Can the US recover from this phase?

Or does our democratic republic go down?

Richard Burr, the chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, apparently provided the White House with information on the Russia investigation after a private briefing with then-FBI Director James Comey, according to special counsel Robert Mueller's redacted report.

Within a week of Comey briefing the "Gang of Eight" congressional leaders about the FBI's Russia probe in March 2017, Mueller wrote that then-White House Counsel Donald McGahn's office was in contact with the North Carolina Republican "and appears to have received information about the status of the FBI investigation."

As Mueller notes, it's unclear if Trump was aware of the briefing at the time. But Annie Donaldson, who served as McGahn's chief of staff, wrote then that "POTUS in panic/chaos ... Need binders to put in front of POTUS. (1) All things related to Russia."

  NBC

The information concerned the fact that the FBI was investigating targets including...

[...] former national security adviser Michael Flynn, former campaign chairman Paul Manafort and former Trump campaign advisers Carter Page and George Papadopoulos.

[...]

Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., and a member of the panel, said in a statement: "Given evidence from the Mueller report, the committee must take steps to ensure its investigations do not leak to the executive branch."

When Trump is the executive, Republicans on the Committee can be expected to leak.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

It's Elie Mystal

And his argument is unassailable.

Does the asshat still have lawyers?

Because this case is back on.

If there's a statue of limitations passed, somebody should tell Alvin Bragg.  (I think he knows the law, Donald.)

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

The crux of the Nichols killing, black communities, and police brutality

The race of a cop is “cop.” Nobody should have needed to see a video of five Black cops lynching Tyre Nichols to figure that out. Nichols was beaten to death by Black cops (five of whom have been charged with murder); Tasered by a white cop who encouraged the beating (who has been suspended but still not charged); and abandoned by people with a duty to render aid (three Memphis first responders have been relieved of duty) as he slumped, dying of injuries, for 23 minutes until an ambulance showed up on the scene. [...] Then, a police force made up of a diverse group of people whose forebears were enslavers, slaves, and slave catchers took to the streets in riot gear and armored personnel carriers to keep Memphis “safe” from people who wanted to protest the brutality of those cops.

[...]

All cops are employed to uphold a system, a system conceived of by white folks, for white folks, that operates to oppress and control Black people. It’s not surprising if Black people do not even find it difficult to participate in the oppression of other Black people, especially when they align themselves with an institution (in this case, the police) instead of working to take down that system. To put it a different way: When a cop says they “bleed blue,” believe them.

[...]

Normally, the police union’s spokespeople run to any camera they can find to defend officers caught performing violence, but not this time. We can also clearly see that the justice system cares about the race or ethnicity of police officers: These five Black officers were fired and charged faster than any white police officer I can remember, including George Floyd’s murderer, Derek Chauvin.

[...]

Systemic racism does not require an individual to harbor hatred for another race in their hearts; it simply requires individuals to participate in the corrupted system.

[...]

Studies show that even when a massive influx of cops into a city leads to a small reduction in major crimes like homicide, it comes with an explosion of arrests for petty, victimless crimes, and, of course, increased brutality against Black people.

[...]

Capturing (and if need be, killing) their targets is the primary way they justify their continued existence. Police are judged everywhere based on their numbers of arrests, the number of people they catch. And like all predators, they tend to target the weakest among us.

[...]

Many in [black] economically depressed communities, which are legitimately beset by crime, are willing to accept more oppressive policing than what happens in white communities in exchange for its false promises of enhanced safety.

[...]

The fact that our society doesn’t often believe Black people when we are the victims of police brutality and violence, or thinks that we are ultimately at fault for the violence against us, has the effect of isolating us from that society and makes us targets of violent cops. It’s the same reason serial killers usually start by preying on those who are homeless, who engage in sex work, who are addicted to drugs or are otherwise marginalized by society.

[...]

Even with clear and convincing video, cops are only convicted when their Black victim dies face down begging for their life. Any attempt to fight back, to live, results in acquittal for the cop.

[...]

Another officer, a medic, a neighbor—there were any number of people who could have intervened to save Nichols’s life. Nobody did. The cops who beat him knew nobody would be coming to help.

They also assumed nobody would demand justice after the fact. Note that the most damning video of his murder does not come from the cops’ body cameras (which, as usual in this situation, mysteriously did not capture the full encounter) but from a surveillance camera mounted on the light post that the cops probably didn’t know was there.

[...]

If Nichols had survived his injuries and there were no video evidence of this encounter, the officers would still be on the force and Nichols would be the one charged with a crime.

[...]

I hope they don’t get me. I hope they don’t get my kids. But all I can do is hope, because too many people have decided that my death or my children’s death is a price they’re willing to pay for the fear the cops induce. In the meantime, asking me to differentiate between a white cop and a Black cop is like asking me whether a tiger is orange with black stripes, or black with orange stripes. It really doesn’t matter.

[...]

It should go without saying that this kind of predatory behavior cannot be “reformed.” You can’t fix this with more training videos or diversity initiatives or trust falls or whatever else mayors claim their police need more money to do. As long as we accept armed paramilitary forces roving the streets looking for people to catch, we accept the disproportionate murder of Black people at the behest of the state.

  Elie Mystal @ The Nation

I cannot imagine what it must be like to be a black parent. And I am so damned grateful. How black people have not risen, organized en masse as a people, against the state is beyond me.  Other than the fact they know they would lose.

UPDATE 02/08/2023:  I'm guessing this is why those officers were shut down so fast.  They had severely beaten another man at a traffic stop just three days earlier.

