Former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations and current presidential candidate Nikki Haley, appeared on Fox News’ The Story show(03/30/23), where she slammed Russia’s President Vladimir Putin, calling him “a mafia type dictator”, following the arrest of American journalist Evan Gershkovich (Wall Street Journal) in Russia, ostensibly on espionage charges.
Importantly, Haley also used the arrest of the American journalist to distinguish herself from former President Trump and other future GOP presidential nomination contenders regarding Putin/Russia.
Haley specifically told host Martha MacCallum re Putin(4:11): “This is a reminder to the American people. Whenever you doubt whether Ukraine needs to win, look at this Mafia type dictator, who basically does not value human life, and does not value freedom, this is another example of that.”
Asked directly about flattering statements former President Trump and other Republicans have made regarding Putin and his invasion of Ukraine, Haley responded(6:54): “This is a dictator and a thug. There wasn’t anything savvy about it [Russia/Ukraine war]. This was just a malicious move to go take over a freedom-loving country. That is why it is so important for us to remember we have to defend Ukraine. This is a war for freedom. This is one where the dictators and the thugs of the world are trying to move in and take over all freedom-loving countries…You are either with Putin and Xi, or you’re with freedom-loving countries…This is not the time to get weak in the knees on Russia.”
There’s no other way to interpret Haley’s remarks other than she is making it abundantly clear that she is diametrically opposed to former President Trump’s views on Vladimir Putin/Russia.
Bottom line folks, for a politician who has been credibly accused of waffling, or abandoning her long held principles following attacks by Trump, it was quite refreshing to see her going out of her way and setting the record straight on how she views Putin/Russia–a view, by the way, most Americans agree with. The only question now is whether Nikki Haley will stick to her views on Putin/Russia after a Trump “counterpunch”? As Trump famously says, “We’ll see what happens.”
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An interesting segment on CNN’s Outfront w/ErinBurnett(03/16/23 )revealed that five months ago, renowned Economist Douglas Diamond, who won a Nobel Prize for his research in bank runs, predicted, even warned, that banks would go under if the federal reserve kept raising interest rates. This of course means that the recent collapse of Silicon Valley Bank(SVB), and the ripple effect it has caused around the banking world, were totally foreseeable. Host Erin Burnett rightly wondered why nobody at the fed heeded warnings from this esteemed economist known for his work on bank runs?
Douglas Diamond specifically told host Erin Burnett when asked whether he was surprised by the collapse of SVB(1:21): “I’m actually quite surprised. I realized that they[interest rate hikes]could wreak havoc, and I assumed that the supervisors–the Fed, FDIC, control of the currency–would have carefully looked at the balance sheets of all these banks and made sure that they would have been resilient, could have made it through this huge interest rate increase. So clearly from the Silicon Valley National Bank and First Republic, it’s pretty much the interest rate increases that caused their problems, so I’m surprised that we got here, and I would have thought that either the Fed would have slowed interest rate increases a bit, or even better, made sure these banks were stable so they could increase them to fight inflation.”
More importantly, Douglas Diamond pointed out that this was not a problem caused by lack of adequate banking regulations, but rather, just a failure of supervision. He specifically told host Erin Burnett(3:30): “Within the existing laws, the supervisors and regulators could have done a thousand times better.”
Bottom line folks, the collapse of SVB and its ripple effects, were totally foreseeable. The Biden administration is justified in extending generous bailouts to affected banks in an effort to prevent a “contagion” from SVB. Reasonable people can reasonably disagree about the wisdom of extending generous bailouts to struggling banks who made bad financial decisions. What we must not disagree about however, is that the supervisors and regulators, whose job it was to prevent this totally foreseeable crisis, must be held to account–beginning with Fed Chair Jerome Powell.
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Ryan Goodnan, a former Special Counsel at the Department of Defense, dropped a bombshell on CNN’s OutFront show(03/21/23 ), telling host Erin Burnett that contrary to popular belief, New York legal precedent does indeed dictate that Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg must bring criminal charges against former President Trump for falsifying of business records.
Goodman said that after analyzing cases going back 15 years related to falsifying of business records, there is already more than enough evidence to indict Trump. Put another way, regular people have been charged based on far less incriminating evidence.
