The Commentariat -- July 8, 2021
Afternoon Update:
John Wagner, et al., of the Washington Post: “President Biden said Thursday that the country had accomplished its objectives in Afghanistan of killing Osama bin Laden and undercutting al-Qaeda’s ability to launch more attacks on the United States as he defended his decision to bring a 20-year war to an end. Biden, during a White House speech, was defiant in the face of gains by the Taliban since he announced a planned U.S. troop withdrawal in April and said the Afghan people needed to dictate their own future. 'We did not go to Afghanistan to nation-build,' Biden said.... 'I will not send another generation of Americans to war in Afghanistan with no reasonable expectation of achieving a different outcome.'... Biden also pledged to evacuate thousands of interpreters who served alongside troops in Afghanistan, as well as their families.” ~~~
Widlore Merancourt, et al., of the Washington Post: "A U.S. citizen of Haitian descent has been arrested in connection with the assassination of Haitian President Jovenel Moïse, a senior official here said Thursday. James Solages, a U.S. citizen, is among the six people arrested so far in Moïse’s killing, according to Mathias Pierre, Haiti’s minister of elections and inter-party relations. Pierre told The Washington Post that at least one other detainee is also believed to be a Haitian American. Four other suspects have been killed, authorities have said."
Jeff Stein, et al., of the Washington Post: “Congressional Democrats and Republicans have agreed to increase funding for the Internal Revenue Service so that the agency can bring in more tax revenue, hoping the money can help pay down some of the infrastructure package’s expected price tag. The early contours of the infrastructure blueprint have won the White House’s support, but the IRS provision in particular is drawing opposition from well-funded conservative groups, which are strongly opposed to expanding the reach of a tax-collection agency that they long have alleged is politically motivated.... They are preparing a letter that warns Republicans should not negotiate with the White House unless they agree to 'no additional funding for the Internal Revenue Service.'”
Jan Hoffman of the New York Times: "Fifteen states have reached an agreement with Purdue Pharma, the maker of the prescription painkiller OxyContin, that would pave the way toward a $4.5 billion settlement of thousands of opioid cases. The states decided late Wednesday to drop their opposition to Purdue’s bankruptcy reorganization plan, in exchange for a release of millions of documents and an additional $50 million from members of the Sackler family, the company’s owners. The agreement was contained in a late-night filing by a mediator in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in White Plains, N.Y. The settlement extracts concessions that will be added to a comprehensive proposal now being voted upon by more than 3,000 plaintiffs, including cities, counties, tribes and states, who sought to hold Purdue and its owners responsible for their role in the opioid epidemic. More than 500,000 Americans have died from overdoses of prescription and illegal opioids."
The New York Times' live updates of Covid-19 developments Thursday are here.
Ben Dooley of the New York Times: "Olympic organizers said on Thursday that they would bar spectators from most events at the Games scheduled to open in two weeks, a decision that followed the declaration of a new state of emergency in Tokyo in response to a sudden spike in coronavirus cases. Officials have long insisted that they can hold the Tokyo Games safely amid a pandemic. Last month, they announced that they would allow domestic spectators at the events despite public fears that the Games could become a petri dish for new variants of the virus."
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Cleve Wootson of the Washington Post: "President Biden said Wednesday that his focus remains on his administration’s expansive efforts to invest in programs that touch many facets of American life, not just the bipartisan infrastructure agreement that has spent weeks in the spotlight. Biden toured McHenry County College [in Crystal Lake, Illinois], which has a workforce development plan and on-site child-care facility, two programs that exemplify cornerstones of his American Families Plan.... In the opening minutes of his remarks at the community college, which is a 90-minute drive northwest of Chicago, Biden lauded the work of the legislative group that had forged a framework for a compromise on infrastructure. But the president spent the bulk of the half-hour speech stressing that much more needs to be done."
David Sanger & Nicole Perlroth of the New York Times: “President Biden emerged from a Situation Room meeting with his top cybersecurity advisers on Wednesday to declare that he 'will deliver' a response to President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia for the wave of ransomware attacks hitting American companies, after hearing a series of options about how he could disrupt the extortion efforts. Mr. Biden’s vague statement, delivered as he was departing for a trip, left it unclear whether he was planning another verbal warning to Mr. Putin — similar to the one he issued three weeks ago during a one-on-one summit in Geneva — or would move ahead with more aggressive options to dismantle the infrastructure used by Russian-language criminal groups.” The AP's story is here.
