Washington Post: “A warehouse storing fireworks in Northern California exploded on Tuesday,leaving seven people missing and two injured as explosions continued intoWednesday evening, officials said. Dramatic video footage captured by KCRA 3 News, a Sacramento broadcaster, showed smoke pouring from the building’s roof before a massive explosion created a fireball that seemed to engulf much of the warehouse, accompanied by an echoing boom. Hundreds of fireworks appeared to be going off and were sparkling within the smoke. Photos of the aftermath showed multiple destroyed buildings and a large area covered in gray ash.” ~~~
New York Times: “The Rev. Jimmy Swaggart, who emerged from the backwoods of Louisiana to become a television evangelist with global reach, preaching about an eternal struggle between good and evil and warning of the temptations of the flesh, a theme that played out in his own life in a sex scandal, died on July 1. He was 90.” ~~~
~~~ For another sort of obituary, see Akhilleus' commentary near the end of yesterday's thread.
Help!
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Commencement ceremonies are joyous occasions, and Steve Carell made sure that was true this past weekend (mid-June) at Northwestern's commencement:
~~~ Carell's entire commencement speech was hilarious. The audio and video here isn't great, but I laughed till I cried.
CNN did a live telecast Saturday night (June 7) of the Broadway play "Good Night, and Good Luck," written by George Clooney and Grant Heslov, about legendary newsman Edward R. Murrow's effort to hold to account Sen. Joe McCarthy, "the junior senator from Wisconsin." Clooney plays Murrow. Here's Murrow himself with his famous take on McCarthy & McCarthyism, brief remarks that especially resonate today: ~~~
~~~ This article lists ways you still can watch the play.
New York Times: “The New York Times Company has agreed to license its editorial content to Amazon for use in the tech giant’s artificial intelligence platforms, the company said on Thursday. The multiyear agreement 'will bring Times editorial content to a variety of Amazon customer experiences,' the news organization said in a statement. Besides news articles, the agreement encompasses material from NYT Cooking, The Times’s food and recipe site, and The Athletic, which focuses on sports. This is The Times’s first licensing arrangement with a focus on generative A.I. technology. In 2023, The Times sued OpenAI and its partner, Microsoft, for copyright infringement, accusing the tech companies of using millions of articles published by The Times to train automated chatbots without any kind of compensation. OpenAI and Microsoft have rejected those accusations.” ~~~
~~~ Marie: I have no idea what this means for "the Amazon customer experience." Does it mean that if I don't have a NYT subscription but do have Amazon Prime I can read NYT content? And where, exactly, would I find that content? I don't know. I don't know.
Washington Post reporters asked three AI image generators what a beautiful woman looks like. "The Post found that they steer users toward a startlingly narrow vision of attractiveness. Prompted to show a 'beautiful woman,' all three tools generated thin women, without exception.... Her body looks like Barbie — slim hips, impossible waist, round breasts.... Just 2 percent of the images showed visible signs of aging. More than a third of the images had medium skin tones. But only nine percent had dark skin tones. Asked to show 'normal women,' the tools produced images that remained overwhelmingly thin.... However bias originates, The Post’s analysis found that popular image tools struggle to render realistic images of women outside the Western ideal." ~~~
~~~ Marie: The reporters seem to think they are calling out the AI programs for being unrealistic. But there's a lot about the "beautiful women" images they miss. I find these omissions remarkably sexist. For one thing, the reporters seem to think AI is a magical "thing" that self-generates. It isn't. It's programmed. It's programmed by boys, many of them incels who have little or no experience or insights beyond comic books and Internet porn of how to gauge female "beauty." As a result, the AI-generated women look like cartoons; that is, a lot like an air-brushed photo of Kristi Noem: globs of every kind of dark eye makeup, Scandinavian nose, Botox lips, slathered-on skin concealer/toner/etc. makeup, long dark hair and the aforementioned impossible Barbie body shape, including huge, round plastic breasts.
New York Times: “George Clooney’s Broadway debut, 'Good Night, and Good Luck,' has been one of the sensations of the 2024-25 theater season, breaking box office records and drawing packed houses of audiences eager to see the popular movie star in a timely drama about the importance of an independent press. Now the play will become much more widely available: CNN is planning a live broadcast of the penultimate performance, on June 7 at 7 p.m. Eastern. The performance will be preceded and followed by coverage of, and discussion about, the show and the state of journalism.”
No free man shall be seized or imprisoned, or stripped of his rights or possessions, or outlawed or exiled, or deprived of his standing in any other way, nor will we proceed with force against him, or send others to do so, except by the lawful judgment of his equals or by the law of the land. -- Magna Carta ~~~
~~~ New York Times: “Bought for $27.50 after World War II, the faint, water stained manuscript in the library of Harvard Law School had attracted relatively little attention since it arrived there in 1946. That is about to change. Two British academics, one of whom happened on the manuscript by chance, have discovered that it is an original 1300 version — not a copy, as long thought — of Magna Carta, the medieval document that helped establish some of the world’s most cherished liberties. It is one of just seven such documents from that date still in existence.... A 710-year-old version of Magna Carta was sold in 2007 for $21.3 million.... First issued in 1215, it put into writing a set of concessions won by rebellious barons from a recalcitrant King John of England — or Bad King John, as he became known in folklore. He later revoked the charter, but his son, Henry III, issued amended versions, the last one in 1225, and Henry’s son, Edward I, in turn confirmed the 1225 version in 1297 and again in 1300.”
