Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Tick tock motherfuckers!

Whatever happens next week, the fight doesn’t end.

… riddled with inexplicable and elementary errors of law and fact

They think we are photo bombing their nice little lives.

Russian mouthpiece, go fuck yourself.

“And when the Committee says to “report your income,” that could mean anything!

Not so fun when the rabbit gets the gun, is it?

When do the post office & the dmv weigh in on the wuhan virus?

After roe, women are no longer free.

Imperialist aggressors must be defeated, or the whole world loses.

Usually wrong but never in doubt

Teach a man to fish, and he’ll sit in a boat all day drinking beer.

They love authoritarianism, but only when they get to be the authoritarians.

Republicans seem to think life begins at the candlelight dinner the night before.

Damn right I heard that as a threat.

Come on, media. you have one job. start doing it.

Fuck the extremist election deniers. What’s money for if not for keeping them out of office?

Second rate reporter says what?

Incompetence, fear, or corruption? why not all three?

That’s my take and I am available for criticism at this time.

You can’t love your country only when you win.

This has so much WTF written all over it that it is hard to comprehend.

Republicans do not pay their debts.

Balloon Juice has never been a refuge for the linguistically delicate.

You are here: Home / Organizing & Resistance / Don't Agonize - Organize / Thursday Morning Open Thread: Not So Fast, Kobach

Thursday Morning Open Thread: Not So Fast, Kobach

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Good news (if we can keep it) — looks like the Trump administration’s Voter Suppression Act of 2016 is not garnering the kind of respectful reviews and/or general lack of interest for which Kris Kobach and his GOP kobolds were hoping. Doesn’t mean we can take our eyes off the bastids, of course…

Apart from continuing to #Resist, what’s on the agenda for the day?

***********

Reader Interactions

168Comments

  2. 2.

    Mustang Bobby

    The best part of this charley-foxtrot is that Kobach’s own state, Kansas, refused to turn over the data, too.

    On the nature front, my A/C went toes-up on the 4th of July, so for the last couple of nights I’ve been sleeping with the windows open and the calming hum of ceiling fans. Last night I heard the distinctive hoot of a Barred Owl (thanks to my 1962 edition of Field Guide to the Birds and the Cornell Lab of Ornithology for the confirmation). Now I can add him to my life list. This denizen of old forests and treed swamps was pretty close, too. Hearing that in the suburbs of Miami may seem like an oddity, but I’m in a part of town with that kind of nature around me.

  5. 5.

    debbie

    @Mustang Bobby:

    Oddities abound in the bird world. I see seagulls in central Ohio. I can’t imagine what it is they think they’ll find in the creeks around here.

  6. 6.

    Derelict

    Kobach broke the law? Say it ain’t so! He’s a conservative’s conservative, so it’s theoretically not possible for him to break the law. After all, the law is whatever conservatives say it is at any given moment.

  7. 7.

    David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch

    Claude Taylor‏ @TrueFactsStated 22h22 hours ago

    Senior CNN Executive: “We have seen and have copies of transcripts of calls between Kushner, Bannon and high level Russian officials”. 1/2

    241 replies 2,956 retweets 5,128 likes

    Claude Taylor‏ @TrueFactsStated 22h22 hours ago

    “At the least, those two committed treason, and it’s hard to believe Trump wasn’t part of it”. 2/2

    98 replies 1,381 retweets 2,957 likes

  8. 8.

    Gin & Tonic

    In the meantime, in unscripted remarks in Poland, Trump (again) belittles the US intelligence community, attacks the (US) free press, and criticizes his predecessor.

    I’m so fucking old I can remember when politics stopped at the water’s edge.

    I’m also so fucking old that this inability to sleep is becoming a fact of life, but that’s another story.

  15. 15.

    bystander

    Dave Bratt’s tweet that Hilary should be our ambassador to Libya has to be a new low with its implicit violence. I find myself unable to stomach their evil any more.

  18. 18.

    Baud

    @bystander: I’ve been on a need blackout for the last two weeks. Like after the election, but this one wasn’t triggered by anything.

  19. 19.

    Iowa Old Lady

    @Gin & Tonic: I was just reading an account of his speech and answers to reporters. For some reason, his weakness stands out more sharply when he’s out of the country and standing next to the leader of the country he’s in.

  22. 22.

    Iowa Old Lady

    @bystander: Bratt’s tweet is disgusting. Either he’s convinced himself that Clinton let people die in Libya or he knows it’s a crock and doesn’t care. I’m inclined to think he’s convinced himself it’s true. That would be the right combination of stupid AND evil.

  24. 24.

    Bruce K

    About the only good thing I’m seeing out of the Koback Commission is the language being used in the various rejections that needs an “I Am Not Making This Up” disclaimer. My favorite so far is the “go jump in the Gulf of Mexico” one (bonus for being an official statement).