Libby Cathey of ABC News: "President Joe Biden taunted Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell on Wednesday for having acknowledged his home state of Kentucky will receive money from the Biden administration-backed American Rescue Plan -- despite McConnell not having voted for it.... ABC News Chief White House Correspondent Cecilia Vega asked the president about remarks McConnell made Tuesday on his infrastructure packages.... 'Mitch McConnell loves our programs,' the president said with a smile.... 'Have you seen what Mitch McConnell said? He told me he wasn't going to get a single vote in order to allow me to get, with the help of everybody here, that $1.9 trillion ... program for economic growth,' he said. 'Look it up, man. He's bragging about it in Kentucky. It's a great thing for Kentucky, it's getting $4 billion to help poor -- it's amazing,' Biden added, mimicking McConnell and gesturing widely. In fact, McConnell at an event on Tuesday in his home state did talk about the American Rescue Plan. 'So you're gonna get a lot more money. I didn't vote for it...," he said. 'My advice to members of the legislatures and other public officials is spend it wisely, because hopefully this windfall doesn't come around again.'"
Neil Irwin of the New York Times: “This week, the White House is planning to release an executive order focused on competition policy. People familiar with the order say one section has several provisions aimed at increasing competition in the labor market. The order will encourage the Federal Trade Commission to ban or limit noncompete agreements, which employers have increasingly used in recent years to try to hamper workers’ ability to quit for a better job. It encourages the F.T.C. to ban 'unnecessary' occupational licensing restrictions, which can make finding new work harder, especially across state lines. And it encourages the F.T.C. and Justice Department to further restrict the ability of employers to share information on worker pay in ways that might amount to collusion. More broadly, the executive order encourages antitrust regulators to consider how mergers might contribute to so-called monopsony — conditions in which workers have few choices of where to work and therefore lack leverage to negotiate higher wages or better benefits.” (Also linked yesterday.)
Lara Seligman of Politico: "The U.S. military's withdrawal from Afghanistan is essentially complete, despite President Joe Biden's comments last week that American troops will leave by late August, according to two U.S. officials.... The U.S. currently has roughly 600 troops in Afghanistan, most of whom are Marine Corps and Army personnel providing security at the U.S. Embassy in Kabul, the person said. The rest of the 600 will be based at the Kabul's Hamid Karzai International Airport, said another U.S. official with direct knowledge of the discussions. All of those troops are expected to remain after the pullout is officially complete, The Associated Press first reported last month. Besides the security troops, the only U.S. military personnel left to withdraw by the Sept. 11 deadline Biden set in May are Gen. Scott Miller, the commander of U.S. Forces-Afghanistan, and a handful of staff, the two officials said."
Luz Lazo of the Washington Post: "Amtrak has signed a mammoth contract with manufacturing company Siemens Mobility for 83 new train sets, part of a $7.3 billion plan to upgrade its rolling stock over the next decade. Under the plan announced Wednesday, Amtrak will replace nearly 40 percent of its rail car fleet by 2031 and invest $2 billion in facilities upgrades systemwide. The oldest cars in Amtrak’s fleet would be taken off the rails after five decades of service. The deal marks one of the railroad’s biggest investments in its 50 years of operation and comes as the company is pursuing an ambitious $75 billion expansion to bring trains to dozens of cities and towns across the nation."
Mark Berman of the Washington Post: “The Air Force was mostly responsible for the 2017 massacre at a Sutherland Springs, Tex., church because it failed to submit records to federal law enforcement that could have prevented the attacker from buying guns, a judge determined this week. The gunman, former airman Devin Kelley, was convicted of domestic assault years before he opened fire during Sunday morning services, killing more than two dozen people. That military conviction would have prevented him from passing the background check for buying guns, but the Air Force never submitted his criminal record or fingerprints to the FBI despite having 'an obligation — and multiple opportunities' to do so, according to U.S. District Judge Xavier Rodriguez.... Kelley joined the Air Force in 2010.... He was given a bad-conduct discharge in 2014 after being convicted of attacking his wife and stepson and sentenced to 12 months of confinement.... In breaking down liability, Rodriguez apportioned 60 percent to parts of the Air Force and the remaining 40 percent to the gunman.”
