The Washington Post offers tips on how to keep your EV battery running in frigid temperatures. The link at the end of this graf is supposed to be a "gift link" (from me, Marie Burns, the giftor!), meaning that non-subscribers can read the article. Hope it works: https://wapo.st/3u8Z705
Tuesday
Jan232018
The Commentariat -- January 24, 2018
Afternoon Update:
Amy Goldstein of the Washington Post: "The Senate voted Wednesday to confirm Alex Azar, a former drug industry executive with pristine conservative credentials, as the next secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services. The 55 to 43 vote for Azar ushers in his return to the government's largest domestic agency, where he held senior roles during the tenure of the last Republican president. He will become the Trump administration's second HHS leader in 11 months; his predecessor, Tom Price, resigned in the fall amid an investigation of his use of expensive private planes for official business."
Trump Shows His Support for Dreamers. Louis Nelson of Politico: "... Donald Trump reiterated late Tuesday night that funding for his promised wall along the U.S.-Mexico border remains a requirement for any deal to shield undocumented immigrants brought here as children from deportation, a declaration that came hours after Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said he would take wall funding off the table in upcoming negotiations. 'Cryin' Chuck Schumer fully understands, especially after his humiliating defeat, that if there is no Wall, there is no DACA,' Trump wrote on Twitter. 'We must have safety and security, together with a strong Military, for our great people!'" ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: So the Rule remains. Innocent young people must pay for Trump's fake campaign promise. The lowest of the low.
Richard Wolf of USA Today: "The Supreme Court is racing Congress to decide the future of the Dreamers. The justices agreed Tuesday to decide quicklywhether to hear the Trump administration's appeal of a federal district court's order to restart the DACA program without waiting for an appeals court ruling. By setting up a fast track for both sides to submit court papers, the high court likely will consider the Justice Department's request at its Feb. 16 conference. If it decides to take the case, it could hear arguments in the spring."
Tracy Connor of NBC News: "After a remarkable hearing that featured gut-wrenching statements from 156 of his accusers and an apology that the judge said rang hollow, former Olympic gymnastics doctor Larry Nassar was sentenced Wednesday to 40 to 175 years in prison for molesting young girls under the guise of treatment.... Nassar, 54, agreed to a minimum 40-year sentence when he pleaded guilty last year to seven counts of first-degree criminal sexual misconduct in Ingham County. He still faces sentencing in Eaton County for three more counts, and he's already been sentenced to 60 years in federal prison for possession of child pornography. The judge could have given Nassar a stiffer sentence than the one he agreed to, but that would have given him the option of withdrawing his plea and asking for a trial."
*****
Carol Leonnig & Josh Dawsey of the Washington Post: "Special counsel Robert S. Mueller III is seeking to question President Trump in the coming weeks about his decisions to oust national security adviser Michael Flynn and FBI Director James B. Comey, according to two people familiar with his plans. Mueller's interest in the events that led Trump to push out Flynn and Comey indicates that his investigation is intensifying its focus on possible efforts by the president or others to obstruct or blunt the special counsel's probe. Trump's attorneys have crafted some negotiating terms for the president's interview with Mueller's team, one that could be presented to the special counsel as soon as next week, according to the two people." ...
... Mrs. Bea McCrabbie: It would appear that Trumpie's legal team doesn't think the Biggest Liar can pull the wool over Mueller's eyes. ...
... Way back on January 10, Trump said "it seems unlikely that you'd even have an interview" because "no collusion, no collusion, everybody says no collusion, Hillary Clinton":
... Michael Schmidt of the New York Times: "Attorney General Jeff Sessions was questioned for several hours last week as part of the special counsel investigation, and the former F.B.I. director, James B. Comey, was interviewed by the office last year, according to two people briefed on the meeting. The interview with Mr. Sessions marked the first time that investigators for the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, are known to have questioned a member of President Trump's cabinet.... For Mr. Mueller, Mr. Sessions is a key witness to two of the major issues he is investigating: the campaign's possible ties to the Russians and whether the president tried to obstruct the Russia investigation." This story also was linked yesterday afternoon, & has been updated.) ...
... Aaron Blake of the Washington Post: "... there are increasing signs that Sessions has indeed done plenty of Trump's bidding behind closed doors. And he's done it on some dicey and very politically tinged issues -- so much so that he made Trump's second FBI director deeply uncomfortable with the whole thing.... It's only the latest evidence that Sessions and his Justice Department are taking specific actions that Trump has publicly urged, even as they, in some cases, risk looking like they are in service to Trump's political goals." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...
... Devlin Barrett & Philip Rucker of the Washington Post: "... several people familiar with the dynamic [between Christopher Wray & Sessions, et al.,] told The Post that they were not aware of Wray making such an explicit threat [to resign]. Firing [Deputy Director Andrew] McCabe could be problematic because he has limited civil service protections as a government employee. Such a move, in the aftermath of public criticism from the president and others, could prompt litigation." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...
... Margaret Hartmann of New York on FBI Director Christopher Wray's (disputed) threat to resign if TrumpSessions interfered with FBI operations: "While the White House is abandoning all pretense of avoiding interference in FBI operations, there's some good news here. First, Wray appears to be making good on his promise to stand up for the bureau's independence. During his Senate confirmation hearing, Wray said he wouldn't be 'pulling punches' as FBI director. 'I will never allow the FBI's work to be driven by anything other than the facts, the law, and the impartial pursuit of justice. Period,' he said." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...