    As for His Royal And Imperious Cheetoness, a quote from Bujold’s Vorkosigan Saga comes to mind: “A rational government wouldn’t allow him possession of a pocket knife…”

  25. 25.

    debbie

    @Immanentize:

    Kobach’s wide-eyed Bambi look in response to the responses to his request is similar to Sessions’ fainting couch routine. They’re both full of shit.

  29. 29.

    Immanentize

    @debbie: Both are bad men who obtained too much power. I wish them both failure! Let’s toast to their inability to succeed!

  31. 31.

    Immanentize

    @Baud: oh — of course. I must admit I was hoping you really meant “need” blackout I need to free myself of needs right now.

  32. 32.

    Amir Khalid

    @Gin & Tonic:

    … in unscripted remarks in Poland, Trump (again) belittles the US intelligence community, attacks the (US) free press, and criticizes his predecessor.

    Why does POTUS hate America?

  34. 34.

    MJS

    @debbie: I see them in Central PA. They love parking lots, especially grocery store parking lots. They come for the trash, I think.

  37. 37.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @debbie:

    According to Our Progressive Betters, Alison is a neoliberal corporate shill, a sellout to the corrupt status quo.

  44. 44.

    Baud

    She had no path to victory. The fact that Rand Paul is Kentucky’s other senator should tell you how committed they are to the GOP, at least while Obama was president.

  45. 45.

    Gin & Tonic

    I’ll wait to watch actual video and/or read the transcript, but apparently Trump explicitly mentioned Article 5 in his prepared remarks.

  46. 46.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @debbie:

    Yeah, that’s about it. For 8 years, out in the state, you could run (and win) on a platform that would explicitly and candidly include statements of “my policy preferences will make your lives a lot worse, but colored folks will get even less. Fuck Obama.”

  48. 48.

    Iowa Old Lady

    I heard someone on the radio talking about the NK missile launch and saying one lucky thing was that all the countries who’d be most concerned (SK, US, Japan, China) would be at the G20 meeting so they could meeting to talk about responses, whereas it would have been hard to set up a such a meeting on its own. I thought, yeah, the Obama State Dept would be organizing that meeting. Trump and his pals? No.

  50. 50.

    Cheryl Rofer

    @Gin & Tonic: “The US has demonstrated not merely with words but with actions that we stand squarely behind Article 5”
    But paired with another complaint that Europe has to pony up more protection money and questioning whether “the West has the will to survive.”

    I’m waiting for the transcript, too, but short instant analysis: The Article 5 statement would have been stronger if he had been more concrete, ie something like “We will stand with our NATO allies as they stood with us after 9/11.” And shut up with the protection racket already. The “will to survive” thing has echoes of a leader whose name I will not mention. It’s also the kind of thing Vladimir Putin says about his crusade to bring back Christian/Orthodox values.

  54. 54.

    schrodingers_cat

    “the West has the will to survive.”

    Translation: Will to declare war against random peoples who don’t conform to their definition of whiteness and Christianity, am I right?

  56. 56.

    Ian G.

    @Mustang Bobby:

    I’ve heard Barred Owls numerous times while camping in the northeast, always near water. Heard a chorus of 3 of them last summer while camping near a lake in the Catskills.

    I feel like I always hear them in the east, and Great Horned Owls out west.

  64. 64.

    Lapassionara

    @OzarkHillbilly: yes. I realized before the election that a fair number of the people I had met and thought were liberals were actually Republicans and solidly so. Talk about “knee jerk.” They love Danforth and have evidently not realized that their party is now full of people who would uproot every part of the New Deal, including Social Security and Medicare.

  68. 68.

    Another Scott

    I think OO has made some good points about this voter data stuff – if it’s public information, then there really isn’t much basis to deny (a properly formulated and directed) request (that pays the necessary fees and so forth). However, there’s this concept from the IC that says that information that is not sensitive on its own suddenly becomes sensitive when collected together. Similarly, having public lists of voter information in eleventy seven thousand separate locations is very different from having it in one central, easily searched location that is likely to be 1) poorly secured, 2) access restricted by partisan actors, 3) being collected for the obvious purpose of enabling the disenfranchisement of millions of legal voters.

    Their incompetence is making their task easier, luckily, but I’m not sure what else sensible people can do to stop them. But we have to fight.

    :-(

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  71. 71.

    OzarkHillbilly

    From Gen. David Petraeus, asked if he believes Donald Trump is mentally fit to serve as president:

    “I think it’s immaterial.”

    (via -K Drum)

  73. 73.

    Another Scott

    In other news, TheHill:

    GOP aides say the proposal that Cruz and his allies are framing as the potential key to passing the stalled healthcare bill is a nonstarter with most Republicans in the upper chamber.

    The proposal would allow insurance companies the freedom to sell any kinds of health plans they want as long as they also sell at least one plan that qualifies under the regulatory requirements of the Affordable Care Act (ACA).