NPR lists all of the 2025 Pulitzer Prize winners. Poynter lists the prizes awarded in journalism as well as the finalists in these categories.
Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.
Success is not final, failure is not fatal; it is the courage to continue that counts. — Anonymous
A nation of sheep will beget a government of wolves. — Edward R. Murrow
Publisher & Editor: Marie Burns
I have a Bluesky account now. The URL ishttps://bsky.app/profile/marie-burns.bsky.social . When Reality Chex goes down, check my Bluesky page for whatever info I am able to report on the status of Reality Chex. If you can't access the URL, I found that I could Google Bluesky and ask for Marie Burns. Google will include links to accounts for people whose names are, at least in part, Maria Burns, so you'll have to tell Google you looking only for Marie.
How tone deaf is Donald Trump? Pools of blood were still coagulating on the Pulse nightclub dance floor and all Trump could do was congratulate himself for being right about Muslims. Not a word of kindness or concern for the dead; it's all about Trump.
Then yesterday, as Britain voted for the modern nation-state version of suicide and markets across Europe collapsed, all he could do, while halting his presidential campaign to fly off to Scotland to oversee the pitiful grand opening (a tiny crowd of paid staff and hundreds of protesters screaming at him from afar) of his latest ego project, was to rub his hands in glee about all the money he'll make now that the pound had fallen off a cliff.
Like Dick Cheney's ludicrous prediction that the Iraqis would welcome an invading force with flowers and open arms (still waiting for those flowers 13 years later, Dick...), Trump still maintains that the Scots love him! They can't get enough of Trump. But, er...no. That's wrong too. The Scotsman, "Scotland's National Newspaper" declared that "It’s hard to think of a less sympathetic character in the eyes of most Scots. Despite all his tartanry and trumpeting of heritage, The Donald is almost the anti-Scot personified. Left and right, unionist and nationalist, man and woman, young and old – it takes quite a lot to unite the people of this notoriously fractious little country in a collective shudder. But Donald Trump effortlessly manages to strike the wrong note in just about everything he does."
But in Donald's eyes, as always, he's a hero.
And so far, we've seen what to expect should he win in November, a president whose only concern during a time of crisis is "How can I benefit from this? How much money can I make during this terrible time?"
An Idiot Abroad. Jenna Johnson & Jose DelReal of the Washington Post: "Donald Trump celebrated Britain's stunning vote to leave the European Union on Friday during a visit to Scotland, saying that the people of the United Kingdom have 'taken their country back,' musing that it could benefit his Turnberry resort and arguing that running a nation is a lot like running a golf course.... For a candidate who has struggled to prove that his grasp of foreign policy matches that of former secretary of state Hillary Clinton..., Trump could have used the moment to substantively address a momentous global event. Instead, he provided a widely broadcast infomercial for his newest luxury golf club.... As reporters pressed Trump on the referendum, it was not clear if Trump fully understood what had just happened." -- CW
Paul Krugman: "Well, that was pretty awesome -- and I mean that in the worst way. A number of people deserve vast condemnation here, from David Cameron, who may go down in history as the man who risked wrecking Europe and his own nation for the sake of a momentary political advantage, to the seriously evil editors of Britain's tabloids, who fed the public a steady diet of lies. That said, I'm finding myself less horrified by Brexit than one might have expected -- in fact, less than I myself expected." -- CW
*****
See also yesterday's Afternoon Update for significant news developments. (You could probably skip the one about the New York Times' acknowledgment that there are no Trump Steaks.)
James McAuley of the Washington Post: "Scottish leaders who overwhelmingly supported Britain's membership in the European Union warned Friday of possible renewed bids for independence after British voters turned their backs on the 28-nation bloc. Nicola Sturgeon, leader of the Scottish National Party, said a second referendum on Scotland's membership in the United Kingdom was a possibility in the immediate future." See also "Ignoramus-in-Chief, Ctd.," below. -- CW ...
... ** Heather Stewart & Jessica Elgot of the Guardian: "David Cameronhas resigned as prime minister after the British public rejected his personal entreaties and voted to leave the European Union.... Cameron promised to remain in post until the autumn, to 'steady the ship', but said: 'I do not think it would be right for me to be the captain who steers the country to its next destination.'" -- CW ...
... Youkyng Lee of the AP: "European and Asian stock markets crashed Friday as Britain's unprecedented vote to leave the European Union rocked world financial markets and also sent oil prices crashing and the pound to its lowest level in three decades. Investors dumped European shares as soon as the markets opened, following earlier drops in Asia. Britain's FTSE 100 plunged about 8 percent while German index tanked 10 percent. France's index tumbled about 7 percent." -- CW
** ... Steven Erlanger of the New York Times: "Britain has voted to leave the European Union, a historic decision sure to reshape the nation's place in the world, rattle the Continent and rock political establishments throughout the West. With all but a handful of the country's cities and towns reporting Friday morning, the 'Leave' campaign held a 52 percent to 48 percent lead. More than 17 million people voted in the referendum on Thursday to sever ties with the European Union, and about 15.9 million to remain within the bloc. The value of the British pound and stock prices in Asia plummeted as financial markets absorbed the news." -- CW ...