Goodman specifically told host Erin Burnett(3:57): “What we did is we surveyed the last fifteen years of all the District Attorney offices across New York, and saw how many times they brought this particular charge–falsifying business records–and the conclusion is essentially, if the person’s last name was not Trump, he would be charged.”
Goodman then went on to point out specific examples of New Yorkers who have been prosecuted for falsifying business records, with far less evidence than the Manhattan DA’s office is known go have against Trump. The image below lists some of the cases Goodman cited.
Bottom line folks, despite all the lamentations by prominent Republicans, of former President Trump being a “victim” of a “weaponized” justice system, the evidence, as Ryan Goodman correctly illustrates, shows the complete opposite, and that is, any other similarly situated New Yorker would have been indicted already.
The real question is what valid excuse DA Alvin Bragg will offer to the public if his office decides not to indict former President Trump? Yours Truly will go out on a limb and say an indictment(s) from the Manhattan DA’s office is/are coming. Only question left is when it/they will come down.
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Karen Friedman Agnifilo, a former Chief Assistant DA at the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office(under Cy Vance) dropped a bombshell on CNN’s OutFront show (03/13/23), telling host Erin Burnett that she expects former President Donald Trump to be indicted in Manhattan “in the next week or two”, for his role in the hush money case involving adult film star Stormy Daniels.
Interestingly, she added that Trump will also soon be hit with indictments from Fulton County Georgia(2020 election interference) and by the special counsel investigating the classified documents found at his Maralago residence.
Karen Friedman Agnifilo specifically told host Erin Burnett(0:49 ): “All indications are that he’s about to be indicted, I would say, in the next week or two.” She pointed to the statute of limitations, which is about to expire in May, as the reason why she believes an indictment from the Manhattan DA’s office is imminent.
As for other possible indictments against former President Trump, she said( ): “I think you’re going to see Alvin Bragg, who’s the Manhattan DA, bringing the Stormy Daniels’ case first, then I think you’re going to potentially see the Fulton County Fani Willis in Georgia case, then I think[Special Counsel]Jack Smith is going to bring either the Maralago documents case and/or the Jan 6th insurrection.”
Crucially, even though former Assistant DA Agnifilo appears confident that an indictment against former President Trump by the Manhattan DA’s office is imminent, she told host Erin Burnett that given Trump’s litigious nature, it will be at least a year before we see a trial in the case. As host Erin Burnett correctly pointed out, a year from now, we’ll be in the thick and thin of the 2024 presidential nomination primaries.
Will the said indictment(s) from Manhattan DA’s office help or hurt Trump’s chances of securing the 2024 GOP presidential nomination? As Trump famously says, “We’ll see what happens.” The popular wisdom out there is that candidate Trump will benefit from any such indictments, but Yours Truly will go out on a limb and predict that if Trump is indeed criminally indicted, he will not, I repeat, not secure the 2024 GOP presidential nomination. You can take that to the bank.
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The 2022 midterm election will not only go down in history as one which produced the most unlikely outcome for the party in power, but also, one where the pollsters got it totally wrong. As a matter of fact, the pollsters got it so wrong, that the public is convinced, they were deliberately misled with the “red wave/tsunami” predictions. It’s therefore only fair that the mainstream media journalists who got sucked into the red wave mass hysteria be named and shamed, and their actions memorialized for future reference–sort of a handy list, if you will.
MSNBC did an interesting, and quite frankly, hilarious mashup of the “red wave” mass hysteria that appeared to suck up even some well respected journalists from reputable networks. This shows how these faulty/fake polls can affect mainstream media coverage of elections, which can then have negative consequences, up to and including depressing voter turnout. This is therefore an issue that needs to be addressed head on as we approach the 2024 general elections.
Politicians are known to exaggerate, so they are not the subject of this naming and shaming. Our interest here is only on journalists, who ought to know better.
Fox News’ Steve Doocey(0:26): “You know, your predictions of a red wave are accurate.”
Unidentified Fox News Reporter(0:25):”…a red wave is coming.”
Fox News star Anchor Laura Ingraham(0:27): “Red Wave Rising.” This is the title of a whole segment Ingraham dedicated on the “red wave” on 10/18/22. Not a good look, Laura, not a good look.
Unidentified Reporter on NewsMax(0:34): “Sleepy Joe just guaranteed a red wave in Pennsylvania.”
