Rep Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) appeared on the 05/22/24 edition of MSNBC’s All In w/Chris Hayes show, where she dropped a bombshell by calling for a U.S. Senate probe into the affairs of Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito. Rep AOC’s call for an investigation is of course related to recent news reports that say a flag known to be sympathetic to the January 6th insurrection, was spotted flying at Justice Alito’s residence.
Asked by host Chris Hayes what she thought about the Alito news reports, Rep AOC replied(2:22): “I don’t even think that we have to wait until we have a Democratic House majority, because we have a Democratic Senate majority. This is an alarm that I have been sounding for quite some time now. I think that what we’re seeing here, is an extraordinary breach of not just the trust and the stature of the Supreme Court, but we’re seeing a fundamental challenge to our democracy. [Justice] Samuel Alito has identified himself with the same people who raided the Capitol on January 6th, and is now going to be presiding over court cases that have deep implications over the participants of that rally.”
Rep AOC went on to add that Democrats cannot just keep on sitting on power after getting elected. They actually have to use the power that voters bestow upon them, to start addressing this runaway Supreme Court, and other burning voter concerns.
Rep AOC specifically told host Chris Hayes(3:13): “Democrats have a responsibility for defending our democracy, and in the Senate, we have gavels. There should be subpoenas going out, there should be active investigations that are happening, and I believe that when House Democrats take the majority, we are preparing and ensuring to support the broader effort to stand up our democracy…When Democrats have power, we have to use it. We cannot be in perpetual campaign mode. We need to be in governance mode, we need to be in accountability mode, with every lever that we have…”
As you know, Yours Truly has for a long time lamented weakness by congressional Dems. It was therefore quite refreshing to see Rep AOC calling it out too.
A bombshell segment on the 05/20/24 edition of The Rachel Maddow Show (TRMS) delved into the GOP’s long history of using political pressure to scuttle criminal investigations and prosecutions targeting them.
Maddow’s intent was to bring attention to the Republican political attacks currently being leveled against Fulton County DA Fani Willis, as she tries to hold former President Trump accountable for trying to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential elections in Georgia.
It is widely assumed by many, that the political attacks currently playing out against DA Willis are somehow novel, or totally unheard of in America, when as Maddow clearly illustrates, there is a very long and sordid history of Republican politicians successfully employing similar tactics in the past.
The full Maddow segment (YouTube) is available here for context, but my posts on X(formerly Twitter) get to the crux of her argument, and that is, the Republican attacks on Fulton County DA Fani Willis are nothing knew. Republicans have been doing these political pressure campaigns against prosecutors dating as far back as the 1940s. Such pressure campaigns have largely evaded media scrutiny because as she puts it, they make the country and all the stakeholders look bad.
#Maddow: "The prosecutors and investigators personally were CRUSHED. They were smeared and discredited and destroyed, so they were in no position to tell the story either, and so the story, mostly, was not told. But we NEED TO KNOW that story and stories like that…" pic.twitter.com/UsZnixTvpw
As Maddow correctly points out, it’s incumbent upon any democracy-loving individual, to step up and defend DA Fani Willis, or any other similarly situated prosecutor, against such political pressure campaigns. They are antithetical to a free and democratic society.
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Former Porn Star Stormy Daniels recently appeared to testify at former President Donald Trump’s hush money trial currently playing out in Manhattan, New York. As was expected, a lot of juicy details came out of her testimony, some previously known by the public, and others totally new. Trump’s supporters have predictably sought to downplay, even totally disregard Daniels’ testimony, but as MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow recently said on her colleague Nicolle Wallace’s show, we cannot/must not forget the fact that the person at the heart of this sordid affair, is someone who could potentially end up as U.S. president again. Put another way, this is, as Maddow would put it, “a big freaking deal”.
Maddow said(5:55): “The very big picture here is, we are thinking seriously as a country, about putting somebody back in the White House, who mounted a violent effort to overthrow the government the last time that he was voted out, who says that parts of the constitution should be terminated, who says he wants to put the U.S. military in American cities, he wants to build camps for tens of millons of people. That’s what we’re thinking about doing. There’s like this huge yikes factor when it comes to him.”
