Thom Hartmann says the Supreme Court is wimping out in the Colorado case. Section 3 of the 14th Amendment was written to protect us from fascist thugs. And Florida is passing legislation to teach kindergartners about the dangers of Communism. I’m all in favor of teaching about the dangers of both Communism and fascism (Florida left out that danger). Both Stalin and Hitler were deadly enemies of freedom and democracy. But leave the kindergartners alone. Let them play.
He wrote:
— The Supreme Court has wimped out on Trump. The 14th Amendment was passed to prevent the very scenario we’re now facing: a fascist insurrectionist seeking political office to end American democracy and replace it with a strongman authoritarian like the men who ran the Confederacy. One of the most absurd moments was when Kagan and Roberts both suggested that “one state shouldn’t determine the outcome of a presidential election,” as if they’d never, ever even heard of Bush v Gorewhen Jeb Bush and Kathrine Harris threw out over 30,000 “spoiled” ballots where people in Black communities with defective voting machines both punched the “Al Gore” hole and wrote “Al Gore” on the ballot. Florida, and Florida alone, determined the outcome of the 2000 election. One state. Bottom line: this is now up to us. Nobody is coming to the rescue of American democracy. We must turn out the vote this fall in overwhelming numbers…
— Trump steals classified documents, the ones about US spies in Russia are missing (and our spies are dying), and Biden wrote a letter to Obama when he was VP that he kept, and now the media and this idiot special counsel and lifelong Republican hack Robert Hur are doing their best to conflate the two. That pretty much sums it up. Like the Dean Scream and Comey’s press conference to complain about Hillary’s emails, it looks like our mainstream press and the GOP are working together to get a Republican back into the White House. Again, we have to turn out this fall in overwhelming numbers…
— Pink triangles come to Kansas? Republicans in the Kansas legislature are pushing a new law that would require trans people to be identified as such on their birth certificates. Never forget that the first group Hitler went after — literally weeks after he took power — were trans people. When fascists want a minority group to beat up on for political gain, this is the smallest minority out there, smaller than any racial or religious group, and thus the most defenseless. These Republicans in Kansas are bullies and thugs.
— Smartmatic is suing OAN, and they busted the CEO! Voting machine manufacturer Smartmatic is in the discovery phase of their multiple lawsuits against rightwing hate outlets for defamation, and, boy howdy, they have pulled in a big fish. It appears from press reports that the CEO of One America News, the rightwing TV channel, allegedly obtained hacked passwords to Smartmatic machines and passed them along to pillow guy Mike Lindell and Trump loony lawyer Sidney Powell. Get out the popcorn: this is going to get interesting (and expensive!)…
— Crazy Alert! Republicans want Florida schools to teach kindergartners all about the “threat of communism.” Soon, five year olds in Florida may be watching newsreels of mass murders in Stalinist Russia and learning how Social Security and Medicare are “socialism.” These are the same idiots who keep railing against “liberal elites indoctrinating our kids.” Right…
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Maybe Florida should start with the dangers of Capitalism.
You can have capitalism or democracy, but you can’t have both! (As W. E. B. DuBois said, “Capitalism cannot reform itself; it is doomed to self-destruction. No universal selfishness can bring social good to all.”)
Think of the Ukrainians who died in their assault on Crimea because their communications went dark because Elon Musk decided, unilaterally, to shut off their access to Starlink. And think about the fact that he is not held responsible, at all, for those deaths. Unchecked Capitalism at its finest.
Musk did not want to give Ukrainians “an unfair advantage,” so he turned off his Starlinks and left them in the dark, unable to communicate. He has never done anything to tilt the very uneven battlefield against Russia, which has an overwhelming advantage in men and weapons.
A public-private partnership that may impact national security is a terrible idea. The US should not be asking for permission to access intel. We need to focus on rebuilding our wholly public entities and services.
But children are not allowed to read books on Black issues, anything on sex or gayness — but communism is ok?
Nobody is coming to the rescue of
“American democracy”.
BINGO
The mythic core (democracy) DOESN’T
stand up to the test of evidence.
SCOTUS remains the dictatorial leader,
independent of voter turnout.
The rhetoric of the standard bearers, of
either faction, may compel the die-hard
believers in electoral savors, to continue
the fantasy,
BUT that strategy has yet to end
the pay-to-play, of-by-for money power.
Seeking solace through fantasy
works as good as a symphony of
school-daze dog whistles.
The United States is a confederacy of corporations. The second amendment mania began as machine gun manufacturers learned that unlimited access to public consumption would help them overcome the limits of selling to governments. This Supreme Court, established by the Federalist Society and Leonard Leo, is a corporate subsidiary. Education policy is being driven by private interests and the pyramid grift perfected by the founders of Amway. The tech bros of Silicon Valley have little accountability because they put significant dime into political coffers. Now the media is taking the road of those tech bros by coagulating into fewer media companies that are shutting down local coverage. I still have confidence that the drumbeat of questionable polls published by the likes of The NY Times and Washington Post will be proven wrong. Enough Americans in specific states voted for Trump in 2016 because they were fed up with the cozy illiberal arrangements of our two parties that has led to economic inequality and less opportunity for most of us. It is now clear that Trump is in league with those interests and it gets clearer everyday. I think the opportunity for a route of the Republican Party on Election Day is right in front of us. The next step will be to hold the Democratic Party accountable to serve more than the oligarchy. Stay tuned!