Fox News’ Dana Perino(0:44): “Democrats are bracing for the worst case scenario, a red Tsunami.”
Fox News’ Greg Gutfeld(0:48): “We are officially on a red Tsunami watch.” He was apparently referring to an Axios piece by Josh Kraushaar titled “RED TSUNAMI WATCH.” Not a good look Josh, not a good look.
Fox News’ Clay Travis(0:51): “Red Tsunami grows…that means red Tsunami.”
Fox News’ Stephen Miller(0:59): “Poverty, joblessness, critical race theory, crazy gender ideology in our schools, we are going to see a red Tsunami.”
Unidentified host of Fox News’ The Five show(1:19): “Up next, Elon Musk ready to ride the big red wave.”
Fox News’ Steve Doocey(1:21): “Elon Musk tweeted massive red wave.” For the record, Musk did indeed tweet about a red wave. Other Fox News personalities who used this Elon Musk tweet to proclaim a “red wave” were Tucker Carlson(biggest star on Fox), Maria Bartiromo, among others. Not a good look, Elon, not a good look.
Daily Wire’s Ben Shapiro(1:26): “You’re about to see a red wave, that makes ‘Day After Tomorrow’ [the popular movie] look like nothing.”
Leading Podcaster Joe Rogan(1:30): “That’s going to be responsible for the red wave. I think the red wave that’s coming is going to be like the elevator doors opening up in ‘The Shining'[popular 80’s movie]”
Daily Wire’s Ben Shapiro(1:38): “Rogan said that the red wave is going to look like the elevator doors opening, and the blood pouring out of the elevator in ‘The Shining’, that is correct, except it’s not going to be an elevator, it’s going to look more like ‘Deep Impact ‘[popular movie], the tsunami at the end, but colored red.” Good Lord have mercy!!
Fox News Contributor Dan Bongino(1:54): “Remember that Teo Leone ‘Deep Impact’ disaster movie? That’s the red wave tsunami that will come ashore.”
Daily Wire’s Ben Shapiro(2:00): “It’s going to be a brutal week for the Democrats beginning on Tuesday.”
Fox News’ Clay Travis(2:05): “Frankly, I’ve already DVR-ed CNN and MSNBC for election night, not because I’m going to watch, but just because I want to enjoy the tears post-red tsumami.” Hope you’re enjoying those DVRs, Clay.
Fox News’ Jesse Watters(0:13): “It’s going to be a wave election, and you [Democrats] gonna lose the Senate, I’ll bet you $1,000 now.”
Fox News’ Lisa Boothe(0:20): “Democrats are going to be crushed on November 8th because a red wave is coming.”
Fox News’ Greg Gutfeld(0:25): “Betting that Joy will learn two new words on Tuesday, red wave.”
Unidentified Fox Business host(0:29): “How big could that looming red wave get?”
Fox Business’ Maria Bartiromo(0:31): “We begin this Sunday morning with expectations of a red wave this Tuesday.”
Fox News Contributor Marc Thiessen(0:37): “We’ve been hearing, ‘is it going to be a red wave?’, ‘is it going to be a red tsunami?’, I think it’s going to be a red hurricane.”
Fox News’ Pete Hegseth(0:51): “When the red wave comes, and it is coming, Joe Biden’s political utility is over.”
Fox News’ John Roberts(0:56): “Are we in for a red wind here, or a red wave?”
Fox News’ Martha MacCallum(0:59): “Red wave or red tsunami, what are you feeling today?”
Fox News’ Jesse Watters(1:02): “And don’t listen to the lies they are spewing, that this could take days…to know who won. This is total bs. A wave like this, we should know that night, basically, who won the Senate and the House, and even if it happens Wednesday into Thursday, it’s gravy.”
Unidentified Fox News Reporter reporting on an actual tropical storm approaching Florida(1:17): “Right out the back door, I’ve got a tropical storm brewing right now. I think they’re saying it could be a category one by the end of the day. However, let me tell you what is the storm, that red wave…” Oh boy!!
There’s also this clip from MSNBC’s The Beat with Ari Melber which shows even journalists from CNN sucked into the “red wave” mass hysteria. Not a good look, CNN, not a good look.
