I think this creeps me out more than anything I’ve seen in recent days. A Hollywood desperate to make money at the dying box office is sure to see this and decide that we need more of it: Type the words “sound of freedom” into Twitter (decent people who wish to live good, happy lives should under no circumstances actually do this) and the search will yield dozens of triumphant reports crowing about the improbable victory of a film by that title over the likes of Indiana Jones at the box office this week. That’s not, strictly speaking, accurate – Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny had already been out for five days, the first three of which out-earned Sound of Freedom’s opening-day take, when the new independent thriller came to theaters on Tuesday. But for a fleeting moment this past Fourth of July, while the intended audience of Indy’s latest outing was presumably spending time with their families and friends at barbecues or in other social situations, an unoccupied fandom rallied by the star Jim Caviezel claimed the day with a $14.2m gross versus Dial of Destiny’s $11.7m.
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The right is relentless. The left needs to be. Several small stories this morning worth attention. Lin Wood retired to avoid being disbarred (NBC News): Lin Wood, a high-profile Georgia lawyer who embraced and promoted former President Donald Trump’s bogus 2020 election claims, told the state bar he was retiring amid disciplinary probes. “I understand that this request is unqualified, irreversible and permanent,” Wood, 70, said in a letter to the State Bar of Georgia seeking to be transferred to “Retired Status.” “I further understand and acknowledge that if granted Retired Status I am prohibited from practicing law in this state and in any other state or jurisdiction and that I may not reapply for admission,” he wrote in the letter, which he posted on his Telegram account.
Not exactly news, but this analysis pulls it all together: Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, looking to shift his run for president into a higher gear after an early series of missteps, spent the last two weeks rolling out an immigration policy and holding town halls with voters. But rather than correcting course, he stumbled again this week, raising questions about where his campaign is heading. First, Mr. DeSantis’s team was forced to battle allegations, including from fellow Republicans, that it had shared a homophobic video on social media. Then, a top spokesman for the main super PAC supporting Mr. DeSantis acknowledged that former President Donald J. Trump was the race’s “runaway front-runner,” while Mr. DeSantis faced an “uphill battle.” “Right now in national polling we are way behind, I’ll be the first to admit that,” the adviser, Steve Cortes, said in a livestream Twitter event on Sunday. It was an admission notably at odds with the confidence that the governor’s advisers usually project in public. To top it off — in a visual representation of his recent troubles — Mr.
Law schools that give preferences to minorities and women in admissions and hiring risk getting sued by America First Legal, the conservative legal group warned in a letter to 200 U.S. law schools following last week’s U.S. Supreme Court decision on affirmative action. America First Legal, a nonprofit group headed by former Trump adviser Stephen Miller, said on its website that it sent the letter threatening to sue the law schools if they extend any “discriminatory preferences” based on race, gender or national origin. The group also said decisions based on factors in an applicant’s biography that could serve as a proxy for race—such as socioeconomic status—is also unlawful. The letter, dated June 30 and reviewed by Reuters, came one day after the U.S. Supreme Court held that giving some minority college applicants a boost over others based on their race violated the U.S. Constitution.
Tom Cruise gets endless rehearsals. We don’t. “Well, this is more than a little terrifying. Shouldn’t we all be paying a little bit more attention?” asks Dan Froomkin. It’s like something out of Mission Impossible. Recent Wagner mercenaries’ moves against Moscow leave the West wondering about Vladimir Putin’s fate, the stability of the Russian state, and the security of the Russian nuclear arsenal (Washington Post): And in recent weeks the drumbeat has intensified, with some well-connected Russian strategic analysts and think tank experts openly proclaiming the “necessity” for Moscow to carry out a preemptive tactical nuclear strike on a NATO country, like Poland — to avoid defeat in the war on Ukraine and to revive Western terror of Russia’s nuclear might. Since the Wagner rebellion, Sergei Karaganov, a former Kremlin adviser and influential Russian political scientist, has doubled down on calls for Moscow to do so.