... Here's the Guardian's liveblog of developments. -- CW ...
**New York TimesEditors: "The impasse that made Mr. Obama's program [to give temporary protection to some undocumented immigrants] necessary -- the absolute refusal by congressional Republicans to reform an unjust system -- persists. The case, United States v. Texas, should never have made it to the Supreme Court. But such is the power of the Republicans' spite." -- CW ...
... CW: There is a direct philosophical connection between the Brits' isolationism & our own. Our only hope for a decent future is that the British outcome is reversed here in November: that at least 52 percent of Americans will vote to "keep America great" & 48 percent or fewer will hew to "Republican spite."
David Nakamura of the Washington Post: "The bitter fight over President Obama's immigration policies moved quickly from the courtroom to the campaign trail on Thursday, as the White House and its allies sought to turn a legal setback at the Supreme Court to their political advantage ahead of the November elections.... Even as Obama acknowledged that he had reached the end of his efforts to overhaul border control laws, he and other Democrats, including ... Hillary Clinton, saw an opportunity to gain some advantage in the political fight over immigration reform that has roiled the 2016 campaign.... Clinton, who has said she would seek to expand Obama's executive actions on immigration, called the Supreme Court's outcome 'a stark reminder of the harm Donald Trump would do to our families, our communities and our country.'... In a statement, issued in both English and Spanish, Clinton referred to Trump's characterization last year of Mexican immigrants as 'rapists' and 'murderers,' and she pledged to introduce a comprehensive immigration reform bill within her first 100 days in office.... The politics will be far trickier for GOP candidates, including Trump, in the general election." -- CW ...
... Soumya Karlamangla of the Los Angeles Times: "The Supreme Court decision Thursday effectively blocking President Obama's immigration programs also comes as a blow to California legislators who have been fighting to offer health insurance to people living in the country illegally. Immigrants living in the U.S. without authorization can't enroll in Obamacare and make up a large portion of those who remain uninsured in California. But an unusual state policy allows those granted temporary relief from deportation to sign up for Medi-Cal, the state's low-income health program. If the court had upheld the deferred action programs, more than half a million unauthorized immigrants in California could have become eligible for state-funded health insurance...." -- CW
Rachel Bade of Politico: "House Democrats' 24-hour gun-control protest marks a turning point in Congress as a major escalation in minority battle tactics, lawmakers in both parties said Thursday -- and a move that brings fundamental risks for the institution. Already rank-and-file Democrats, energized by nationwide publicity and praise they received for occupying the House floor over demands for a gun vote, are saying they'll likely use the same strategy again." -- CW
Reuters: "Volkswagen AG will pay more than $10 billion to settle claims by nearly 500,000 owners stemming from its U.S. diesel emissions cheating scandal and fund efforts to offset pollution.... A source said that owners will receive an average of $5,000 in compensation along with the estimated value of the vehicles as of September 2015, before the scandal erupted." -- CW ...
... Jamelle Bouie of Slate: "That Democrats are willing to gum up the House in an effort to pass new gun control legislation is indicative of the change in the congressional Democratic Party over the past seven years. It's a geographically smaller party, with many more liberals and a proportionately greater number of representatives from dense urban areas. Where once it counted NRA backers like Michigan's John Dingell among its longest-serving members, now it's dominated by liberals like [John] Lewis, with few if any ties to pro-gun activists." -- CW
Annals of "Journalism," Ctd.
Neal Gabler, on Bill Moyers' blog: "... the Republican Party, with its history of dog-whistle racism, sexism, homophobia, nativism, and gun addiction, salted now by incipient fascism, has been legitimized by the mainstream media for years.... Now the MSM routinely rebuke [Donald] Trump, but that easy critique allows them not to have to rebuke the Republican Party itself, whose values, if not his often-changing policy pronouncements, are virtually identical with Trump's, minus his oft-changing policy pronouncements. It is the politesse of a Paul Ryan that Trump lacks in expressing his hostility, and it is that politesse that has conned a gullible, frightened media.... Television news still has the longest national reach, and it will never call out the Republican Party no matter what it does, much less examine its values." Thanks to Joel M. for the link. -- CW ...
... CW: Gee, Neal. I don't know how you can say that. ...
... David Bauder of the AP: "CNN snapped up former Donald Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski three days after he was fired, and he began his new career as a political commentator Thursday by not answering a direct question about whether he'd agreed not to disparage his former boss.... The Associated Press has reported that Trump requires nearly everyone working in his businesses and presidential campaign to sign nondisclosure agreements preventing them from releasing confidential or disparaging information about him.... Before signing with CNN, Lewandowski met with executives at MSNBC about a possible job there but the network decided not to hire him...." -- CW ...
... ** Erik Wemple of the Washington Posthas four questions for CNN about the Lewandowski hire. CW: ... all of which make it pretty funny that Trump calls CNN the Clinton News Network. ...
... Andrew Kaczynski of BuzzFeed provided a helpful Midtown Manhattan map, noting that the Trump offices from which Lewandowski was forcefully escorted, are only 13 min. on foot from CNN's studio. -- CW ...
... CW: No one should be surprised. This is the same network that also thought it would be a good idea to hire a commentator who called a guy (who just now jogged past my front window) a "goat-fucking child molester." Luckily, I no longer keep goats or have kids of any species (tho I once did, on both counts).