Jim Mustian of the AP: "The FBI is taking the unusual step of ordering a new look at the autopsy of Black motorist Ronald Greene to consider evidence not provided after his 2019 death, including graphic body camera video of Louisiana state troopers stunning, punching and dragging him after a high-speed chase. The re-examined autopsy is part of a federal civil rights investigation that has taken on new urgency in the nearly two months since The Associated Press obtained and published the video of Greene’s arrest. Federal prosecutors also met with his family last month and made clear they plan to present the case to a grand jury by the summer’s end."
Sarah Ellison of the Washington Post reports on Natalie Mayflower Sours Edwards, the whistleblower who leaked 2,000 federal government documents to BuzzFeed News journalist Jason Leopold. “Edwards — known to her friends as 'May' — is largely unknown and mostly forgotten. She is scheduled to report to the Bureau of Prisons in August [to serve a six-month sentence], and no celebrities are clamoring about the injustice on Twitter.”
Insurrectionist/Teacher Thought It Was All a Kids' Game. Jordan Williams of the Hill: "The FBI seized a 'fully constructed' Lego set of the U.S. Capitol from the home of an alleged insurrectionist. Prosecutors detailed the finding in a court document for Robert Morss, who was arrested on June 11 at his home in Glenshaw, Pa.... The Pittsburg Post-Gazette previously reported that Morss was a substitute social studies teacher.... He faces nine charges in connection to the riots, including assaulting, resisting, or impeding certain officers or employees; civil disorder; robbery of the personal property of the United States and obstruction of an official proceeding." (Also linked yesterday.)
Felicia Sonmez of the Washington Post: “... Donald Trump on Wednesday declared that a police officer defending lawmakers and the Capitol on Jan. 6 had 'no reason' to shoot an individual involved in the attack and echoed calls from the far right for the officer to be publicly named.... In April, a U.S. Capitol Police officer was cleared of criminal wrongdoing for fatally shooting Air Force veteran Ashli Babbitt as she attempted to breach a set of doors deep in the Capitol during the January siege.... Some conservatives have sought to turn Babbitt into a martyr.... Trump ... declared, without evidence, that he knows 'exactly' who the officer is.” ~~~
~~~ Brad Reed of the Raw Story: "New York Magazine columnist Jonathan Chait describes Trump's willingness to embrace Babbitt as a martyr as a 'chilling' development that he believes shows the former president is coming around to supporting the deadly riot waged by his followers to stop the certification of the 2020 election.... Although Trump at least tried to distance himself from the riot shortly after it occurred, Chait argues that he's been emboldened to embrace it because the Republican Party failed to expunge him from its ranks. 'By throwing himself behind this message, Trump is endorsing the most radical interpretation of his presidency,' he concludes. 'January 6 was not a minor misstep after a successful era, as fans like Mike Pence and Lindsey Graham now say. It was the heroic culmination of a righteous uprising.' Read the whole column here." (Firewalled.)
~~~ Philip Bump of the Washington Post: "Early in the morning of May 29, [as people around the nation protested the murder of George Floyd, Donald Trump tweeted,] 'Any difficulty and we will assume control..., but, when the looting starts, the shooting starts.'... Concerned about the unrest [that night], the president’s protective detail moved him into a bunker inside the White House, a precautionary measure that Trump would later claim involved nothing more than a tour. (This was not true.)... '[N]obody came close to breaching the fence' outside the White House, Trump [said]. 'If they had they would have been greeted with the most vicious dogs, and most ominous weapons, I have ever seen. That’s when people would have been really badly hurt, at least.'... This, at its heart, is Trump’s view of justice. Those on his side are exempt from accountability for their actions. Those on the other side, however, most be dealt with harshly — more harshly than the law allows.... This is precisely what the American legal system is supposed to uproot, this idea that culpability for a crime should be colored by political belief or political allegiance.”