Jim Jordan is still an ass

Jim Jordan will always be an ass.

Jim Jordan, the man who famously turned a blind eye to sexual abuse of young men under his care while he was an assistant wrestling coach at Ohio State University.  And who claimed exoneration when an investigative report said there was no "contemporaneous documentary evidence" to implicate him.  It did say numerous athletes testified that Jordan was told about and was aware of the allegations.

MAGA

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Here we go

Multiple GOP lawmakers tell NPR that embattled New York Republican Rep. George Santos has voluntarily recused himself from serving on committees temporarily.

Santos made those comments during the GOP's weekly closed-door conference meeting Tuesday morning.

Santos noted his presence was a distraction, those in the meeting said. He did not answer questions from NPR as he left the meeting.

  NPR

Yeah, there's more to this "decision".

Santos declined to comment Tuesday morning, telling reporters that “what happens in conference stays in conference.”

Santos’s move comes after he met with Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) on Monday.

“I met with George Santos yesterday and I think it was an appropriate decision that until he could clear everything up he’s off of committees right now,” McCarthy told reporters following the closed-door conference hearing.

“We had a discussion, he asked me if he could do that. So I think it was the appropriate decision,” McCarthy said.

  The Hill

HE asked if he could do that. Uh-huh. McCarthy just duped Santos by telling him it was "temporary".

“Going through Ethics on some of these concerns,” McCarthy said. “The voters have elected him, they’ll have a voice here in Congress, until he answers all those questions then he’ll, at that time he’ll be able to be seated on committees.”

Also, there may well be some attempt to get a vote to boot Ilham Omar off her committee involved.

“Just all the controversy surrounding him and then while we’re working to remove Ilhan Omar from Foreign Affairs,” Greene said.

h/t Stephen

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

UPDATE  12:34 pm:

Alvin Bragg is afraid Letitia James will beat him to the prize

"Potential".  Yeah. Whatever.  I'll believe he pays consequences for his crimes when I see it.  So far, the only person near or in on Trump's many crimes to remotely pay anything for it is his ex-attorney, Michael Cohen.  And in fact, this particular crime is the one Cohen ended up serving time in jail for.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

UPDATE 01/31/2023:

Keep talking, pal.

Earlier this month, prosecutors met with Michael Cohen, Trump’s former personal attorney and fixer who was convicted of federal charges in 2018 for paying the hush money to Daniels and ex-Playboy model Karen McDougal.

[...]

National Enquirer’s former publisher David Pecker was spotted heading into the Centre Street building in the morning as part of Bragg’s revived efforts to charge Trump, 76, according to sources.

Pecker was involved in the $130,000 payout to Daniels .

[...]

Prosecutors want to interview other witnesses, like Dylan Howard, the Enquirer’s former editor, and Jeffrey McConney and Deborah Tarasoff, two workers at Trump’s company, sources told the New York Times. The three have not yet testified before the grand jury.

[...]

Trump could face charges of falsifying business records, as federal filings show Cohen was reimbursed for the hush-money payment as a legal expense.

[...]

One of the [former] prosecutors, Mark Pomerantz, has since penned a book, “People V. Donald Trump: An Inside Account,” whose impending publication has prompted Bragg to issue a warning to Simon & Schuster that the book could prejudice his investigation.

  NY Post

What's the big deal about the debt ceiling?

Here's a relatively short, understandable (and even entertaining) explanation of the country's debt and the debt ceiling controversy for people who are not economists...

Do yourself a favor and listen.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Missing radioactive capsule in Australia

Emergency officials in Western Australia warned that a tiny radioactive capsule was on the loose, with a harried hunt underway along a lengthy stretch of highway for what was essentially a toxic needle in a haystack.

[...]

The capsule — which is less than a third of an inch long — went missing somewhere along the more than 800-mile stretch of road between Newman and Perth, the department said. It contains cesium-137, a radioactive material used in gauges for mining, one of the main industries in resource-rich Western Australia.

[...]

“Exposure to this substance could cause radiation burns or radiation sickness,” it said, cautioning people not to touch it or move it if they come across it. Anyone who sees the capsule should stay at least five meters (16 feet) away from it and report it, the department said.

[...]

Specialists are focusing on “strategic sites” along the route the truck took, Ray said, noting they were concentrating on high-population areas near Perth.

[...]

Darryl Ray, acting head of the emergency department, said in a statement Sunday that officials had received specialized equipment to search for the capsule. The equipment will allow workers to look for the capsule while in a moving vehicle, and they plan to use it this week, he said.

[...]

It’s possible the capsule has been missing for a couple of weeks. It departed the mine on Jan. 12 and was thought to have arrived on Jan. 16, but its disappearance was discovered Wednesday when it was missing from the package it was transported in, with the gauge inside “broken apart” with screws and a bolt missing, the department said. Officials said they believe the capsule fell off the back of a truck.

  WaPo

Fell off the back of a truck. Really? Is this how they ship something dangerous? On the back edge of an open truck? Bullshit. That is not what happened.  The gauge mysteriously broke, sending screws and a bolt - and the dangerous capsule - flying?  Bullshit.  That is not what happened.  Could they not come up with a more believable story?

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

UPDATE 02/01/2023:

They found it.  So they say that's where they found it.

FBI agent arrested for ties to Oleg Deripaska

Charles McGonigal, who was the special agent in charge of counterintelligence in the FBI's New York Field Office, is under arrest over his ties to Oleg Deripaska, a Russian billionaire who has been sanctioned by the United States and criminally charged last year with violating those sanctions.

