Come for the politics, stay for the snark.
Christmas in the middle of the week seems odd to me, and it’s throwing my whole week off.
Open thread.
This was great, as was Cory Booker’s tribute to Jon Tester
Link to Cory Booker tribute to Sherrod Brown.
If someone finds that one on YouTube, let me know!
Whose Idea Was It To Make Christmas on a Wednesday?Post + Comments (54)
I watched this interesting YouTube video from David Pakman.
And I got to thinking about content creators and new media. Good context creators. How to support them, How to not just quit turning to the NYT and the Washington Post and even some of the crappy left-leaning sites. Since we mock them with references to Tiger Beat, why are we quoting them?
In the olden days, we had the blog roll. (Speaking of which, I probably haven’t updated that in 3 years – does anyone still use the blogroll?)
Anyway, just thinking out loud here, but I wonder if we might want to put together a list like that of good content creators.
If you think that’s a good idea, let me know who you think should be on it, and supply links.
If you think that’s the dumbest idea you have ever heard, you can let me know that, too. Just don’t be an ass about it as you do. :-)
Here’s a link to the Gaetz report and all of the appendices.
I skimmed the whole thing. Blegh. The summary at the start of the report has the lowlights:
In sum, the Committee found substantial evidence of the following:
• From at least 2017 to 2020, Representative Gaetz regularly paid women for engaging in sexual activity with him.
• In 2017, Representative Gaetz engaged in sexual activity with a 17-year-old girl.
• During the period 2017 to 2019, Representative Gaetz used orpossessed illegal drugs, including cocaine and ecstasy, on multiple occasions.
• Representative Gaetz accepted gifts, including transportation and lodging in connection with a 2018 trip to the Bahamas, in excess of permissible amounts.
• In 2018, Representative Gaetz arranged for his Chief of Staff to assist a woman with whom he engaged in sexual activity in obtaining a passport, falsely indicating to the U.S. Department of State that she was a constituent.
• Representative Gaetz knowingly and willfully sought to impede and obstruct the Committee’s investigation of his conduct.
• Representative Gaetz has acted in a manner that reflects discreditably upon the House.
Based on the above, the Committee concluded there was substantial evidence that Representative Gaetz violated House Rules, state and federal laws, and other standards of conduct prohibiting prostitution, statutory rape, illicit drug use, acceptance of impermissible gifts, the provision of special favors and privileges, and obstruction of Congress.
The women Gaetz paid for sex were often found via a “sugar dating” website and did not appear to be prostitutes in the traditional sense. I might have missed it, but it looked like they were all in the age range of 18-25, with one exception: he had two sexual encounters with a then 17 year-old girl at a party, and did not bother to check her age. His slimeball buddy Joel Greenberg helped coordinate finding and paying the women.
Gaetz paid a little under $100K in total to all the women. His girlfriend at the time was paid over $60K, and the committee clearly suspected that she funneled payments to the other women. His girlfriend was also present at many of the sexual encounters with the other women. They also helped obtain cannabis cartridges and party drugs, and he reimbursed them. Almost all the women reported that they were so drunk/high that they couldn’t recall all of the sexual activity with Gaetz.
The committee report says the Department of Justice was uncooperative in their investigation. Many of the women took the fifth since they didn’t want to self-incriminate on the payments for sex.
There are appendices to the report with screenshots of some of the women going back and forth about trying to get more payment from Greenberg.
This is the slimy fucker that Trump wanted to run the Department of Justice, and the real reason he didn’t get the job probably isn’t his conduct, but rather that he pissed off some Republican Senators, because in addition to being pretty disgusting, he’s also an asshole to his colleagues.
I Wrestle With Your Conscience; You Wrestle With Your PartnerPost + Comments (115)
Biden commutes most federal death row sentences to life in prison before Trump takes office. Biden, the actual pro-life president. www.cnn.com/2024/12/23/p…
— Jersey Craig (@jerseycraig.bsky.social) December 23, 2024 at 5:20 AM
He’s taken heat from all sides on the topic already, and President Biden still chose clemency. Per CNN:
President Joe Biden announced Monday that he is taking 37 people off federal death row to serve out life sentences behind bars — a decision that leaves only three federal prisoners awaiting execution when President-elect Donald Trump takes office next month…
Notably, the president did not commute the sentences of three people whose crimes included mass shootings or acts of terrorism: Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, one of two brothers responsible for the deadly Boston Marathon bombing in 2013; Dylann Roof, a White nationalist who massacred nine people at a historically Black church in Charleston, South Carolina, in 2015; and Robert Bowers, who killed 11 worshippers at Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life Synagogue in 2018…
While the Justice Department under Trump could resume seeking the death penalty in future cases, it cannot undo any commutations that Biden has issued.