Maddow adds(6:43): “On top of the scariness about what he’s offering us as a political figure, on top of his likely criminal liability in his multiple criminal trials, we also then just get this yuck factor stuff[with the porn star].”
Maddow then lists the yucky stuff
“She’s doing a porn company promotion at a golf tournament.”
“His infant son is four months old.”
“He has his bodyguard ask her if she’d like to have dinner, so she goes to his room. There is no dinner. He’s wearing satin pajamas. She says get dressed.”
“He tells her I’ll get you under my reality competition TV show and I will help you cheat at it. I’ll give you advance notice on the challenges on the show, and that will help you.”
“He tells her me and my wife don’t sleep in the same room.”
“He asks her when she was last tested for sexually transmitted diseases.”
“He tells her she reminds him of his daughter.”
“She goes to the bathroom, she comes out of the bathroom, and he’s stripped down to his underpants.”
“She tries to leave, and he steps between her and the door. She doesn’t want to do it. She says she doesn’t feel threatened but he says to her, I thought you were serious about what you wanted. If you ever want to get out of that trailer park…”
“They have sex. She’s not into it. He does not wear a condom. That is particularly concerning to her, and he should know that it is because she has just explained to him about her work in the adult film industry.”
“They meet several more times, he makes more sexual advances, they never have sex again, and ultimately it is only when he finally says no, I’m not putting you on my TV show, that she stops picking up his calls.”
Maddow then bottom lines it perfectly saying, “[President]Jimmy Carter almost lost in 1976 because he said he had committed lust in his heart, but this is who we are thinking about putting back in the White House right now, along with what he has threatened to do to the country, in part out of anger for the criminal liability that he has brought on himself by trying to cover up things like this, behavior like this, character like this.”
On 05/08/24 U S. President Joe Biden sat down with Outfront CNN host Erin Burnett in Milwaukee Wisconsin, for a wide ranging interview that included his reelection campaign, the economy, his thoughts about his Republican challenger Donald Trump, AI, the crisis in Gaza… The interview provided an excellent compare and contrast situation between president Biden and his Republican challenger Trump, thanks in large part to excellent questioning by host Erin Burnett.
As host Erin Burnett correctly pointed out at the start of the interview, President Biden was in the battleground state of Wisconsin to tout plans for the creation of a massive Microsoft AI (artificial intelligence) data center, that will reportedly bring some 2,000 union construction jobs to that region, plus provide AI training to some 100,000 people (more job opportunities). As Erin pointed out, Trump, while president, promised the creation of some 13,000 FoxConn jobs in the same area, a promise we now know, never panned out. Only about 1,000 jobs exist right now, as opposed to the promised 13,000.
Asked why Wisconsinites should believe his jobs promise after clearly being duped by his predecessor Trump, Biden’s response boiled down to this(1:42): “He [Trump] has never succeeded in creating jobs, and I’ve never failed. I’ve created over 15 million jobs since I have been president. 15 million in 3.75 years and secondly, Microsoft is a serious player, and they are very much engaged in making sure that they pick this area as the home base for their AI initiative in the nation. They are going to do it.” Biden then delivered a body shot to Trump (liver shot if you will), telling host Erin, “When has he [Trump] ever done anything that he said? I’m not being facetious…” You get the drift–Trump is all talk, or as they say in Texas, “All hat and no cattle”.
Next up on the interview was the economy, where host Erin Burnett pointed out that recent polls show his challenger Trump beating him when it comes to the question as to who voters think would handle the economy better. Specifically, Erin asked whether he was worried that time was running out for him to turn around that sentiment. President Biden responded in relevant part (7:31), “We’ve already turned around. Look at the Michigan survey. Over 65% of Americans think they are in good shape economically. They think the nation is not in good shape, but they are personally in good shape. The polling data has been wrong all along…” Yours Truly has warned about these mainstream media “polls” in a previous post.
The next major topic was the crisis in Gaza, which is having ripple effects way beyond the Middle East.