CNN & ABC’s Alyssa Farah Griffin(7:29): “A red wave is coming. Republicans are going to win the midterms…”
New York Post’s Karol Markowicz(7:32): “Forget red wave, I’m rooting for a red tsunami. “
CNN’s Jake Tapper(7:35): “Politicos with whom I spoke today all agree, as of now, a modest red wave at the very least, seems to be building.”
Fox News’ Dana Perino(7:49): “Signs of a red wave are kind of getting bigger than ever, but not everybody in the media wants to hear that.” Dana is a former White House Press Secretary.
Fox News’ Jesse Watters(7:55): “It wasn’t looking like a red wave earlier in August, and now it looks like a tsunami.”
As MSNBC host Ari Melber aptly summarized it (8:00): “The point there is not that multiple news channels over there echo Fox and sound similar, as they make those predictions that have been proven false…It’s bigger than the media or polls. This is a larger effort to hack your mind, and the discourse, and shape the ultimate turnout for the results in our democracy itself…It is legal to be sure, but it’s also misleading with real consequences…If you really have a huge bankable lead, you don’t need to hype it. You just turn your voters out and win, but so many Republican leaders know their slate of MAGA candidates lately, is very weak…So Republicans concluded they needed to inflate their perceived support in the hopes that that might then create more support than they have actually have…”
Bottom line folks, this stuff is serious. New York Governor Kathy Hochul also addressed this fake poll issue, which featured prominently in her race. What Gov Hochul said about this serious issue lines up with the assessment by MSNBC’s Ari Melber.
Bottom line folks, voters have voters have a right to know which polling firms are credible, and those with a history of manipulating polls to aid campaigns. This will prevent reputable news channels from getting sucked into these “wave” hoaxes, as they report on elections.
For the record, Yours Truly never fell for the “red wave/tsunami” mass hysteria for one minute.
Can’t wait for doom & gloom MSMers with their “polls” next week.I know my Dems will kick @GOP’s a$$, especially in Senate races
Election officials in Georgia formally announced(11/09/22) that the U.S. Senate race between incumbent Senator Raphael Warnock(D) and his challenger Herschel Walker(R), will be headed for a runoff slated for December 6th, 2022. Prior to this formal announcement however, Gabe Sterling, the Chief Operating Officer at the Georgia Secretary of State’s Office, appeared on CNN, where veteran Anchor John King, an authority in election result coverage, appeared to question the wisdom behind the decision to declare a runoff, when in his opinion, there were still enough outstanding votes to bring either candidate to 50%. I found that exchange quite interesting because it was John King, a very respectable figure, essentially arguing that a runoff decision was premature.
John King(0:46): “Why are you certain at this point, it will be a runoff? If you look at the results, there’s 49.2[Warnock] to 48.7[Walker] and we have the estimated outstanding vote here, maybe you have updated numbers. We have it at 96% estimated reporting, and you still seeing these circles, a decent amount of votes, a decent share of the votes still to come in in Fulton County and the suburbs around it, where Senator Warnock is doing well. You’re certain that there’s absolutely no possibility he gets to 50?”
Gabe Sterling: “At 2 AM last night I tweeted out it’s pretty safe to say we’re going to have that runoff. As we get closer and closer, more votes keep coming in. By our internal estimates, we have less than 10,000 votes to go into the election night reporting for the final counts. You know, I’ve seen some of these estimates of these votes and I’m like, I don’t know where the hell they are getting these numbers from, but we know there’s about less than 10,000, so there’s just not enough numbers out there still, to change the outcome of this race.”
Did CNN get the numbers wrong? Was Gabe Sterling’s answer satisfactory? Is this an issue the Warnock campaign needs to look further into? Hmm, lots of valid questions here, that’s all Yours Truly is saying.
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CNN pundit Ana Navarro, a longtime resident of Miami, Florida, appeared as a panelist on one of the network’s segments covering the midterm election results, where she gave her reasons for the shellacking Democrats got in the race for Florida Governor. One of the eye-popping reasons Navarro gave host Erin Burnett, was that Democrats essentially ran “a political corpse”, an obvious reference to Democratic candidate Charlie Crist.
Host Erin Burnett and her panelists struggled to contain an on-set outburst of laughter following Navarro’s remarks.
