The Conversation -- January 31, 2024

From the New York Times live business updates: "Federal Reserve officials left interest rates unchanged at a more than two-decade high at their first meeting of 2024 and hinted that their next move will be to lower interest rates. But officials also made it clear that they need to see more progress on inflation before reducing borrowing costs. 'In considering any adjustments to the target range for the federal funds rate, the committee will carefully assess incoming data, the evolving outlook and the balance of risks,' the Fed said in its post-meeting statement on Wednesday, dropping previous language suggesting that officials saw 'additional policy firming' as potentially appropriate."

I'd vote for a cardboard cutout before I'd vote for Donald Trump.... He doesn't have a character flaw; he doesn't have a character at all. -- John Bolton, on MSNBC today (no link) ~~~

~~~ ** "The Room Where It Happened." Jamie Frevell of Mediaite: "During an appearance on CNN's The Source with Kaitlan Collins on Tuesday, John Bolton, who served as Trump's National Security Advisor from 2018 to 2019, told anchor Kaitlan Collins that while his former boss gloats about his personal relationships with Russian President Vladimir Putin, North Korea's Kim Jong Un, and Chinese President Xi Jinping, 'they think he's a laughing fool and they're fully prepared to take advantage of him' if he was elected to a second term." Thanks to Akhilleus for the link. Worth reading the post in its entirety. You'll probably find yourself nodding along, as Akhilleus did: "Yeah, pretty much what we all thought."

Fox Stars Warn Taylor Swift to Stay Out of Politics. Michael Grynbaum of the New York Times: "Taylor Swift has not uttered a word about the 2024 presidential election. But the mere prospect that the pop superstar could endorse President Biden has sent conservatives on Fox News into conniptions. 'Why would someone as popular as she is alienate your fans, the Swifties?' Jeanine Pirro said ... before addressing the singer directly. 'So don't get involved! Don't get involved in politics! We don't want to see you there!'... And Sean Hannity, using his prime time soapbox on Tuesday evening, suggested that Democrats were leading Ms. Swift astray. 'Does Taylor realize the guy that they want her to endorse is a kind of stumbling, bumbling mess?' he asked. 'Maybe,' Mr. Hannity added, 'she wants to think twice before making a decision about 2024.'" ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: You know, Pirro & Hannity sound a lot like goombahs. We'll see if Taylor Swift cowers under their threats.

Marie: Last night, Alex Wagner said everybody loves football. She shoulda asked me: ~~~

~~~ Will Hobson of the Washington Post: "Finalized in 2015, the NFL concussion settlement resolved the most serious threat America's most popular and lucrative sports league has faced. While the NFL admitted no wrongdoing, it promised to pay every former player who developed dementia or several brain diseases linked to concussions.... In seven years since the settlement opened, the NFL has paid out nearly $1.2 billion to more than 1,600 former players and their families -- far more than experts predicted during settlement negotiations.... But ... the settlement routinely fails to deliver money and medical care to former players suffering from dementia and CTE, a Washington Post investigation found, saving the NFL hundreds of millions of dollars, if not more....

"The settlement's definition for dementia requires more impairment than the standard definition used in the United States.... At least 14 players have ... failed to qualify for settlement money or medical care and then died, only to have CTE confirmed via autopsy.... In more than 70 cases reviewed by The Post, players were diagnosed with dementia by board-certified doctors, only to see their claims denied by the administrative law firm that oversees the settlement.... In total, court records show, the settlement has approved about 900 dementia claims since it opened in 2017. It has denied nearly 1,100, including almost 300 involving players who were diagnosed by the settlement's own doctors."

