Lies, Laziness and Propaganda, that’s why Chaos benefits strongmen. This sort of hysteria plays right into MAGA’s hands.
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Too much fun to miss Brighten your weekend. Holding the North Carolina governor’s mansion is my Hanukkah wish.
A Texas Tornado of it “Telegraphing” is a euphemism for unconsciously signalling your intentions. Telegraphing a punch in the boxing ring. Like a player’s “tell” in poker. Donald Trump must be the worst player in either arena. Arrogance works like that. Where once he spoke in code like a mob boss, now Trump speaks like an aspiring dictator. When Trump promised Waco, Texas rallygoers in March, “I am your retribution,” collaborators began singing his song like a Greek chorus (ABC News): “We will go out and find the conspirators not just in government, but in the media,” said former Defense Department official Kash Patel during an appearance on Steve Bannon’s War Room podcast. Patel, who served as chief of staff in the Department of Defense during the Trump administration and Trump’s counterterrorism adviser on the National Security Council, was asked by Bannon if he would be able to deliver “serious prosecution and accountability” against their political opponents during a second Trump presidency.
Oh my God Many breathless headlines have appeared in the mainstream media over the past few weeks about the impending dictatorship of Donald Trump if he were to win the election next fall. All the major newspapers and magazines have finally begun to delve into exactly what Trump and his henchmen have in store in order to exact his revenge and enact the white nationalist agenda of the MAGA far right. It’s about time. Let’s hope they keep it up. Here are just a few of the proposals that we know about. He plans to gut the EPA, and drill in Alaska to under the illusion that somehow the “profits” will pay for Social Security and medicare (a totally absurd proposal.) He’s going to use the Insurrection Act to deploy the military to quell domestic dissent and he’ll ban homeless camps in cities and put the unhoused in camps as well. And there are very detailed plans to round up millions of migrants and put them in detention camps prior to mass deportation.
She trapped those college presidents and they fell for it Michelle Goldberg has a very astute observation about this brouhaha over the Ivy League presidents allegedly failing to condemn antisemitism in a congressional hearing this week. As she points out, if you only see the highlights that have been circulating you would agree they they were expressing tolerance for hate speech against Jews but when you view the whole thing it’s obvious that there was more to it: In the questioning before the now infamous exchange, you can see the trap Stefanik laid. “You understand that the use of the term ‘intifada’ in the context of the Israeli-Arab conflict is indeed a call for violent armed resistance against the state of Israel, including violence against civilians and the genocide of Jews. Are you aware of that?” she asked Gay. Gay responded that such language was “abhorrent.” Stefanik then badgered her to admit that students chanting about intifada were calling for genocide, and asked angrily whether that was against Harvard’s code of conduct.
The whole point of the Hunter scandal is to make Joe Biden cry Right wingers are saying that the new prosecution of Hunter Biden on tax charges proves that the Justice department is doing Joe Biden’s bidding. I’m not kidding: It’s completely daft. Obviously, the Special Prosecutor has been stung by the right wing accusations of being in the tank which is why he’s bringing these new tax charges against Hunter Biden, replete with all the salacious details the wingnuts love to drool over. You’d think that would be enough to placate them but of course it isn’t. Everyone on TV today is talking about how the White House isn’t worried about the legal ramifications for Biden but rather the emotional toll this is taking, That is, after all, their intent. I wrote about that a couple of years ago: The right has attempted to turn Joe Biden’s care and concern for a son who was going through a major life crisis, which included substance abuse, wild partying and a range of self-destructive behavior, into a corruption scandal.
There was more good news about the economy today: Data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics released on Friday showed the unemployment rate was 3.7% for the month, down from 3.9% in October. The US economy added 199,000 jobs in November, an uptick from 150,000 the previous month as striking auto workers and Hollywood actors came back to the workforce. Economists surveyed by Bloomberg expected job gains of 185,000 with unemployment holding steady from the prior month at 3.9%. Wages, a closely watched indicator for inflation and a gauge of how much leverage workers have in the labor market, increased 0.4% on a monthly basis and 4.1% over last year; economists had expected wages to rise 0.3% over last month and 4% over last year. Meanwhile, the labor force participation rate ticked higher to 62.8%, up from 62.7% the month prior, while average weekly hours worked moved up slightly from 34.3 to 34.4. The largest jobs increases in Friday’s report were seen in healthcare, where 77,000 jobs were added. Employment in government rose by 49,000, reaching its pre-pandemic level. Leisure and hospitality rose by 40,000.
The DC Circuit speaks The gag order in the January 6th case stands. Trump will be allowed to personally insult and threaten Jack Smith and the Judge but witnesses and federal employees are off limits. They write: “We do not allow such an order lightly. Mr. Trump is a former President and current candidate for the presidency, and there is a strong public interest in what he has to say. But Mr. Trump is also an indicted criminal defendant, and he must stand trial in a courtroom under the same procedures that govern all other criminal defendants. That is what the rule of law means.” Here is his response: Waaaaaaah!!!
Baby monkey! There is a new, tiny face at the San Diego Zoo. A De Brazza’s monkey was born Oct. 28 to parents Lillie and Augustus, and it is the first De Brazza’s monkey born at the Zoo in 26 years. The little primate, whose gender has not yet been determined, can be seen holding tightly to its very attentive mother’s chest while they bond. In the next few weeks, the infant is expected to start walking and climbing. It will stay close to its mother until it is weaned, at around 1 year old.
No lad who has liberty for the first time, and twenty guineas in his pocket, is very sad, and Barry rode towards Dublin thinking not so much of the kind mother left alone, and of the home behind him, but of tomorrow, and all the wonders it would bring. -from Barry Lyndon Oh man, oh God…we’ve lost another one: Ryan O’Neal, the boyish leading man who kicked off an extraordinary 1970s run in Hollywood with his Oscar-nominated turn as the Harvard preppie Oliver in the legendary romantic tearjerker Love Story, has died. He was 82. O’Neal died Friday, his son Patrick O’Neal, a sportscaster with Bally Sports West in Los Angeles, reported on Instagram. He had been diagnosed with chronic leukemia in 2001 and with prostate cancer in 2012. “As a human being, my father was as generous as they come,” Patrick wrote. “And the funniest person in any room. And the most handsome clearly, but also the most charming. Lethal combo. He loved to make people laugh. It’s pretty much his goal. Didn’t matter the situation, if there was a joke to be found, he nailed it. He really wanted us laughing. And we did all laugh. Every time. We had fun.