Host Erin Burnett(10:26): “I know that you have paused, Mr President, shipments of 2,000-pound U.S. bombs to Israel due to concern that they could be used in any offensive on Rafah. Have those bombs, those powerful 2000-pound bombs been used to kill civilians in Gaza?”
President Biden: “Civilians have been killed in Gaza as a consequence of those bombs and other ways in which they [Israel] go after population centers. I made it clear that if they go into Rafah…I’m not supplying the weapons that have been used historically to deal with Rafah, to deal with the cities, to deal with that problem…” Simply put, the United States will continue supporting Israel in its efforts to counter terrorism, but it will no longer just rubber-stamp and supply weapons for anything Israel does to Gazans. The Biden administration will hold the Netanyahu government to some human rights standards, a commendable position indeed. As for the related protests popping out at U.S. institutions of higher learning, and the legitimate questions such protests have raised regarding the first amendment, President Biden said (13:06): “There’s a legitimate right to free speech and protest…They [students] have a right to do that. There’s not a legitimate right to use hate speech. There’s not a legitimate right to threaten Jewish students.There’s not a legitimate right to block people’s access to class. That’s against the law.”
Next up was a discussion about the real potential for a repeat of a January 6th style insurrection if Biden defeats Trump again. Specifically, Erin asked how seriously President Biden takes the remarks by Trump, that he will not accept the election results if he loses. President Biden responded(16:44): “Very seriously, just like I did with January 6th. The guy is not a democrat (small d)…You can’t only love your country when you win…He may not accept the outcome of an election? I promise you he won’t.”
The interview concluded with a question as to whether former President Obama, who did very well in his election and re-election, and who Biden served as vice president, was giving him any advice on how to run his re-election campaign. President Biden admitted that he was indded getting advice from Obama, adding that the advice was, “You’ve got to organize, block and tackle, people knocking on doors, putting up signs…”. One has to admit, that is as “Obama-esque” as it gets. Hopefully Team BidenHarris heeds his advice and get the results Obama always delivered–kicking Republicans in their you know what!!
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A bombshell segment on MSNBC’s Alex Wagner Tonight show (04/30/24) delved into a recent interview Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump had with Time Magazine. As host Alex Wagner correctly pointed out, the biggest bombshell from the Time interview was Trump’s admission that if elected president again, he would be open to a draconian immigration policy that mirrors former President Eisenhower’s infamous “Operation Wetback.”
Time Magazine’s Eric Cortellessa(2:35): “You’ve said you’re gonna do this massive deportation operation. I want to know specifically how you plan to do that.”
Trump: “So, if you look back to the 1950s, [President] Dwight Eisenhower was very big on illegal immigration not coming to our country. And he did a massive deportation of people.”
Any reasonable person presented with Trump’s response would conclude, as host Alex Wagner did, that if elected president again, Trump intends to craft a draconian immigration policy that mirrors Eisenhower’s “Operation Wetback”.
It will be interesting to see how Hispanics, who Trump has successfully peeled off from the “reliable Democrats” tent, will react to this bombshell revelation. As host Wagner correctly pointed out, a lot of U.S. citizens of Mexican descent also got swept up in Eisenhower’s militarized “Operation Wetback” raids, and got deported illegally to Mexico.
Will a potential “Operation Wetback 2.0” be a game-changer with MAGA Hispanics in 2024, making them pull the lever for Biden? Hmm, as Trump famously says, “We’ll see what happens.”
I’d be remiss if I didn’t point out the fact that in the interview, Trump also appeared eager to expand law enforcement’s “qualified immunity” to a point where it is practically “absolute immunity”. This would dramatically roll back progress that has been made–and there has been progress–in the fight against police brutality, especially as it pertains to Black and Brown communities. Will this be a game-changer for the so-called BlacksForTrump? Hmm, we shall see.