Former Guy Sues Social Media. Cat Zakrzewski & Rachel Lerman of the Washington Post: “... Donald Trump on Wednesday filed class-action lawsuits targeting Facebook, Google and Twitter and their CEOs, escalating his long-running battle with the companies following their suspensions of his accounts. The suits were filed in the Southern District of Florida, and Trump said at a news conference in Bedminster, N.J., that they would call for the court to issue an order blocking the companies’ alleged censorship of the American people.... The suits allege that the companies violated Trump’s First Amendment rights in suspending his accounts and argues that Facebook, in particular, no longer should be considered a private company but 'a state actor' whose actions are constrained by First Amendment restrictions on government limitations on free speech. Traditionally, the First Amendment is thought to constrain only government actions, not those of private companies. It also called for the court to strike down Section 230, a decades-old Internet law that protects tech companies from lawsuits over content moderation decisions.” (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ Zoe Tillman of BuzzFeed News: "... Donald Trump’s latest attempt at getting back on mainstream social media platforms came in the form of lawsuits on Wednesday against Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube — each featuring a series of claims that multiple courts, including the US Supreme Court, have rebuffed.... The US Supreme Court and federal appeals and district courts have repeatedly rejected efforts to classify social media platforms as state actors.... In [a 2019] opinion by Justice Brett Kavanaugh — one of Trump’s nominees — the court found that the First Amendment didn’t apply to the operator of public access channels that had suspended producers over content.... [Trump is] also claiming, without evidence, that the companies were coerced by Democrats in Congress who threatened to strip them of Section 230 immunity if they didn’t restrict conservative speech and that Section 230 itself represents a government endorsement of unconstitutional censorship." Et-cetera. ~~~
~~~ Marie: There are a number of reasons Trump is bringing these frivolous suits now. One, he thinks anyone or any entity who rebuffs him or knocks him is "unfair." Two, the suits take the focus away from the real cases against his company & its CEO Allen Weisselberg. Three ~~~
~~~ Grifters Gotta Grift. Paul Waldman of the Washington Post: Donald Trump's lawsuit against the big social media companies is “puny and pathetic. Perhaps because of his company’s struggles, Trump is returning to his roots as a small-time grifter, desperate to draw attention to himself and willing to do just about anything to grab a few extra bucks.... His complaint against Facebook — presumably prepared by actual lawyers, hard as that may be to believe — claims that it 'rises beyond that of a private company to that of a state actor....' It goes on to use the word 'unconstitutional' again and again to describe Facebook’s decisions, despite the fact that only government action is or isn’t constitutional.... As soon as Trump announced the suit, fundraising texts were blasted out to his supporters.” ~~~
~~~ Marie: Somehow, after all these years, I managed to miss Trump's piss-in-a-bottle scam. Waldman enlightens us: “For much of his career, there has been no scam too small for him to pull and no product too cheesy for him to hawk, whether it was steaks or ties or vodka or vitamins. That last one involved people sending in a urine test, after which they’d receive a package of vitamins supposedly tuned to their unique metabolism. You can guess how it ended.” (Worth clicking on the link here to the STAT article, too.)
We're All the Big Grifter's Marks. David Fahrenthold of the Washington Post: "... Donald Trump’s golf club in Bedminster, N.J., charged the Secret Service nearly $10,200 for guest rooms used by his protective detail during Trump’s first month at the club this summer, newly released spending records show. The records — released by the Secret Service in response to a public-records request — show that the ex-president has continued a habit he began in first days of his presidency: charging rent to the agency that protects his life.... In all, Trump’s company charged the government more than $2.5 million during his presidency, according to a Post analysis of federal spending records."
Rachel Weiner of the Washington Post: “The D.C. Court of Appeals has temporarily barred Rudolph W. Giuliani from practicing law, following a similar decision in New York. A committee of judges in New York determined last month that Giuliani was unfit to keep practicing law after he 'communicated demonstrably false and misleading statements to courts, lawmakers and the public at large' while representing ... Donald Trump and the Trump campaign in connection with their efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election. A day after the ruling, disciplinary counsel in D.C. recommended suspending Giuliani’s license in D.C. until the New York case is resolved. On Wednesday the D.C. Court of Appeals agreed.” CNN's story is here.