Presidential Race
Carrie Dann & Danny Freeman of NBC News: "Asked on MSNBC's Morning Joe whether he will vote for [Hillary] Clinton in November, [Bernie] Sandersresponded 'Yes.' The Vermont senator, who has not yet formally ended his 2016 campaign, said that stopping Donald Trump from becoming president must be an overarching goal." With video. -- CW
Andrew Rosenthal of the New York Times: "... it's really past time for [Bernie] Sanders to put an end to his candidacy.... While the Sanders crowd continued to talk about revolution, Representative John Lewis led a sit-in of his fellow Democrats on, literally, the floor of the House to express outrage at the Republicans' continued blocking of even the most obvious forms of gun regulation.... The chilling scene in the House was just a taste of what Sanders followers will risk if they do not throw their undeniable enthusiasm behind [Hillary] Clinton and other Democratic candidates, and the G.O.P. holds Congress and wins the White House in November.... [Sanders should] put his abundant skills as a candidate behind a presumptive Democratic nominee who is less adept at campaigning." -- CW
John Hudson of Foreign Policy: Robert Kagan, "a prominent neoconservative intellectual and early promoter of the Iraq War is headlining an official campaign fundraiser for Hillary Clinton next month.... The move signals a shift in the Clinton campaign's willingness to associate with prominent Republicans and is the latest sign of how far some GOP defectors are willing to go to block a Donald Trump presidency.... According to an invite obtained by FP, the 'event will include an off-the-record conversation on America's continued investment in NATO, key European allies and partners, and the EU.'" CW: Good work, Hillary. Let's talk about your Iraq War vote again. ...
... The Week: "Stalwarts of the Republican foreign policy establishment have started endorsing Democrat Hillary Clinton over GOP presumptive nominee Donald Trump, and on Thursday, the Clinton camp is announcing the endorsement of several Republican business leaders. There are some frequent Democratic supporters among the more than 50 business executives whose backing the Clinton campaign is highlighting -- Google's Eric Schmidt, Warren Buffet, Facebook's Sheryl Sandberg, and Barry Diller, for example -- but also longtime Republicans like AT&T Service's Jim Cicconi and Dan Akerson, a former top executive at GM and Nextel." CW: Good word, Hillary. Let's talk more about your billionaire friends.
Michael Biesecker of the AP: "Former Secretary Hillary Clinton failed to turn over a copy of a key message involving problems caused by her use of a private homebrew email server, the State Department confirmed Thursday. The disclosure makes it unclear what other work-related emails may have been deleted by the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee.... Clinton has never outlined in detail what criteria she and her lawyers used to determine which emails to release and which to delete, but her 2010 email with [top aide Huma] Abedin appears clearly work-related under the State Department's own criteria for agency records under the U.S. Freedom of Information Act." -- CW ...
... Scrub-a-Dub. Stephen Braun of the AP: "The AP review of [Hillary] Clinton's [State Department] calendar -- her after-the-fact, official chronology of the events of her four-year term -- identified at least 75 meetings with longtime political donors and loyalists, Clinton Foundation contributors and corporate and other outside interests that were either not recorded or listed with identifying details scrubbed." -- CW ...
... Lester Holt backs Donald Trump into a Jackie Gleason homina-homina moment:
... CW: He knows it must be true because he read it in the Right Wing News.
Ewan MacAskill of the Guardian: "Donald Trumphas expressed full-throated support for the Brexit referendum victory during a visit to Ayrshire in Scotland.... [He] said there were parallels with the US and elsewhere. 'People do not necessarily want people pouring over their borders,' he said. 'The UK will be stronger for it. They have taken their independence back. They can block anyone coming in they do not think is appropriate.'... The Brexit result has justified his visit, with Trump able to claim he backed the winning side. A small group of protesters was restricted to a car park, well away from the press conference. No senior British or Scottish politicians were present, regarding him as too toxic. Initial plans to include a visit to a golf resort in Ireland were shelved when neither the president or any other senior politician would meet him." -- CW ...
... Ignoramus-in-Chief, Ctd. James Vincent of the Verge: "Donald Trump praised the Scottish this morning for '[taking] their country back' in the UK's vote to leave the European Union. This is despite the fact that Scotland voted overwhelmingly to stay in the EU, with 62 percent of the population backing the Remain campaign. However, this wasn't enough to change the total outcome of the UK vote, which backed the decision to leave 52 percent to 48 percent." -- CW
Trump's Bad Day. Matea Gold of the Washington Post: "... Donald Trump's campaign announced Thursday that he has forgiven more than $50 million in loans he made to finance his presidential bid, converting them into contributions in an effort to reassure GOP donors that he is personally invested in the effort.... By turning the loans into donations, Trump's campaign cannot repay the candidate, even if a surplus arises. The campaign, however, can continue to reimburse Trump's companies, and those of his children, for campaign-related expenses, including travel." CW: We'll have to wait for the next round of financial disclosures to find out if the Trump campaign announcement is true.
Kurtis Lee of the Los Angeles Times: "Donald Trumpis working from a short list of possible running mates, former campaign manager Corey Lewandowski said Thursday. 'The list when I left was very, very short,' said Lewandowski, who appeared on CNN in his new role as a contributor for the network after being fired Monday from the campaign. 'It's no more than four individuals. ... They're household names." CW: If you recall, Gabriel Sherman reported that Trump fired Lewandowski because his only "plan" to bolster the campaign was to leak the name of Trump's running mate. Apparently, that's still his only plan.