... OR Maybe Wray Has Caved to TrumpSessions. Sari Horwitz & Matt Zapotosky of the Washington Post: "FBI Director Christopher A. Wray, who has been under political pressure to remove top officials at the bureau, is filling two senior positions previously held by people who served under former director James B. Comey. Dana Boente, the U.S. attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia who is acting head of the Justice Department's national security division, has been selected to be the FBI's next general counsel, according to three people familiar with the matter. He replaces James Baker, who was reassigned late last year.... Wray also will replace his chief of staff, Jim Rybicki, with Zachary J. Harmon, a colleague from the law firm where Wray was a partner before joining the bureau. Harmon is a former federal prosecutor...." ...
... Ellen Nakashima, et al., of the Washington Post: "Shortly after President Trump fired his FBI director in May, he summoned to the Oval Office the bureau's acting director.... The two men exchanged pleasantries, but before long, Trump, according to several current and former U.S. officials, asked Andrew McCabe a pointed question: Whom did he vote for in the 2016 election? McCabe said he didn't vote, according to ... officials.... Trump, the officials said, also vented his anger at McCabe over the several hundred thousand dollars in donations that his wife, a Democrat, received for her failed 2015 Virginia state Senate bid from a political action committee controlled by a close friend of Hillary Clinton.... McCabe, who has spent more than two decades at the bureau, found the conversation with Trump 'disturbing,' said one former U.S. official.... One person said the Trump-McCabe conversation is of interest to special counsel Robert S. Mueller III...." ...
Impeach JeffBo! Brian Beutler of Crooked: "On a substantive level, Sessions' tenure as attorney general has been extraordinarily damaging. At the very least, it has set back civil rights enforcement and criminal justice reforms by years. And in supplicating to Trump, Sessions has compromised both himself and the rule of law alike.... In testifying before Congress, Sessions has claimed not to recall a tremendous amount of information about his conduct as a Trump surrogate.... Sessions is also actively and passively helping Trump corrupt federal law enforcement.... Sessions deserves to be impeached." Beutler argues that a Democratic threat to impeach JeffBo would provide some cover for Mueller's investigation to continue.
One Year Ago Today. Carol Lee of NBC News: "A year ago today, Donald Trump's newly sworn -- in national security adviser, Michael Flynn, met privately in his West Wing office with FBI investigators interested in his communications with Russia's ambassador, without a lawyer or the knowledge of the president and other top White House officials, according to people familiar with the matter. Flynn's FBI interview on Jan. 24, 2017, set in motion an extraordinary sequence of events unparalleled for the first year of a U.S. presidency." ...
... As Rebecca Savransky of the Hill notes, Lee's report reveals parts of the Mueller investigation not previously reported: "CIA Director Mike Pompeo has been interviewed as part of special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation into Russian election interference, NBC News reported. Former acting attorney general Sally Yates has also cooperated with the special counsel, the network reported.... Pompeo and Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats, who has also spoken with Mueller's team, are 'peripheral witnesses' to the firing of former FBI director James Comey, one person familiar with the matter told NBC News."
Katie Williams of the Hill: "Conservative lawmakers from four separate committees are raising alarm bells about a tranche of missing text messages between two FBI agents assigned to the investigation into Russia and President Trump's campaign, saying it calls into 'further question the credibility and objectivity of certain officials at the FBI.'... Five months of missing messages between senior counterintelligence agent Peter Strzok and FBI lawyer Lisa Page ... begin again on May 17, the day that [Robert] Mueller was appointed.... Trump, who has repeatedly characterized the Mueller probe as a 'witch hunt,' tweeted Tuesday that the news of the lost text messages was 'one of the biggest stories in a long time.'... Meanwhile, House Intelligence Committee lawmakers are refusing to allow the FBI to view a classified four-page memo that GOP members say shows abuse by the bureau of government surveillance powers.... Rep. Jerrold Nadler (N.Y.), the top Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, called the allegations in the memo 'a conspiracy theory concocted by Chairman [Devin] Nunes' after reviewing the underlying materials...." ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: Congratulations to loony conspiracy theorist Alex Jones. His wacky worldview has taken over the highest levels of government.
... Greg Sargent: "Republicans may be on the verge of publicly releasing a secret memo compiled by Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.), one of President Trump's most devoted bodyguards against accountability on Capitol Hill, that purports to show serious misconduct by the FBI and Justice Department toward the Trump campaign. The memo is the latest effort to build an alt-narrative that casts the FBI's Russia probe -- which became special counsel Robert S. Mueller III's probe -- as a Deep State Coup to remove Trump from power.... In an interview with me this morning, Rep. Adam B. Schiff (D-Calif.) -- who is Nunes's Democratic counterpart on the House Intelligence Committee -- pushed back hard, alleging that the memo presents a profoundly doctored picture of what the classified information actually shows.... Schiff also ... said that in allowing the memo to be accessed in a classified setting by House Republicans, Nunes has violated an agreement with the FBI and the Justice Department." (Also linked yesterday.)
