The Commentariat -- August 19, 2018
Late Morning/Afternoon Update:
Trump Mad at Maggie & Mike. David Nakamura of the Washington Post: "President Trump reacted angrily Sunday to a new report that the White House counsel has cooperated extensively in the Russia investigation without Trump's full knowledge, calling it a 'Fake Story' and comparing the probe to McCarthyism. In a series of tweets, the president lashed out at a New York Times report that White House lawyer Donald McGahn had participated in at least three interviews with special counsel Robert S. Mueller III that spanned 30 hours." Mrs. McC: Best way to get under Trump's skin: expose his ignorance & stupidity, as the NYT story does.
Rudy Deconstructs Reality -- So Derrida! Rebecca Morin & David Cohen of Politico: "... Rudy Giuliani on Sunday claimed 'truth isn't truth' when trying to explain why the president should not testify for special counsel Robert Mueller.... 'When you tell me that, you know, he should testify because he's going to tell the truth and he shouldn't worry, well that's so silly because it's somebody's version of the truth. Not the truth,' Giuliani told Chuck Todd on NBC's 'Meet the Press' on Sunday morning. 'Truth is truth,' Todd responded. 'No, no, it isn't truth,' Giuliani said. 'Truth isn't truth. The President of the United States says, "I didn't..."' A startled Todd answered: 'Truth isn't truth?' Giuliani: 'No, no, no.' Todd said: 'This is going to become a bad meme.'... Last week on CNN, he rejected Chris Cuomo's assertion that 'facts are not in the eye of the beholder.' 'Yes, they are,' Giuliani said. 'Nowadays they are.' In May, the former New York mayor pursued a similar line of thought in an interview with the Washington Post about the Mueller investigation: 'They may have a different version of the truth than we do.'" ...
... Benjamin Hart of New York: "Alert: another half-chilling, half-laughable Trump administration mantra is ready to add to the trophy case, in the space just beside 'Alternative Facts' and 'What You're Seeing ... Is Not What's Happening.'... Todd's wry prediction was, of course, immediately proven right. In the other noteworthy section of his interview, Giuliani once again changed the Trump administration's line on its fateful meeting with Russians at Trump Tower in 2016. He now claims, confusingly, that the sitdown was all about getting dirt on Hillary Clinton (not adoptions after all!), but that Trump officials had no idea that actual Russians would be involved (which is definitely not true). But then, what is truth, when you really think about it?" ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: Trumpbots are very good at magical thinking when it comes to religion, but I don't think that makes them ready for the deconstruction of conceptual systems. Just the opposite. Trumpbots deal in absolutes -- like there absolutely is a God & heaven has a lot of kitchen appliances. I don't think "Truth Isn't Truth" will go over well. Although as one wag -- Pat Shipp -- pointed out (Hart linked the Twitter feed), "I can see it now. 'TiT' hats. That ought to help capture females votes!"
Quinn Scanlan of ABC News: "... Donald Trump's National Security Adviser John Bolton floated the possibility of reviewing longstanding policy of maintaining security clearances of former government officials." In an ABC News interview, Bolton implied John Brennan abused his security clearance, but when ABC's Martha Raddatz pressed him, he could not cite any examples of Brennan doing so. Bolton maintained his own security clearance when he was on a corporate board & was a Fox "News" contributor. Bolton implied he used his clearance to obtain classified information for the company, which did classified contract work. IOKIYAR.
Another Trump Fox "Guarding" Henhouse. Eric Lipton of the New York Times: "As a corporate lawyer, William L. Wehrum worked for the better part of a decade to weaken air pollution rules by fighting the Environmental Protection Agency in court on behalf of chemical manufacturers, refineries, oil drillers and coal-burning power plants. Now, Mr. Wehrum is about to deliver one of the biggest victories yet for his industry clients -- this time from inside the Trump administration as the government’s top air pollution official. On Tuesday, President Trump is expected to propose a vast rollback of regulations on emissions from coal plants, including many owned by members of a coal-burning trade association that had retained Mr. Wehrum and his firm as recently as last year to push for the changes."