    “I would say that if we voted on the Cruz proposal, it would be in the neighborhood of 37 to 15 against, 37 no votes and 15 yeses, and that’s probably generous,” said a GOP aide familiar with the Senate negotiations.

    “Nobody wants to go home and say to a 45-year-old steelworker with diabetes that you should have to pay a lot more for your health insurance,” the aide added.

    Frustrations are mounting with Cruz among Senate negotiators because leaders have felt blindsided by his demand that the legislation essentially eliminate the protection for people with pre-existing conditions.

    […]

    “From day one of the Senate discussions, in a working group that Sen. Cruz started with Chairman Alexander, consumer freedom has been one of Cruz’s major points. The idea that this is sprouting at the last minute is inaccurate,” said a senior conservative Republican aide.

    The Hill reported Monday that Senate GOP leaders have sent two versions of a revised healthcare bill to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), one with the Cruz amendment and one without it.

    Republican aides who say Cruz’s amendment is politically untenable acknowledge that the CBO could report some good news, like that the proposal would send down premiums without significantly affecting coverage.

    But they think it’s more likely that the CBO analysis will be damning.

    “Or CBO will come back and say the market will be destroyed and 45 million people will be left without insurance,” said one staffer.

    Conservatives close to Cruz admit the CBO score will be better for the revised bill that does not include Cruz’s amendment because that version includes a market stabilization fund without including any of the regulatory reforms that would destabilize — at least temporarily — the market.

    It’s not going to be easy for them to pass something, but McConnell and Ryan are going to try to force something through. We have to keep fighting them.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  74. 74.

    bystander

    @Baud: Glad you clarified “news blackout” for Immanenitize. I wish I could make myself do something more than turn off the sound/change channels when Trump comes on, but I can’t turn away from the trainwreck.

    @Iowa Old Lady: I think you got the chemistry right.

  76. 76.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @Lapassionara:

    just my luck, to move from one solidly red state to another.

    One of my criteria in deciding where to live upon (semi) retirement was “not-a-red-state.” It’s amazing how few states are left when another top criterion is “lower-cost-of-living,” plus “natural beauty,” “good food,” and “some reasonable semblance of a cultural life.” That’s how I ended up in New Mexico.

  78. 78.

    d58826

    @Another Scott: Quote from Byron York that the info is being sold anyway. Now he doesn’t say exactly what is being sold
    True which raises the issue of should the state be in the business of selling this kind of info in the first place.. Same with motor vehicle/drivers license info.

    Back in the day when accumulating large scale databases was hard maybe it was of but today with the vulnerability of this information then not so much.

    Plus they want the information for voter suppression not the non-existent voter fraud.

    https://twitter.com/ByronYork/status/882942685295906817

  81. 81.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @satby:

    Deplorable was the wrong word for them. Hillary should have called them despicable.

    contemptible, loathsome, hateful, detestable, reprehensible, abhorrent, abominable, awful, heinous; odious, vile, low, mean, abject, shameful, ignominious, shabby, ignoble, disreputable, discreditable, unworthy; informal dirty, rotten, lowdown, lousy; beastly; archaic scurvy.

    All of them, Katie.

  83. 83.

    d58826

    @Another Scott: In a normal world, the R’s who believe this

    Nobody wants to go home and say to a 45-year-old steelworker with diabetes that you should have to pay a lot more for your health insurance,” the aide added

    would work with the D’s and plug the known holes in Obamacare and declare victory. Really Fixing Obamacare starts with 48 votes in the Senate so all you need is 3-4 Gop moderates. In the House you need to peel off enough reasonable Goopers to get to 218. Would Der Fuhrer sign it? Well if you package it as a BIG WIN for MAGA then probably yes.

  85. 85.

    JPL

    @d58826: The Trump administration is using Obama’s plan to defeat ISIS. They want to add something so Trump can declare it his own plan. Maybe just add an adjective or two, and he’ll be happy.

  87. 87.

    Kathleen

    @debbie: Yup. That’s what. is so sad. KY benefitted so much from Obamacare and they hate him so much. Makes me sick.

  88. 88.

    d58826

    @JPL: yep. He wants that Rose Garden signing ceremony. The legislation that established the interstate highway system was named the Nation Defense Highway Act. It let the conservatives to vote for it knowing that the average voter wasn’t really into the details.

    I must admit that my 8 year old at the time mind found it very confusing. Why would we spend all that money building all those highways just top move tanks and army trucks around? Besides wouldn’t the tank threats tear up the roadway?

  89. 89.

    Bruce K

    @Aimai: Yeah, it was said about Miles by his own mother, for different reasons, but be honest, would you trust any of the current crew in DC with a pocket knife?

  93. 93.

    rikyrah

    If you or I steal 5,000 of something, we’d be on our way to jail.

