It’s going to be momentous, no matter which way it goes Author Brynn Tannehill tweeted this and I think she’s right. No matter what happens in the election in 2024, we are in for tremendous tumult. Even so, there is only one thinkable outcome. It won’t be easy and the aftermath may very well be violent. But it’s infinitely better than the alternative. I’m going to bookmark once I post this, because it’s about what’s going to happen in 2024. I’m going out on a limb to say that regardless of what specifically happens, this is going to end up being mentioned along with 1860 as watershed moments in US history. Look, it’s easy to say that if Trump wins, it’s going to be chaos. We’ll see his new cabinet coming in. They’ll be telegraphing their intentions, and it’s going to be mayhem.
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Section 3 of the 14th Amendment isn’t the only one forgotten Move over Section 3. Michael Meltzner reminds readers of The American Prospect that America should not treat Section 2 of the 14th Amendment as a dead letter either. There is another lawsuit pending based on it: About a year ago, I reported in the Prospect on a pending lawsuit filed on behalf of a citizens group by former Department of Justice lawyer Jared Pettinato. The suit asks that the Census Bureau be required to enforce Section 2 of the 14th Amendment, enacted in 1868 to strip congressional representation from states that disfranchise voters. The text applies to general methods states adopt that keep people from voting and is not limited to racial discrimination. The proportional loss of congressional representation would also reduce the votes that states would get in the Electoral College. The Section 2 case is now moving toward resolution. Briefs have been filed, and oral argument is expected shortly before the court of appeals in Washington, D.C It’s another one of those constitutional sections that seems to have been ratified and quickly forgotten.
Wayne LaPierre is going on trial. As further evidence of the total corruption of the conservative movement, despite being shown to have ripped off the membership in the millions LaPierre was welcomed back into the fold. But this could be the end of him, God willing: For decades, Wayne LaPierre, the National Rifle Association’s longtime leader, has been a survivor. He has endured waves of palace intrigue, corruption scandals and embarrassing revelations, including leaked video that captured his inability to shoot an elephant at point-blank range while on a safari. But now, Mr. LaPierre, 74, faces his gravest challenge, as a legal showdown with New York’s attorney general, Letitia James, goes to trial in a Manhattan courtroom. Ms. James, in a lawsuit filed amid an abrupt effort by the N.R.A. to clean up its practices, seeks to oust him from the group after reports of corruption and mismanagement. Much has changed since Ms. James began investigating the N.R.A. four years ago. The organization, long a lobbying juggernaut, is a kind of ghost ship.
Stephen Miller will be a very important influence in Trump 2.0 Judd Legum talks about the Trump threat in his newsletter today. I thought I would highlight just one little passage for those who think it might be useful to punish Biden and the Democrats by letting Trump have another term. It’s pretty clear it won’t just be the Democrats who suffer at Trump’s hands.
I got my law degree from watching “Law and Order” so I’m not what anyone would call an attorney. But I do find this stuff fascinating. I came across this last night on the presidential immunity question. (That question drives me crazy because it seems so obvious I can’t even imagine how it can be debatable but here we are.) Anyway: A new wrinkle has emerged in former President Donald Trump‘s immunity battle in his federal election interference case, with a watchdog group filing a brief on Friday calling for his appeal effort to be dismissed and for his trial allowed to resume. Trump is currently contending with four criminal indictments at the state and federal levels, totaling 91 criminal charges in all. Among these cases is the federal one brought by the Department of Justice (DOJ) and special counsel Jack Smith pertaining to Trump’s alleged efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election, which ultimately led to the January 6, 2021, Capitol riot. Trump, the frontrunner in the 2024 GOP presidential primary, has maintained his innocence in the case.
Paul Krugman agrees that things are looking up. Will people recognize it in time or will they continue to blame Joe Biden for the chaos and ugliness that Trump and his cult are creating? Almost four years have passed since Covid-19 struck. In America, the pandemic killed well over a million people and left millions more with lingering health problems. Much of normal life came to a halt, partly because of official lockdowns but largely because fear of infection kept people home. The big question in the years that followed was whether America would ever fully recover from that shock. In 2023 we got the answer: yes. Our economy and society have, in fact, healed remarkably well. The big remaining question is when, if ever, the public will be ready to accept the good news. In the short run, of course, the pandemic had severe economic and social effects, in many ways wider and deeper than almost anyone expected. Employment fell by 25 million in a matter of weeks.
So much information has gone under the bridge about the insurrection that I’ve lost sight of some of the more interesting details that flush out what happened on January 6th — and who is responsible. (People like Marcy Wheeler who follow the trials are very well aware, of course.) This piece from June 2021 by Amanda Carpenter came to my attention over the holidays and I thought it was interesting. If you still think that Trump didn’t actually incite the insurrection, this is important to consider: To understand January 6, 2021, we must first look back to June 1, 2020. That was the day Donald Trump delivered a terse Rose Garden speech threatening to deploy the U.S. military to any city or state that “refuses to take the actions that are necessary to defend the life and property of their residents.” The speech was prompted by the protests that began on May 26 in Minneapolis and spread throughout the country after George Floyd was killed by police.
That is 100% a lie. They did none of that. All the evidence is available. Nancy Pelosi did not turn down his request for the National Guard on January 6th. And no, unless you are saying that Jonathan Turley represents the “most respected legal minds in the Country” there is virtually no one saying that he’s “fully entitled” to immunity for what he did. MSNBC keeps saying that they won’t show what Trump is saying because “there’s a cost” to them. Actually, there’s a cost to everyone if they don’t. People need to see it and they need to see the arguments against it. Today I saw them put up Liz Cheney’s response to this but not the post itself which didn’t show just how deranged he really is. Trump needs to be seen by everyone in all his glory. What they’re doing now is inadvertently covering for him. They need to stop it.
At least for a little while I’m pretty sure this will be reversed but in the meantime it’s nice to know that won’t have to go into my local Starbucks and see someone playing cowboy with a gun in his holster while a cop stands by at the door as I did a couple of months ago. It was an incredibly unnerving moment. I left as did a bunch of other people and the barristas were obviously nervous. This is no way to live. A California law that bans people from carrying firearms in most public places will take effect on New Year’s Day, even as a court case continues to challenge the law. A U.S. district judge issued a ruling Dec. 20 to block the law from taking effect, saying it violates the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution and deprives people of their ability to defend themselves and their loved ones. But on Saturday, a federal appeals court put a temporary hold on the district judge’s ruling. The appeals court decision allows the law to go into effect as the legal fight continues. Attorneys are scheduled to file arguments to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in January and in February. The law, signed by Democratic Gov.
Trump complained to Breitbart about Biden’s vacations. I’m not kidding. Trump [said] that when he went on vacation as president, he was always actually working and taking meetings with world leaders and lawmakers—and he never made anyone who had urgent business wait for a call back. He called Mar-a-Lago, where he spent some of his holidays as president, the “Southern White House,” and noted that he regularly packed his schedule even when he was not in the White House. “I have to say, when I take vacations I’m always working,” Trump said. “This is really the Southern White House. I have meetings left, right, and all day. Even if I’m playing golf, I’m always playing golf with somebody who is important like heads of countries, senators, et cetera. But it’s all work.” When Biden goes on vacation, though, Trump said he hears that he refuses to take phone calls and refuses to meet anyone—he just totally and completely checks out and makes himself unavailable for weeks on end. “This guy takes a vacation and he doesn’t talk to anybody,” Trump said.