Jennifer Bendery of the Huffington Post: "Four months after abruptly quitting Congress amid a sexual harassment scandal, former Rep. Blake Farenthold (R-Texas) still doesn't think he did anything wrong. In fact, the former GOP lawmaker says he 'took a bullet for the team' by resigning. He insists he's right not to repay $84,000 in taxpayer money he spent on a sexual harassment settlement. He ripped the House Ethics Committee for not caring about facts. And he blames f[uck]tards' and the Me Too movement for driving him out of a job.... And that's just a sample of Farenthold's comments in an Aug. 1 deposition he gave in a lawsuit over his new job at a Texas port authority.... What's clear is that he blames everyone but himself for his downfall and that his reasons for not repaying the $84,000 are bonkers. You can read 79 pages of his deposition yourself, here...." Mrs. McC: Sadly, I have retired my Pajama Boy photos. I blame fucktards for that decision.
AP: "Minnesota Democrats are standing behind U.S. Rep. Keith Ellison and his bid for state attorney general, with the state party giving him an endorsement Saturday amid an allegation of domestic abuse from an ex-girlfriend.... Ellison received 326 votes, or 82 percent of delegates on hand at the party's state executive committee meeting Saturday, the Minneapolis Star Tribune reported."
*****
These are not very bright guys, and things got out of hand. -- Deep Throat, to Bob Woodward (thanks to Scott Lemieux) ...
Bad news for Old MacDonald.... Heigh-ho the Derry-o, McGahn Spills the Beans. Michael Schmidt & Maggie Haberman of the New York Times: "The White House counsel, Donald F. McGahn II, has cooperated extensively in the special counsel investigation, sharing detailed accounts about the episodes at the heart of the inquiry into whether President Trump obstructed justice, including some that investigators would not have learned of otherwise, according to a dozen current and former White House officials and others.... In at least three voluntary interviews with investigators that totaled 30 hours over the past nine months, Mr. McGahn described the president's furor toward the Russia investigation and the ways in which he urged Mr. McGahn to respond to it. He provided the investigators examining whether Mr. Trump obstructed justice a clear view of the president's most intimate moments with his lawyer.... Mr. McGahn laid out how Mr. Trump tried to ensure control of the investigation.... It is not clear that Mr. Trump appreciates the extent to which Mr. McGahn has cooperated with the special counsel. The president wrongly believed that Mr. McGahn would act as a personal lawyer...." (Also linked yesterday.) ...
... Chas Danner of New York: "... it sounds like there was no smoking gun, but McGahn's insight might prove useful [by allowing] Mueller [to build] an obstruction case based on a series of Trump's actions, rather than just one.... Trump responded to the story on Saturday night, characteristically tweeting that there was nothing to see here...: ... 'I allowed White House Counsel Don McGahn, and all other requested members of the White House Staff, to fully cooperate with the Special Counsel. In addition we readily gave over one million pages of documents. Most transparent in history. No Collusion, No Obstruction. Witch Hunt!'... White House spokesperson Sarah Huckabee Sanders, meanwhile, released a statement stressing that everything was just fine between Trump and McGahn...." ...
... Bob Bauer (White House counsel to President Obama) in Lawfare: "A White House counsel is not in a position to reject or ignore a special prosecutor's request for information relevant to an ongoing criminal investigation.... The White House counsel is a government employee, not personal counsel to the president. Courts presented with the question have ruled that, in a criminal investigation, the attorney-client privilege does not shield a White House counsel from providing his or her evidence. Neither is executive privilege a safe harbor if the government can demonstrate need for the information and its unavailability from other sources.... This is the irony of the counsel's position: the very proximity to the Oval Office that distinguishes the role and accounts for so much of its value, can also present grave risks for a president in legal trouble." ...
