April 2, 2023
Late Morning/Evening Update:
Devlin Barrett, et al., of the Washington Post: "Justice Department and FBI investigators have amassed fresh evidence pointing to possible obstruction by ... Donald Trump in the investigation into top-secret documents found at his Mar-a-Lago home, according to people familiar with the matter. The additional evidence comes as investigators have used emails and text messages from a former Trump aide to help understand key moments last year.... The Trump investigation team has spent much of its time focusing on events that happened after Trump's advisers received a subpoena in May demanding the return of all documents with classified markings...." MB: IOW, there's some written evidence suggesting Trump told staff to hide the docs and lie about it. It's the equivalent of the chocolate-smeared kid saying, "No, Mom, I don't know what happened to the chocolate cake."
Finland. Steven Erlanger & Johanna Lemola of the New York Times: "Prime Minister Sanna Marin and her Social Democratic Party lost a tight election in Finland on Sunday to a center-right party that focused on economic concerns. The National Coalition Party, led by Petteri Orpo, 53, captured the most votes in the parliamentary election, followed by the right-wing Finns Party and the Social Democrats. But no party is near a majority in the 200-seat body, and Mr. Orpo is going to have a complicated task pulling together a governing coalition. With almost 100 percent of the vote counted, late Sunday night, Mr. Orpo's party had 48 seats with 20.8 percent of the vote, just ahead of the populist Finns, led by Riikka Purra, with 46 seats and 20.0 percent. Though Ms. Marin has been the closest Finland has to a political rock star, her center-left Social Democrats came in third, with 43 seats and 19.9 percent of the vote.... Given the tightness of the race, forming a new coalition government is expected to take many weeks of negotiations among the parties...."
~~~ Marie: I needed an explanation for the exchange between Jost & Che. Here it is, via Deadline. ~~~
~~~ RAS brings us this "Daily Show" PSA "for the heartbroken." Touching: ~~~
~~~ Happily, the Indicted One is in high spirits despite the circumstances: ~~~
Presidential Race 2024. Alisa Wiersema of ABC News: "Former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson made his 2024 White House bid official on Sunday in an exclusive sit-down interview with ABC 'This Week' co-anchor Jonathan Karl." Hutchinson told Karl the indicted, twice-impeached, defeated ex-president* should drop out of the presidential primary race.
~~~~~~~~~~
Mr. Biden Regrets. Caroline Frost of Deadline: "British press reports this weekend that Joe Biden will not be attending the [coronation] ceremony on May 6 in London, citing previous commitments. No US president in history has attended the Coronation of the British monarch. However, the Telegraph reports that Biden plans to send a representative for the occasion, either his wife Jill Biden or vice president Kamala Harris."
Jonathan Weisman of the New York Times: "... this week, on two consecutive days..., [Donald Trump] and the highest-rated cable news channel [Fox 'News'] were delivered a dose of reality by the American legal system.... In a court of law, the magnetism that Mr. Trump and Fox News have over their audiences may lose some of its power."
As Others See Us. Mark Landler of the New York Times: "Whether foreign leaders view the potential return of Donald J. Trump to the White House with hope or horror, the prospect of a Trump restoration is so deeply ingrained overseas that leaders in several countries have hedged their bets in diplomacy, security and even where they invest their fortunes. There were few signs that Mr. Trump's indictment last week on criminal charges in New York has changed those calculations. Foreign leaders have watched him bounce back from so many disasters, according to diplomats and foreign policy experts, that they now regard his political resilience with something approaching fatalism. This is especially true in Europe, whose leaders spent four years enduring Mr. Trump's hectoring on a host of issues, including military spending and climate change.... [Even if Trump is not re-elected,] many worry that he will be replaced by any number of Trump-like alternatives, of whom the Republican governor of Florida, Ron DeSantis, is the most prominent example."
Capitalism Is Awesome, Ctd. Ashley Capoot of CNBC: "Starbucks fired Alexis Rizzo, the employee responsible for igniting the Starbucks Workers United union campaign, just days after the company's former CEO Howard Schultz testified on Capitol Hill about the coffee chain's alleged union-busting, CNBC confirmed. Rizzo worked as a shift supervisor at Starbucks for 7 years and served as a union leader at the Genesee St. store in Buffalo, New York, which was one of the first two stores in the country to win its union campaign.... She said [store managers] told her [they fired her] because she had been late on four occasions -- two of which were instances where she had been one minute late. Rizzo suspects she was let go as a result of Wednesday's Senate hearing, she said.... 'I don't think it's a coincidence that two days after Howard Schultz had his ego bruised the way that he did that he started lashing out at Buffalo' Rizzo said. She added that two other employees were also fired Friday.... During the hearing, [Sen. Bernie] Sanders [I-Vt.] said that Starbucks has engaged in the 'most aggressive and illegal union-busting campaign in the modern history of our country.'"