Marie: This demented right-wing fellow murdered his father and cut off his head: ~~~

~~~ Claire Moses & Orlando Mayorquin of the New York Times: "A man who posted a graphic video on YouTube in which he claimed to be holding his father's severed head was charged with murder and abuse of a corpse early Wednesday after his father's body was found in a Pennsylvania home, the police said. Lt. Stephen Forman, a detective with the Middletown Township Police Department, said the man, Justin Mohn, was arrested Tuesday night. The police also confirmed that it was Mr. Mohn in the YouTube video, in which he promoted conspiratorial and anti-government views and briefly showed what he claimed was his father's head wrapped in plastic.

"The video, which has since been removed, appeared to have been filmed during the daytime and was online for about five hours, Lieutenant Forman said. He added that it had received just over 5,000 views.... On Wednesday morning, YouTube confirmed it had taken down the video because it violated the company's graphic violence policy. It also terminated Mr. Mohn's channel for violating its violent extremism policies. YouTube said it was monitoring for any re-uploads of the video to prevent it from resurfacing.... It's unclear ... how such a graphic video could stay online for five hours before being taken down, and a YouTube spokeswoman did not answer questions about why it took that long for the video to be removed." ~~~

     ~~~ Zenebou Sylla, et al., of CNN: "During [his] online tirade, Mohn describes his father as a federal worker and rails against the Biden administration and the border crisis while declaring himself the new acting US president under martial law.... 'America is rotting from the inside out as far left, woke mobs rampage our once prosperous cities,' he says in the video.... 'Some of the things that he has said on the video -- allegedly referring to woke mobs and things like that -- that's not dissimilar from rhetoric that you hear from some politicians that we've heard recently in the primary season,' [former FBI Deputy Director Andrew] McCabe said. 'So this kind of language has an effect on the ... most vulnerable, most potentially dangerous part of our population. And I think it.s something that most security officials are really concerned about.'... After fleeing the home, Mohn drove more than 100 miles, then broke into a Pennsylvania National Guard base with a gun, state Department of Military and Veterans Affairs spokesperson Angela Watson told CNN."

~~~~~~~~~~

Marie: When Nikki Haley said earlier this month, "We've never been a racist country," a lot of jaws dropped. Of course we're a racist country. We found a bloody civil war over racism. And throughout the 19th and at least the early 20th centuries, I'd wager most white Americans believed there was scientific evidence that whites were intellectually superior to other races. (And only certain whites: Irish and Italians didn't count.) Now, in the 21st century, we're building toward another civil war, and it is over race as well. White legislators are engaged in trying to suppress the basic rights of racial minorities at the same time they fear that racial minorities from Central and South America will "take over" the country, and these whites are willing to go to extra-Constitutional lengths to prevent that from happening. ~~~

~~~ Karoun Demirjian of the New York Times: "The House Homeland Security Committee approved two articles of impeachment early Wednesday against Alejandro N. Mayorkas, the homeland security secretary, over his handling of the southwestern border, as Republicans raced forward with a partisan indictment of President Biden's immigration policies. In an 18-to-15 party-line vote, the panel endorsed a resolution charging Mr. Mayorkas with refusing to uphold the law and breaching the public trust by failing to choke off a surge of migrants across the United States border with Mexico. It set the stage for a House vote as soon as next week on an impeachment that would be an extraordinary escalation of a political feud between Republicans and Democrats over immigration, further elevating the issue at the start of an election year in which it is expected to be a main focus. The G.O.P. was plowing forward without producing evidence that Mr. Mayorkas committed a crime or acts of corruption, arguing instead that the Biden administration border policies he implemented ran afoul of the law. Legal scholars, including prominent conservatives, have argued that the effort is a perversion of the constitutional power of impeachment, and Democrats remained solidly opposed." ~~~

~~~ Jacqueline Alemany & Amy Wang of the Washington Post: "Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas vigorously defended his record Tuesday as Republicans moved forward with the process of impeaching him -- which, if successful, would be the first such action against a Cabinet member in almost 150 years. The House Committee on Homeland Security convened Tuesday morning to mark up articles of impeachment against Mayorkas, despite struggling in two recent hearings on the inquiry to detail clear evidence of high crimes and misdemeanors. In a six-page letter sent Tuesday to Homeland Security Committee chairman Rep. Mark Green (R-Tenn.), Mayorkas detailed his lengthy career and pushed back on the GOP's accusations that he has avoided their oversight requests." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: IMO, the central idea in impeaching Mayorkas & threatening to impeach other officials in the Biden administration, as well as President Biden himself, is to demonstrate that impeachment is a meaningless political exercise; therefore, the two impeachments of Donald Trump were nothingburgers. As it turns out, impeachment is meaningless only when Republicans do it.

Benjamin Guggenheim of Politico: "Speaker Mike Johnson‘s plans to get a bipartisan tax deal through the House this week are teetering on the verge of collapse after an unlikely coalition of House Republicans aired last-minute concerns during a private GOP meeting on Tuesday. According to members who attended the meeting, Republican leaders are staring down a messy litany of complaints from both incumbents in vulnerable districts demanding state and local tax relief and conservative Freedom Caucus members who are intent on bringing border politics into the tax debate. Then there are the lawmakers with a third type of complaint: anger that Johnson is relying on Democratic votes to pass a major piece of tax legislation in an election year." MB: This is different from the U.S.-Mexico border/Ukraine package, which House Republicans also are determined to block.