... Tom Levenson of Balloon Juice: "... this whole thing reminded me of two deep truths. First: when wrongdoing starts to unravel in public view, any smart, or even mildly self-aware mooks entangled in the affairs of the principal miscreant, realize that their interests diverge from said brigand. Clearly that's happening all over Trump world. Second: the Manchurian president appears both to have committed the cardinal sin of all criminal clients -- lying to his legal team -- and to be represented by morons[.]" ...
... Marcy Wheeler of emptywheel: "Over two thousand words and over a dozen sources, and Maggie and Mike never get around to explaining whether Don McGahn has any exposure in or provided testimony for the investigation in chief, the conspiracy with Russia to win the election. Instead, along the way, Maggie and Mike repeat some version of 'obstruction' fourteen times ... perpetuating the grossly misleading myth, once again, that Trump and his cronies are only at risk for obstruction charges.... One bit of legal exposure that the NYT has provided evidence for -- but confused as yet more actual legal discussion -- is in McGahn's role in the Mike Flynn firing.... McGahn wrote an obviously misleading explanation for the Flynn firing, one that suppressed transition period emails that would undermine all the claims about Flynn deciding to lie about his discussion with Sergi Kislyak, and one which would conflict in material ways with the contemporaneous reports of Jim Comey, Sally Yates, and a number of othe DOJ witnesses.... The whole theme of [the NYT] story is that McGahn 'cooperated' with Mueller's inquiry. The word, in some legal contexts, may mean 'responded to legal requests in a way that limited a person's own criminal exposure' and in others may mean 'helped convict co-conspirators.'.... Because the story doesn't explain the difference in connotations, it makes McGahn look far more cooperative than he has necessarily been." ...
... Mrs. Bea McCrabbie: I think the reason "Maggie & Mike" didn't get around to explaining the extent of McGahn's cooperation is that they don't know what-all he told the Mueller team. ...
... Wheeler has another excellent post (which is more readable than much of her stuff) about McGahn's real areas of expertise: campaign finance law & court-stacking. "Most Republicans, I suspect, will one day become willing to jettison Trump so long as they can continue stacking the courts. Trump, one day, may be expendable so long as McGahn’s expertise at stacking the court holds sway. At that level, McGahn's political fortunes may actually conflict with Trump's." ...
... digby: "It's pretty clear who has been behind the leaks over the past year and a half that make Don McGahn look very heroic. There's only one person who would have so much to gain by it.... McGahn has been covering his ass from the beginning. One imagines he's been safe from reprisals because the GOP backs him for their court packing project which, at this point, is their only serious strategy for future survival."
... David Atkins in the Washington Monthly: "Loyalty is not reciprocated in Trumpworld, and every underling expects to be the fall guy for their criminal superior.... [As Haberman & Schmidt write,] 'Mr. McGahn and his lawyer, William A. Burck ..., feared Mr. Trump was setting up Mr. McGahn to take the blame for any possible illegal acts of obstruction.... So he and Mr. Burck devised their own strategy to do as much as possible to cooperate with Mr. Mueller to demonstrate that Mr. McGahn did nothing wrong.'... Beyond its moral perversity, this is an unsustainable institutional culture.... When Trump's White House does fall, this is how it will do so: with each person looking to save their skin at the expense of the others, a den of thieves entirely without honor."
Jeremy Schulman of Mother Jones: "On Saturday, Trump tweeted that [John] Brennan would 'go down as easily the WORST [CIA director] in history & since getting out, he has become nothing less than a loudmouth, partisan, political hack.' Trump -- who last year revealed what the Washington Post described as 'highly classified information' to Russian officials during an Oval Office meeting -- added that Brennan 'cannot be trusted with the secrets to our country!'" (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...