Ana Navarro specifically told host Erin Burnett: “You know I’ve been dying to talk about Florida, and I think it’s being completely misread, I think the narrative is all wrong…I told you he was going to win bigly, but listen, Ron DeSantis barely won in 2018 by 35,000 votes, by the skin of his teeth, against a Black Progressive, little known Mayor from Tallahasee, Florida. Yesterday he won by 20 percentage points. Why? Because he gamed the system, because he turned Florida into an unlevel playing field. He changed election laws, making it harder to vote by mail. They paraded a bunch of people, Black people that they arrested for voting fraud, and paraded them in front of national media. He created an election police. He also was very good at responding to Hurricanes and other tragedies. He also invested and laser focused on Miami-Dade.”
Navarro then delivered her bombshell hit saying(1:19): “What you had is that the press deflated the Democratic vote, and who can blame them when you nominate a corpse? Yes he [DeSantis] won bigly, but he won against a political corpse, and that’s an insult to corpses. I apologize to the voters everywhere.”
Now, Yours Truly has witnessed many political “post mortums”(no pun intended) after hard-fought elections, but this one by Ana Navarro, certainly takes the cake. It will be very interesting to hear what the good folks at Team Crist or the Dem establishment have to say about Navarro’s scathing attack.
Bottom line folks, Ana Navarro is absolutely correct on one issue, and that is, no statewide Democrat in Florida, should be getting blown out by 20 points in a crucial election. Florida Dems can absolutely do much better/be more competitive in statewide races. Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama won the state both in 2008 and 2012, and Democrats can certainly do it again.
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New York Governor Kathy Hochul(D) appeared on MSNBC’s 11th Hour (11/04/22) to essentially make her closing argument against her Republican challenger Lee Zeldin in the election slated for this coming Tuesday(11/08/22). You’ll remember Hochul, then Lt. Governor, took over when former Governor Andrew Cuomo was forced to step down amid sexual harassment allegations. Hochul is now seeking election to a full term.
Asked to comment about her challenger, Lee Zeldin, Gov Hochul didn’t mince words, telling New Yorkers that Zeldin was “the architect of the big lie”, which formed the basis of former President Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election results. She specifically said(0:50): “This is something that needs to come out. Lee Zeldin was described by Donald Trump as a brilliant lawyer. You know why? Because Lee Zeldin had sent text messages right when the question of the presidential election was out there. He sent messages helping strategize on how to create the big lie. So you think about the architect of the big lie, actually undermining our democracy, as well as being out there supporting the insurrectionists, refusing to certify Joe Biden’s election on the same day as the attack on the seat of our democracy. He is so extreme, opposes women’s right to choose, doesn’t support a single bit of gun safety legislation, says he’s tough on crime, but boy, is he soft on guns, so people need to know, that’s who’s running for Governor, trying to hide all that now, like ‘Oh no, he would never do all these things’. Come on, voters in New York are smarter than that.”
Gov Hochul then touched on one of the biggest questions related to Zeldin’s quest for the governorship, and that is, whether it’s all tied to a possible Trump pardon. Gov Hochul specifically said(1:46): “Being so close to Trump though, you got to wonder, does Donald Trump raise money for him, associate with him…Donald Trump is probably sizing up saying, boy, this guy could give me a pardon if he were the Governor.”
Asked whether a Governor Zeldin could derail all the investigations into Trump’s businesses currently being conducted by New York Attorney General Letishia James, Gov. Hochul said(2:26): “Absolutely. Tish James is one tough prosecutor, she’s a great friend, and I know she’s going to go to the mat, but if there’s a conviction, that’s when a Governor has the power to pardon or grant clemency. Donald Trump knows this because he granted a pardon to a guy who went to jail who defeated me for Congress, Chris Collins, so he knows all about how this game is played. Let them do what they want, their dirty tricks, get convicted, but then you got a friend in the Governor’s office who can pardon you. That’s what Donald Trump is banking on, that’s why he’s so supportive of Lee Zeldin, and people need to know that close connection between the two of them. Lee Zeldin was called one of Donald Trump’s earliest and staunchest supporters. That should mean something to New Yorkers.”