McGonigal retired from the FBI in 2018. He was arrested Saturday afternoon after he arrived at JFK Airport following travel in Sri Lanka, the sources said.

[...]

He was charged along with a court interpreter, Sergey Shestakov, who also worked with Deripaska.

McGonigal, 54, is charged with violating U.S. sanctions by trying to get Deripaska off the sanctions list. McGonigal is one of the highest ranking former FBI officials ever charged with a crime.

[...]

Both face money laundering charges in addition to charges for violating sanctions. Each of four counts carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison.

[...]

After leaving the FBI, McGonigal subsequently worked for Deripaska through a law firm representing the Russian oil tycoon.

[...]

McGonigal then worked directly for Deripaska, getting an initial payment of $51,000 and then payments of $41,790 each month for three months from August 2021 to November 2021.

  ABC

You may recall Deripaska was in the news a lot when the Russia, Russia, Russia "hoax" brought about impeachment charges against Donald Trump.

"The FBI is committed to the enforcement of economic sanctions designed to protect the United States and our allies, especially against hostile activities of a foreign government and its actors," FBI Assistant Director in Charge Michael Driscoll said in a statement. "Russian oligarchs like Oleg Deripaska perform global malign influence on behalf of the Kremlin and are associated with acts of bribery, extortion, and violence."

[...]

The U.S. Attorney's Office in Washington, D.C., unsealed a separate case Monday against McGonigal on charges he received $225,000 in cash from an individual with business interests in Europe who McGonigal knew was an employee of a foreign intelligence service.

When I learned of this story, I first thought of another story about which I'm currently reading: "The Fourth Man". It's an account of former CIA official Bob Baer about a double agent passing information to Russia who has never been caught, who is/was in either the CIA or the FBI. I think maybe that person would be older than McGonigal, because the evidence of the spying dealt with incidents in the mid-eighties, and the spy is believed to have been in the top ranks, probably of the CIA. On the other hand, we haven't been told McGonigal has been involved in espionage per se. Still, we probably won't know the extent of what's been going on because neither the CIA nor FBI like to air their dirty laundry.

And, of course, it still leaves the question of whether any double agents are currently working in our intelligence agencies. I think it's almost certain there are some.

An interesting conclusion in the Baer account is that this country may be at least partially responsible for ex-KGB officer Vladimir Putin's current position because with Saint Ronnie Regan's acclaimed destruction of the Soviet Union, the US stopped keeping close track of Russian intelligence agencies. I would have to argue then, that was not only a huge mistake for the world, it was a huge mistake for the US leading to the election of Donald Trump.

If you're interested in the fourth man story, there's also a 2-part podcast on it. And a YouTube investigative video. In July last year, a former CIA official who was a prime suspect came forward to deny he was the spy.  He would of course, wouldn't he?

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

UPDATE 02/17/2023:  McGonigal story in Rolling Stone.

Police state brutality

Read this article about the police killing of Tyre Nichols and then ask yourself this question:  if those five black police officers had been white, would they also have been quickly fired and charged with murder?

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

UPDATE 11:45 am:

UPDATE 01/31/2023:

That's in addition to two additional police officers being suspended.

UPDATE 02/08/2023:  I'm guessing this is why those officers were shut down so fast.  They had severely beaten another man at a traffic stop just three days earlier.

The Santos news never stops

Is he a money laundering or mere campaign finance violation?  If it's money laundering, Santos could end up "falling" out of a hotel window.

In September 2020, George Santos’ congressional campaign reported that Victoria and Jonathan Regor had each contributed $2,800—the maximum amount—to his first bid for a House seat. Their listed address was 45 New Mexico Street in Jackson Township, New Jersey.

A search of various databases reveals no one in the United States named Victoria or Jonathan Regor. Moreover, there is nobody by any name living at 45 New Mexico Street in Jackson. That address doesn’t exist.

[...]

Santos’ 2020 campaign finance reports also list a donor named Stephen Berger as a $2,500 donor and said he was a retiree who lived on Brandt Road in Brawley, California. But a spokesperson for William Brandt, a prominent rancher and Republican donor, tells Mother Jones that Brandt has lived at that address for at least 20 years and “neither he or his wife (the only other occupant [at the Brandt Road home]) have made any donations to George Santos. He does not know Stephen Berger nor has Stephen Berger ever lived at…Brandt Road.”

The Regor and Berger contributions are among more than a dozen major donations to the 2020 Santos campaign for which the name or the address of the donor cannot be confirmed.

[...]

These questionable donations [...] account for more than $30,000 of the $338,000 the Santos campaign raised from individual donors in 2020.

[...]

The retirees listed as big donors for Santos include Jason and Lesley Goodman. They jointly donated $5,600 in late September 2020. A search of public records unearthed no one named Lesley Goodman living in New York. According to Santos’ FEC filings, the Goodmans reside at 220 Central Park South, a luxury skyscraper on Billionaires’ Row. The building’s penthouse sold for a record-breaking $238 million in 2019. Two employees at 220 Central Park South said that no one named Jason Goodman lives in that building.

[...]

Talking Points Memo has also reported a case of a Santos donor being charged for contributions he or she did not approve.

[...]

During Santos’ first run for Congress, only about 45 people maxed out to his campaign during the primary and general elections. In nine instances, Mother Jones found no way to contact the donor because no person by that name now lives at the address listed on the reports the Santos campaign filed with the FEC. None had ever contributed to a candidate before sending Santos the maximum amount allowed, according to FEC records. Nor have any of these donors contributed since. The Santos campaign’s filings list the profession of each of these donors as “retired.”