Ben Collins & Spencer Ackerman of the Daily Beast: "The online groundswell urging the release of House Republicans' attacks on the Federal Bureau of Investigation appears thus far to be organically American -- not Russian propaganda, a source familiar with Twitter's internal analysis told The Daily Beast.... On Tuesday, two Democratic leaders urged Facebook and Twitter to conduct an 'in-depth forensic examination' of #ReleaseTheMemo to determine the extent of Russian propaganda promoting the hashtag. They relied on a report from the German Marshall Fund's Alliance for Securing Democracy claiming that #ReleaseTheMemo was had become the favorite hashtag of Russian-sponsored Twitter accounts.... But a knowledgeable source says that Twitter's internal analysis has thus far found that authentic American accounts, and not Russian imposters or automated bots, are driving #ReleaseTheMemo.... The source pointed to influential American users on the right, including Donald Trump Jr., with his 2.49 million followers, pushing the hashtag forward." ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: Uh, I thought Junior was a Russian asset. ...
... BUT. Christina Zhao of Newsweek: "As government closure reaches day three, it emerged that ... Donald Trump's supporters on Twitter got a boost from the Russians in blaming Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer for the federal shutdown.... The Alliance for Securing Democracy found that #SchumerShutdown had exploded among Russian influence networks. The security group tracked approximately 600 Twitter accounts believed to be operated by Russian-tied groups and found the shutdown hashtag had surpassed popular Russian bot hashtag #ReleaseTheMemo, reported The Hill.... #ReleaseTheMemo, which was pushed to second on the list of most peddled hashtags by Russia propaganda trolls, has been used by GOP supporters to call for the release of a memo that allegedly shows political bias by the FBI in investigating allegations of collusion between Russia and Trump's campaign. Last Friday, Hamilton 68, a website that monitors propaganda from Russia, found that the Kremlin bots were using the hashtag to push the House Intelligence Committee into releasing the classified report." ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: Alliance for Securing Democracy & Twitter can't both be right on #ReleaseTheMemo. It's reasonable to suspect, tho it's not necessarily so in every case, that a corporation is not as good at self-analysis as an outside organization is at conducting an analysis of that corporation's product.
Sarah Jones of the New Republic: "Evangelicals don't care about Stormy Daniels. Evangelicalism once referred to a specific set of doctrinal beliefs. But as a new Politico interview with the Family Research Council's Tony Perkins makes clear, America evangelicalism is no longer about doctrine, at least not as much as it's about politics. Perkins knows all about ... Donald Trump's moral failings -- including the alleged Stormy Daniels affair -- and his response is to shrug. 'We kind of gave him -- "All right, you get a mulligan. You get a do-over here,"' Perkins told reporter Edward-Isaac Dovere[.]... By aligning himself with Trump, and convincing most of his movement to follow along, Perkins has altered the course of American Evangelicalism itself." (Also linked yesterday.)
Jonathan Chait: "It's true that Trump has proven even less competent in office than his most dismissive critics anticipated.... But the argument for complacency misunderstands how authoritarian leaders attack democratic governments, and how Trump might yet do so.... Trump's ignorance and authoritarianism are not mutually exclusive. Trump is not an ideologically committed authoritarian. He is an instinctive one, who understands relations between people and countries in terms of zero-sum dominance. He certainly has no coherent plan to dismantle the republic. But his authoritarianism springs primarily from his ignorance.... One of the most surprising conclusions in How Democracies Die, a new study of case histories in democratic backsliding by Harvard government professors Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt, is that some authoritarian leaders have waited a year or more to attack institutional constraints.... Anti-democratic rhetoric can be a telling indicator of what lies ahead.... From the standpoint of democratic backsliding, the most alarming development over the last year has been the Republican Party's almost total abdication of independent responsibility."
Burgess Everett & Seung Min Kim of Politico: "Chuck Schumer is taking his big spending boost for Donald Trump's border wall off the table. The Senate minority leader, through an aide, informed the White House on Monday that he was retracting the offer he made last week to give Trump well north of the $1.6 billion in wall funding Trump had asked for this year, according to two Democrats. And now they say Trump will simply not get a better deal than that on his signature campaign promise." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...
... "Fear of Chucky," the White House Horror Movie. Asawin Suebsaeng & Sam Stein of the Daily Beast: "With three weeks to go for lawmakers to hit a self-imposed deadline for a sweeping immigration deal, West Wing officials have become consumed with a singular objective: keeping ... Donald Trump away from Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.). The objective is drawn from a recurring fear, shared among Trump allies and anti-immigration hardliners both within and without the administration, that the president's proclivity to change his tune based on what the last person advised could be exploited by Schumer and Democratic leaders."
Victoria Guida of Politico: "The Senate on Tuesday ushered in the Donald Trump era at the Federal Reserve, confirming Jerome Powell, the president's pick to chair the world's most important central bank, in a bipartisan 84-13 vote. Trump chose Powell over outgoing Chair Janet Yellen, breaking with the precedent for presidents to renominate Fed chairs they inherit and continuing his drive to ditch policies and personnel put in place by former President Barack Obama."