Beyond the Beltway
Texas. Aala Elassar, et al., of CNN: "A federal judge in Texas ruled that at least 12 books removed from public libraries by Llano County officials, many because of their LGBTQ and racial content, must be placed back onto shelves within 24 hours, according to an order filed Thursday. Seven residents sued county officials in April 2022, claiming their First and 14th Amendment rights were violated when books deemed inappropriate by some people in the community and Republican lawmakers were removed from public libraries or access was restricted. The lawsuit filed in the US District Court for the Western District of Texas in San Antonio claimed county officials removed books from the shelves of the three-branch public library system 'because they disagree with the ideas within them' and terminated access to thousands of digital books because they could not ban two specific titles.... The library system also is required to reflect these books as available in their catalog and cannot remove any books for any reason while the case is ongoing, US District Judge Robert Pitman said in his order. 'Although libraries are afforded great discretion for their selection and acquisition decisions, the First Amendment prohibits the removal of books from libraries based on either viewpoint or content discrimination,' Pitman said." MB: Pitman is an Obama appointee.
Wisconsin. Sam Levine of the Guardian: "More than $37m has already been spent in an election that will this month determine control of Wisconsin's supreme court, easily making it the most expensive judicial contest in US history.... The race has national implications -- it will probably ultimately determine the legality of abortion in the state as well as play a key role in setting voting rules for the 2024 election in one of America's most competitive states." ~~~
~~~ Michelle Goldberg of the New York Times: Former Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) "and his party ... lock[ed] in G.O.P. rule [in Wisconsin], enacting shockingly lopsided electoral maps and assuring continuing Republican control of the State Legislature, as well as dominance of Wisconsin's national congressional delegation. Nothing since, not even the election of a Democratic governor, has been able to loosen Republicans' gerrymandered grip on the state. That grip has been used to restrict voting rights, pass an anti-union right-to-work law, cut funding to education, dismantle environmental protections and make Wisconsin one of the hardest states in the country in which to cast a ballot. Democrats, on the other hand, are powerless to pass laws of their own. In 2022, the Wisconsin Supreme Court ruled, 4 to 3, that the state must adopt new, even more gerrymandered maps passed by the legislature.... A contentious State Supreme Court election on Tuesday could finally put a crack in [Republican hegemony].... The Wisconsin Supreme Court election, pitting the mild-mannered, liberal-leaning family court judge Janet Protasiewicz against the Trumpist former State Supreme Court justice Daniel Kelly, is by far the most important political contest of the year.
Way Beyond
Israel. Shira Rubin of the Washington Post: "Israelis opposed to their far-right government flooded the streets in protest Saturday, turning out in force for the first major demonstration since Benjamin Netanyahu, the country's prime minister, announced a pause to legislation that would overhaul the judiciary earlier this week. Protesters showed up at more than 100 locations, according to the organizers, including in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, where they hoisted Israeli and American flags. The U.S. flags were a nod to President Biden's public opposition to the proposed legislation, which, if passed, could give the government a greater say in judicial appointments, including to the Supreme Court and those presiding over Netanyahu's corruption trial. The Supreme Court in Israel provides the sole check on legislative and executive power."
Ukraine, et al. The Washington Post's live briefing of developments Sunday in Russia's war on Ukraine is here: "Russia has assumed the presidency of the U.N. Security Council, part of a routine annual cycle that was denounced by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.... Russia's turn as head of the Security Council shows the 'complete bankruptcy of such institutions,' Zelensky said Saturday in his evening address.... The Biden administration and news organizations around the world called on Moscow to release American journalist Evan Gershkovich, a reporter for the Wall Street Journal who was detained in Russia on charges of espionage. The White House and the Journal have sharply denied the allegations." ~~~
~~~ The Guardian's live updates for Sunday are here. The Guardian's summary report is here.
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Sunday Sermon:
This year, that tax month starts on April Fools’ Day seems more appropriate than ever.
Republicans are again making loud threats about defaulting on the nation’s debt, while simultaneously failing to propose a budget of their own. Instead of drafting a budget, they take refuge in vagueness and threats to plunge the world into a recession, imitating the plot device that has criminals staging an explosion in one part of town to draw attention from the bank they’re robbing a mile away.
A close look at our taxing and spending habits reveals many things about them that Republicans prefer we don’t notice.