Two other donors who contributed $1,500 and $2,000, respectively, were listed in Santos’ FEC filings as retirees residing at addresses that do not exist. One was named Rafael Da Silva—which happens to be the name of a Brazilian soccer player.

[...]

Nancy Marks, a veteran Republican campaign operative, served as Santos’ treasurer in 2020 and 2022. On Wednesday, Santos’ campaign committees filed paperwork with the FEC stating that Thomas Datwyler was replacing Marks. (Marks did not respond to requests for comment.)

But [...] Datwyler’s attorney said that Datwyler had told Santos’ team that he did not want the job. For now, Santos appears to be effectively without a treasurer.

  Mother Jones

And up a creek without a paddle.

On Friday, Datwyler sent a letter to the FEC requesting the commission refer the matter to the “appropriate law enforcement agency to determine whether a crime has occurred.” Also that day, the Justice Department asked the FEC to hold off on any enforcement action against Santos, according to the Washington Post—a sign the feds are proceeding with their investigation of Santos.

If you need a refresher on the list of Santos' lies and Brazilian crimes, this article contains them. These false donation reports are different in that they are illegal and prosecutable in this country.

And one more tidbit...

One [legitimate donor] reported giving to the Santos campaign in 2020 after requesting that a campaign fundraiser have someone from the National Republican Congressional Committee contact him and vouch for Santos.

[...]

The Santos fundraiser later arranged for this donor to have breakfast with Santos at a restaurant about an hour’s drive from the donor’s home. The donor arrived for the meeting, but Santos stood him up and, afterward, ignored his calls, according to the donor. Santos later phoned this donor to ask for more money. He did not give again.

Jesus.

UPDATE 11:41 am:

UPDATE 02/02/2023:

Last week, Mother Jones reported that more than a dozen top donors to Rep. George Santos’ first congressional campaign did not appear to exist. The donations from people whose names or addresses could not be confirmed totaled more than $30,000. This pattern of questionable contributions, Mother Jones has learned, extends to Santos’ successful campaign last year.

According to Santos’ campaign filings with the Federal Election Commission, his recent campaign pulled in more than $45,000 from relatives who lived in Queens. This included a mail handler who gave more than $4,000, a painter who donated the maximum of $5,800, and a student who also contributed $5,800. One of Santos’ relatives, who was recorded as giving $5,800, says that they did not make any donation to Santos.

[...]

“It’s all news to me.” This person added, “I don’t have that money to throw around!”

[...]

Santos’ 2022 campaign filings list his sister Tiffany giving more than $5,000. (She also ran Rise NY, a political action committee that paid her more than $21,000.) When a Mother Jones reporter contacted her on Tuesday, she would not confirm whether she or her relatives had made the contributions attributed to them by Santos’ campaign. Last month, the Daily Beast reported that New York court records show that Tiffany was facing potential eviction for failure to pay rent.

[...]

The questions sparked by contributions to Santos’ campaign add to a number of money mysteries dogging Santos. He has yet to identify the source of $705,000 he loaned his 2022 campaign. Nor has he explained his curious personal finances. In 2020, he declared on his financial disclosure form that he had made $55,000 in salary that year working for a company that organized investor conferences. In 2022, his financial disclosure filing stated that he had made between $3.5 million and $11.5 million through a company he set up in May 2021, after another firm he worked for had been accused by the Securities and Exchange Commission of operating a Ponzi scheme. [...] And he has repeatedly lied about his career, education, family history, and much more.

[...]

Several complaints regarding Santos’ campaign finances have been filed with the FEC. He is under investigation by local, state, and federal law enforcement. The Justice Department recently told the FEC to stand down as federal prosecutors pursue a criminal investigation of Santos’ campaign finance practices.

  Mother Jones

"Uterus Inquisition Squad"

Access to medicine shouldn’t be controversial, and it wouldn’t be but for the Christian fundamentalist forces who’ve been emboldened by the right-wing takeover of the Judicial Branch and the Supreme Court’s revocation of reproductive rights. Now, at the very moment mifepristone has become one of the few means of securing widespread abortion access, these people have targeted it for destruction. Back in November, the inaccurately named Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) brought a lawsuit against the FDA challenging its initial approval of mifepristone. The ADF claims that the FDA did not follow its own procedures when it approved the drug.

The lawsuit is so ridiculous that it hardly warrants discussion on the merits. First of all, the statute of limitations allows challenges to FDA procedures for only six years and mifepristone has been approved for over 20. Moreover, Congress passed an amendment to the Food and Drug Act in 2007 that revised the FDA’s procedures and deemed any drug previously approved by the agency to be in compliance with the new rules. There are also jurisdictional problems with the lawsuit. But even if you overlook all these technical legal hurdles, the ADF’s core argument—that the FDA failed to consider the dangers of mifepristone—is wrong. Mifepristone is safe, and no amount of Gregorian chanting from the self-appointed Uterus Inquisition Squad can prove it otherwise.

Unfortunately, we have to treat this incoherent nonsense masquerading as a lawsuit as a serious threat to abortion drugs because of the judge who recently got hold of the case: Matthew Kacsmaryk. Kacsmaryk is a Trump-appointed district court judge in Texas.

[...]

He was an anti-gay crusader for a Christian right law firm before Trump raised him up to be a judge. He claims that homosexuality is a “disorder.” He’s attacked the right to contraception and denounced the “sexual revolution” of the 1960s and ’70s.