Nicholas Kulish of the New York Times: “If over the next two years [Bill Gates and Melinda French Gates] can’t find a way to work together following their planned divorce, Mr. Gates will [take over their charitable foundation].... 'They have agreed that if after two years either one of them decides that they cannot continue to work together, Melinda will resign as co-chair and trustee,' [foundation CEO Mark] Suzman said in a message on Wednesday to employees of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. If that happened, he added, Ms. French Gates 'would receive personal resources from Bill for her philanthropic work' separate from the foundation’s endowment. The money at stake underscores the strange mix of public significance — in global health, poverty reduction and gender equality, among other important areas — and private affairs that attends any move made by the first couple of philanthropy, even after the announcement of their split. The foundation plans to add trustees outside their close circle, a step toward better governance that philanthropy experts had urged for years.”
What Climate Change? Henry Fountain of the New York Times: “Last month was the warmest June on record in North America, researchers said Wednesday, confirming the suspicions of millions of people who endured some of the hottest temperatures ever experienced on the continent. The Copernicus Climate Change Service, an agency supported by the European Union, said that average surface temperatures for June in North America were about one-quarter of a degree Fahrenheit (0.15 of a degree Celsius) higher than the average for June 2012, the previous record-holder.” (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~
~~~ Henry Fountain of the New York Times: "The extraordinary heat wave that scorched the Pacific Northwest last week would almost certainly not have occurred without global warming, an international team of climate researchers said Wednesday. Temperatures were so extreme — including readings of 116 degrees Fahrenheit in Portland, Ore., and a Canadian record of 121 in British Columbia — that the researchers had difficulty saying just how rare the heat wave was. But they estimated that in any given year there was only a 0.1 percent chance of such an intense heat wave occurring."
The Pandemic, Ctd.
The New York Times' live updates of Covid-19 developments Wednesday are here. (Also linked yesterday.)
Beyond the Beltway
Arizona. Yvonne Sanchez of the Arizona Republic: “Arizona Secretary of State Katie Hobbs on Wednesday asked Attorney General Mark Brnovich to open a criminal investigation into possible efforts by ... Donald Trump and his allies to influence Maricopa County supervisors as the ballots were still being tallied. Hobbs said some of the communications 'involve clear efforts to induce supervisors to refuse to comply with their duties,' which could violate Arizona law. She cited The Arizona Republic’s reporting last week on text messages and voicemails from the White House, Trump’s personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, and Arizona Republican Party Chair Kelli Ward to the Republican members of the Board of Supervisors. 'The reporting also includes firsthand statements from the victims of this potential crime,' Hobbs said. She cited at least one potential felony charge under Arizona law.... Hobbs, a Democrat, is running for governor next year.... Brnovich, a Republican, is running for the U.S. Senate next year.... Late Wednesday, Rep. Ruben Gallego, D-Ariz., called on U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland to examine the possibility of 'an extremely serious crime' in what Gallago called a 'pressure campaign' exerted by the Trump campaign and party officials.”
Georgia. Pamela Kirkland & Sara Murray of CNN: "A federal court judge on Wednesday denied a motion to stop the implementation of parts of Georgia's new voting law, ahead of state legislature runoff elections next week. In the ruling, US District Judge J. P. Boulee declined to block parts of SB202, saying the timing of the request presents a problem with runoff elections already ongoing and would change rules for elections that are already underway. The runoffs for two Georgia House seats are set for July 13." Boulee is a Trump appointee.
Minnesota. Timothy Bella of the Washington Post: "Darnella Frazier, the teenager whose cellphone footage of Derek Chauvin murdering George Floyd last year sparked a racial reckoning in the United States, said Tuesday that her uncle was killed in a car crash involving a Minneapolis police vehicle that was pursuing a robbery suspect. Leneal Lamont Frazier, 40, was in his car when it was struck by Minneapolis police while they were in a high-speed chase with another vehicle on the north side of the city. The victim, who was later identified by Darnella Frazier as her uncle, was not being pursued by police, authorities said." (Also linked yesterday.)