The interview then shifted to probably the biggest topic in the New York Governor’s race, and that is, crime. Asked what she has done to combat crime in New York, Gov Hochul said(3:46): “Last January in my state of the state address, January 5th, this is not an election conversion here. January 5th, you can go look at the records, I was talking about how people are feeling insecure, we need to reduce crime, we need to get more guns off the streets. Since I’ve been Governor, we have 8,000 more guns off the streets. Why? Because I took my police force, state police, and said we don’t need to give out as many tickets, let’s get them stopping the guns from flowing into our streets, and for the first time in decades, you have the Governor of New York, working in partnership with the Mayor of New York City…No Governor has spent more money than I have on public safety in history.”
Gov. Hochul also addressed the contentious bail issue, that her challenger Lee Zeldin has used to cast her as weak on crime–criminals getting arrested, only to be released back on the streets due to a lax bail system. Gov Hochul told host Stephanie Ruhle(6:48): “You mentioned the bail laws. The reason the New York state budget, my very first budget was nine days late, I wanted it on time, but I said I’m not leaving here until we deal with the repeat offenders you mentioned, who will keep taking things off the shelves in the drug stores every day, the bail laws now cover them. Anything with a gun, the bail laws now cover them. I gave more powers and discretion to judges and district attorneys than they had before. We made those changes in our law, but they’ve only been in effect a short time.”
Asked whether she thinks the perception that she’s weak on crime is in any way related to her gender, a sexist perception based on New York’s history of “alpha male, macho men” Governors, she responded(7:44): “People ought to know I’m as tough as hell. I’m from Buffalo. My father and grandfather were steel workers, grew up in a big, Irish Catholic, rough and tumble family. There’s no one tougher than I am, and I’ve been through hell and back in this job, and I loved every minute of it. But there’s no one tougher than me, and if anyone thinks that I’m soft on crime, look at what we’ve been doing. We have been aggressive about this, and so I’m breaking the mold perhaps, people haven’t seen a Governor who looks like me, I want to make sure that this becomes the norm. We have the toughest, I am a mother, I’m actually a grandmother, so this is personal to me when people have that fear, so I have my own toughness, but also that compassion and the empathy that perhaps others don’t have.”
The interview then shifted to the “tightening polls” being parroted by Fox News and other rightwing media outlets. Gov. Hochul dismissed these bogus polls as gimmicks commonly employed by Republicans to raise more money for their candidate based on the false perception that they are on the brink of victory. Gov Hochul specifically said, regarding the “tightening polls”(10:43): “All you have to do is see the name Trafalgar. It’s going to show that we’re neck and neck , or that Lee Zeldin is beating me today. Our own polls show that that’s wildly wrong, but you’re making money. You’re getting super billionaire donors like Ron Lauder to dump millions ans millions and millions of dollars in negative ads against me to prop up your election because you gave them a fake poll. Democrats are too honest to do that, we’re not playing that game, and so that’s what’s going on here. I think that is having an effect, but I don’t care, I’m not intimidated by them, by their polls, their money, I have my faith in New Yorkers, and I know they’ll do the right thing. All I need to win on this election, is Democrats turning out. We have enough Democrats, but they get complacent…That’s when you get in trouble. We cannot let that happen.”
Gov. Hochul finished with this powerful message(11:17): “I’m calling on all New Yorkers to stand up, defend your democracy against a Trump-loving, climate change denier, election denier, abortion denier-denying abortion rights, that’s who’s on the ballot. It’s time people understand that.”
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Former U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton appeared on MSNBC’s ReidOut show(11/01/22) to discuss among other things, the violent attack on Paul Pelosi, the 82 year old husband of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, at their San Francisco home. As host Joy Reid correctly pointed out, Hillary Clinton, like Nancy Pelosi, is a high-flying female political figure, who has also been the subject of numerous threats of violence from rightwingers, so she was the perfect guest to opine on this topic.
Asked how the attack on Paul Pelosi personally struck her, and whether this spoke to a larger general animus in America towards powerful women, Hillary Clinton responded(3:30): “There’s always been a streak of violence, of racism, misogyny, anti-Semitism…but I think what we’re seeing today, and it has certainly been thrown into very high relief by the horrific attack on Paul Pelosi, is not just an aberration where one or two people, or a small group engage in that kind of violent rhetoric, and urge people to take action against political figures like her, like me, like others, we’re seeing a whole political party, and those who support it, those who enable it, those who run under its banner, engaging in behavior that is so dangerous, and I find frankly, disqualifying for people who are running for office.”