[...]

[This case has] not ended up in front of Kacsmaryk by accident or bad luck. Right-wingers have actively sought out Kacsmaryk for their most dubious legal claims by means of the 21st-century version of “forum shopping.”

[...]

In the past, one of the more popular forms of forum-shopping saw lawyers trying to game out whether a state court or federal one would lead to a better outcome. They could do this because many state and federal laws overlap, and many corporations (and the federal government) can be sued in any state they do business in.

[...]

The Supreme Court tried to put a stop to this kind of forum shopping in 1938, in a case called Erie Railroad v. Tompkins. The so-called Erie Doctrine required that in cases where there is a question of whether to apply federal or state law, a federal judge must apply the law as it would be understood in the states where the judge resides.

[...]

You’ll never see a challenge to federal gun regulations filed in California, or a lawsuit against the fossil-fuel industry filed in Texas. Lawyers will always seek to take advantage of the laws most favorable to their clients or positions, wherever those laws happen to exist.

[...]

[L]awyers Steven Vladek and Max Wolson point out that Texas regularly removes cases to federal court to get specific judges, and it works.

[...]

But that’s not what right-wingers are doing now. Instead, they are “judge shopping”—trying to take advantage of the fact that the judges themselves apply the laws differently based on which party appointed them and whether they have even a basic grasp of logic or fairness.

[...]

In the North District of Texas, judges are assigned based on their “divisions,” which break the region down to places like Dallas, Lubbock, and Amarillo. Kacsmaryk is the district judge for Amarillo and, by rule, is assigned every single federal case filed there. If you bring a federal case in Amarillo, you are guaranteed to get Judge Kacsmaryk. As Ian Milihiser put it on Vox, this rule makes Judge Kacsmaryk “one of the most consequential public officials in modern-day America.”

[...]

Meanwhile, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton regularly files suit in the Southern District of Texas, Victoria Division, where the case is guaranteed to end up in front of Judge Drew Tipton, another Trump appointee who is a virulent anti-immigration crusader. Paxton did it again this week to challenge another Biden immigration policy.

[...]

There are no laws, rules, or doctrines to stop this kind of behavior. Arguably, both conservative and liberal lawyers can (and do) engage in judge shopping at some level. What’s supposed to make the process fruitless are the circuit courts of appeal and, ultimately, the Supreme Court.

  The Nation

So much for any liberal lawyer's hopes of judge or forum shopping advantage.

[C]ertain courts of appeal, like that of the Fifth Circuit that presides over Texas, have been captured by right-wing extremists just like the rest of the Republican Party. More problematically, we’ve seen the Supreme Court act quickly to overrule liberal district court judges on emergency appeal but leave in place rulings from conservatives for at least as long as it takes for their cases to make it all the way up to the highest court through normal order. That’s a process that can take years, and sometimes span presidential administrations.

[...]

When you file a lawsuit, the judge should be picked from a pool of all federal judges in a state, and if we’re talking about a federal law, any judge in the country should be in the hopper.

[...]

The circuits exist so that travel wouldn’t be too taxing for the judges, who lived in some central region of the district. But judges no longer need to take two horses and a palanquin hoisted by slaves to get from New Orleans to Amarillo. A Delta flight and an Uber can get anybody anywhere in this country in under 12 hours.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

UPDATE 04/13/2023:  The Texas judge ruled as expected.  Scrambling ensued.

Still ridiculous.

Checking in on John Fetterman

Freshman John Fetterman has been given assignments on the following Senate committees:
Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry
Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs
Environment & Public Works
Joint Economic Committee
Special Committee on Aging

His website is quite plain (good), and lacking in technical sophistication (not great), but the home page lets us know just what his priorities are with this section:

I can't really fault him for not prioritizing web design, but at this point, those are not links.  Hopefully, his team will improve the site and make them so.  Also, all the links that ARE there don't work, so I'm assuming this is a work in progress.  At least the contact links DO work.

Chuck Schumer looks a little like the cat that ate the canary in that picture.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

There is no justice where Trump is concerned

And it often looks like there never will be.

Egged on by Mr. Trump, Attorney General William P. Barr set out in 2019 to dig into their shared theory that the Russia investigation likely stemmed from a conspiracy by intelligence or law enforcement agencies. To lead the inquiry, Mr. Barr turned to a hard-nosed prosecutor named John H. Durham, and later granted him special counsel status to carry on after Mr. Trump left office.

But after almost four years — far longer than the Russia investigation itself — Mr. Durham’s work is coming to an end without uncovering anything like the deep state plot alleged by Mr. Trump and suspected by Mr. Barr.

  NYT

Surprised?

Mr. Barr assigned Mr. Durham to scour the origins of the Russia investigation for wrongdoing, telling Fox News that he wanted to know if “officials abused their power and put their thumb on the scale” in deciding to pursue the investigation.

[...]

Interviews by The Times with more than a dozen current and former officials have revealed an array of previously unreported episodes that show how the Durham inquiry became roiled by internal dissent and ethical disputes as it went unsuccessfully down one path after another.

[...]

Mr. Barr and Mr. Durham never disclosed that their inquiry expanded in the fall of 2019, based on a tip from Italian officials, to include a criminal investigation into suspicious financial dealings related to Mr. Trump.

Was that the basis for Trump's false claims that Italy was involved in nefarious activity against his 2020 campaign? An attempt to preempt whatever might come out from that investigation? No doubt it would have been retaliation, a typical kneejerk Trump reactionto any negative publicity.