The largest portion of the national debt was caused by Republican tax cuts during the Reagan, Bush II, and Trump administrations. Without those cuts that primarily benefitted corporations and the top ten percent, the national debt would long ago have trended toward zero (americanprogress.org). It is Republicans who commonly make use of the nation’s credit card and then brazenly refuse to pay the bill. Some might call them deadbeats.
Republicans also like to whine because the relatively wealthy pay so much in taxes. They say it’s unfair. But if all taxes are considered as a portion of their income, the tax burden between rich and poor is almost even, the poor devoting about 25 percent of their income to taxes, the rich, 28 percent (nyreview.com). And that small difference is more than compensated for by the greater benefits in direct payments, subsidies, and tax credits that the rich receive, with the top twenty percent receiving forty percent more than the bottom twenty (nyreview.com).
Noisily beating their anti-tax-and-spend drum, Republicans are again attempting to drown out the quiet voices of arithmetic and reason.
They apparently hope Americans can be fooled, not just on April 1st, but all year long.
https://democraticunderground.com/10143054056
Trump campaign claims it received 4 million dollars in campaign
contributions in the 24 hours after his indictment.
That's a lot of nickels and dimes from his millions of worshippers,
if true.
I'm holding out to purchase a framed, genuine, no makeup, mug shot.
Need something for target practice. Damned rabbits are eating everything in sight.
Forest: We have (had) a slew of rabbits roaming around our land. especially trying to get into our gardens but last summer they seemed to not be so plentiful. Found out from a neighbor that another neighbor down south from us shoots not only all the rabbits that get on his property but squirrels to boot. I happen to know this guy is a staunch Republican–--even poor bunnies have to hide from them.
A PSA for the heartbroken.
Michelle Goldberg has an important piece on Wisconsin politics and having been born and raised in that state it infuriates me no end to see it become so fractured. Here's a bit of it going back to that dandy baby faced Scott Walker when governor.
"Walker and his party would go on to lock in G.O.P. rule, enacting shockingly lopsided electoral maps and assuring continuing Republican control of the State Legislature, as well as dominance of Wisconsin’s national congressional delegation. Nothing since, not even the election of a Democratic governor, has been able to loosen Republicans’ gerrymandered grip on the state. That grip has been used to restrict voting rights, pass an anti-union right-to-work law, cut funding to education, dismantle environmental protections and make Wisconsin one of the hardest states in the country in which to cast a ballot."
But now there is a chance for change: Liberal leaning Democrat Judge Janet Protasiewicz is running against the Trumpist former state Supreme Court justice Daniel Kelly. It's by far the most important political contest of the year. So even though you weren't a Wisconsinite. a state that has more cows than people and some of those people keep voting for the dumbist of dummies, Ron Johnson, keep your eyes open on this race.
RAS: Otherwise called THE BIG SAD––tears flowing like honey but shaped a lot like crocodiles.
How come we never hear a rebuttal when the filthy repigs say that Dumpster's indictment is "election obstruction" or the "end of democracy as they know it?" Our message is always lost in the sludge. To begin with, the end of democracy is marked not with the indictment of a criminal, but with the election of said criminal as president and head of a cult. As far as election obstruction is concerned, they don't recognize it as something they do with every breath, and that they all know he declared early in order to avoid arrest. We know it...they know it... It should be screamed with every breath of our own.
Someday it would be nice for the mainstream media to dominate its coverage with stories about the party that preserves and protects the vote AND democracy. There is far too much despair over the indictment of a former president and far too little on the times the criminal piece of s*** broke laws and spit on everyone, never paying any of his bills. MSM: stop the endless eternal desperate navel-gazing and report the news. Just the news. One of the parties is being tarred and feathered for existing. My husband says there is no point in reading the letters to the editor today in the local rag. EVERYTHING is Biden's fault, especially his lifelong love of maxims and sayings, delivered not in the dulcet tones of the Fatster. See SNL cold open for a perfect rendition of the cult leader blabbing away. It is all malarkey.
@Jeanne,
You seem a wee bit stressed. As an alternative to the MSM, check out the Medias Touch for their reporting of events. They can be a little repetitive, but still get their point across. That, and get rid of your TV to maintain your sanity.
Thanks, Unwashed. I will give that a try. Sometimes I get a bit carried away, but I am so tired of the people foghorning the great disservice done to the creep and his minions and nothing vibrating forward about what a disservice he and his have done to the rest of us. I heard he has collected 5 million bucks since Thursday-- it is simply horrible. I sometimes feel this "manbaby" is behaving like an unfeeling moron just to spite ME...yeah, I need help...Thanks UNWASHED! What time is my psychiactric appointment?