(Guessing that executing Dylan Roof will not be anywhere near the top of the incoming maladministration’s agenda.)
As we confront a second Trump presidency, here’s a path forward: 🧵
— Elizabeth Warren (@elizabeth-warren.bsky.social) December 19, 2024 at 1:27 PM
I ❤️ my senior Senator. Picking off the tyrant’s army from cover, an American tradition as old as Lexington & Concord…
1. We have to fight every fight in Congress. We won’t always win, but we can slow or sometimes limit Trump’s destruction. With every fight, we can build political power to put more checks on his administration and build the foundation for future wins.
During the Trump years, Congress stepped up its oversight of his unprecedented corruption and abuses of power.
In the Senate, Democrats gave no quarter to radical Trump nominees; we asked tough questions and held the Senate floor for hours to slow down confirmation and expose Republican extremism.
These tactics doomed some nominations entirely, laid the groundwork for other cabinet officials to later resign in disgrace, and brought scrutiny that somewhat constrained Trump’s efforts.
Remember the GOP’s attempts to repeal the ACA? Dems did not have the votes to stop them. Nevertheless, patients kept up a relentless rotation of meetings in Congress, activists in wheelchairs performed civil disobedience, and lawmakers used every tactic possible. The GOP lost.
Democrats should also acknowledge that seeking a middle ground with a man who calls immigrants “animals” and says he will “protect” women “whether the women like it or not” is unlikely to land in a good place.
Uniting against Trump’s legislative agenda is good politics because it is good policy. Democratic opposition to Trump’s tax bill drove Trump’s approval ratings to what was then the lowest levels of his administration, helping spark one of the largest blue waves in recent history.
Monday Morning Open Thread: Nevertheless, We PersistPost + Comments (261)
“Democrats, under the leadership of Hakeem Jeffries and Joe Biden, were able to avoid a shutdown and provide aid to those who needed it. In three months, Republicans under the leadership of Elon Musk and Donald Trump, must do the same.” Better version of this.
— The Fig Economy (@figgityfigs.bsky.social) December 21, 2024 at 2:10 PM
Musk lost because he wanted a govt shutdown. Trump lost because he wanted to raise the debt ceiling to cut taxes for his donors. GOP in Congress lost because they’re a hot mess. Dems held strong & we didn’t close down the government. Sausage making is prettier.
Happy holidays!— Rep. Mark Pocan (@pocan.house.gov) December 20, 2024 at 6:02 PM
“…Democrats are less willing to hurt people…”
This is a good thing. This is *why* I align politically where I do, why the democrats are preferable to the republicans. It’s like the most basic distillation of the reason.— The Fig Economy (@figgityfigs.bsky.social) December 21, 2024 at 12:50 PM
Yeah, fighting with one hand behind your back makes fights harder. Fighting to protect the people the other guy wants to hurt while also neutralizing him is a harder fight. But it’s what it means to try to be good.
— The Fig Economy (@figgityfigs.bsky.social) December 21, 2024 at 12:52 PM
Meanwhile…
more evidence that trump doesn’t have as much juice as people think!
— jamelle (@jamellebouie.net) December 21, 2024 at 8:10 PM
All I ask is for Trump to have enough juice to really mess Musk up when he flies too close to the sun.
— Gluon Spring (@gluonspring.bsky.social) December 21, 2024 at 9:28 PM
we're getting signs of this from every direction. less than storming autocraft than decrepit replay barely able to call the shots in the first days.
— Josh Marshall (@joshtpm.bsky.social) December 21, 2024 at 8:14 PM
It looks like it’s time for the President-elect’s annual review:
⚡️Trump claims Putin wants to meet with him ‘as soon as possible’.
“President Putin said that he wants to meet with me as soon as possible. So we have to wait for this. But we need to end that horrible, horrible war.”
— The Kyiv Independent (@kyivindependent.com) December 22, 2024 at 5:46 PM
From The Kyiv Independent:
U.S. President-elect Donald Trump on Dec. 22 said that Russian President Vladimir Putin wants to hold a meeting with him “as soon as possible.”
Trump delivered the remarks to conservative activisits at a rally in Phoenix, Arizona, where he celebrated his victory in the Nov. 5 presidential election.
“President Putin said that he wants to meet with me as soon as possible,” Trump claimed.
“So we have to wait for this. But we need to end that horrible, horrible war.”
Trump emphasized the heavy military losses incurred in the war and repeated his claims that Russia would not have launched the full-scale invasion if he had been president in 2022.