Rebecca Kaplan, et al., of NBC News: "The Justice Department is investigating Rep. Cori Bush, D-Mo., for her campaign's spending on security services, she confirmed in a statement Tuesday. 'We are fully cooperating in this investigation,' Bush said, denying any wrongdoing. As a former Black Lives Matter organizer and high-profile progressive on Capitol Hill, Bush has faced what she called 'relentless threats to my physical safety and life' since her election in 2020. 'As a rank-and-file member of Congress I am not entitled to personal protection by the House, and instead have used campaign funds as permissible to retain security services,' Bush said in her statement."

Trials of Trump

Maggie Haberman & Shane Goldmacher of the New York Times: "Donald J. Trump piled up legal expenses in 2023 as he was indicted four times, spending approximately $50 million in donor money on legal bills and investigation-related expenses last year, according to two people briefed on the figure. It is a staggering sum.... The exact figure spent on legal bills will be reported on Wednesday in new filings to the Federal Election Commission.... The broader picture expected to be outlined in the documents is one of a former president heading toward the Republican nomination while facing enormous financial strain." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: This is why Trump doesn't mind spending the money to file frivolous motions, like the one Alina Habba filed this week, accusing Judge Lewis Kaplan of bias which Habba based on an anonymous, single-source allegation she read in the New York Post: ~~~

~~~ Never Mind! Tori Otten of the New Republic, republished by Yahoo! News: "Donald Trump's lawyer Alina Habba on Tuesday suddenly backed off her own claim that the presiding judge in the E. Jean Carroll defamation trial had a conflict of interest, less than a day after she made the initial court filing. Habba filed a letter to Judge Lewis Kaplan on Monday accusing him of failing to disclose the fact that he had worked at the same law firm as Carroll's lawyer Roberta Kaplan (no relation) in the 1990s. Habba said she believed the judge had shown 'preferential treatment' to Carroll's team and would seek to have both verdicts overturned. 'As Ms. Habba well knows, these allegations are utterly baseless,' Roberta Kaplan said in a letter of her own, submitted Tuesday.... Roberta Kaplan accused Trump and Habba of pushing 'a false narrative of judicial bias' and explained that while she had wanted to respond quickly to Habba's allegations, she might still seek sanctions against the other attorney. Within hours, Habba submitted another letter backtracking on her accusations."

Mystery Loan. Tax Evasion Scheme? Adam Klasfeld of the Messenger: "The mystery surrounding a purported eight-figure loan involving an entity tied to Donald Trump's Chicago skyscraper merits criminal investigation, despite the explanation provided by the former president's attorney, three legal experts tell The Messenger. For nearly a decade, financial journalists have puzzled over a loan between Trump and an entity Chicago Unit Acquisition LLC, linked to the former president's 92-story Chicago tower. Trump disclosed the loan annually while president on sworn documents to the federal government's Office of Government Ethics (OGE), indicating that he owed upwards of $50 million to his own limited liability company. In the latest development of the former president's civil fraud case, everything about the Chicago loan remains in dispute — including its size, the parties to the agreement, or whether it even exists. On Friday, the court-appointed monitor overseeing Trump's business empire contended the longstanding controversy may amount to little more than a mirage." There is also evidence that Trump did get a $100 million loan on the Chicago building, half of which was forgiven in 2012, but Trump failed to pay taxes due on the resulting $50 million income windfall.

Amy Gardner & Holly Bailey of the Washington Post: "The lead prosecutor in the Georgia election interference case against ... Donald Trump and his allies settled a contentious divorce dispute on Tuesday, canceling a hearing scheduled for Wednesday morning that could have included testimony about allegations of an improper relationship between him and Fulton County District Attorney Fani T. Willis. Nathan Wade had been expected to be questioned under oath Wednesday morning about his finances -- including his income as a special prosecutor in the Trump case and his spending, including his purchase of airline tickets for himself and Willis in October 2022 and April 2023.... The last minute settlement agreement allows both Wade and Willis to avoid testimony in a divorce case that has underpinned many of the salacious allegations against the two prosecutors." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Well, that's one low hurdle Willis will not have to jump. But there are plenty more. Richard Fausset & Danny Hakim of the New York Times: "Here are a few things to know about this complicated subplot in the prosecution of Mr. Trump and others for trying to overturn his 2020 election loss in Georgia."

Presidential Race

Kimberly Leonard of Politico: "During a fundraiser in Jupiter, Florida, on Tuesday, [President] Biden rallied donors to help him make Trump..., a 'loser again' and made the sign of the cross after bemoaning that Florida faced a 'real dose of Trumpism.' The president accused Trump of leaving the U.S. a 'mess' when he came into office during the height of the Covid pandemic and when the economy was 'reeling.' Biden swiped his opponent on mass shootings, the economy, abortion rights and the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.... Biden ended his speech with the lofty prediction that he could win Florida, though he lost the state to Trump by more than three percentage points in 2020 and polling shows him trailing by double digits."

Lee Moran of the Huffington Post: "President Joe Biden claimed multiple world leaders have expressed to him their fear of ... Donald Trump returning to the White House.'I've been doing foreign policy for a long, long time,' Biden told the congregation at Brookland Baptist Church in Columbia, South Carolina, over the weekend. 'I know every one of those heads of state, and I've known them for a while. And every meeting I go to internationally, as they're walking out, this is the God's truth [...] virtually every one of them pull me aside and says, "You've got to win. We can't let that happen again. You can't let that happen again. You can't let that happen again."'" (Also linked yesterday.)

Illinois. Punt! Sophia Tareen & Nicholas Riccardi of the AP: "Illinois' election board on Tuesday kept ... Donald Trump on the state's primary ballot, a week before the U.S. Supreme Court hears arguments on whether the Republican's role in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol disqualifies him from the presidency. The board's unanimous ruling comes after its hearing officer, a retired judge and Republican, found that a 'preponderance of the evidence' shows Trump is ineligible to run for president because he violated a constitutional ban on those who 'engaged in insurrection' from holding office. But the hearing officer recommended the board let the courts make the ultimate decision. The eight-member board, composed of four Democrats and four Republicans, agreed with a recommendation from its lawyer to let Trump remain on the ballot by determining it didn't have the authority to determine whether he violated the U.S. Constitution." (Also linked yesterday.)

** Jamelle Bouie of the New York Times -- drawing on an amicus brief filed in the U.S. Supreme Court case reviewing Colorado's decision to keep Donald Trump off the ballot -- writes "that top of mind for the drafters of the 14th Amendment were the actions of John B. Floyd, the secretary of war during the secession crisis of November 1860 to March 1861." After Lincoln's election but before his inauguration, and while secessionists were organizing their conventions, Floyd, "in the words of Ulysses S. Grant, distribute[d] 'the cannon and small arms from Northern arsenals throughout the South so as to be on hand when treason wanted them.'" According to the brief..., "through both actions and inactions of Floyd and his allies, efforts to prevent President-elect Lincoln from lawfully assuming power at his inauguration." At least one member of Congress, while discussing Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment mentioned Floyd as an example of the kind of man the section was intended to exclude from office. Bouie goes on to cite from other briefs bolstering the evidence that the presidency is an "officer of the United States" covered under the section.

The right-wing's bizarre Swift/Kelce/NFL conspiracy theory has caught the attention of the New York Times & Washington Post: ~~~