... Tyranny, TV-Style. Steve M. "I'm not sure Trump understands that Mueller and his team have security clearances.... But Fox has been telling him that the others on the [enemies] list are evil Deep State creatures who are abusing their security clearances. So he'll target them for clearance revocation. A true tyrant would conduct a sweeping, massive purge of critics. What Trump is doing is terrible, but he doesn't quite have a real tyrant's broad vision.... And Trump is revoking the clearances slowly because that's how you'd do it on reality TV -- you'd want to prolong the drama. No real tyrant would do that. But effective tyranny is bad television. So Trump is a slow-acting tyrant. That's why there's still a Mueller investigation at all." ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: As usual, Steve lays an interesting perspective on the Trump presidency: it's tyrannical, all right, but it's a slow-rolling tyranny because that's the way Trump did it on the teevee. Whether or not Trump himself has figured this out, there does seem to be a "boiling frog" aspect to Trump's methodology: by pulling these undemocratic & sometimes unconstitutional stunts in small doses, the public becomes accustomed to them & Congressional Republicans can largely avoid oversight: I mean you can't hold hearings on every little thing, can you (unless they're little Democratic things)? (More on Congressional "oversight" linked below.)
Betsy Woodruff & Pervaiz Shallwani of the Daily Beast: "Maria Butina, the Russian national accused of acting as a Kremlin agent in the United States, was abruptly moved from a jail in Washington to a lockup in Alexandria, Virginia, according to her lawyer.... The Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs has accused American officials of mistreating Butina in jail." Mrs. McC: Oh, good. Maybe she can fraternize with Paul Manafort during rec time. (Also linked yesterday.)
Space Farce! David Cloud & Noah Bierman of the Los Angeles Times: "When President Trump spoke to Marines at the Miramar Air Station in San Diego on March 13, he threw out an idea that he suggested had just come to him. 'You know, I was saying it the other day, because we're doing a tremendous amount of work in space -- I said maybe we need a new force. We'll call it the "space force,"' he told the crowd. 'And I was not really serious. And then I said what a great idea -- maybe we'll have to do that.'... The concept had been pushed unsuccessfully since 2016 by a small group of current and former government officials, some with deep financial ties to the aerospace industry, who see creation of the sixth military service as a surefire way to hike Pentagon spending on satellite and other space systems.... When Trump abruptly embraced the idea at Miramar -- and began promoting it to wild applause at other rallies -- a moribund notion opposed by much of the Pentagon hierarchy and senior members of the Senate became a real possibility.... The story of how that happened is a window into the chaotic way Trump sometimes makes key decisions, often by bypassing traditional bureaucracy to tout ideas that work well as applause lines but aren't fully thought-out." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
Paul Krugman: "The real news of the past few weeks isn't that Trump is a wannabe Mussolini who can't even make the trains run on time. It's the absence of any meaningful pushback from Congressional Republicans.... Is Trumpocracy what Republicans always wanted?... My guess is that most Republican politicians are spineless rather than sinister -- or, more accurately, sinister in their spinelessness.... The party has long been in the habit of rejecting awkward facts and attributing them to conspiracies: it's not a big jump from claiming that climate change is a giant hoax perpetrated by the entire scientific community to asserting that Trump is the blameless target of a vast deep state conspiracy.... So remember this moment. We're seeing, in real time, what the GOP is really made of." ...
... Ashley Parker, et al., of the Washington Post: "The Washington Post reached out to all 51 Republican senators and six House Republican leaders asking them to participate in a brief interview about Trump and race. Only three senators agreed to participate: Jeff Flake of Arizona, David Perdue of Georgia and Tim Scott of South Carolina, the only black Republican in the Senate.... As Trump immersed the nation in a new wave of fraught battles over race, most GOP lawmakers tried to ignore the topic altogether. The studied avoidance is a reflection of the enduring reluctance of Republicans to confront Trump's often divisive and inflammatory rhetoric, in part because the president remains deeply popular within a party dominated by older white voters. '[Trump] is trying to convince white people that the way to keep their long-term status is to keep out people of color, keep out immigrants, and keep blacks down, and they'll feel better off by doing so,' [Dianne] Pinderhughes [of the University of Notre Dame] said. 'In turn, some white people are excited and responsive. It's not all whites, but it's significant enough to be recognized by other Republicans, who decide to stay quiet about it.'" ...