    Hobby Lobby steals 5,000 artifacts, and they get A FINE?

  95. 95.

    bystander

    @rikyrah: Yes, but they stealing (while Americans were dying for their thievery) Christian artifacts. Why do you feel compelled to persecute Christians?

  96. 96.

    d58826

    @rikyrah: I saw a tweet that they were buying this stuff from ISIS? But they are doing God’s work so it’s ok.

  97. 97.

    d58826

    @Gin & Tonic: And in his speech he is endorsing the clash of civilizations.
    There was a lot of speculation on MSNBC last night about what Der Fuhrer would say when he meets with Putin. If his remarks today are any indication it is going to be a bad day for team USA.
    Putin is going to need a bigger airplane to carry all of the vodka and caviar for his victory party tomorrow.

  98. 98.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @Kathleen:

    There was an old joke that made the rounds among white Kentuckians from the shabbier areas of town when I was briefly shunted to a Pentecostal private school in the 8th grade (that was only a year – dad finally prevailed over RWNJ mom). Anyway, this one was a real knee-slapped then (not), and sadly reflects the mindset of the WWC, particularly as to their attitude toward Obama:

    Q: What do you call a black millionaire nuclear physicist with a Nobel prize?

    A: A n****r.

    There it is, in brutal print, and it got too many chuckles of agreement, instead of being a Mel Brooks style reflection on the shitty attitudes of white people. Nowadays, it is a wry statement on the social pathology of white folks. No matter how accomplished, brilliant, humane, wealthy, elegant or tasteful, all that a large cohort of white people see is someone to mock, degrade and humiliate.

    No matter how good a person of color is at life, they’re just a n****r. You have to be SO much better to even rise to the level just beneath the worst white mediocrity.

  102. 102.

    Bruce K

    Saw a report on TPM that Scalise’s back in the hospital.

    I’m terribly conflicted; I still can’t forgive the man for voting to kill me, but at the same time I don’t want to wish misfortune on him or his family. And I have this sense that ignoring politics is something I can’t afford any more these days.

  103. 103.

    d58826

    @Cheryl Rofer:

    The Article 5 statement would have been stronger

    If he had said it in May at the NATO conference. Here it looks like a five year old to his Mom -‘ok I’ll drink my milk’ and then makes gagging noises.

  104. 104.

    d58826

    @Bruce K: I saw that he was transferred back to ICU due to concerns about an infection. Condition still listed as serious

  108. 108.

    rikyrah

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes:

    There it is, in brutal print, and it got too many chuckles of agreement, instead of being a Mel Brooks style reflection on the shitty attitudes of white people. Nowadays, it is a wry statement on the social pathology of white folks. No matter how accomplished, brilliant, humane, wealthy, elegant or tasteful, all that a large cohort of white people see is someone to mock, degrade and humiliate.

    Which is why the election of 44 so destroyed the psyche of huge swaths of White America.

    When what you keep in your heart is..

    ‘At least I’m not a Nigger’…

    Is what you hang you hat on….

    And a Black man not only becomes President, but it successful at the job…
    It just blows your world apart.

    It’s also why they’re so upset at our response to Dolt45.

    Their vessel for White Supremacy isn’t just a national embarrassment, but an INTERNATIONAL embarrassment.

    Also, folks are bringing 8 years of receipts on their azzes, and informing them that their vote for Dolt45 defines them, and shows their LACK OF CHARACTER.

    Ain’t nobody going back for these muthaphuckas. Not in the least.

  109. 109.

    Elizabelle

    @Bruce K: I am good with Scalise leaving this mortal coil. He’s an awful congressman.

    Since the shooter gave his life, I wish his aim had been better. I have no sympathy, frankly, for GOP assholes getting shot. I think we are safer without them.

    No crocodile tears for Scalise, as there were none for Scalia. These are terrible, awful people. I do not wish them well, and I do not see enough humanity in them.

  110. 110.

    bystander

    @Bruce K: I’m not wishing anything on him except the realization of how much he facilitated his own shooting. The rest of us don’t have the opportunity to keep mentally unstable people and spousal abuse perpetrators from free access to guns.

  111. 111.

    Kathleen

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: Yup. Interesting that that virulent hatred will result in some of these people dying because they have chosen hatred over their health care.

    The worst to me are the affluent, arrogant, entitled uber Catholics in No Ky. Some of the most loathsome people I’ve ever met.

  114. 114.

    bystander

    @Elizabelle:

    …I wish his aim had been better.

    Exactly what I thought when I saw David Brat’s tweet about Clinton.

    I just read a post on facebook that Scalise’s doctor is a Hillary donor and that explains the relapse. Killary is everywhere! I’ll bet the nursing staff voted for Obummer.

  116. 116.

    Elizabelle

    @Kathleen: They are going to do that, no matter what. Democrat gets shot: mental health issues.