New York. Dana Rubinstein, et al., of the New York Times: "Kathryn Garcia and Maya D. Wiley, who ran muscular campaigns to become the first female mayor of New York City, acknowledged on Wednesday that their bids had fallen short, conceding to Eric Adams in the Democratic primary." (Also linked yesterday.)
Way Beyond
Haiti. The New York Times' live updates Thursday of development in Haiti's political crisis are here. ~~~
~~~ The New York Times is live-updating of developments in Haiti after the assassination of the country's president, Jovenel Moïse. (Also linked yesterday.) The New York Times' full story is here. ~~~
~~~ Haiti’s police chief says four suspected killers of President Jovenel Moïse have been fatally shot by police and two others arrested in an apparent hostage-taking situation. Léon Charles said late Wednesday that three police officers held hostage were freed. The killing of Moïse early Wednesday, and the wounding of his wife, was sure to bring more chaos to the unstable Caribbean country already beset by gang violence, soaring inflation and protests by opposition supporters who accused Moïse of increasing authoritarianism."
South Africa. John Eligon of the New York Times: "Jacob Zuma, the former president of South Africa, was taken into custody on Wednesday to begin serving a 15-month prison sentence, capping a stunning downfall for a once-lauded freedom fighter who battled the apartheid regime alongside Nelson Mandela. The Constitutional Court, the nation’s highest judicial body, ordered Mr. Zuma’s imprisonment last month after finding him guilty of contempt for failing to appear before a commission investigating corruption accusations that tainted his tenure as the nation’s leader from 2009 to 2018."
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Reader Comments (5)
DIGGING ONE'S OWN GRAVE-––we hope
John Dean: " Trump just created a huge trap for himself with his latest court filing.
Keith Olberman: "This is the dumbest thing Trump has ever done. It's wonderful!"
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/john-dean-trump-deposition_n_60e65df4e4b0f9cbbfd750ff
Thinking about how Mel Brooks dealt with Hitler by making fun of him (Springtime for Hitler and Germany) I'd love to see someone make a video with the faces of all the GOP numskulls sitting around a campfire having each one spout some B.S. followed by a loud fart and finish with a duo like Mel and Anne who did that marvelous "Sweet Georgie Brown" dance number, singing it in Polish but instead change the lyrics to "Sweet Tubby Trumpy" and sing it in English since the words would be scurrilous. Just a thought.
Joe taunting Mitch: as much as we like the idea, Mitch knows that taunts aren't nearly as bad as when Jim Jock stuffed his head in the toilet at school and gave him a flushy in 7th grade. We will never recover from Jim's bad behavior.
As for Mark & Sheryl: couldn't happen to nicer people! He was always as slimey as he seemed, one thinks. Sheryl as the public face was always the earnest, sympathetic, and later widow. She is calculating in her business cynicism; that's why she is worse than Z. She know better and does it anyway. Lawyer material, that.
PD: absolutely use humor to depants all these power grabbers with their little worms. Humor shows how close these guys are to tottlers in diapers.
@citizen625: Yes, and it's all the better because nothing pisses off Trump more than being laughed at. He has no sense of humor other than that he thinks he's really hilarious when he bullies people, the more helpless they are the better.
Maybe when he gets thru suing Zuckerberg, he'll follow thru on his threat to sue NBC because they didn't give him equal time with SNL skits that made fun of him & his toadies. (Actually, he wanted the DoJ to get after SNL on the equal-time thing, but that's out now -- unless he can convince DoJ he's still president*.)
Hurried note:
Learned the poison pill (which Dems seem eager to swallow) in the bi-partisan infrastructure package is a rush to privatize public properties--or at least lease them long term to private interests in return for private investment.
A dumb idea that didn't die with the Pretender's departure. Don't have time to cite.
And the Wa St AG won't sign off on the Purdue plan. Let's the Sacklers off the hook, he says. Again, no cite. Sorry.
BTW, I really like this AG, Bob Ferguson.
Trumps "mini-me", Ron DeSantis, has a slogan "Make America Florida" which is scary enough. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution has an in depth look at this Trump wannabe.
https://www.ajc.com/politics/national-politics/make-america-florida-desantis-goes-national-with-eye-toward-white-house/I2JH4CFJO5EQRLBY4D7SWU6ZRY/