... Amber Phillips of the Washington Post: "Compared to former national security officials criticizing President Trump in increasingly forceful ways, Congress has been reluctant to challenge him.... But every once in a while, Congress does do something to make itself stand apart from Trump's most controversial actions. It's usually in subtle ways, like Thursday's unanimous vote in the Senate to separate themselves from the president's attacks on the media.* Phillips looks at the times Congress has stood up and/or kinda sorta slightly stood up to Trump. ...
... * Mrs. McCrabbie: I missed this. Here's a story about it: Nicole Guadiano of USA Today (August 16): "The Senate unanimously passed a ['sense of the Senate'] resolution by Democrats on Thursday condemning attacks on the free press and affirming that 'the press is not the enemy of the people,' President Trump's label for the media. The move came as more than 300 newspapers and other media outlets joined The Boston Globe in publishing editorials Thursday promoting freedom of the press and refuting Trump's denouncements. 'We can't let statements by the president declaring the press is the enemy of the people go unchallenged,' said Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii.... Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., joined Schatz in introducing the resolution, which passed with unanimous consent by voice vote."
Benjamin Wallace-Wells of the New Yorker writes a glossy piece on John McCain's "romantic conservatism," as seen through the eyes of McCain's long-time aide & coauthor Mark Salter.
Matt Ford of the New Republic: "Brett Kavanaugh's confirmation process is turning into a mess.... Americans are less supportive of his elevation to the high court than any successful Supreme Court nominee in the past thirty years. The voluminous paper trail from his six-year tenure in the George W. Bush White House is turning into a political liability. And the GOP's haste to put him on the court before those records are available gives Democrats the chance to question the process's legitimacy. The Senate's narrow Republican majority means Kavanaugh is still more likely to be confirmed than not. But he's skating closer to thin ice than a nominee in his position should be.... According to The New York Times, [Mitch McConnell] warned White House Counsel Don McGahn that Kavanaugh's extensive paper trail would make things more difficult for the Senate compared to other potential selections."
The following linked story presents one of many reasons to oppose Brett Kavanaugh. Democrats must require Kavanaugh to give a straight (no pun intended) answer on this, but we pretty much know what an honest answer would reveal:
... A Couple Walks into a Retirement Community. Paula Span of the New York Times: A faith-based continued-care retirement community (CCRC) in Missouri rejected the application of a married couple -- because the couple were women. The couple, with the backing of the ACLU, has sued the facility."Faith organizations operate many retirement facilities. If a baker can refuse to make a wedding cake for a gay couple (and have the Supreme Court agree, albeit on narrow grounds), can a C.C.R.C. refuse admission to [a same-sex married couple]? With Attorney General Jeff Sessions announcing the creation of a 'religious liberty task force,' some facilities might try." Read the whole story. There is a lot of discrimination against LGBT seniors in CCCRs, including against those who are already in the facilities. This is really distressing.
Beyond the Beltway
Update to the story linked yesterday about ICE's detaining a man who was driving his pregnant wife to the hospital to give birth: Alex Horton of the Washington Post: "On Saturday afternoon, officials released previously undisclosed details about [Joel] Arrona-Lara’s arrest. He is a Mexican national wanted in Mexico under a warrant issued for homicide charges and has been detained pending removal proceedings, according to a statement by ICE spokeswoman Lori Haley.... Arrona-Lara's legal representative, Emilio Amaya García, told The Post he believed his client was not suspected of crimes within the United States, and denies criminal charges in Mexico. García questioned why Arrona-Lara is slated for removal but not extradition, where a more formal handoff to authorities would be made."