Clinton then slammed Republicans, a lot of who are running on a “tough on crime” message this midterm election cycle, saying, “They don’t seem to be too bothered” by an 82 year old man being attacked in his own home by an intruder, because “that person is married to the Speaker of the House who’s of a different political party.”
Clinton then went all the way there, telling host Joy Reid that the kind of violent rhetoric we are currently witnessing from Republicans, is what leads to authoritarian regimes. She specifically said(4:54): “I just want your viewers, and really, I would like every American just to stop and think about that. This is the kind of violent rhetoric that leads to violent action, that props up authoritarians, and that’s unfortunately what we see the Republican Party today supporting.” She went on to single out Rep Marjorie Taylor Greene’s violent rhetoric directed at Speaker Pelosi as one example, adding(8:39), “This is a real threat to the heart of our democracy.”
The interview then shifted to the upcoming midterm elections, where Hillary Clinton urged voters to believe Republicans when they say they will gut social security and other entitlement programs. She specifically said(10:43): “Sometimes when I tell people that, they say. ‘Oh, they would never do that.’ Well, they told us for 50 years they were going to get rid of Roe v Wade, and turn abortion over to the states, where state legislators, local political officials could decide what your healthcare would be, why won’t you believe them, that they are going to go after social security and Medicare? I believe them, I take them at their word.”
A very interesting part of the interview came when host Joy Reid showed an old picture of then Senator Clinton with the late Senator John McCain(R-AZ), Senator Susan Collins(R-ME) and Senator Lindsey Graham(R-SC) during a foreign trip they had taken related to climate change. Host Joy Reid asked Clinton to compare and contrast the Lindsey Graham she knew back then, with the full blown Trumper he has since become.
Clinton said when they took the trip, Sen Graham was a believer in climate change, and that he continued to believe in it up until Senator McCain’s sad death. After that, he totally changed. Clinton(15:58): “There was no doubt that everybody, including Senator Graham, understood and believed in climate change, and while John McCain was still alive, he seemed to believe that. After Senator McCain’s very sad passing, Lindsey was unmoored, I don’t know how else to say it. In 2016 he was still somewhat of himself…and then when Trump ended up getting elected, Senator Graham threw his lot in with him…I find it bewildering that somebody who was always on the conservative side, don’t get me wrong, has so thrown his lot in with the cult that goes along with the big lie, and seems to be moving us in a direction that I think anyone with half a sense of American history knows, is going to hurt us.”
Clinton, a former U.S. secretary of State, was then asked to opine on the current volatile situation in Brazil after President Jair Bolsonaro, dubbed the “Brazilian Trump”, lost his quest for reelection. Clinton said(23:48): “I think what he did today sends a quite positive message…I think that he basically couldn’t bring himself to say that he lost, and so it wasn’t a formal concession, but he said he would follow the constitution, and he apparently gave the okay to his team to say they would start the transition. So we didn’t hear ‘big steal’, we didn’t hear, you know, ‘it was rigged’, ‘I didn’t really lose’, we didn’t hear any of that from him, like we heard from, and still hear today, from Trump, so I’m cautiously optimistic that Brazil will make this transition. I think it’s going to be quite difficult for Lula because the election was so close…but he has made it clear, again something we didn’t hear from Trump at his inauguration…he wants to be the president for all Brazilians, those who voted for him, those who did not vote for him, so as I said, I’m cautiously optimistic that he will be able to govern the country effectively and begin to deal with some of the very big problems that face Brazil.”
Asked about the Russia-Ukraine war, Clinton spoke very highly of President Zelensky and his “very impressive” administration, saying they are holding up very well under the circumstances, and that Ukraine will ultimately prevail if the West continues providing them with military assistance. She added(26:55): “I personally view their fight as our fight. They are fighting for democracy, they are fighting for freedom, they are fighting for their rights to make their own futures, and not be subjected to Putin’s whims and his imaginary history that they’ve never existed…”
Asked at the very end of the interview, about the return of Bibi Netanyahu as Israel’s Prime Minister, and specifically, how Iran’s cooperation with Putin as he attacks Ukraine, might affect his relationship with Putin(they seemed to get along fine while he was PM and Trump President), Clinton said(27:46): “Netanyahu is a very experienced politician, and he certainly has always paid attention to the threat from Iran. I hope he pays attention to it now because this partnership that Iran has with Russia should be of deep concern to Israel.”