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Rep Marjorie Taylor-Greene(R-GA), the loudest opponent to Ukraine funding
A bombshell segment on Alex Wagner Tonight show (04/17/24), citing a Washington Post piece, confirmed what we’ve suspected all along, and that is, Putin’s Russia is behind the Republican Party’s opposition to efforts by Congress to provide funding for Ukraine, as it defends itself against a Russian invasion. The bombshell report essentially says that Rep Marjorie Taylor-Greene(R-GA), aptly nicknamed “Moscow Marge”, and other congressional Republicans currently opposed to Ukraine funding, are either willing or unwilling participants in Vladimir Putins propaganda campaign–a sad state of affairs indeed.
Host Alex Wagner(5:43): “…Ukraine and the vote for Ukraine funding has become a leverage point for Russia. The Washington Post has some explosive reporting…on newly revealed documents from inside Vladimir Putin’s government, documents which show how Russia is seeking to subvert western support for Ukraine and disrupt the domestic politics of the United States and European countries through propaganda campaigns and supporting isolationist and extremist policies. Russia is formenting division over Ukraine because it wants to weaken America’s role in the world. In particular, one Russian policy expert cited in one of these documents, specifically calls on Russia to continue to facilitate the coming to power of isolationist right-wing forces in America.”
Host Wagner then got very specific, adding, “Russia very much wants the Marjorie Taylor Greene’s to continue doing exactly what they are doing, because it serves Russia’s interests.”
Bottom line folks, host Alex Wagner and the Washington Post are absolutely correct. Trump GOP’s opposition to Ukraine funding is not rooted in some legitimate conservative ideology as they would like the public to believe. Instead, it is a shameless assist to Russia’s strongman Vladimir Putin, who they are banking on to help them win Congress and possibly the White House in 2024. You read that right, a win for Trump in 2024 is a win for Vladimir Putin.
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Turns out, per bombshell segment on CNN‘s NewNight Show (01/30/24) that political action committees (PACs) supporting former President Donald Trump are using the $50 million they have raised, to offset Trump’s personal legal bills. As NewsNight host Abby Phillips hastily points out, as shady as this may appear to the general public, it is apparently totally legal.
One would understand why the public would struggle with the legality of this action by Trump’s PACs, given the myriad news stories out there, of people being criminally prosecuted for starting GoFundMe campaigns to ostensibly raise funds for medical bills, only to turn around and use those funds for personal items like new vehicles, rent, jewellery, etc. If that is illegal, then why should it be perfectly legal for a PAC, which ostensibly raises money for Trump’s campaign for the presidency in 2024, to turn around and use the raised funds to offset his personal legal bills?
Host Abby Phillip (0:15): “Sources tell CNN that $50 million, is how much the PACs supporting Trump, have raised and then donated to the cause of keeping Trump out of jail. Now, mind you, this is all legal, but a spokesman for one of those PACs insists tonight to the New York Times, that every dollar being raised by MAGA Inc is going directly to defeating Joe Biden in November. But at least some of those dollars and cents are as of this moment, being siphoned off for courtroom costs.”
Bottom line folks, reasonable people will agree that there is no difference between the financial fraud that GoFundMe scammers are rightly criminally prosecuted for, and what these Trump PACs are engaged in. Simply put, rather than just throwing up our hands in the air and accepting this cheating by Trump’s PACs as “totally legal”, maybe some legal eagle should embark on a novel federal lawsuit arguing that Trump’s PACs are defrauding their donors, and are in essence, no different than the criminal GoFundMe scammers. While this may not fix the issue during this 2024 election cycle, maybe, just maybe, it may spur members of Congress to come up with a legislative fix for these and other PAC loopholes, for future elections.
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Rep Troy Nehls (R-TX) in a verbal altercation with insurrectionists on 01/06/2021
Rep Troy Nehls (R-TX) has created a reputation for himself as one of former President Donald Trump’s loudest advocates in Congress, right up there with Trump’s most trusted lieutenants Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), Matt Gaetz (R-FL) and others.
A major part of being one of former President Trump’s trusted lieutenants is of course, one’s willingness to go out in public and declare the 2020 election “rigged/stolen”, and also playing down the violent January 6th insurrection as some kind of “peaceful protest gone wrong”.Rep Troy Nehls has of course, done his part to satisfy the prerequisites for appeasing former President Trump—election denialism and playing down January 6th.