    Republican: patriotic martyr!

  117. 117.

    Kay

    And this is where Maine’s secretary of state fits in. He’s going to be used like a patsy.
    The new commission is supposed to have up to 15 members; so far, Pence has named just seven, only two of whom are Democrats: New Hampshire Secretary of State Bill Gardner, and Maine’s Matthew Dunlap.
    Republican supporters of the commission are desperate to have Democrats serve on the commission so that they can claim it is “bipartisan.” They are looking for anything to give this commission legitimacy. Bob Bauer, the former White House counsel for President Obama and former co-chair of the 2012 Presidential Commission on Election Administration, has warned everyone to stay away from this commission. (The 2014 report by Bauer and Mitt Romney’s election lawyer, Republican Ben Ginsberg, with bipartisan recommendations for improving the election process, was quickly removed from government websites shortly after Trump’s inauguration, with no explanation.)
    Dunlap is skeptical of Trump’s claims, and has said his purpose in serving on the commission is to work from the inside, with a seat on the table. There is no reason to believe he can serve this purpose, even if he issues a minority report disagreeing with its findings. The report will still be trumpeted as a “bipartisan” commission that reached certain conclusions.
    Dunlap is making a mistake, but it is not too late. People around the country are watching his participation with concern. Maine residents who disagree with his decision to join the commission should let their voices be heard. It’s a necessary step to prevent the further deterioration of voting rights.

    Labor organizers call this “at the tablism” which is just perfect. It’s when you are flattered into lending your name and presence to garbage and you insist it is better you be “at the table”. It’s usually personal- the invitee is personally approached and likes the person who invited him or her. Dunlap says he likes Kobach, so maybe that’s it.

    Anyhow- it shouldn’t matter who Dunlap “likes”- he’s not supposed to be serving himself. It’s not the middle school lunchroom table.

  121. 121.

    d58826

    Here we go again. The right is going full bore on the CNN ‘fake news’ report that 17 intell. agencies agree on the Russian hack.
    They are linking to this NYT correction from a couple of weeks ago that it was really only 3 agencies.

    Now I have no idea how many it was but every story I have seen since before the election has referenced the number 17. But 3 or 17 doesn’t change the fact that Russia hacked the election and the ongoing attempt to discredit the media plays into Putin’s hands.

    http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/a-rather-large-new-york-times-correction/article/2627527

  122. 122.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @Kathleen:

    They’re the worst. Youngest daughter dated one a bit – I warned her. Told her that Northern Kentucky Catholics aren’t like Louisville Catholics (Louisville Catholics are all about fish fries, gambling, drinking and sinning their way around their smaller, contracepted families). Northern Kentucky Catholics man the Louisville abortion clinic protests that Louisville Catholics won’t bother with (most of the clinic protestors here are from out of town AND mostly evangelicals).

    Turned out I was right – it was a huge culture clash (we raised our kids Greek Orthodox).

  125. 125.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @d58826:

    I define a Nothern Kentucky Catholic as somebody who can shriek “you filthy fucking slut babykiller” at an impoverished pregnant woman while counting beads on a rosary.

  127. 127.

    The Moar You Know

    Saw a report on TPM that Scalise’s back in the hospital.

    @Bruce K: Bullets are serious business.

    Shame he had to get shot and crippled for life/die (jury’s still out, it will be one or the other) to figure that out.

  128. 128.

    The Moar You Know

    It feels as if the MSM is slow walking crucial information about Trump-Russia collusion for some reason.

    @Patricia Kayden: Frog & pot of water. And America is not noticing that the water is getting hotter, as by design.

  129. 129.

    Patricia Kayden

    @Kay: Dunlap “likes Kobach” despite Kobach’s zeal to purge Democratic voters (especially those of color) from the voting rolls. Good to know.

  130. 130.

    Wyatt Derp

    @d58826:

    Plus they want the information for voter suppression not the non-existent voter fraud.

    Plus it’s so much easier for Putin’s minions to hack one unsecured database than 50 separate ones.

  131. 131.

    Patricia Kayden

    @Elizabelle: He was openly racist. Whatever happens to him, it will be “No comment” from me for that reason alone. There are so many people for whom I’ll weep when they leave this earth. He’s not one of them. He wouldn’t weep for any of my kind either.

  132. 132.

    Barbara

    @O. Felix Culpa: I would humbly suggest my own state of Virginia as a possibility. Much bluer than it used to be, with a lot of cultural resources in places you might not expect, including some with a reasonably low cost of living. Although many of these places, when combined with natural beauty, tend to be in redder parts of the state, some are not — Staunton and Roanoke, for instance.