~~~ Jonathan Weisman of the New York Times: "The fulminations surrounding [Taylor Swift,] the world's biggest pop icon -- and girlfriend of Travis Kelce, the [Kansas City] Chiefs' star tight end -- reached the stratosphere after Kansas City made it to the Super Bowl for the fourth time in five years, and the first time since Ms. Swift joined the team's entourage. The conspiracy theories coming out of the Make America Great Again contingent were already legion: that Ms. Swift is a secret agent of the Pentagon; that she is bolstering her fan base in preparation for her endorsement of President Biden's re-election; or that she and Mr. Kelce are a contrived couple, assembled to boost the N.F.L. or Covid vaccines or Democrats or whatever.... The pro-Trump broadcaster Mike Crispi led off on Sunday by claiming that the National Football League is 'rigged' in order to spread 'Democrat propaganda': 'Calling it now: KC wins, goes to Super Bowl, Swift comes out at the halftime show and "endorses" Joe Biden with Kelce at midfield.' [Other Swift detractors soon joined in.]... The right has been fuming about Ms. Swift since September, when she urged her fans on Instagram to register to vote, and the online outfit Vote.org reported a surge of 35,000 registrations in response.... Mr. Kelce's advertisements promoting Pfizer's Covid vaccine and Bud Light -- already a target of outrage from the right over a social media promotion with a transgender influencer, Dylan Mulvaney -- added fuel to that raging fire." ~~~

~~~ Philip Bump of the Washington Post tries to explain the popularity of this nutty conspiracy theory: "I'll leave you with the wise words of [Vivek] Ramaswamy, almost certainly responding to the (wonderful! desired!) controversy he'd stirred up with his football observations. 'What the [media] calls a "conspiracy theory" is often nothing more than an amalgam of incentives hiding in plain sight,' he wrote. 'Once you see that, the rest becomes pretty obvious.' The natural Step 2 here: When the media points out that my comments make no sense, it proves that I'm right. Okay. Wait. Actually, I'll leave you with an observation attached to Ramaswamy's second post, one that comes from the world's most prominent seeker of attention by way of posting controversial/bizarre/unnecessarily-political comments. 'Exactly,' wrote Elon Musk." ~~~

