his team, and out of concern for Ms. Suggs, who he said had gone through a “traumatic experience.” [….]
The warrant obtained by the F.B.I. to search Ms. Suggs’s home sought evidence of a conspiracy to violate campaign finance law between members of Mr. Adams’s campaign, the Turkish government or Turkish nationals, and a Brooklyn-based construction company, KSK Construction, whose owners are originally from Turkey. The warrant also sought records about donations from Bay Atlantic University, a Washington, D.C., college whose founder is Turkish and is affiliated with a school Mr. Adams visited when he went to Turkey as Brooklyn borough president in 2015.
I guess we’ll learn more as time goes on.
I hope everyone has a great Caturday and Veteran’s Day weekend!!
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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.
The Washington Monthly
Higgins represents Southernmost Louisiana which is basically Cajun Country. He was a 
So, that cartoon sums up Higgin’s views of thugs pretty well. I’m sure you can all name at least 5 crazy Republicans in Congress. Now, add Higgins to that list. Right Wingers with money, businesses, and platforms that serve as Republican enablers and donors are equally as nuts these days. I’ve heard more than a few references to Henry Ford’s wingnuttery and the bat shit crazy Elon Musk. Musk is placing NAZI propaganda on X quite close to the ads he relies on for revenues. 
You may see the ads placements and the offending material at the link. 
So, we need to address the continuing saga which is Congressman George Santos. He appears to be the only Drag Queen that right wing Republicans want to keep around. After he announced he would not be running for reelection this week, he likely believed his expulsion was less likely. That’s not a good assumption, gurl! The AP has this breaking news headline. “Ethics chairman launches a new bid to expel George Santos after a withering report on his conduct.”
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