Ruth Eglash of the Washington Post: "If there's one thing female journalists covering the trip of Vice President Pence to Israel will remember it is the 'special treatment' they received, first by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's security detail and second, in their 'unique' vantage point while covering Pence's visit to the Western Wall on Tuesday. At Netanyahu's office on Monday morning, a visiting female journalist from Finland's state television was asked to remove her bra during an overly zealous and demeaning security check. When she refused, she was prevented from covering Pence's news conference with Netanyahu. Then, on Tuesday, female journalists were particularly perturbed to discover that they had been relegated to covering Pence's spiritual stop at the Western Wall, one of Judaism's holiest sites, from the other side of a fence.... The Western Wall ... is currently under the authority of the ultra-Orthodox Jewish Western Wall Heritage Foundation. According to custom, the plaza is divided by gender, with men praying on one side of a barrier and women on the other." ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: This would never happen in the USA. Trump keeps all journalists, regardless of gender, in cages. Way more fair. ...
... Karen Pence Also Had to Observe the Taboo. Photos show mike pence standing alone at the Wall. Herb Keinon of the Jerusalem Post: "Pence's wife, Karen, received a separate explanation on the women' section of the wall, after which she, too, approached it and stood with her hand on the stones for a few moments." ...
... Annals of "Journalism," Ctd. No Girls Allowed, Ctd. New York Magazine Does Find a Special Cage for Women. Marcy Wheeler in the New Republic: "A lot of people have opinions about Glenn Greenwald, who has emerged as one of the most controversial voices in the debate over Russia's interference in the 2016 election. But according to New York magazine, none of them are women. In a 4,800-word profile -- audaciously titled, 'Does Glenn Greenwald know more than Robert Mueller?' -- author Simon van Zuylen-Wood fails to quote even one woman to test Greenwald's insistence that the Russia investigation is much ado about nothing, despite the fact that women journalists and lawyers have made huge contributions to the debate and nurtured Greenwald's career."
You Can Buy Mick Mulvaney for $4,500. Josh Keefe of International Business Times: "Mick Mulvaney’s Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) quietly closed an investigation into a payday lender headquartered in Mulvaney's home state Monday. The company previously donated to the former congressman's political campaigns. Payday lender World Acceptance Corporation announced in a press release Monday that it received a letter from the CFPB stating that the financial watchdog had closed its nearly four-year investigation into the company's marketing and lending practices. The company, which is headquartered in South Carolina, has given at least $4,500 in campaign donations to Mulvaney, who represented South Carolina in the House for six years before becoming ... Donald Trump's budget director last year. The CFPB declined comment on World Acceptance Corporation's press release. The investigation followed a 2013 report by ProPublica and Marketplace that found World Acceptance Corporation issued loans that were 'deceptively expensive' and packaged with 'nearly useless insurance products' while trapping borrowers in a 'debt cycle.'"
Josh Gerstein of Politico: "Attorney General Jeff Sessions is embracing newly-released FBI statistics as evidence that America has turned the tide in its battle against violent crime -- a shift he credits in large part to the policies of ... Donald Trump.... A statement posted on the FBI's website referred to the reduction in crime as 'slight.' However, Sessions said in an op-ed piece published Tuesday in USA Today that the report is evidence that Trum is delivering on the vow he made in his jarring inaugural speech last year to put an end to what he termed 'American carnage.'... Sessions and other top Justice Department officials routinely use their public appearances and statements to pay tribute to the president's leadership. The op-ed on the crime numbers was no exception.... Critics disputed that any of the administration's policy changes are having an impact on crime rates. 'They're correct that crime in 2017 is down ... but there's no evidence whatsoever that this is due to the administration's policies,' said Inimai Chettiar of the Brennan Center for Justice. Chettiar said the administration exaggerated indications of a crime wave and now is exaggerating the impact of officials' efforts."
Scott Cacciola of the New York Times: "Judge Rosemarie Aquilina listened on Monday morning as yet another gymnast, one of scores coming forward in her courtroom, took her turn excoriating Lawrence G. Nassar, a prominent doctor for U.S.A. Gymnastics who has pleaded guilty to multiple sex crimes.... Judge Aquilina ... has now allowed nearly 140 girls and women, including several prominent Olympic gymnasts, to give statements against Dr. Nassar.... Belying the stone-faced image of dispassionate jurists, Judge Aquilina has emerged as an unusually fierce victims' advocate in a sentencing hearing that has drawn national attention for the scope of Dr. Nassar's abuse and for the role that institutions like U.S.A. Gymnastics and Michigan State University played in employing him for decades.... Judge Aquilina's unconventional approach has not elicited any discernible criticism, but she has generated attention. Not only has she opened the floodgates to emotional testimony in a very pronounced way, but she seems determined to lend her voice, shedding any pretense of judicial distance." ...
... CBS News (Jan. 22): "The chairman, vice-chairman and treasurer of USA Gymnastics resigned under pressure from the U.S. Olympic committee on Monday in the latest fallout from the Larry Nassar scandal. Nassar is the former women's team doctor for USA Gymnastics and Michigan State University (MSU) who has pleaded guilty to abusing young patients." One 15-year old victim who spoke during the sentencing hearing said, "My mom is still getting billed [by MSU] for appointments where I was sexually assaulted." ...