~~~ Travis Gettys of the Raw Story: "Donald Trump's allies are already preparing a 'holy war' against pop superstar Taylor Swift if she endorses President Joe Biden. Sources familiar with the matter told Rolling Stone the former president's loyalists and other allies assume the singer-songwriter will eventually endorse Biden, as she did in 2020, and that likely move infuriates Trump.... 'Behind the scenes, Trump has reacted to the possibility of Biden and Swift teaming up against him this year not with alarm, but with an instant projection of ego,' two sources told Rolling Stone. 'In recent weeks, the former president has told people in his orbit that no amount of A-list celebrity endorsements will save Biden. Trump has also privately claimed that he is "more popular" than Swift is and that he has more committed fans than she does.'"

The Hunter Factor. Kathleen Culliton of the Raw Story: "Hunter Biden's lawyers working to dismiss their client's gun case argued Tuesday far-right extremists and ... Donald Trump unduly pressured prosecutors once willing to cut a deal. A new filing in Delaware's federal court -- where Hunter Biden stands accused of lying about drug use to purchase a firearm he kept for fewer than two weeks -- contends political motivations tainted special counsel David Weiss' case after a plea deal was in the works last year. 'In response to that outcry from former President Trump, extremist House Republicans, and right-wing media looking to make Mr. Biden's fate a political issue in the next presidential election, the prosecution blew up that deal,' his lawyers write."

Yes, Thomas & Alito Are Terrible Co-workers. Devan Cole of CNN: "Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor opened up on Monday about the 'frustration' she said she experiences daily as the high court's conservative supermajority continues to move the country further to the right. 'I live in frustration. And as you heard, every loss truly traumatizes me in my stomach and in my heart. But I have to get up the next morning and keep on fighting,' Sotomayor, the court's senior liberal member, said at an event at the University of California, Berkeley School of Law." (Also linked yesterday.)

Pay Cut! Jack Ewing & Peter Eavis of the New York Times: "Elon Musk, the chief executive of Tesla, suffered a stunning rebuke Tuesday when a Delaware judge voided the pay package that helped make him a billionaire many times over and the world's wealthiest human being. In a decision that cast a harsh light on the behavior of Mr. Musk and Tesla's board of directors, Chancellor Kathaleen St. J. McCormick of the Delaware Court of Chancery said the chief executive had effectively overseen his own compensation plan -- currently worth about $50 billion -- with the help of compliant board members.... [McCormick] ordered that the contract that gave Mr. Musk 'the largest potential compensation plan in the history of public markets' be voided, and told parties in the case to work out how Mr. Musk would return excess pay." The AP's story is here. ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Gosh, if a judge snatched away $50 billion of my ill-gotten gains, I might support Donald Trump in order to undermine the rule of law, too.

~~~~~~~~~~

Arizona. Extreme Voter Suppression. Kayla Gallagher of the Messenger: "Arizona State Senator Anthony Kern, R, is pushing to give the state legislature power in appointing presidential electors, regardless of who wins the popular vote, through a new piece of proposed legislation. As it currently stands in Arizona, the winner of the popular vote gets to determine the state's electors, however, Kern is looking to override that process entirely. With Senate Concurrent Resolution 1014, the Arizona legislature would be the sole decider of appointing electors, no matter the winner of the popular vote. Should the legislation pass, it will appear on the state's November ballots for voters to decide if it should be enshrined in the state constitution. Kern was heavily involved in the attempts to overturn the 2020 election in the Grand Canyon State and signed a document falsely claiming to be a state elector for ... Donald Trump."

Florida. Jo Yurcaba of NBC News: "Florida will no longer allow transgender people to change the sex on their state driver's license to reflect their gender identity, a policy change that muddles whether trans people who have already updated their documents could face fraud charges for 'misrepresenting' their identities. Robert Kynoch, deputy executive director of the Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles, wrote in a memo to the department's executive director on Friday that the department would rescind a provision on 'gender requirements' in the Driver License Operations Manual that allowed Floridians to change the gender marker on their licenses." Oh, read on. This guy Kynoch seems to consider himself something of an expert in gender determination and his memo includes a little lecture/scolding on that topic.

Kansas. Aimee Ortiz of the New York Times: "Parts of a life-size bronze statue that celebrated the legacy of the legendary baseball player and civil rights figure Jackie Robinson were found dismantled and burned early Tuesday after it had been stolen from a Kansas park last week, the authorities said. Remnants of the statue were found after a city worker reported a fire in a trash can at Garvey Park in Wichita [-- a different park from the one from which the statue was stolen --] at around 8:38 a.m., Andrew Ford, a police spokesman, said in a statement. The Wichita Fire Department responded and ... the Fire Department immediately notified the police, who collected the pieces at the scene. [A police spokesman] said ... that 'unfortunately, the statue is beyond repair.'" MB: You can't convince me that the people responsible are not racists.

Texas. Judd Legum & Tesnin Zekeria of Popular Information: "Congressman Chip Roy (R-TX) is publicly urging Texas to ignore the Supreme Court. In previously unreported comments, Roy explained that he feared his position would push the country into 'a post-constitutional world.' But, Roy said, the Supreme Court is 'pushing our hand' by issuing a ruling related to the southern border that he opposes, and the Supreme Court needs to 'feel the pressure.'... Roy also said [in an interview] that his 'first duty' as Congressman was not to comply with the Constitution, which establishes the Supreme Court as the ultimate legal authority. Rather, Roy believes he should take whatever actions are necessary, in his own mind, to 'make sure our people are protected and secure and safe.'... In other words, Roy believes his own opinion about what is required to keep people 'secure and safe' trumps the Constitution. This is a radical view that would upend the nation's legal system." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Since Congressional Republicans are looking everywhere to find somebody else to impeach, they might start with their own. Here's ole Chip Roy violating his oath of office and essentially urging civil war, yet there's nary a voice in Congress urging his removal from the House.