News Lede
New York Times: "Ralph Stanley, the singer, banjo player and guardian of unvarnished mountain music who was also a pivotal figure in the recent revival of interest in bluegrass, died on Thursday. He was 89."
Adam Liptak & Michael Shear of the New York Times: ""The Supreme Court on Thursday announced that it had deadlocked in a case challenging President Obama's immigration plan, a sharp blow to an ambitious program that Mr. Obama had hoped would become one of his central legacies. As a result, as many as five million undocumented immigrants will not be shielded from deportation or allowed to legally work in the United States. The 4-4 deadlock, which left in place an appeals court ruling blocking the plan, amplified the already contentious election-year debate over the nation's immigration policy and presidential power." ...
... CW: If you're a Sanders hardliner, here's your reason to vote for Clinton. You can't say you care about people, then sit out the election or vote for another candidate. ...
... Adam Liptak: "The Supreme Court on Thursday rejected a challenge to a race-conscious admissions program at the University of Texas, Austin, handing supporters of affirmative action a major victory. The vote was 4-3.... Justice Elena Kagan had recused herself for prior work on the case as United States solicitor general.... Justice Anthony M. Kennedy wrote the majority opinion, joined by Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen G. Breyer and Sonia Sotomayor. Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel A. Alito Jr., dissented. -- CW ...
... ** President Obama responds to the two Court actions:
... David Nakamura of the Washington Post: "A frustrated President Obama on Thursday decried the Supreme Court's failure to lift an injunction against his signature immigration program and blamed Republicans for standing in the way of progress, as he and other Democrats vowed to turn immigration into a election litmus test." -- CW
Karoun Demirjian, et al., of the Washington Post: "Democratic lawmakers on Thursday afternoon ended the dramatic protest they have staged on the House floor for more than 25 hours, while pledging to continue to find ways to pressure Republicans to hold votes on gun-control measures." -- CW
Justin Fenton & Kevin Rector of the Baltimore Sun: "The Baltimore Police van driver accused of giving a "rough ride" that killed Freddie Graywas acquitted of all charges Thursday by Circuit Judge Barry Williams.Officer Caesar Goodson Jr., 46, had faced the most serious charges of any of the six officers indicted in Gray's arrest and death last April, including second-degree depraved heart murder. Goodson was also acquitted of three counts of manslaughter, second-degree assault, reckless endangerment and misconduct in office. His acquittal, which comes after Williams considered the charges for three days, throws the rest of the cases into jeopardy. The other officers charged face similar, but lesser accusations. Williams said the timeline of Gray's injuries remains unclear, and the state 'failed to meet its burden' to present enough evidence to back its assertions...." -- CW
Sibylla Brodzinsky & Jonathan Watts of the Guardian: "The Colombian government and Farc guerrillas have declared the final day of one of the world's oldest wars with the signing of a ceasefire agreement to end more than 50 years of bloodshed. At a ceremony in Havana attended by the UN secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, President Juan Manuel Santos and Farc chief Timoleón 'Timochenko' Jiménez listened on Thursday to the reading of a deal laying out how 7,000 rebel fighters will demobilize. Although a final peace deal also will require approval in a referendum, the formal cessation of hostilities between the two main combatants and the Farc's acceptance of disarmament are key steps towards resolving a low-intensity war that has caused more than 250,000 deaths and the displacement of more than 6 million people." -- CW
AND Annals of "Journalism," Ctd. Correction. Jonathan Chait: "The New York Times finally stops" calling fake Trump steaks Trump Steaks. -- CW
*****
David Herszenhorn & Emmarie Huetteman of the New York Times: "A Democratic sit-in on the House floor demanding votes on gun-control legislation led to a remarkable scene of pandemonium and a late-night confrontation on Wednesday when Speaker Paul D. Ryan was shouted down after briefly regaining control. Democrats pressed against the speaker's dais, waving signs with the names of gun victims and chanting 'No bill! No break!' as Mr. Ryan repeatedly banged his gavel in an attempt to restore order. When Mr. Ryan gave up and left the speaker's chair, Democrats shouted: 'Shame! Shame! Shame!' The standoff continued through early Thursday morning, as Mr. Ryan contemplated adjourning the House until July 5, which would shut down the Democrats' protest or leave them alone in a darkened, empty chamber." ...
... Karoun Demirjian & Kelsey Snell of the Washington Post: "Republicans voted early Thursday morning to adjourn the House until after the July 4th recess in an attempt to quash a dramatic, 16-hour sit-in by their Democratic colleagues seeking a vote on gun control measures in the wake of the Orlando massacre. House Democrats, led by civil rights hero Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.), were still giving speeches even after the adjournment vote, but activity seemed to winding down just after 3 a.m. on Thursday morning. About 25 members remained on the House floor, wrapped in blankets, and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) joined them." -- CW ...
... Tom Jacobs of Pacific Standard: "A study just published in the Journal of the American Medical Association ... notes that, while [Australia] suffered 13 fatal mass shootings (with five or more victims) between 1979 and 1996, there have been none at all in the years since [1996, when the Parliament passed strict laws restricting firearm ownership]. Moreover, both homicide and suicide rates have declined over the two decades since the reforms were enacted. While it's impossible to say this decline in violence was the direct result of stricter gun regulations, the data suggests it played a significant role." ViaPaul Waldman. -- CW ...