... Marc Tracy of the New York Times: "The N.C.A.A. sent a letter of inquiry to Michigan State University, formally opening an investigation into how the university handled the case of Lawrence G. Nassar, the doctor who sexually assaulted scores of female athletes.... N.C.A.A. bylaws require colleges to protect the health, safety and well-being of athletes." ...
... Julie Mack and Emily Lawler in an undated (2017??) MLive (Michigan Live) report: "Over [two decades], some of Nassar's alleged victims say they were telling parents, coaches, counselors, MSU athletic trainers - even police -- that, without consent or explanation, Nassar was digitally penetrating them in the vagina and anus during medical treatments for back, hip and other injuries. Yet again and again, the women's accounts were viewed with skepticism, the women claim." The report cites specifics alleged in numerous lawsuits.
Laura Yuen, et al., of MPR News: "When Minnesota Public Radio abruptly severed ties with Garrison Keillor in November, the sole explanation offered by the company was 'inappropriate behavior' with a female colleague. For his part, the creator and longtime host of A Prairie Home Companion described his offense as nothing more than having placed his hand on a woman's back to console her. An investigation by MPR News, however, has learned of a years-long pattern of behavior that left several women who worked for Keillor feeling mistreated, sexualized or belittled.... The revelations ... suggest a star who seemed heedless of the power imbalance that gave him an advantage in his relationships with younger women.... Jon McTaggart, president and CEO of MPR and American Public Media Group... said the company's separation of business interests from Keillor came after it received allegations of 'dozens' of sexually inappropriate incidents involving Keillor and a woman who worked for him on A Prairie Home Companion. He said the allegations included requests for sexual contact and descriptions of unwanted sexual touching."
Jonathan Tamari of Philly.com: "U.S. Rep Pat Meehan acknowledged Tuesday that he had developed a deep 'affection' for a younger aide and told her that he saw her as 'a soul mate' last year, but said he never pursued a romantic relationship with the woman and, despite paying her a secret settlement, denied her claims of sexual harassment.... He released a heartfelt, hand-written letter he wrote to her in May in which he wished her well, thanked God 'for putting you into my life' and signed it 'with all my heart, Patrick'[.] In an interview with the Inquirer and Daily News, Meehan also said he intends to continue running for reelection in Pennsylvania's Seventh District. The comments were his first extensive response to a New York Times report Saturday that revealed that he had used thousands of taxpayer dollars to quietly settle a sexual harassment claim brought by the former aide, who was decades younger than the married, 62-year-old Congressman."
Finally a Story to Make You Smile. Lynn Sweet of the Chicago Sun-Times: Sen. Tami "Duckworth [D-Ill.] told me she is expecting her second child, another girl, in late April, a few weeks after she turns 50. The birth will make Duckworth the nation's first senator to have a baby while serving in the chamber."
Josh Lederman of the AP: "Multiple American citizens were killed and injured in the Taliban's 13-hour siege of an upscale hotel in Kabul, Afghanistan, the State Department said Tuesday. No exact figures were immediately available for either the U.S. fatalities or injuries." (Also linked yesterday.) ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie BTW: Duckworth is six months pregnant & that hasn't kept her from her appointed rounds. Brandon Carter of the Hill (Jan. 20): "Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.) tore into President Trump on the Senate floor Saturday, calling him a 'five-deferment draft dodger' and slamming him for his comments toward North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. 'Does he even know that there are service members who are in harm's way right now, watching him, looking for their commander in chief to show leadership, rather than [trying] to deflect blame?' Duckworth said. 'Or that his own Pentagon says that the short-term funding plans he seems intent on pushing is actually harmful to not just the military, but to our national security?'"
Senate Races
Jonathan Martin of the New York Times: "Senator Joe Manchin III of West Virginia told colleagues on Tuesday that he intended to run for re-election this year after all, ending an anxiety-making flirtation with retirement and easing Democratic fears that the most conservative Democrat in the Senate was about to effectively hand his seat to a Republican. In an interview, Mr. Manchin said he repeatedly expressed his frustration to Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the Democratic leader, and other colleagues, telling them that 'this place sucks,' before finally signaling Tuesday morning to Mr. Schumer's aides that he would file his re-election paperwork before West Virginia's deadline on Saturday. 'I was very vocal,' Mr. Manchin said, adding, 'they read between the lines.'... 'I've said this point blank: If people like me can't win from red states, you'll be in the minority the rest of your life,' Mr. Manchin said about his conversations with other Democrats about the need to tolerate more moderate lawmakers."
What to Do When a Democrat Wins a Senate Special Election. Brian Lyman of the Montgomery (Alabama) Advertiser: "The Alabama House of Representatives Tuesday evening approved a bill that would end special elections for the state's two U.S. Senate seats when vacancies occur. The bill, sponsored by Rep. Steve Clouse, R-Ozark and coming after last year's special election for U.S. Senate, would allow a governor's appointee for a Senate vacancy to serve until the next general election in the state, rather than have the governor call a special election. The appointee would go through regularly scheduled primaries for that contest. It passed 67 to 31 on a largely party-line vote after a two-hour filibuster from Democrats who said it would diminish voters' voices in the process."