The specifics of the tip and how they handled the investigation remain unclear, but Mr. Durham brought no charges over it.

[...]

Mr. Barr and Mr. Durham decided that the tip was too serious and credible to ignore. But rather than assign it to another prosecutor, Mr. Barr had Mr. Durham investigate the matter himself — giving him criminal prosecution powers for the first time — even though the possible wrongdoing by Mr. Trump did not fall squarely within Mr. Durham’s assignment to scrutinize the origins of the Russia inquiry.

[...]

The extraordinary fact that Mr. Durham opened a criminal investigation that included scrutinizing Mr. Trump has remained secret.

Well, until now, I guess.

Taciturn and media-averse, the goateed Mr. Durham had spent more than three decades as a prosecutor before Mr. Trump appointed him the U.S. attorney for Connecticut.

[...]

As a career federal prosecutor, Mr. Durham already revered the office of the attorney general, people who know him say. And as he was drawn into Mr. Barr’s personal orbit, Mr. Durham came to embrace that particular attorney general’s intense feelings about the Russia investigation.

[...]

Referring to the C.I.A. and British spies, Mr. Barr also said he suspected that the N.S.A.’s “friends” had helped instigate the Russia investigation by targeting the Trump campaign, aides briefed on the meeting said. And repeating a sexual vulgarity, he warned that if the N.S.A. wronged him by not doing all it could to help Mr. Durham, Mr. Barr would do the same to the agency.

[...]

Mr. Durham used Russian intelligence memos — suspected by other U.S. officials of containing disinformation — to gain access to emails of an aide to George Soros, the financier and philanthropist who is a favorite target of the American right and Russian state media. Mr. Durham used grand jury powers to keep pursuing the emails even after a judge twice rejected his request for access to them. The emails yielded no evidence that Mr. Durham has cited in any case he pursued.

[...]

The publicly unexplained resignation in 2020 of his No. 2 and longtime aide, Nora R. Dannehy, was the culmination of a series of disputes between them over prosecutorial ethics. A year later, two more prosecutors strongly objected to plans to indict a lawyer with ties to Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign based on evidence they warned was too flimsy, and one left the team in protest of Mr. Durham’s decision to proceed anyway. (A jury swiftly acquitted the lawyer.)

[...]

By summer 2020, it was clear that the hunt for evidence supporting Mr. Barr’s hunch about intelligence abuses had failed. But he waited until after the 2020 election to publicly concede that there had turned out to be no sign of “foreign government activity” and that the C.I.A. had “stayed in its lane” after all.

I'm guessing it wasn't a "hunch" anyway.  It was simply Barr's own attempt to "find" something to exonerate Trump and keep him in power.

Mr. Barr has never prosecuted a case and is known for using his law enforcement platform to opine on culture-war issues and politics. He had effectively auditioned to be Mr. Trump’s attorney general by asserting to a New York Times reporter that there was more basis to investigate Mrs. Clinton than Mr. Trump’s “so-called ‘collusion’” with Russia, and by writing a memo suggesting a way to shield Mr. Trump from scrutiny for obstruction of justice.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

As was Bill Barr.

Why should they?

They don't care about losing the popular vote.  They care about NOT losing the electoral college system.  They've already molded their approach to elections to simply win the electoral count.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

SCOTUS in a nutshell

He's consistently dishonest

Trump announced on his social media platform on Tuesday that he won the Senior Club Championship at Trump International Golf Club in unincorporated West Palm Beach last weekend, despite not playing the first round of the tournament.

[...]

Trump called it a "great honor" to have won "on of the best courses in the Country, in Palm Beach County," in his post on Truth Social.

“Competed against many fine golfers and was hitting the ball long and straight," he wrote. "The reason that I announce this on fabulous TRUTH is that, in a very real way, it serves as a physical exam, only MUCH tougher. You need strength and stamina to WIN, & I have strength & stamina – most others don’t. You also need strength & stamina to GOVERN!”

[...]

Members arrived the second day surprised to see Trump with a five-point lead, according to the Daily Mail. But Trump never played the first round as he was attending a funeral in North Carolina of ardent supporter Lynette Hardaway, known by the moniker “Diamond” of the conservative political commentary duo Diamond and Silk.

Trump told tournament organizers he played a strong round on the course Thursday, two days before the tournament started, and decided that would count as his Saturday score for the club championship. That score was five points better than any competitor posted during Saturday's first round.

  USA Today

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Unsurprising

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Military aid to Ukraine

Germany is sending tanks, which Zelensky has repeatedly requested for almost a year.  Not many - 14 - but it's a start, and it's shaming the US into "considering" sending Abrams tanks.  We will, of course, send more than Germany.  Of course.

The United States appears poised to start a process that would eventually send dozens of its M1 Abrams battle tanks to Ukraine, US media reported, in a reversal that could have significant implications for Kyiv’s efforts to repel Russian forces.

  Guardian

"Dozens" being "just over 30."

The move follows reports on Tuesday that Berlin has succumbed to huge international and domestic pressure and was set to announce that it will send German-manufactured tanks to Ukraine, and allow other countries to do the same.

[...]

“If the United States decides to supply tanks, then justifying such a step with arguments about ‘defensive weapons’ will definitely not work. This would be another blatant provocation against the Russian Federation,” [Russia’s ambassador to the United States, Anatoly] Antonov said in remarks published on the embassy’s Telegram messaging app on Wednesday.

[...]