... Dahlia Lithwick: "Occasionally when Donald Trump misspeaks, he accidently points the way to a larger truth; a kind of Kinsley gaffe born ... of accidentally taking a really bad argument to its inevitable conclusion.... So too, his recent push-me-pull-you on gun rights accidentally shed some useful light upon the unbound 'guns everyplace' logic of the National Rifle Association.... In Trump's telling, if only bar patrons had all been packing heat, gunfight 'beauty' would have ensued. This one claim was, as it happens, a bridge too far for the NRA, which quickly repudiated Trump's assessment.... Trump's real sin lay in ... pointing out the inconsistency of [the NRA's] position.... Presumably if you shouldn't be carrying a weapon while drinking in a bar, you shouldn't be carrying a weapon while drinking at home, or on campus. And that's why the NRA has to dance itself in circles.... This entire approach to defending against gun violence inevitably assumes that the heroic defensive shooter is a trained marksman and that everyone else is just a prop.... It is, in short, a grand unifying theory of human narcissism, pushed out by narcissists and given its ultimate expression -- obvs -- by the greatest narcissist public life has ever known." -- CW
Paul Waldman in the Washington Post: "... House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) [Wednesday] released something that sort of looks like a [healthcare] 'plan'.... Ryan would eliminate the individual and employer mandates; shut down the insurance exchanges; cancel the ACA's expansion of Medicaid and then cut the program and convert it to block grants so that states could kick people off; move Medicare to a 'premium support' model, which essentially means privatizing it and cutting it back; eliminate the ACA's subsidies for low- and middle-income people...; promote health savings accounts and 'mini-med' plans that cover virtually nothing; cap the tax exclusion for employer plans...; and limit the amount victims of medical malpractice can sue for.... Despite what Ryan says, the plan doesn't actually maintain the prohibition on denials of coverage for preexisting conditions, which may be the single most popular element of the ACA.... This plan, like almost any repeal-and-replace idea Republicans have, would cause absolutely cataclysmic upheaval in Americans' health care. I cannot stress this strongly enough." -- CW ...
... ** Ian Millhiser of Think Progress: "Speaker Ryan's reputation for wonkitude is not deserved. Indeed, his proposals typical follow a familiar pattern -- a pattern Ryan repeated on Wednesday with a package of health reforms Jonathan Cohn and Jeffrey Young [of the Huffington Post] described as a plan to 'replace 20 million people's health insurance with 37 pages of talking points.' Ryan offers sweeping, ambitious ideas that would radically transform the fundamentals of America's social contract. Then, when genuine policy wonks point out that Ryan's numbers don't add up, or that his ideas would have absurd consequences, Ryan often responds with a new proposal that is just like the first -- only vaguer." CW: If you don't have time to read this today, read it tomorrow; Millhiser provides a mini-history of Ryan's lamebrained plans & suggests, based on compelling evidence, that Ryan doesn't understand his own proposals.
President Obama speaks with Bloomberg editors about the growth of the economy under his watch. CW: ... Which Hillary Clinton says she'll fix; interview linked below.
Linda Greenhouse: The conservative Supreme Court's many projects for this term died with Justice Scalia. The Court, therefore, has ended the term "not with a bang but a whimper." -- CW
Another Dip into the Cornucopia of False Equvalency. Jonathan Chaitresponds toJonathan Rauch's Atlantic cover story, "How American Politics Went Insane." linked here yesterday: "The ... serious problem with Rauch's argument is this: Virtually every breakdown in governing he identifies is occurring primarily or exclusively within the Republican Party.... The 20th-century party system worked because the parties of that era were qualitatively different. Rauch's proposal is merely one more in the latest of a series of well-intentioned but doomed plans to bring back a world that can never be restored." -- CW
Michael Schmidt of the New York Times: "An internal investigation by the Marine Corps has concluded that for more than 70 years it wrongly identified one of the men in the iconic photograph of the flag being raised over Iwo Jima during one of the bloodiest battles of World War II. The inquiry found that a private first class named Harold Schultz was one of the six men in the Pulitzer Prize-winning photograph. And it determined that a Navy hospital corpsman, John Bradley, whose son wrote a best-selling book about his father's role in the flag-raising that was made into a movie directed by Clint Eastwood, was not actually in the image.... The investigation was opened in response to questions raised last year by producers working on a documentary, 'The Unknown Flag Raiser of Iwo Jima,' which will air July 3 on the Smithsonian Channel, in what was only the latest controversy about the photograph."