AND Georgia Cops Taze 87-Year-Old Woman Collecting Dandelions. Amy Wang of the Washington Post: "When Martha Al-Bishara went on a walk near her home in northern Georgia last week, she was on a quest for dandelions. The stroll would end in her getting stunned by a Taser and arrested by police officers. The 87-year-old woman often ventured outside -- with a kitchen knife and a plastic bag in hand -- to cut and collect the plants for cooking, her family said. She was doing just that last Friday afternoon when she crossed the street from her home in Chatsworth, Ga., and arrived at a partially fenced lot belonging to a branch of the Boys and Girls Club. There, she began gathering the plants she needed." Al-Bishara doesn't speak English & family members say she suffers from dementia. She made no threatening motions but did not put her steak knife down when officers ordered her to do so. So naturally, the three officers were skeert & one of them Tazed her. Then they carted her off to jail. Mrs. McC: Did I mention Al-Bishara is (probably) Muslim? (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)
Way Beyond
Putin Danced at Her Wedding. Griff Witte of the Washington Post: "When [Austrian] Foreign Minister Karin Kneissl tied the knot at a vineyard in the hills of southern Austria on Saturday afternoon, Russian President Vladimir Putin was on hand to give his blessing. He stayed for a little over an hour and briefly danced with the bride.... Kneissl married Wolfgang Meilinger, an entrepreneur.... The country's Foreign Ministry said the ceremony was private, with just 100 attendees. But with Putin among them, the personal event took on a very public meaning for Europe while generating a backlash in Austria.... In addition to Putin, the two most powerful figures in Austria -- Chancellor Sebastian Kurz and Vice Chancellor Heinz-Christian Strache ... -- also attended Saturday's wedding.... The wedding gave Putin a highly symbolic platform to demonstrate his deepening ties with political leaders in Europe.... The timing is particularly apt for Putin given that Austria currently holds the rotating E.U. presidency."
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Reader Comments (14)
Hey trump! Your buddy Putin has made his intentions clear in a form you can understand. He's cutting in on your girl.
The "girl" he really wants is Europe. He's cajoled you into being a jerk with the entire EU, and now he's moving in to replace you.
Will we next see President Xi dancing in Tokyo or Seoul?
With East and West gone, we'll only have friends to our North and South. Oh, but they're our enemies now too.
And all the fucking Republican are sitting on their hands or plugging their ears or holding their noses because they're getting something they want, be it nut-job judges or tax cuts for their donors, while the country is getting smaller and smaller in front of our eyes.
Bin Laden is smiling.
And I got a notice from Comcast last week announcing that I can
now sign up for a Russian 8-pack. I thought of beer, but that's
usually a 6-pack. Turns out it's 8 Russian TV channels for the low,
low price of $34.95 per month.
I would sign up, but don't speak Russian and it's probably all fake
news channels. I should sign the president* up for a trial. (Not that
trial).
@NiskyGuy: Of course, unlike Trump, bin Laden united the country. For one brief moment, New York City became "real America" & "we were all New Yorkers."
What worries me about history's repeating itself & all is that Trump saw the overwhelming positive reaction to Dubya's very mundane, short Ground Zero remarks -- remarks Trump himself may be capable of making -- and Trump surely wants such a moment for himself. What will he do to manufacture the occasion to "unite" us?
I am no expert on religion so maybe someone can tell me where it says:
Marriages can only be between man and women
It's OK to use a gun
Driving when drunk is immoral
Slavery is OK
"Interpretation" is a strange word.
https://www.mprnews.org/story/2018/08/19/trump-administration-says-conserving-oil-is-no-longer-an-economic-imperative-for-us
As were reasonable taxes on corporations and the wealthy, apparently.
Wonder if the administration math whizzes took the effect on fossil fuel use of the increased mileages standards imposed on the auto industry over the last fifty years into their sunny calculations...
Capre Diem and wake up and smell the coffee used to have a similar meaning to my mind. Pay attention, notice what's around you and enjoy it in the moment.
These guys eagerly carp the diem but notice absolutely nothing.