** Barbara Ehrenreich & Alissa Quart in the Guardian: "Let's call the pro-lifers what they are: pro-death. There is mounting evidence that it is not abortion, but the lack of access to abortion that is a deadly threat to women. This conclusion comes from careful state-by-state monitoring of maternal mortality, including deaths occurring at birth and around the time of birth. The less access to abortion, the greater the chance that women will die in childbirth or pregnancy.... Texas, for example, saw its maternal mortality rate more than double between 2010 and 2014, as the state closed more than half of its abortion clinics and severely cut funding for Planned Parenthood. Thanks to Texas and a few other states with strong 'pro-life' lobbies, mostly in the south, the US now bears the ghastly distinction of having the highest maternal mortality rate of all the world's wealthy democracies."
Beyond the Beltway
Kevin Dayton of the Honolulu Star-Advertiser: "Gov. David Ige [D] told reporters today that part of the delay in notifying the public that the Jan. 13 ballistic missile alert was a false alarm was that he did not know his Twitter account password. The Hawaii Emergency Management Agency issued the false alarm at 8:07 a.m., and Ige was told the missile alert was a false alarm two minutes after the alert was sent to cell phones across the state. However, Ige's office did not get out a cancellation message until 17 minutes after the alert." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
Mike Stunson & Morgan Eads of the Lexington Herald-Leader: "A shooting at Marshall County High School in Western Kentucky killed a 15-year old boy and a 15-year-old girl and wounded 12 others, according to Kentucky State Police. Five more students were treated for injuries, but they weren't shot, Gov. Matt Bevin and police said. All of the victims are thought to be students. The suspect is a 15-year-old boy who was arrested at the school by a deputy. The boy will be charged with murder and attempted murder, police said. The shooting occurred just before 8 a.m. [Tuesday] at the school in Benton, in southwestern Kentucky, according to State Police Commissioner Rick Sanders."
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Reader Comments (19)
If I may wander a bit afield here and repeat some of what I said earlier today to my son and to the NYTimes about Ursula Le Guin's death:
I have read science fiction and fantasy for most of my reading life, so many years ago I was particularly pleased to have the chance to talk to her at a small conference I attended in the Seattle area, where I the opportunity to converse with her about teaching literature to high school students. We talked about the difficulty of selecting stories of substance that balanced age-appropriate reading levels with narrative interest. Charles Dickens, a favorite author of mine and she told me, of hers, came up and I remember we ticked through some of the novels and chatted about which might be most accessible to high school students and which more likely to captivate their attention.
I don't remember what she said in the presentation to the group, but throughout our brief subsequent conversation the interest she showed in teaching and learning, the intelligence that illumined everything she had to say, and (of course) the attention she was kind enough to pay to me remain with me to this day.
I'm still grateful I was able to share a few minutes with this extraordinarily civilized woman.
And I'm guessing she would have felt right at home here. Her politics certainly would.
NYT: School Shooting Was Nation’s 11th of the Year. It Was Jan. 23.
I had no idea. And I'm sure none were done by a Dreamer. That would have been all over the news. Last night, just thinking about yesterdays event, I had an idea that would deal with justice. The owner of the gun gets charged with same crimes as the child shooter.
Of course this is America, so it will never happen.
Marvin,
Your tongue in cheek (how far in I don't know) suggestion about holding gun owners responsible for their use brings into sharp relief one of the simplicities wholly unsupported by evidence or experience by which we prefer to live.
Guns don't kill people. People kill people.
Bushwah!
To the degree that human beings don't exist entirely by themselves, sans culture, sans society, sans even family members, one might say they are alone responsible for what they do.
But no one lives that way, no one, not even the hermit who holed up in a cave a few years back up one of our local river valleys but who had to depend on raiding homes and farms for food.
It's a truth that ought to be much more obvious than it apparently is.
After all, dependency is one of the first things we learn as small children.
Then as our ego develops, it obscures that sure knowledge. A counter-intuitive moral amnesia sets in as we drink deep of the all-powerful potion of personal responsibility, whose negative side implies that we are responsible only to and for ourselves.
It's an attitude not just intellectually lazy but also essentially mean and selfish--and enticed by an entire continent open to rapine and despoilation, we've founded an entire culture on it.
Maybe as population and physical interconnectedness increase, the little control we really have over our own lives is becoming more and more obvious, and along with that a growing sense that our absolute faith in personal responsibility is misplaced.
And that's why we need God--or a Pretender to save us.
Under federal law, there are some limited cases in which a gun-seller can be charged with a crime committed by the buyer. "... if you loan a gun to someone, knowing they intend to use it to rob a bank, and then they rob the bank while you stay home, you can still be convicted of bank robbery." It stands to reason, then, if the bank robber kills a teller in the course of the robbery, you could be charged with murder, just as the guy driving the getaway car could be.
But (I think) if you illegally sell a gun to a guy whom you know has robbed banks before but don't know how he plans to use the gun you sell him, the worst that can happen to you is to be charged with an illegal gun sale. You have to have knowledge (mens rea) of the buyer's specific plans.
Caveat: I can't think of any instance in which it would be wise to take "Mrs. McCrabbie's Advice to Gunrunners."
School shootings? Confederates have the answer!