The Consequences of Cops' Incompetence. Paul Wagner of Fox "News" Washington, D.C.: "A review is underway at the District's Pre-Trial Services agency after a GPS monitoring device was incorrectly placed on a man's prosthetic leg. That man, 34-year-old Quincy Green, took off his leg and committed a murder. Dana Hamilton was shot to death on Southern Avenue last month and police had no suspects for six days until someone dropped a dime on Green. He was fitted with the GPS device after he had been arrested for carrying a pistol without a license." ViaNew York's Daily Intelligencer, whose headline is "Short Story We Wrote in Middle School Comes True." -- CW
Presidential Race
Neil Irwin of the New York Times: "In an economic policy speech on Wednesday, Hillary Clintongave this message: I alone am the candidate who knows how to turn those underlying frustrations into actual policies that might make things better. She offered herself as someone who would not merely vent voters&' anger, but respond to that anger by pulling the levers of the federal bureaucracy and creating legislation that can be scored by the Congressional Budget Office and just maybe pass a Senate committee.... This carefully rolled-out speech suggests she seeks to run not by boasting of what has gone right in the economy under President Obama, but as a fixer who can more successfully deal with the things that are still broken." -- CW ...
... Jim Tankersley of the Washington Post interviews Hillary Clinton, who discusses why people might want to vote forDonald Trump. CW: If you read Leon Wieseltier's essay, linked below -- or even if you don't -- you'll see that Clinton puts the cart before the horse, which I suppose is a necessary political feint. In fact, Trump didn't create all those bigots; he was the bigoted candidate they were waiting for.
Michael Biesecker & Ted Bridis of the AP: "State Department staffers wrestled for weeks in December 2010 over a serious technical problem that affected emails from then-Secretary Hillary Clinton's home email server, causing them to temporarily disable security features on the government's own systems, according to emails released Wednesday." -- CW
Katherine Krueger of TPM: "Brent Scowcroft, a national security adviser to former Presidents Gerald Ford and George H.W. Bush, endorsed Democrat Hillary Clinton's campaign for the White House on Wednesday." -- CW
Yamiche Alcindor of the New York Times: "Senator Bernie Sanderscame one step closer to accepting defeat on Wednesday, telling C-SPAN in an hourlong interview that he most likely would not be the Democratic presidential nominee.... 'It doesn't appear that I'm going to be the nominee, so I'm not going to be determining the scope of the convention,' Mr. Sanders said, adding that he has reached no agreement to endorse Mrs. Clinton but has been negotiating with her campaign. 'What our job is now is to have her listen to what millions of people in this country who supported me want to see happen. We'll see how that evolves.'" CW: I guess this places Bernie on the cusp of the seventh, and last, stage of grief.
Here's Donald Trump Being Presidential in a "Professionalized Presentation." Maggie Haberman of the New York Times: "In a 41-minute speech seeking to build his case against ... [Hillary Clinton] by labeling her a 'world-class liar,' Mr. Trump moved to soothe concerns among Republicans alarmed by gaping self-inflicted wounds.... He said Mrs. Clinton would not create jobs, portraying her as a scandal-tarnished former secretary of state who 'may be the most corrupt person ever to seek the presidency.'... His new, more sober approach was undercut by factual inaccuracies and embellishments, as well as flimsy claims -- at one point, Mr. Trump suggested that Mrs. Clinton was probably the victim of blackmail from Chinese hackers who gained access to her email account while she was the secretary of state." -- CW ...
... Michael Barbaro & other NYT reporters attempt to fact-checkTrump's speech, which is hard to do since a lot of his claims are "suspicions" & promises. -- CW ...
... ** The AP's fact-check, by Bradley Klapper & Jim Drinkard, is even more devastating: "Donald Trump's fierce denunciation of Hillary Clinton on Wednesday was rife with distortion. He accused Clinton of announcing a withdrawal from Iraq that wasn't on her watch, pulled numbers out of nowhere on her plan for refugees and went beyond the established facts behind the killing of the U.S. ambassador to Libya in stating starkly that she 'left him there to die.' In doing so, he assigned her far more influence in the world than she exercised as secretary of state." CW: Why, you might think a "professionalized presentation" full of crap is still a load of crap. ...
... Dana Milbank: "Trump's volume of disinformation is so heavy that even the nimblest fact-checker can't keep pace. And that's no accident: In Trump's dystopia, things are so bad -- so utterly and desperately awful -- that no allegation, no matter how sinister, seems implausible to his followers." -- CW ...
... Amy Davidson of the New Yorker: "One problem, which Clinton supporters would be best to be upfront about, is that the Clintons have givenTrump some raw materials, however unsteady the structures that he builds from them may be." -- CW ...
... AND Michelle Goldberg of Slate: "Donald Trump's Wednesday morning speech about Hillary Clinton's record is probably the most unnervingly effective one he has ever given.... Like all skillful demagoguery, Trump's speech on Wednesday interwove truth and falsehood into a plausible-seeming picture meant to reinforce listeners' underlying beliefs." -- CW
CW: The Washington Post today is A Major Symphony in Trump-Bashing. Maybe Trump's banishing the Post from his road trips was not his best idea. Remember that if you aren't a Post subscriber, you can open a private window to read all the stories. The Post has a 5-click limit, so you'll have to open more than one!