Speaking of fascism and whether it is already here:
Fani Willis is being tried in a kangaroo court to disqualify her because she slept with another prosecutor.
Since sleeping with another prosecutor is NEVER grounds for disqualification, the right wing got the NYT to do one of their patented Claudine Gay numbers on Fani. The Claudine Gay treatment is the NYT condemning Claudine Gay in dozens of articles to get her removed, but as soon as they learn a white woman did the same thing, they said it was no big deal,and it would be a witch hunt for the white woman to have to suffer any negative coverage. Now it’s Fani’s turn, and the NYT has newly discovered the scandalous and terrible crime of two prosecutors hooking up, and it is a scandal that is so horrific that the NYT must give it dozens of stories.
The thrust of the stories about both Claudine Gay and Fani Willis is that
while it is fine for a white woman to make human mistakes that are in no way criminal, when a Black woman does so, it is imperative that the NYT present her as guilty of breaking the highest law of all — the law of “appearances”. Those Black women “appear” guilty to the NYT, so they report that these attacks are a legitimate reason to doubt her fitness and honor.
The charge is that Fani Willis hired a Black attorney for the sex. Or so he could use the money he earned to take her on romantic holidays. It’s really hard to get a handle on the ridiculous reasons given for why a Black woman’s human actions are a scandal big enough to get her thrown off a case.
Today, former Governor of Georgia testified under oath that Fani Willis tried to hire HIM first. He turned her down. The fact that working on this case would get your family threatened didn’t help make the job more appealing.
It is ABSURD to say that Fani hired Ward for any reason other than so many attorneys REFUSED to work on the case for fear of their personal safety and careers. By all accounts Ward has done a stellar job, so this was never about his performance.
Did Fani Willis have lure Ward with sex because all the other lawyers she asked first wouldn’t take the job? Maybe that will be the next investigation that the right wing lawyers get the NYT to present as necessary and legitimate. I have no doubt the NYT can amplify right wing narratives enough to get many folks to accept the logic that it would harm the defense if the likelihood that Fani had to offer Wade sex to get him to take this job that no one wanted.
Shameful the folks here who have endorsed and amplified this lie that Fani Willis – who was done a MASTERFUL and ETHICAL job prosecuting wrongdoing in the 2020 election – did something unethical or improper.
David Weiss -the Republican attorney prosecuting Hunter Biden – did something unethical and improper. Crickets from the lawyers who are extremely concerned about the intimate details of sex lives of democratic prosecutors, but not at all concerned about the unethical and improper legal practices of Republican prosecutors. No speculation about the appearance of conflicts of interest.
^^^How the NYT helps the far right narrative:
“Her office called former Gov. Roy Barnes in an effort to establish that Mr. Wade was not Ms. Willis’s first choice to manage the election interference case”.
“IN AN EFFORT TO ESTABLISH”???
Unless the NYT is now accusing Gov. Barnes of perjury, it is now an absolute fact that Mr. Wade was not Ms. Willis’ first choice. Her “efforts” have nothing to do with it.
The lede should be that Gov. Barnes testimony established for a fact that Fani asked other lawyers first, and they turned her down, and, eventually she got to Wade, who agreed to take the case.
The lede should be that Roy Barnes testimony shot down the false narrative the defense offered that she hired Wade because she wanted to share in his salary.
Did that effort to establish that Wade wasn’t her first choice work, NYT reporter? It seems that the NYT reporters do not think it did. They still have doubts about Fani’s integrity and since they were not convinced by Roy Barnes’ testimony that Wade wasn’t Fani’s first choice, they feel certain other people will join them in doubting her.
nyc, it seemed wholly inappropriate for defense attorney to question Fani W about her sex life.
You are right. This should be a no-brainer.
But the Republicans always invent some ridiculous grounds in which to make a Democrat’s sex life a legal issue. And the NYT legitimizes it and pushes the dishonest narrative we saw some folks here amplifying, that two prosecutors hooking up could be a “conflict of interest” when that has never been the norm. In fact, what is way outside the norm is a DEFENDANT’S ATTORNEY being allowed free reign to cross examine a prosecutor about the intimate details of her relationship with another prosecutor on the same team.
There should be outrage and instead this is normalized.
“Republican Voters Can — And Should — Rethink Nominating Trump”
–National Review
Lot of good points in that article, including: “He’d have trouble attracting talent to serve him.” Scary to imagine the kind of people who would want to be next to Trump at this point.
Ha! Fat chance. He will own almost all the delegates.