~~~ Texas, etc. David Gilbert of Wired: "On Monday morning, the organizers of the Take Our Border Back convoy kicked off their road trip to the Texas-Mexico border in Virginia Beach. Though they claimed that up to 40,000 trucks would be joining, only 20 vehicles made up the convoy as it rolled into Jacksonville, Florida, 14 hours later. The promised support had not materialized -- not a single truck showed up, tires were reportedly slashed, participants got lost, and paranoia struck the group. In short, the convoy was a complete mess.... The organizers also repeatedly stated that the event was peaceful, though online chats in a related Telegram group show members discussing 'exterminating' migrants." Read on; this is like a National Lampoon road trip. But darker. And no chance of a happy ending.

~~~~~~~~~~

Israel/Palestine, et al.

The Washington Post's live updates of developments Wednesday in the Israel/Hamas war are here. The New York Times' live updates are here. CNN's live updates are here.

Betsy Klein, et al., of CNN: "President Joe Biden told reporters Tuesday he has made a decision about the US response to the drone strike that killed three US service members and injured dozens in Jordan. Asked by CNN's Arlette Saenz whether he has decided how to respond, Biden said, 'Yes,' but declined to provide further details." (Also linked yesterday.)

Karen DeYoung, et al., of the Washington Post: "All civilian hostages being held by Hamas inside Gaza would be released during a six-week pause in fighting proposed by the United States, Qatar and Egypt, parts of which have been accepted in principle by Israel and which is under consideration by Hamas, according to officials familiar with the negotiations. The proposal includes the freeing of Palestinian prisoners held by Israel, at a rate of three prisoners for each hostage, a temporary repositioning of Israeli troops away from high-population areas of Gaza and a significant increase in humanitarian aid flowing into the enclave. Described as a bare-bones 'framework,' it is said to be a two- or three-page document with bullet points. It envisions follow-on pauses beyond the six weeks, during which Israeli military captives and the bodies of hostages who have died in captivity would be released, amid hopes by negotiators that an extension could lead to a permanent cessation of the fighting now nearing its fourth month."

Kareem Fahim, et al., of the Washington Post: "Israeli security forces disguised as doctors and patients raided a hospital in the occupied West Bank early Tuesday and killed three Palestinian militants, according to a video of the raid and statements by the Palestinian Health Ministry, the Israel Defense Forces and Palestinian militant groups. The Palestinian Health Ministry said 'occupation forces' raided the Ibn Sina Hospital in the West Bank town of Jenin early Tuesday and fatally shot three young men in the hospital's wards. The statement, which did not identify the men, called the raid a 'crime' and one of 'dozens' carried out by Israel against medical facilities in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. An IDF statement said the raid targeted militants it described as 'hiding' in the hospital, including Mohammed Jalamneh, a member of the Hamas militant group. The statement said Jalamneh, along with two other militants, brothers Mohamed and Basil Ghazawi, were 'neutralized' during the operation." (Also linked yesterday.) The Guardian's report is here.

News Lede

Washington Post: "Former U.S. senator Jean Carnahan, who became the first female senator to represent Missouri after she was appointed to replace her husband following his death in a plane crash, died Jan. 30 at a hospice center in suburban St. Louis. She was 90.... Mrs. Carnahan, a Democrat, was appointed to the Senate in 2001 after the posthumous election of her husband, Gov. Mel Carnahan (D), and she served until 2002."

Comments

[Ken Winkes]

Marie,

How about of Gresham's Law of Impeachment?

The R's have already deployed a Greshham's Law of Science, etc.

[Akhilleus]

Imeachment of Mayorkas serves as a shiny object to deflect from the fact of Republican determination to do nothing about a border crisis that is a direct result of their continuing refusal to deal with immigration reform, seeing it as an EZ way to whip up hatred against both Democrats and brown people.

Sit on your ass, point fingers, score political points with your racist base, made ever more fearful by demagoguery and propaganda, and reap electoral rewards. Repeat as needed.

Then, when it becomes more and more obvious who is to blame for the humanitarian crisis at the border, scream IMPEACH! IMPEACH! Go on Fox and rant about Biden and Mayorkas, all while supporting your conniving traitorous leader.