About that school shooting, it's important to remember that Kentucky governor Matt Bevin, former shady businessman, sleazy jamoke (who bought a mansion for half its market value from a donor and thinks that's perfectly okay), and tax evader, who was described in pretty much all reports yesterday as "shaken" is one of the more rabid supporters of guns everywhere, for everyone, concealed or out in the open, with no regulation, anytime, anywhere.
He supported a bill in the Kentucky senate last year that would have allowed for 18 year olds to own and carry concealed weapons with no licensing, no training, and no background checks. His snippy response to questions about gun control is that controls are not needed because "there are laws against murder". Oh yeah...and I see that those laws have been spectacularly successful. After the mass murder in Las Vegas last year, he warned that it's wrong to connect that event with guns. Oh, okay. How about peanut butter? Can we connect it to peanut butter? Because that makes as much sense as not connecting it to guns. Christ almighty, the guy had a freakin' arsenal with him. He spent days ferrying weapons up to the room, but it's not about guns??
But wait. I read that Bevin did actually have a plan for halting the carnage of gun violence: prayer. I am not even kidding. Prayer.Roaming bands of the religious, praying away the violence. I'm thinking it was likely a great idea and would have worked wonderfully if the evangelicals in those groups weren't spending most of their prayer capital trying to pray away the gay ("Oh no. Fuck guns, Look! There are two guys holding hands! Oh save them, Lord Jesus!"). This is the physical manifestation of that hoary wingnut standby in the wake of gun violence: thoughts and prayers. Always so effective.
In a country where the killing is epidemic, where kids in schools are gunned down on a regular basis, this is the kind of response Confederates offer. 1. No regulation and guns for everyone, and when it gets too crazy and people are dropping by the dozens in hails of gunfire, 2. pray. It sounds too stupid to be serious, but this is what they have on offer. Basically, they're saying, the NRA won't let us do anything about it, so we'll pray that your kid's isn't the next bullet riddled body to hit the floor.
Bevin was shaken? He clearly isn't stirred.
GOTV.
@Akhilleus
Had no idea that prayer was the answer, but am not surprised.
As I said, God or a Pretender.
Now if we could somehow require all of the Pretenders, large and small, to stand between the shooters and their victims...
@Akhilleus: Yes, but you are providing cover for the Stupidest U.S. Senator -- Ron Johnson. Your logical argument -- more guns, more gun killings -- is exactly the "logic" Johnson used when claiming that ObamaCare's Medicaid expansion is the cause of the opioid crisis: more people with access to doctors, so more access to opioids. Never mind all the other factors that have an impact on addiction. In fact, as Michael Hiltzik of the LA Times points out, the rise in opioid addiction may be the reason some states finally accepted the Medicaid expansion: "Medicaid pays for a huge proportion of opioid treatments."
Wonder how far Johnson gets in his cart with the horse standing behind it.
So lemme get this straight.
This guy, Devin Nunes, who was supposed to have been off the House Intelligence Committee for ETHICS VIOLATIONS, has been conducting his very own double secret, hush-hush investigation on the side, while trying to avoid being kicked out of the House (which, okay, would never happen because Confederates) for running to tell Daddy Trumpy all about what that committee was looking at--highly illegal, by the way--has written a supposedly hot-dang four page memo (in crayon, triple spaced) that "outlines" abuses blah, blah, blah, Obama, Hillary, Treason, blah, blah, blah. The proof? Oh...can't see that. It's See-krett. No lookie.
Then he lets Confederates read his memo who emerge from the vault, or wherever the hell this thing is being kept, saying things like "people will go to jail, duh" and "worse than Watergate."
Well, paint a swastika on my ass and call me a friend of Trump! Worse than Watergate? So, okay, let's see this masterpiece of Sherlockian detective work. What's that? It's classified? And the "proof" can't be shown either?
How conveeeeenient, Devvy.
You know, I get so fucking tired of these lying scumbags trotting out one bullshit canard after the other to protect the little king from the consequences of his treason. After all, the whole point of this committee's investigation was supposed to be how and how much did Putin help Trump win the election. Nunes and Trump and King and the rest of the jabronis scream No Collusion! No Russians! But oops. Look who's helping spread the word for Nunes about his Wicked, Unbelievably Crazy Memo: RUSSIANS!
Are you fucking kidding me?
Who could take any of this clown show bullshit seriously?
Well, Fox for one. And several million Trumpbots. And these slugs know that. So just make shit up, call it a "Top Secret Memo!" but don't let anyone see it. Let it leak that that horrible nee-groe did terrible things, terrible, to the little king! Don't worry about proof or anything as inconvenient as that.
When I was a kid, there was this guy in the neighborhood, a weird, shifty kinda guy, who told all the kids that he had built a death ray in his basement and came out at night to kill things. We asked to see it or to see any of the things he had killed. He told us we couldn't because....the death ray made them invisible. Or something. I can't remember the guy's name, but if was Devin Nunes, I wouldn't be a bit surprised.
Perdition. That's what these assholes deserve. Perdition, with large fiery objects shoved up their asses.
If this memo is that incredible, let's see it. And then show us the proof.
You all know the answer to that.
Trumpian whiplash
Yesterday: American Carnage!!! Illegal aliens murdering 'mericans every-FUK'N-day.