  134. 134.

    japa21

    Penzey’s Spices is at it again. Go to their FB page. Here is part of the latest:

    The history of this presidency has only begun to unfold, but the history of the election, and what the people of the United States were willing to turn a blind eye to, is already cast. No future historian of 21st century America will be so unaware of 20th century history as to not know exactly who the then candidate was channeling with the words “tremendous infectious disease” or the inhumanity he was willing to risk being set in motion to bring attention to his candidacy. History will not be kind.

    Two years ago today, 7-6-15, our President rolled out his campaign including these words: “Likewise, tremendous infectious disease is pouring across the border.” It’s been said history is written by the winners. In my travels I’ve found it to be more often written by local historians.

  135. 135.

    Mnemosyne

    @Elizabelle:

    I want Scalise to live long enough for lifetime caps on healthcare to be re-instituted so that he and his family go bankrupt trying to pay for his pre-existing condition. But I’m kind of an asshole that way.

  136. 136.

    Another Scott

    @Cheryl Rofer: Personally, I’m not going to read it, and I flipped the station when they were playing excerpts on the radio today.

    If it’s a sensible speech, it means that someone else wrote it and he’s just making mouth noises. If it’s a horrible speech, it just means that he’s continuing to make horrible mouth noises. In either case, it will have no impact on US policy because there is no US policy any more. It’s all his thoughtless lizard-brain reactions and Twitter noise.

    If anything good comes out of this trip, it will be by accident.

    Grrr.

    We can’t be distracted. The Democrats in Congress and elsewhere have to keep their eyes on the prizes: 1) Protecting Obamacare, Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security. 2) Protecting voting rights. 3) Laying the foundation to vote these monsters out of office this fall and in every election going forward. 4) Working to fight gerrymandering and every other anti-democratic policy and law that disenfranchises voters and weakens the expression of will of the people. 5) Insisting that Congress re-assert its control over war powers.

    And that’s just for starters. ;-)

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  137. 137.

    Aleta

    He’s a walking violation of the Constitution.

    Niwot, CO Fourth of July parade

    Along with a marching band flanked by horseback riders in western gear and the local high school football team handing out water and candy to the kids, Niwot welcomed the parade’s guest of honor, Associate U.S. Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch.

    Perched atop a red convertible and flanked by his wife and daughter, Gorsuch worked the parade like a senator, not a sitting Supreme Court justice, employing folksy charm like Colorado’s own Ronnie Reagan. Gorsuch—who had come at the invitation of the Boulder County GOP—shook parade-goers’ hands as if they were constituents’, wishing them a happy Fourth of July and thanking them for coming out to see him. Ignoring the smattering of protesters booing him and calling him an illegitimate judge in a stolen seat, he complimented a young boy on his cowboy hat. He may have even kissed a baby. Meanwhile, his wife Louise waved her U.S. flag with increasing force at the protesters in response to every increase in volume.

    Gorsuch’s Fourth-of-July glad-handing (is) a perfect representation of the political role he plays on the current Supreme Court. He represents the most ideological right wing of the Court, but has largely masked those extreme beliefs with charisma that made him appear more reasonable a justice than his opinions prove him to be. And after watching him Tuesday, I have no doubt that Gorsuch is also a skilled politician..

    -Jessica Pieklo at Rewire

  138. 138.

    japa21

    @Aleta: At first I read that as Nitwit, CO. After reading what followed, I realized my misreading was, in fact, correct.

  140. 140.

    Aleta

    Felix Sater has now agreed to co-operate with an international investigation into the alleged money-laundering network, five people with knowledge of the matter said. The co-operation has included working with a team of lawyers and private investigators pursuing civil cases across three continents, the people said.

    Sater, a Russian-born dealmaker with organised-crime connections who worked on property ventures including Trump Soho in Manhattan, has attracted attention in recent months as efforts continue to chart the links between the US president’s circle and moneymen from Russia and its neighbours.

    In October the Financial Times revealed Mr Sater had helped the family of Viktor Khrapunov, a former Kazakh minister now exiled in Switzerland, invest millions in US real estate through front companies. The Khrapunovs have spent heavily across the US, including, records indicate, buying apartments in Trump Soho.

    Mr Khrapunov is accused by Kazakhstan’s rulers of embezzling government funds and hiding the cash around the world. Kazakh authorities claim the Khrapunovs’ laundering schemes also funnelled money from a fellow dissident, Mukhtar Ablyazov, an oligarch accused of stealing billions of dollars from a bank.

    Financial Times

  141. 141.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @Amir Khalid: “Autocrat elected in a dubious election dismisses American democracy in speech in Easter Europe” hot on the heels of July 4th’s “Document from costal intellectual elite calling for the violent overthrow of government read on NPR”

  143. 143.

    gene108

    @Another Scott:

    Similarly, having public lists of voter information in eleventy seven thousand separate locations is very different from having it in one central, easily searched location that is likely to be 1) poorly secured, 2) access restricted by partisan actors, 3) being collected for the obvious purpose of enabling the disenfranchisement of millions of legal voters.