Marie,
I’ve been thinking for some time now that Trump will find a way to start a war. He’s thoroughly enjoying his exercise of irresponsible, unbridled presidential power, unchecked by the Party of Traitors who, for now, run congress. He’s acting on his ever expanding enemies list, rolling back every Obama era regulation he can find. But still he doesn’t get the uncritical love and respect he demands. Plus there’s that pesky Bob Mueller and his bloodhounds fast on the trail of his Russian ratfucking of the election. He needs a distraction. He needs to look prezidenshul. He needs to get the rush of bombing the shit out of someone. He needs a war.
He wants the cachet and impenetrable armor of a wartime president*. He saw Dubya’s bulldogs threatening to throw people in jail for speaking out against his war of choice. He has worked hard to perfect his Mussolini chin-jut. AND he dearly wants his parade.
War. That’ll do it. That’ll show ‘em all.
Didn’t Bill Clinton at one point admit that he didn’t feel as if his presidency would be looked at in the same light as presidents who were tested by war? If a guy as smart as Clinton thought that, what would a despicable little egotistical lizard like Trump think?
And who will stop him? Mattis? Kelly? Bolton? Certainly not McConnell. Besides, with a war, he can declare martial law. That’ll take care of all those fake news critics.
This is a real concern. The difference is, it won’t be nearly as “well planned” as the Bush Debacle. He might even try to cancel the 2020 elections, especially if the PoT retains control of Congress.
Don’t think he hasn’t considered this. He wants to beat Obama at everything. Obama inherited Bush’s wars, but he also had his War Room moment, those pictures of him and Clinton and the brass listening to real time feedback on the successful assault on Bin Laden’s hidey hole. The finale to 9/11 revenge.
He wants that. He wants a war of his very own.
Generalissimo Trumpo!
“These guys eagerly carp the diem but notice absolutely nothing...”
They’re pretty good at carping the per diem too.
Marie: and if you recall Trump claimed he "saw" on a video hundreds of Muslims dancing in the streets somewhere–-New Jersey? maybe–– after 9/11. A harbinger for what was to come from this man who built his brand through the mastery of television and had/ has a knack for complete fabrications––called LIES, in sane circles.
I was thinking back to when Sarah Palin graced our space. How the crowds loved her–-she was "like" them, a "tells it like it is" kind of gal––"we can really relate to her." Even after it was proved that she was not ready for prime time except on SNL, her supporters never let go. I recall how disturbed I was at this and thought at the time–this does not bode well for this country. Then along came Mr. Big Stuff who surpassed Palin's groupies with large crowds who literally "got off" on this guy. And I think, although it's been shown that some supporters have vanished, that when Trump is finally brought down, his true blues who wear the red hats will still call "foul." Kinda like Marvin's list of "SAY WHATS?"
Yesterday old friends from N.H. visited, and of course politics was bandied about. At one point I said that we had let our passports expire and we keep putting off the renewal. They laughingly said "You best get them suckers renewed , we all might be the new refugees on the block,"––there was a pause, the laughter stopped and they said, "it may not BE a laughing matter."
Talked to a young lad in the neighborhood this morning who was washing his car. He is a sophomore at Colby in Maine studying all things environmental. I told him his generation was our hope for change–-especially in this field. He told me how sicken he has been about the damage that is being done ay the EPA. Here was the boy that I used to toss a ball to when he was wee and later bought eggs from him during his chicken raising faze––all grown up and ready to go. Let's hope there will be something solid for him to go to.
I received an email today from onenationunited.com soliciting donations. It said all the right things, take back the house, get out the vote, etc. but there is no information about any person involved or where their money has gone in the past, either in the email or on the web site. The only specific information they give is an address, which appears to be a box in a UPS store. As far as I know, it's a Republican and/or Russian scam aiming to suck away Democratic donations.
If it is a scam, it's light years ahead of the Nigerian Prince emails. Tone, spelling, everything.
I'm feeling extra paranoid today, I guess.
@Nisky Guy: Here's what One Nation United says about itself.
There's more from Open Secrets here and here.