GOP consultant Michael Murphy, in a Washington Post op-ed: "Forget, for a moment, all of Trump's epic character flaws. A new question has seized the campaign: Can the self-proclaimed world-class business wizard actually manage anything? His campaign's spiral into collapse proves he cannot." Murphy counts the ways. -- CW
He was a loudmouth bully. -- Steve Nachtigall, a neighbor, on little Donny Trump
When that kid was 10, even then he was a little shit. -- Charles Walker, former teacher
... Always an Asshole. Paul Schwartzman & Michael Miller in the Washington Post: "Long before he attained vast wealth and far-reaching fame, Donald J. Trump left an indelible impression in the prosperous Queens neighborhood where he evolved from a mischievous, incorrigible boy into a swaggering young man. He was Trump in miniature, an embryonic version of the bombastic, flamboyant candidate..., more than three dozen of his childhood friends, classmates and neighbors said in interviews.... In school, he misbehaved so often that his initials became his friends' shorthand for detention.... Struck with a broomstick during a fight [at the military academy to which his family banished him], he tried to push a fellow cadet out a second-floor window, only to be thwarted when two other students intervened." From the book Trump Revealed, by Post reporters Michael Kranish & Marc Fisher "in a collaboration with more than two dozen Post reporters, researchers and editors." -- CW
... Jenna Johnson of the Washington Post: "When Donald Trump arrives this weekend at the golf course he built on the rugged dunes of ... [Balmedie, Scotland], he will celebrate it as an example of his international business success.... He has pointed to it as a precursor to his bid for the U.S. presidency. But to many people in Scotland, his course here has been a failure. Over the past decade, Trump has battled with homeowners, elbowed his way through the planning process, shattered relationships with elected leaders and sued the Scottish government. On top of that, he has yet to fulfill the lofty promises he made. Trump has also reported to Scottish authorities that he lost millions of dollars on the project -- even as he claims on U.S. presidential disclosure forms that the course has been highly profitable." -- CW
During a dispute over property lines, workers ripped out a fence near the home of David and Moira Milne, who live in a converted coast-guard station on a hill above the golf course. The Trump workers installed their own fence -- and then sent the Milnes a bill for it.... Trump's workers also planted a row of trees that blocked the Milnes' view of the sea. When the first batch died, the workers ripped them out and planted a second. (Emphasis added.)
Mary Jordan & Jose DelReal of the Washington Post: "One trademark of the most unconventional campaign in modern history is that members of Trump's family -- who have virtually no political experience -- are so deeply involved in his campaign that they often act as gatekeepers and strategists. Their influence was clear this week when Trump decided to fire his campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, after his adult children and [Ivanka's husband Jared] Kushner met with him on Father's Day at a Trump golf course in New Jersey. Kushner ... and Donald Trump's three oldest children are in frequent contact with Republican National Committee officials, who have come to expect at least one of them at campaign meetings. Family members are involved in drafting speeches, messaging and policy." -- CW
Constant Weader: As a demonstration of how routinely horrible the Trump campaign is, not a single person commented yesterday on the campaign's throwing a black GOP official out of a Trump meet-and-greet. If Mitt Romney's campaign had done something like that, it would have been a "47 percent"-level story. Romney would have had to go on an apology tour of black churches & his running-mate Paul Ryan would have been forced to pretend to do dishes at a soup kitchen that hosted mostly "urban people." Look, we still remember Rick Santorum for his "blah" people remark nearly as much as for santorum.com, and Santorum wasn't even the nominee. But Trump? Nada. Not even a blip.
** Leon Wieseltier, in a Washington Post op-ed: "The people who support the white working class have been voting for Bernie Sanders, but the white working class has been voting forDonald Trump. He would be nowhere, and we would not be facing a grave historical crisis, without the enthusiasm of these despairing and deluded millions.... These downtrodden demand sympathy, and they deserve sympathy, but they do not give sympathy. They kindle, in the myopia of their pain, to racism and nativism and xenophobia and misogyny and homophobia and anti-Semitism." This a long piece, in some respects self-contradictory, but still well-worth reading. Thanks to Patrick for the link. -- CW
Senate Race
Jeremy Peters of the New York Times: "Senator Marco Rubio of Florida said Wednesday that he would run for re-election, abandoning plans to pursue a more lucrative career in the private sector and jolting a competitive race that is crucial to Democrats' plans to retake control of the Senate. Mr. Rubio, 45, who had told associates of his reluctance to give up the high profile and political power that a Senate seat offers, will enter the race with the formidable advantages of incumbency, national name recognition and strong ties to the Republican Party's donor base. But he faces numerous hurdles, the most difficult of which may be his history of talking down the Senate as unfulfilling and frustrating at times." -- CW ...
... OR, as New York's Daily Intelligencer put it, "After proving he was terrible at campaigning, repeatedly bashing the Senate, and talking about seemingly nothing other than how much he hated being a senator, Marco Rubiohas made the obvious choice to run for his old Senate seat. Rubio had promised -- with relief so palpable we could practically hear his blood pressure drop -- that he would join the private sector, but we guess once you get a taste of life on the campaign trail it can be hard to give it up. That, and it was looking pretty likely a Democrat was going to take his seat in November." -- CW ...
... Good News for Marco, Bad News for America. Alex Leary of the Tampa Bay Times: "All seven [modern-day U.S. senators who ran for re-election to the Senate after losing their parties' presidential primaries] were able to rebound from their unsuccessful presidential runs with convincing double-digit general election wins." CW: Looks like running for president gives these guys an aura of "seriousness." If history serves, we'll have to assume that voters find Little Marco (& Li'l Randy) to be "serious."
Way Beyond the Beltway
Claire Phipps of the Guardian: "Polling stations have opened across the United Kingdom on Thursday morning after a closely-fought referendum campaign [on Brexit] that neither side is confident enough to call." The Guardian's liveblog is here. -- CW
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