Today: Bigliest drop in crime in American history, ever, thanks be to me, Trumpenfart.
Safari,
Remember, Trumpy promised, crossed his withered little heart and hoped to die, that one second after his coronation, all crime would stop. Criminals would be so traumatized by his very presence, that all illegal activity would cease. Immediately. He really did say this. I guess it took a little longer than he thought.
Oh, and he didn't mean that HIS illegal activity would stop, just others'.
Marie,
Johnson is even stupider than that. If his claim was more opioid prescriptions increase the opioid crisis, he'd have a leg to stand on. But he's claiming that more healthcare increases the opioid crisis. Duh. The fact is that prescriptions for opioids are down in many states. How does that translate? No worries. Just say it, and it must be true.
But hey, don't tell Johnson about that Hiltzik article. Here's how it will play in his febrile brain pan, small as it must be:
The opioid crisis caused states to expand Medicaid coverage. But Medicaid STARTED the opioid crisis! So wait, Medicaid makes crisis, crisis makes Medicaid. Heeeelllp! Danger, Will Robinson, fire in the brain pan! Circuits exploding. Gaskets blowing out. EEEEeeeee.
Yeah. Logic is not a big thing with Confederates.
Oh, and about that "Crime is down and I did it" bullshit, let's see some proof. Trumpy's servant, The Evil Elf, is promoting the little king as Crimestopper par excellence and claiming that the statistics indicating that crime is down are directly related to Trump's policies. Okay. Which ones? Show me exactly what he's done to deserve credit for this drop in "carnage".
Oh, you can't? Oh, I see. You'd could, but then you'd have to kill me. Well, I guess then crime statistics would go up again, wouldn't they? What's that? Oh, it's not a crime when the president* or one of his servants kills someone?
Never mind then.
How about it's a sunny day. Trump did it. I have a nickel in my pocket. Trump put it there. Or, a baby is born every eight seconds in the US. Trump did that too. Well, in fact, he could have done a few of those, who knows?
I notice that Trump only takes credit for good stuff. All of the stupid, ignorant, racist, borderline insane stuff he does, like this ridiculous tariff on renewable energy products, and religious tests never result in bad things, or if they do, it's Obama's fault. Doesn't this sort of thing sound a bit...unhinged? So, he passed that test where he had to draw a picture of a clock and now he's as sane as Lear's fool?
I still don't believe it. He is a fool. Just not Lear's. And what does that make the servant of a fool? A footstool? Or just a stool?
Evangelical hypocrites.
If you want to make a rock solid case as to the fallacious nature of evangelical religiosity, and the fact that they're no more religiously inclined than any run of the mill atheist, substituting, as they are wont to do, political power for the power of prayer, look no further than a comparison between Trumpy and Bill Clinton. Evangelicals were incensed about Clinton's dalliance with an intern. There were interminable screams about how "character counts" and calls for impeachment and prison. Trump pays off a porn star to be quiet about an extended sexual relationship, added to the pussy grabbing comments, serial adultery, and unbridled philandering, and it's "Oh well, nothing to see here."
Just common hypocrites. Nothing the least bit sacred here.
Just wondering...
According to people who lose important hours out of their lives doing this work, the number of lies told (in public) by the little king has surpassed 2,000 in just the first year.
Question. Can he beat that in just a few hours "answering" questions from Bob Mueller?
Inquiring minds want to know.
Oh, and a side question. Will Mueller and his investigators be able to suppress the inevitable eye rolls as Donaldo spins his whoppers? I know they're professionals, but geeez...
Bea,
Maybe we just misheard the Pretender.
Did he say Mexico or Mexicans will pay for the promised wall?
I wonder how long Nassar's life sentence will last?
Ken,
So nice that you got to meet Le Guin. About a month ago I went looking for "Lathe of Heaven", couldn't find it so I bought it again. It's still as striking and original now as when I read it years ago. My brother turned me on to her stuff and I couldn't thank him enough.
A great talent. She was the perfect example of a writer long mired in a genre box who transcended genre, the cause of so much great work being denied the title Literature, which hers surely was.
Still farther afield, Akhilleus, (please pardon, Bea; I'll quit now), but if only you lived closer to me, I could have invited you to pore through my boxes of old sf magazines where we might have found "The Lathe of Heaven," serialized as I remember in "Amazing Stories" back (in the late 60's?) when few knew who Ursula Le Guin was.
Now I have a hankering to read it again. Don't think it was as political as some of her others, like "The Dispossessed." Will have to find it and read it again to find out.
So Dolt45 says he'll be glad to testify under oath with anything Mueller might require... does anyone think that means anything?? 45 has no notion that there is any difference between truth and fiction, so he will say whatever he wants and crow about his truthiness. And he thinks we will buy it. In the meantime, the "daaaaaaark state" is acting in concert to bring him down-- uh huh. The only real conspiracy that I am aware of is what passed for policy begun the night Barack Obama was inaugurated. That's when serial liar McConnell promised they would not do anything to help Barack govern, that they would oppose everything. This carried through for nine years, culminating on denying Obama his supreme court justice. I will never get over that. The epitome of conspiracy, of successful treason, which continues.