Repeat as needed.

[Akhilleus]

The Party of Traitors

Trump’s scuttling of a bipartisan deal to achieve immigration reform, a deal that gives Party of Traitors schemers everything they asked for, all in order to use the lack of a deal as a campaign cudgel against President Biden, is just another in a long line of treasonous Republican schemes to gain and maintain electoral power.

1968…President Johnson arranges for peace talks to bring an end to the Vietnam War. Nixon, fearing that Hubert Humphrey could gain serious political points in the upcoming election, creates sneaky back channels to convince the South Vietnam leadership to refuse any peace agreement, telling them that they’ll get a better deal if he, Nixon, gets elected. Johnson finds out about the scheme too late to do anything about it. In a famous phone call to Republican leader Everett Dirksen says “This is treason!” to which Dirksen replies “I know.”

Nixon wins. Then fucks the South Vietnamese by escalating the war. Tens of thousands on both sides die. All so Nixon could win an election.

Next up, 1980…Hostage crisis in Tehran. A deal to release the hostages is in the works. Ronald Reagan, through another sneaky back channel convinces the Iranians not to make the deal. He gets elected. More treason for political points.

A few years later, Iran Contra. More Republican treason. More deaths so Republicans can gain political power.

2000…a Republican Supreme Court steals the election and hands the victory to George W. Bush. The Florida clusterfuck goes before the court. Scalia’s son(!) represents Bush. Thomas’s wife is on the Bush transition team! No recusals, and suddenly a former AWOL Republican traitor is in the White House.

2001…that AWOL traitor is told that Islamic militants are preparing an attack on US targets. He tells the messengers to get lost, then goes on vacation. 9/11. Thousands die.

2003…the same AWOL traitor and his chicken hawk VP gin up a phony war to cover up for their incompetence the first time around. Iraq War. Millions die. World wide turbocharging of terrorism.

2016…a blood enemy of the United States helps get a dangerous moron elected.

2021…that moron stages a bloody coup to take over the US government.

2023…the same treasonous moron strong arms PoT cowards into killing a much needed, long awaited immigration reform deal. Thousand suffer. All for his personal political advantage.

Is there any reason not to refer to this group as the Party of Traitors? They’ve worked hard to earn that designation. That’s what they are. That’s what they do. Been doing it for years.

[Akhilleus]

Marie,

That statue of Jackie Robinson? That was probably just kids horsing around. No biggie. And, c’mon now, no need to go crying “Racism”. In fact, I’m sure some level headed big thinker like Steve Bannon or Jesse Watters will suggest that it must have been the work of BLM supporters to make people think there was racism involved.

Besides, there’s no racism anymore.

Just ask John Roberts.

[ForrestMorris]

Taylor Swift has 279 million followers on Instagram (worldwide).

The donald has less than 10% of that number.

Looks like he shouldn't be messing with people like Taylor Swift,
who has the attention of millions of younger voters.

[Marie Burns]

@Akhilleus: Oh, thanks for setting me straight. Now that you mention it, I suppose it wasAntifa & FBI agents dressed up as racists who absconded with the statue and melted it down. And, yes, a hat tip to John Roberts.

[Marie Burns]

@Forrest Morris: And if you put Trump v. Swift on a popularity scale, don't you also have to consider their unpopularity quotients? No doubt there are some people who don't care for Swift for one reason or another, but millions of people throughout the world (count me in) loathe Donald Trump.

[ForrestMorris]

@Marie: I realize that the following is only one poll, and I personally
don't put much faith in polls, but:

A Monmouth University poll says "Trump's net-negative favorability
rating (-27) is the lowest in poll's history."

https://www.newsweek,com/donald-trump-unpupularity-hits-highest-
one-polls-history-1814451

[Akhilleus]

The Laughing Fool

Former Trump national security adviser, John Bolton, offers a peek inside the Trump bubble.

It’s pretty much what we all know to be true, still, it’s interesting to hear it from someone who had a front row seat to the loose screw maunderings of Feckless Fatty when faced with matters of great import, like like national security.