They’re super white too… Those numbers of Millennials and Gen Z are just astonishing. NBC News reports: Republican primary voters are older, whiter and much more conservative than the electorate at large. That should surprise no one who follows American politics, but our most recent national NBC News poll captures the profile of what the GOP primary electorate looks like. Thirty-nine percent of Republican primary voters are age 65 and older, compared with 25% of the overall electorate and 25% of Democratic primary voters, according to the poll. Eighty-nine percent of GOP primary voters are white, versus 72% of all voters. And 67% of Republican primary voters say they are conservative, including 41% who are “very” conservative. That compares with 36% of all voters who are conservative, including 18% who are “very” conservative. There are two slight — but significant — changes to the composition of the Republican electorate since the 2016 election cycle, when Donald Trump won the party’s presidential nomination and the White House, per the NBC News poll’s historical results.
It’s awful NeverTrumper Tim Miller has some interesting thoughts on Supreme Court reform: How Normal Is This Court, Really: A Meditation From a Conflicted Man People on the right bristled at a frank comment from President Joe Biden as he exited a press conference last Thursday: “This is not a normal Court,” he said. In their view, this was an example of Biden betraying his promise to be a steward of our norms and institutions and taking an unnecessary swipe at a SCOTUS that has executed constitutionally sound, conservative jurisprudence. Here’s a version of this position that was posted by an pseudonymous anti-Trump conservative I follow on Twitter: I assume we at The Bulwark are part of the “norms” crowd he is referring to, and while I don’t speak for everyone here, my view is that critiques of this Court and discussions of reform are totally legitimate and within the bounds of standard political discourse. For starters, the size of the Supreme Court has changed several times before; the current number of justices was not set out on stone tablets delivered from on high.
You have to love that puts President Trump in quotes… I don’t know who has told him this garbage or if anyone has. He might have just heard something in passing and turned it into this preposterous narrative. And it is true that the more he says this the more his cult will be convinced that he’s the one living in reality while everyone else is involved in a massive conspiracy to destroy Deal Leader. That’s how brainwashing works. But the fact is that he is completely unhinged on this subject and you have to wonder what’s setting him off right now. Maybe it’s this: 28% of Republicans and 31% of Independents say a conviction would make them less likely to support Trump. The good news for him is that most people don’t want to see him in jail. I think that’s ok. You can’t put secret service agents in jail with him and they are required to protect him. Years of house arrest would suit me just fine, along with restrictions on his use of internet and television.
Lolololol! QAnon congresswoman-turned-GOP House leadership darling Marjorie Taylor Greene’s (R-GA) membership with the House Freedom Caucus has been in question ever since she laid down her life/remaining dignity to back House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) in his speakership race. Since then, she’s been picking fights and at odds with members of the rebellious faction for being too tight with the establishment crowd. While there’s been speculation for weeks that the Georgia congresswoman may soon get the boot from the fringe group, it turns out that the Freedom Caucus has actually already voted to punish Greene for forgetting where she came from. Freedom Caucus member Rep.
Last week in Philadelphia Moms for Liberty held a cattle call for presidential candidates at their “Joyful Warriors” conference and they got all the big names to show up. This was quite a get for a group that only started in 2021 by Sarasota Florida school board members Tiffany Justice, Tina Descovich and Bridget Ziegler to protest masking and vaccine mandates in public schools during COVID-19. They are big players now in Republican politics with big donors and major politicians competing for their favor. And like so many others in the GOP they also have ties with the Proud Boys, a far-right hate group and have been designated antigovernment extremists by the Southern Poverty Law Center which they are wearing it with pride, as right wing groups tend to do: Florida GOP Chairman Christian Ziegler, quoted above, also happens to be married to Bridget Ziegler, one of the founders of Mom’s for Liberty so for all its claims to being a grassroots organization, let’s just say they had friends in high places from the very beginning.