In response to the reports, Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, said in his nightly address that Russia was preparing for a new wave of aggression and that he had seen “A lot of effort, words, and promises” about tanks. “But it is important to see the reality: it is not about five, or 10, or 15 tanks. The need is greater. Every day we are doing everything necessary to fill the deficit. And I am grateful to everyone who supports us in this.

[...]

Ukraine says heavily armoured western battle tanks would give its troops more mobility and protection ahead of a new Russian offensive that Kyiv expects in the near future. They could also help Ukraine retake some of the territory that has fallen to Russia.

[...]

According to German media reports citing government sources, Berlin plans to send a company of Leopard 2A6 battle tanks – usually comprising 14 of the vehicles – in conjunction with other partners, namely Scandinavian countries in possession of the units.

Berlin is also understood to have said it would give its permission for export licences for countries such as Finland, Sweden and Poland who have bought the tanks from Germany, allowing them to be sent to Ukraine.

[...]

A decision by the United States to send the Abrams would come just days after Washington argued against sending the tanks , despite demands from Kyiv and public pressure from Berlin.

Yeah, well, we can't be seen to be being led by Germany. Also...

No indication has been given on the timing of the tanks’ arrival in Ukraine. The Leopard manufacturer Rheinmetall has said they could be ready to be dispatched by March.

[...]

[R]eports said it was possible the Biden administration could use the USAI process to buy the Abrams from allies who have them, refurbish them, then send them to Ukraine. The process can take months and even years.

So...no help at all, really. Just a headline that we're sending tanks.

UPDATE 1/26:

Georgia decision on 2020 election interference "imminent"

“Decisions are imminent,” Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis said during a Tuesday court hearing called by the Georgia trial court judge overseeing the “special purpose grand jury” that Willis has used to gather evidence over the last year.

[...]

The special grand jury concluded its investigation earlier this month, dissolving in early January, and recommended that its findings be released publicly. [Judge Robert] McBurney then called for a hearing to discuss whether to follow the panel’s recommendation or maintain the secrecy of the report. Willis told the judge that making the report public could jeopardize impending prosecutions.

“In this case, the state understands the media’s inquiry and the world’s interest. But we have to be mindful of protecting future defendants’ rights,” Willis said, emphasizing that multiple people could face charges.

  Politico

Not sure who they might be, but Willis has collected evidence from General Mike Flynn, Lindsey Graham, and Trump lawyer John Eastman, among others

McBurney noted that Willis’ probe has been accompanied by an extraordinary release of information and evidence by the House Jan. 6 select committee and from witnesses being called before a federal grand jury probing the same matters, none of which had derailed Willis’ probe. He also noted that there was little to stop individual grand jurors from simply telling others about the findings in their report.

But McBurney said he wanted more time to consider the arguments and said any ruling he made would provide significant advance notice before the potential release of the report.

[...]

If Willis opts to pursue charges against Trump or others, she needs to present her evidence to a traditional grand jury, which could then issue indictments.

She better have some damned good reasons not to pursue charges if she decides not to.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

UPDATE 04:19 pm:

From yesterday:

More "misplaced" classfiied documents

I've been hearing having classified documents isn't uncommon.

A lawyer for former Vice President Mike Pence discovered about a dozen documents marked as classified at Pence’s Indiana home last week, and he has turned those classified records over to the FBI, multiple sources familiar with the matter told CNN.

[...]

Pence asked his lawyer with experience handling classified material to conduct the search of his home out of an abundance of caution.

[...]

The discovery comes after Pence has repeatedly said he did not have any classified documents in his possession.

  CNN

This is actually absurd. The USG classifies way too many documents for no - or stupid (including fear of embarrassment) - reasons. But there's no reason on earth classified documents should end up in private possession. If you don't know how to set up a system, ask a librarian.

The vice president’s residence at the US Naval Observatory in Washington has a secure facility for handling classified material along with other security, and it would be common for classified documents to be there for the vice president to review.

[...]

Some of the boxes at Pence’s Indiana home were packed up from the vice president’s residence, while some came from the White House in the final days of the Trump administration, which included last-minute things that did not go through the process the rest of Pence’s documents did.

[...]

Pence’s lawyer immediately alerted the National Archives, the sources said. In turn, the Archives informed the Justice Department.

A lawyer for Pence told CNN that the FBI requested to pick up the documents with classified markings that evening, and Pence agreed.

[...]

On Monday, Pence’s legal team drove the boxes back to Washington, DC, and handed them over to the Archives to review the rest of the material for compliance with the Presidential Records Act.

[...]

The classified material was stored in boxes that first went to Pence’s temporary home in Virginia before they were moved to Indiana, according to the sources. The boxes were not in a secure area, but they were taped up and were not believed to have been opened since they were packed, according to Pence’s attorney. Once the classified documents were discovered, the sources said they were placed inside a safe located in the house.

[...]

“The bottom line is I don’t know how this happened, we need to get to the bottom of it,” said Sen. Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican. “I don’t believe for a minute that Mike Pence is trying to intentionally compromise national security. But clearly we’ve got a problem here.”

Lindsey has a fine grasp of the obvious.

And maybe go through your papers if you've ever been anywhere near classified docs in your career.  (Actually, that's probably what's happening and why Mike Pence's lawyer found some.)

And, like Biden, Pence condemned the man before him for mishandling classified docs...

You might think Pence, who boasts about his Christian bona fides, would be more conversant with Biblical admonitions against casting stones and picking motes out of eyes.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

UPDATE 04:11 pm:  And Congressman Donalds only got two days to be self-righteous.  

That, and this, are still up on his Twitter account.  Somebody should let him know.