    I wonder how much of this aggregation is to make the life of Russian hackers easier for microtargeting likely Democratic voters, in the 2018 election, with fake news to get them to sit out and not vote.

  144. 144.

    randy khan

    @Another Scott:

    What really struck me from that excerpt is that nobody in the GOP seems to know for sure what the CBO score would look like. I know the purpose of the CBO is to provide expertise on this sort of thing, but you would think that any competent governing party would have someone who could at least come up with a ballpark number on staff so that you don’t get embarrassed. (Yes, I realize that “competent” is doing a lot of work here.)

  145. 145.

    Kay

    @Patricia Kayden:

    Oh, it’s going great. So glad he is “at the table”:

    When the Presidential Advisory Commission on Election Integrity held its first meeting via conference call last week and discussed a forthcoming request to states for voter information, Maine Secretary of State Matthew Dunlap (D), a member of the commission, cautioned it had to be careful.
    If the panel wanted election officials across the country to provide it with voter information, it had to be delicate about how it worded the request or else it would be seen as demanding highly sensitive voter details.
    “I had suggested only going after information that was legally publicly available and doing it as a request and not as a demand,” Dunlap said in an interview. “I said, you want to be careful how you go at this because election officials are very sensitive guardians of this information, so you want to make sure you’re asking for it, not demanding it, and that it really should only cover the information that is publicly available in your state.”
    The commission, Dunlap said, was receptive to his suggestion.
    The panel agreed they didn’t need to review the actual language of the request before it was sent to states, because only Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach (R), the commission’s vice chair, would sign his name to it. The letter Kobach did send out appears to heed Dunlap’s advice. It says he is seeking “publicly available voter roll data” ― including, “if publicly available,” information like the last four digits of voters’ Social Security Numbers, felony convictions and voter histories.

    I found out presidential commissions have to follow some transparency rules, so there’s already a lawsuit for all the communications- emails, etc.

    He’s going to look like an idiot by the time this is over.

    They are livestreaming their first meeting. Only invited “experts” may ask questions, so I’m sure it will be a joke.

  146. 146.

    Kay

    @Aleta:

    Don’t you just know Eric Prince is in this somewhere? That would explain Trump hiring his sister- the completely unqualified Betsy DeVos.

  147. 147.

    trollhattan

    @OzarkHillbilly:
    Actual traitorous former generals are my usual go-to source for interpretation of presidential fitness for the job.

    To think he once had presidential potential himself, in the eyes of many….

  148. 148.

    Gin & Tonic

    @Aleta: I wrote to Adam about this, hoping maybe for a FP post.

    Interesting additional fact – Mueller has hired the former prosecutor who cut a plea deal with Felix in a fraud case back in 1998.

  149. 149.

    Kay

    If you’re a competent sec of state don’t you have to know what they plan on doing with the information before collecting it and turning it over?

    One would think they would want to at least cover their ass. Voters will blame the state official who didn’t do any due diligence if this all goes south, which it will, because they’re incompetent.

  150. 150.

    Aleta

    Peter Daou‏ @peterdaou

    1. The national media’s conventional wisdom about Hillary, Trump and 2016 is flatly WRONG. And it is regurgitated ad nauseam. (1/16)
    * 
2. Virtually every pundit, right and left, embraces the claim that Donald Trump was a terribly weak candidate. The exact OPPOSITE is true.

    * 
3. Trump eviscerated a well-funded and well-organized field of Republicans with a few tweets and demeaning nicknames. He was unstoppable.

    * 


4. Trump got billions worth of free press. The news media covered empty podiums waiting for him. He bashed them and they came back for more.

    * 
5. Trump flouted every political rule, with few consequences. Claiming Hillary should easily have beaten him is the definition of FAKE NEWS.

    * 
6. With respect to Sanders, few pundits accept the FACT that he ran a viciously negative campaign of character destruction against Hillary.

    * 
7. The big unifying message of Bernie’s 2016 campaign was that Hillary was corrupt. How is that NOT a character attack? Give us a break.

    * 
8. Some still deny the obvious: Bernie’s campaign and surrogates did deep (and unjust) damage to perceptions of Hillary among young voters.

    * 
9. On Russia, many still pretend that a massive, sophisticated propaganda campaign to destroy Hillary’s reputation had no effect. Seriously?

    * 
10. OF COURSE Russia harmed Hillary’s public image. You’d have to intentionally ignore everything that transpired to believe otherwise.

    * 
11. On Hillary’s emails, the media still try to absolve their wildly disproportionate coverage by accusing her of ignoring WWC voters.

    * 
12. But the FACT is that Hillary WON among voters who thought the economy was the most pressing issue. Will reporters ever tell you that?


     * 
13. 600 consecutive days of email coverage was NOT JUSTIFIED. It was a travesty. Hillary’s policies and positions were ignored by the press.
    