“Millions of soldiers have died,” he said.
“We’ve got to stop it, it’s ridiculous. That war would have never happened if I was president.”
Earlier this week, Putin on Dec. 19 said that he was prepared to meet with Trump at “any time” to discuss ending the war in Ukraine.
Trump will take office on Jan 20, 2025. His return to the White House is expected to mark a significant shift in U.S. policy on Ukraine, with a focus on pressuring Kyiv to make a deal with Moscow.
President Volodymyr Zelensky met with Trump on Dec. 7 in Paris, along with French President Emmanuel Macron, in the leaders’ first in-person meeting since the election. Zelensky reported that he praised Trump during the meeting, telling him he was the only one Putin feared.
Following the meeting with Zelensky, Trump said the Ukrainian president appeared ready “to make a deal and stop the madness” and that Putin should do the same after incurring staggering losses in Ukraine.
Trump has nominated retired general Keith Kellogg as his special Ukrainian peace envoy, tasked with leading negotiations between Kyiv and Moscow. Kellogg is expected to visit Ukraine before Trump’s inauguration.
Kellogg previously co-authored a peace plan that would freeze the front line in Ukraine, take NATO’s accession off the table for an extended period, and partially lift sanctionsimposed on Russia. The plan would also cut off military aid to Ukraine unless Kyiv agreed to enter negotiations.
The Financial Times reported on Dec. 20 that despite these proposals, Trump intends to continue sending U.S. weapons to Ukraine when he becomes president.
Putin’s genocidal re-invasion would have definitely happened had the President-elect been in office at the time. Putin determined he could do this because he believed the US, the EU and its member states, NATO and its member states, the UN, etc would not stop him. And that based on the US’s tepid, at best, response during the original invasion of 2014 and the invasion of Georgia in 2008, that the US wouldn’t stand up for Ukraine at all. Moreover, Putin watched the President-elect’s people negotiate the abject surrender of the US to the Taliban.
A kind reminder of who should be pressured to stop the fighting.
— Olena Halushka (@halushka.bsky.social) December 19, 2024 at 1:15 PM
President Zelenskyy made an address today for Ukrainian Diplomats Day. Video below, English transcript after the jump.
War for Ukraine Day 1,033: Time for Someone’s Annual ReviewPost + Comments (28)
Here are the final tallies on election-eligible turnout. Wisconsin hit 77% and Minnesota hit 76%, and the state chairs of those two parties are running to head the DNC, so that’s some good news. Overall, the US had 64% of the eligible population vote.
High Country News has a piece on an alternate post-election poll that shows that Native voters went for Harris at a higher rate than the initial national exit polling.
Other highlights showed that 15% respondents said this was their first time voting, and that support for Harris was higher among Native women, young voters and people who speak an Indigenous language at home.
According to early analyses by voting rights advocates, this election cycle saw a lower turnout among some rural and urban Native communities. This tracks with nationwide findings for some voters compared to the last presidential election in 2020. But the reasons behind the drop in Native voter turnout are likely complicated, as are efforts to draw conclusions concerning voting patterns. The results of the National Exit Poll, distributed in early November by NBC News, CNN and others, were seized upon by conservative outlets and often reposted online devoid of context. Indigenous researchers and community advocates pointed out problems with the data that amounted to misinformation — the sample size was just 229 people, for example, and no polling locations on tribal lands were included. In an email to High Country News, Edison Research, which conducted the poll, agreed that while the poll met Edison’s criteria, it was limited in scope. “This data point from our survey should not be taken as a definitive word on the American Indian vote,” said Randy Brown at Edison Research.
The poll underscores the challenges involved in gathering accurate voting data that is reflective of Indigenous communities, which are not politically homogeneous. “Native people are often omitted from these types of conversations. But then to have the rare cases in which we are included being misrepresentations of our voices is equally as problematic,” said Stephanie Fryberg (Tulalip), professor of psychology at Northwestern University and founding director of the Research for Indigenous Social Action and Equity Center. Fryberg wrote a widely circulated op-ed for Native News Onlinedetailing some of the issues with the Edison Research poll.
My first organizing work when I was old enough to vote was registering voters and gathering absentee ballots in SD. This was the early 80’s, and I had to become a notary public to do it, because the Republicans early voter-suppression legislation required a notary to witness registration or an absentee ballot. This was mainly aimed at the Native communities in the state. It’s been going on forever, of course, and getting worse every cycle. Yet, Natives still vote, and they vote overwhelmingly for Democrats.
(The national numbers are via Paul Campos at LGM.)