No comment yet on Pence's "violation of the espionage act."

UPDATE 01/25/2023:

Does that mean some people should be fired?

Perhaps they do, but unless someone credible comes foward to claim knowledge of it, I don't see this happening.

UPDATE 01/25/2023:  Still no comments on Donalds' Twitter account about Mike Pence's classified document story.

Another day, another American mass shooting

A gunman is at large after he allegedly shot and killed three people at a Circle K convenience store and gas station in Yakima, Washington, early Tuesday, authorities said.

[...]

Police identified the suspect as 21-year-old Jarid Haddock of Yakima County.

He allegedly fled in a car believed to be a gray or silver Chrysler 200, the chief said.

  Yahoo

American exceptionalism.

UPDATE 02:53 pm:  Make that "other" American mass shootings...

Seven people have been killed in an agricultural region of northern California, authorities said on Monday, the latest shootings to rattle the state in recent days.

Two fatal shootings took place at a mushroom farm and a trucking firm on the outskirts of Half Moon Bay, a coastal community about 30 miles south of San Francisco, officials said.

Deputies responding to a call found four people dead and a fifth victim wounded at the first location in Half Moon Bay, then found three more dead at the second location nearby, Sheriff Christina Corpus told a news conference on Monday evening.

Police have arrested a suspect, named as 67-year-old Zhao Chunli, in connection with the shooting.

  Guardian

Des Moines resident Preston Walls, 18, has been charged with two counts of first degree murder, one count of attempted murder and criminal gang participation following a fatal shooting that occurred Monday afternoon.

Police say Gionni Dameron, 18, and Rashad Carr, 16, were killed. Both were from Des Moines. An adult who was also shot and seriously injured has been identified as William Holmes, known as Will Keeps, the founder and CEO of Starts Right Here, the alternative education program where the incident occurred.

  Iowa Public Radio

Guilty

Another day, another American mass shooting

A dozen people were injured in a Baton Rouge nightclub shooting, authorities in Louisiana said Sunday.

One of the victims is in critical condition, police said. No arrests have been made, but police believe the early morning attack was "targeted."

"This was not a random act of violence, based on the preliminary investigating efforts," Baton Rouge Police Chief Murphy Paul said at a news conference Sunday afternoon. "We believe that this was a targeted event, where someone was specifically targeted and others were injured in that process."

  NPR

Poor aim?

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

If only

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Diamond eulogy

Especially Tiffany.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

Santos saga continues: financial crime?

A month after the Securities and Exchange Commission filed a lawsuit in 2021 accusing a Florida-based company of operating a Ponzi scheme, one of the firm’s account managers assured an anxious client that his money was safe.

The client, a wealthy investor named Andrew Intrater, had been lured by annual returns of 16 percent and had invested $625,000 in a fund offered by the company, Harbor City Capital — in part because he trusted and admired the account manager, an aspiring politician named George Santos.

[...]

The letter of credit did not exist, the S.E.C. would later tell a court. The $100 million that Mr. Santos told Mr. Intrater that he had personally raised for Harbor City did not exist either, the commission said. Nor, seemingly, did the close to $4 million that Mr. Santos claimed he and his family had invested in Harbor City.

Mr. Santos’s representations form the basis of a sworn declaration that Mr. Intrater gave the S.E.C. in May 2022, as part of its Harbor City investigation.

[...]

Mr. Intrater told the S.E.C. that the representations influenced his decision to invest in Mr. Santos’s business and political endeavors — an allegation that could leave Mr. Santos vulnerable to criminal charges.

[...]

He shared with The New York Times text messages that he exchanged with Mr. Santos, as well as documents and the declaration that he had given to the S.E.C. — all outlining the ways in which he said Mr. Santos had misled him.

[...]

Although Mr. Santos claimed to have raised $100 million for Harbor City, S.E.C. documents say the firm had only raised a total of $17 million. And while Mr. Santos said that he and his family had invested millions of dollars because of Harbor City, financial disclosures filed during his 2020 run for Congress show that he earned just $55,000 that year, and had no assets.

[...]

According to court documents filed by the S.E.C., Harbor City told investors that it had discovered a way to make guaranteed money by investing in digital marketing and advertising.

But Harbor City was not doing any such investing, and only a small part of the $17 million it raised was used for legitimate business expenses, the government claims. The company, according to civil charges filed by the S.E.C., was instead engaged in a Ponzi scheme, using investments from new clients to make payments to older investors.

[...]

Mr. Intrater became one of Mr. Santos’s more generous patrons. In addition to his investments in Harbor City funds, first reported by The Washington Post, he donated more than $200,000 to Mr. Santos’s election campaign, associated political committees and a New York PAC that he would later learn was controlled by Mr. Santos’s sister.

[...]

Mr. Santos, who was not named in the S.E.C. suit, has publicly said he had no knowledge of wrongdoing at Harbor City.

[...]

Mr. Intrater is a private equity investor perhaps best known for his financial ties to Viktor Vekselberg, his cousin. Mr. Vekselberg is a Russian oligarch whose U.S. assets were frozen in 2018 by the Treasury Department because of his ties to the Kremlin.

[...]

Mr. Intrater is also known for his relationship with Michael D. Cohen, Donald J. Trump’s onetime personal lawyer; Mr. Intrater’s firm, Columbus Nova, signed Mr. Cohen to a $1 million consulting contract when the businessman was looking for new investment opportunities in 2018.

  NYT

I think you can judge the legitimacy of Mr. Intrater's activities themeselves by the connections he has to well-known shady characters.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.