14. The idea that Hillary’s gender played a role is dismissed as sour grapes. As though women face a level playing field. Hint: THEY DON’T.

    * 15. The hatred and disrespect for the first female nominee of a major U.S. party continues to this day. And we should keep fighting it.

    * 

16. Conventional wisdom has congealed about 2016, and most of it is JUST PLAIN WRONG. Let’s continue to reject this rank revisionism.


  151. 151.

    randy khan

    @Mnemosyne:

    As my general opinion is that every death diminishes the world (some much more than others, of course), I do not want him to die. But I kind of want his recovery to take a very, very long time so that the House Republicans don’t have his vote.

  153. 153.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @Elizabelle: eh, goverment by assassination is never good. You end up with in the same place Japan was in WWII.

  154. 154.

    J R in WV

    @Gin & Tonic:

    We have a group of Barred Owls in our neighborhood, they nest up on the ridge in the big twisted oaks that grow up there. We first met them when they started picking chickens off the cedar tree outside the kitchen door when we lived in the old farmhouse.

    Now I can hoot with them, not carry on a conversation, they know I don’t really speak Barred Owl, but out of courtesy they will answer back a couple of times, then go on to more complex conversations with each other.

    I don’t know if all owls do this, but once 2 or more Barred Owls have established contact with their standard “bird book” call – they then go wild with very complex hooting and crying with each other. In the pitch dark woods, it’s quite eerie to hear a group of Barred Owls talking amongst themselves.

    Is that where the word hootenanny came from?

  157. 157.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @Barbara:

    I would humbly suggest my own state of Virginia as a possibility.

    I like Virginia – but for the humidity. Have taken numerous vacations there. Love the vineyards, rolling hills, and historic sites. Appomattox Court House is one of the most beautiful, deeply moving places I’ve ever visited. But the hot, humid heat! ;)

  158. 158.

    rikyrah

    @Patricia Kayden:

    @Elizabelle: He was openly racist. Whatever happens to him, it will be “No comment” from me for that reason alone. There are so many people for whom I’ll weep when they leave this earth. He’s not one of them. He wouldn’t weep for any of my kind either.

    this this this.
    amen.

  159. 159.

    rikyrah

    @Aleta:

    He’s been protected in the past, if the writings have been correct.

    If this is true, that means that The Spooks have told him that they no longer care about his services because they have bigger fish to fry.

  160. 160.

    glory b

    @Bruce K: As I understand it, he never left the hospital, he’s been downgraded from stable to serious condition and returned to ICU.

  161. 161.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @Baud: Reminds me of my conceptual bumpersticker for the Boy Bush years:

    AMERICAN DYNASTY =
    AMERICANS DIE NASTY

  162. 162.

    Mnemosyne

    @randy khan:

    Oh, I definitely don’t want him to die. I want him to live a long, unhappy, pain-filled life filled with financial struggle to pay his medical bills because of the policies that he chose to support.

    Or, to put it another way, fuckem.

  163. 163.

    J R in WV

    This is a very interesting article on Ms Zainab Ahmad, newly joining Bob Mueller III’s team of prosecutors. She has a long and distinguished record of convicting foreign terrorists attacking or attempting to attack Americans and our allies. She managed a team of 60 prosecutors, and had never lost a court case against a terrorist.

    So I find it really interesting that Special Prosecutor Mueller needs her expertise. Is he planning to accuse and convict members of the Republican party of terrorism, or of working with foreign terroristic organizations? I guess a woman experienced in the most difficult prosecutions there are, with many foreign witnesses and anonymous witnesses in disguise, would be qualified to prosecute domestic criminals conspiring with foreign interests just as well.

    I recommend the article to everyone with any interest in the real war on terror, or the war on democracy in America. She sounds like a real professional for Mr. Mueller’s staff. Able to conduct a trial on the most difficult cases, and never lost a case so far.

  167. 167.

    J R in WV

    @bystander:

    @rikyrah: Yes, but they stealing (while Americans were dying for their thievery) Christian artifacts. Why do you feel compelled to persecute Christians?

    Why do you assert that the artifacts are Christian? Why would that make the theft better? I think these artifacts are from long before the earliest known versions of even the Old Testament, and have nothing to do with early Christianity, which couldn’t have started before around the year 1.

    I don’t actually believe the Hobby Lobby folks are really Christian at all, because they don’t follow the teachings of Christ, at all. Calling yourself a Christian while being un-Christian to your fellow beings doesn’t get it done for me.

  168. 168.

    workworkwork

    @Gin & Tonic: I’ve had trouble sleeping since I was a kid. (I’m turning 59 this month)

    The most recent time I actually got some rest was when I was in the hospital last fall getting my spleen removed. Needless to say, I don’t recommend this as an insomnia cure.

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