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A very interesting segment on Fox News’ Tucker Carlson show(10/31/22) featured a bombshell Pulitzer-worthy report by The Intercept’s Lee Fang, which revealed that the Department of Homeland Security(DHS), has for five years now, been collaborating with Twitter, Facebook, and other social media companies, in determining whose speech needs to be suppressed. This of course flies in the face of the “private company” defense usually used to justify questionable speech infringement practices by the social media giants.
More importantly, Lee Fang’s bombshell also touched on the apparent “mission creep”(his words) of DHS, where over the last five years, the powerful agency had unilaterally(without congressional approval) shifted from its stated focus of combating terrorism and terrorist groups like Al-Qaida, to combating disinformation online.
Asked whether the Biden administration was working with tech companies to censor people, Lee Fang responded (1:10): “Yeah, that’s right Tucker. We looked at really hundreds of documents that paint a vivid picture of the FBI, the DHS, closely collaborating with top social media platforms, Twitter and Facebook, to censor various forms of content under the banner of fighting disinformation, and the story shows a couple of things, one, it shows what you just mentioned, a very cozy relationship between the government and these tech giants. There’s those monthly meetings that you just mentioned, but also, just very cozy emails and texts, not a very adversarial relationship. We looked at one text where a Microsoft executive texts Jen Easterly, the top disinfo director at DHS, appointed by[President]Biden, basically saying that the private sector needs to get more comfortable with the government closely collaborating on reports, talking about the expanded role for DHS in censoring a really broad collection of topic areas of policy and political topics.”
Lee Fang then touched on what I believe is by far, the biggest bombshell from his piece, and that is, the “mission creep” aspect. Fang said(2:11): “Just broadly speaking, the story also just looks at the mission creep of DHS. This is an agency that was founded in the aftermath of 9/11 to combat foreign terror threats of Al-Qaeda and the like, but over the last five years, it’s kind of evolved in its mission, its move towards fighting disinfo, and their justification is disinfo radicalizes the homeland, it can lead to disruptions in public health, or political violence…”
Even given DHS’ understandable explanation for going after online disinformation, no reasonable person can ever conclude that Congress would have approved the same powerful tools/tactics used to counter terrorist groups like Al-Qaeda, to be applied against U.S. residents for basically saying the “wrong things” on social media. Sadly however, this is exactly where we find ourselves today, with DHS’ speech police designating people they deem “misinformers” as terrorists, and then mercilessly destroying their lives and livelihoods using among other things, the military. This is shameful conduct which most Americans have always associated with third world dictatorships.
It is because of DHS’ mission creep, that Yours Truly believes Lee Fang’s bombshell piece deserves a Pulitzer. Simply put, DHS’ mission creep, which at the very least should have been run through Congress for approval prior to enforcement, has not only seriously impacted the lives and livelihoods of many U.S. residents who have nothing to do with terrorism, but has also robbed them of their rights under the first amendment.
Congress needs to immediately step in to not only address DHS’ mission creep, but also to hold the officials involved accountable, preferably, via referral for criminal prosecution given the way their unconstitutional actions upend innocent people’s lives
It’s also important to point out here what history has taught us, and that is, not everything the government labels “misinformation” is necessarily so. Often times, there are topics the government simply doesn’t want out there, being discussed in public. One recent classic example is directed energy weapons. For decades, government agents, and their surrogates in the mainstream media, went out of their way to label people who expressed concerns about these weapons as delusional conspiracy theorists. In 2022 however, we not only have the same directed energy weapons being openly discussed by the same mainstream media channels who denied their existence, but also, the government considers the threat so serious, that Congress swiftly enacted a handsome compensation scheme for victims of such attacks.
Bottom line folks, as host Tucker Carlson correctly stated, this bombshell piece by The Intercept is not only a great story, it’s also a huge public service for which Lee Fang deserves a lot of praise and reward. The only question now is whether Congress will do its job, and rein in Mission Creep DHS, and its unconstitutional speech police.
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