“I don’t think Trump is capable of making the decisions grounded in national security. His attention span is short. He doesn’t know much about world history or world affairs. He actually doesn’t think they matter very much.”

Do tell. Anything else, John? How is TFG at decision making during times of crisis?

“…Trump could go one way in the morning, a different way in the afternoon. He doesn’t have the ability to stay consistent for long periods of time, except on one thing, which is how he looks, in the press and in public attention. And that is very worrying. When you’re in a crisis, you need a president who is resolute, who can keep his eyes on the prize, and worry about our national security, not his own image.”

Yeah, pretty much what we all thought.

But what about his kissy-lovey-dovey relationships with the tyrants he is so enamored of? Surely they welcome him as one of their own…

“…the hard men of history like Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping, understand what their job is for their respective country. I don’t think Trump understands what the job of the presidency is for ours.

And I will say, having been in the room with him, in meeting those people, having listened in on his phone conversations, I don’t think they are really friendly with Donald Trump. I think they think, Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin, Kim Jong Un and others, they think he’s a laughing fool and they’re fully prepared to take advantage of him. Trump’s self-absorption makes it impossible for him to understand that…I think they believe he’s an easy mark.”

Well Christ, then. By all means, put that fucking guy in charge again.

[Akhilleus]

President Strangelove

Thinking about tough decisions made by presidents, especially in light of Bolton’s recollection of what a hollow, useless fraud Trump was as president*, I wondered what Fatty would have done about Douglas MacArthur.

When Truman made the decision to can MacArthur, there was more behind it than just serial subordination, although that was a serious consideration. A big part had to do with the fact that the general was nuts. I mean, barking mad bonkers.

After being humiliated by the Chinese Red Army, MacArthur came up with an idea for revenge. He wrote that he had a plan that would end the war in 10 days (Trump would have said 24 hours). How? By nuking both North Korea and China. His plan involved dropping 50 atomic bombs. Fifty. Five-O.

Truman was aghast. He relieved MacArthur of his command. This was an easy decision in some ways (the Dr. Strangelove idea), but not so easy in terms of his public image. MacArthur was much beloved in America. He was considered an untouchable military icon. Truman’s popularity took a beating.

Now, WWTD? What would Trump do?

My guess is, wanting to look like a tough guy, Fatty would authorize turning vast swathes of the Korean Peninsula and parts of China into a nuclear wasteland. Ya know, to look good. And not piss off people who loved MacArthur.

Of course, the Soviets may have gotten involved after that, and with nukes flying everywhere, WW III would have been off to a quick start.

Who knows what secret decisions Fatty made while in office to make himself look good at the expense of national security? Oh, besides stealing top secret documents.

[ForrestMorris]

Justin Mohn, the beheader, is still on Instagram.
He also posted a picture on YouTube of the head in a cooking pot,
a la Jeffrey Dahmer.

Nightmares tonight for sure.

[D in MD]

"A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds..."
~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

But The Donald's mind is UUUUUUUUUGE!
It is SOOOOOO bigly, it can contains dozens of mutually exclusive and self contradictory thoughts simultaneously, and flit among them as effortlessly as a butterfly in a field of daisies.

[Akhilleus]

The hair-ablaze, clusterfuck fire drill on the right over Taylor Swift and E. Jean Carroll is not only proof positive of the dementedly misogynistic caste of the Party of Traitors, but a “can see it from outer space” beacon of fear that their Glorious Rapist Leader might not be the unbeatable Fat Führer they all pray for.

Consider: they are petrified that a pop singer can flip the election. Is that true? Or is it that they are so outraged that women, who should shut up, stay home, cook dinner, and provide sexual service for MEN, are daring to intrude on territory they have no business visiting?

Of course, they have no problem huzzahing over third rate pop acts like fecal matter copy machine Kid Rock and statutory rapist gun toting troglodyte Ted Nugent when they say “Hooray for Trump!”

But chicks who they believe are showing up their beloved fatso, they need to get got.

[Akhilleus]

Whom…