One Nation United: "We are funded exclusively from the voluntary contributions of private individuals, organizations, and businesses who believe in the importance of promoting equality under the law for all citizens."
Thanks, Bea
Looks like One Nation United arose here in WA State from the fear that Indian treaty rights would interfere with the private ownership rights of beaches and tidelands and associated shellfish harvesting on them that were not not dealt with in the locally infamous and still controversial Bolt Decision that interpreted Indian treaty rights to allow Indians 50 percent (the language in question was the meaning of "in common") of the marine harvest.
Seems that the group would prefer to ignore the uncomfortable fact that strict equality and Indian rights as delineated and interpreted by the courts are not and cannot be commensurate.
Locals still claim that the plummeting Puget Sound fishery is all the Indians' and Judge Bolt's fault. The increased pressure of population growth, of course, has nothing to do with it.
After Rudy's statement about 'truth" I wonder which pundit will be first in line to invoke the biblical reference to Pilate and "what is truth?"
Whatever it is it sure as hell isn't coming out of the West Wing.
@Mrs. BMcC: Thank you for the links. I will keep the OpenSecrets.org site in my mental toolbox.
I knew it all along: Truth isn't truth.
It's a refrain here on RC. Fact checks and Reality Chex, WTF is truth? You just can't tell these days.
Some have blamed all those liberal institutions of higher learning who make a habit of questioning verities for our declining perception of what's real and what is not; in fact, that blame game has become a minor academic industry in itself, but as frequently as they may appear that explanation doesn't sit right with me.
In reaction to one such exercise in finger-pointing, I sent a shortened version of the following to "The Skeptical Inquirer" a few months back. (It's appearance in their letter column led to a pleasant email exchange with the author of the article I took issue with, which proved that in some circles it's still possible to disagree, to learn from one another, and get along just fine.)
"In his survey of the academic backdrop to today's rampant unreason, Professor S. suggests a causative link between the rise of what he calls post-modernism and the unreason he sees around us. Goofy thinking is rampant, and perhaps English professors, historians, anthropologists and philosophers do exert some tenuous influence on the general public, but to suggest that academics who question our socially-constructed cultural verities have caused the public to reject science and reason is a misreading of how culture works. In fact, tempests in our academic teapots far more often reflect cultural shifts than cause them.
Some of the academic work Professor S. cites is indeed silly, even entertainingly so, and I thank him for the smiles. Nonetheless, S. grants the legitimacy of much of that work while simultaneously saying it encourages or contributes to the irrationality that permeates society. No doubt, the post-modern movement of the last half century is emblematic of our time but recognizing that everyone from families to nations construct their social realities is hardly new. Nor is acknowledging that those realities encase unquestioned and untested assumptions of value and worth. Reason exercised in and out of universities has long since revealed that many so-called “truths” are really stuff we just made up.
That said, it’s a great stretch to suggest that academics questioning our assumptions have destroyed the philosophic underpinnings of science and reason. There are other very powerful forces at work in our culture that don’t like people thinking too much. Religion would certainly have to top that list but it’s not the only culprit. Most forget our entire lives are embedded in economic system that tolerates reason only as long as it is the servant of short-term profit.
As a recent example of how religion and capitalism have joined forces to strangle reason, here's this from the head of the EPA, Scott Pruitt, whose evangelical Christianity mocks all we know about the environment that sustains us.
"The idea of 'dominion' is about mastery: Human beings have the
right to take what they want from the earth, in terms of natural
resources, without regards to how it might affect other species.”
Are science and reason vastly undervalued in 2018 America? With leaders like Pruitt, who could reasonably deny it? Has post-modern academia, with all its constructing and de-constructing, made some small contribution to the present state of affairs? Maybe a tad..
But as long as we accept the preposterous claims of religion and refuse to examine the assumptions and effects of the economic system we’re all beholden to, we won’t need the permission of professors to act more than a little nuts."
Professor S. also neglected to take a political movement based on bald-faced lying into account.
So endeth this Sunday's sermon.
Back to painting the porch railings.