Well, a new video has been released, which exposes Rep Troy Nehl’s shocking hypocrisy regarding the events that happened on January 6th 2021. In the video, Rep Nehls can be seen and heard arguing with some of the January 6th insurrectionists—who are apparently trying to violently break into Congress—and swearing that in his 30 years as a law enforcement officer in Texas, he had never witnessed what he was witnessing that day. Reasonable people will agree that this doesn’t jive with the “peaceful protest” narrative Rep Nehls and other Trump lieutenants have diligently dished out since 01/06/21.
Rep Nehls(0:53): “I’ve been in law enforcement for 30 years, and I’ve never had people like this.” One of the insurrectionists interjected, asking Rep Nehls to speak louder so he/they can hear what he’s trying to say.
Rep Nehls repeated: “I’ve been in law enforcement in Texas for 30 years, and I’ve never seen people act like this…I’m ashamed…” One of the insurrectionists even tells Rep Nehls that if this insurrection doesn’t happen today, there’s going to be a bigger civil war down the road. That clearly doesn’t jive with the “peaceful protest” narrative Rep Nehls, et al, have helped Trump push since 01/06/21.
Bottom line folks, it’s about time the media, and especially the Texas media, start demanding that Rep Nehls come clean and clarify his record regarding the January 6th insurrection. Simply put, he needs to apologize to the public for all the misleading statements he has made, trying to play down the violent January 6th insurrection. Simply put, the good folks of Fort Bend County (TX-22) deserve better.
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In case you missed it, MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough dropped a bombshell on the 01/08/2024 edition of his Morning Joe Show, telling his viewers that back in the day, former President Trump kept Adolf Hitler’s speeches by his bedside.
#BREAKING: Morning Joe: "We know Trump LOVES dictators, we know he ADMIRES dictators, we know…#IvanaTrump [told] @VanityFair, that he kept Adolf Hitler's speeches BY HIS BEDSIDE…"😳😳
I didn't know that. Why is Vanity Fair SILENT in light of "poisoning the blood"?🙄 pic.twitter.com/pemyX7pIE2
This bombshell revelation by Scarborough was especially notable because it came on the heels of Trump’s recent statement that migrants “poison the blood” of Americans. Notable historians have pointed out that German dictator Adolf Hitler used similar rhetoric on his way to killing 6 million Jews in the 1930s.
Former President Trump when confronted by the media about his Hitler-sounding rhetoric, dismissed such questions saying he has never read Hitler’s book Mein Kampf. Well, that may be true, but this bombshell revelation by Scarborough certainly raises fresh questions as to his admiration of the ruthless German dictator. Simply put, you don’t keep speeches of somebody you hate/despise on your bedside.
Bottom line as we approach the November 2024 general elections, the Trump-Hitler nexus must be fully explored. Vanity Fair owes the public an explanation as to why they’ve buried this story, even as questions about Trump-Hitler nexus continue to swirl
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An interesting segment on MSNBC’s Alex Wagner Tonight (01/1624) show delved into the strange daliance between Evangelical Christians(predominantly White), and the politics of former President Donald Trump, often referred to as Trumpism, or MAGA Trumpism. The alliance between these two strange bedfellows has led many to question whether MAGA Trumpism has become some sort of political/civil religion.
The MSNBC segment came against the backdrop of Trump’s massive win in the Iowa Republican presidential primary, and specifically, his command of the White Evangelical vote, which polls placed at 53%. Back in 2016, when Trump first ran for president, he only received 21% of the White Evangelical vote in Iowa, a clear sign that he has now consolidated the White Evangelical vote in Iowa, and arguably nationwide.
#BREAKING:🔥Alex: "In the eight years between those two #IowaCaucuses, Donald Trump has not only more than doubled his support from #Evangelicals, he has also REDEFINED what it means to be one."
Host Alex Wagner posed this question to her guest, Author Tim Alberta, who’s also a staff writer at The Atlantic (2:07): “I wonder in your estimation, what it means to be an Evangelical in this country, at this moment?” Tim Alberta responded in relevant part: “We are beginning to flirt with this territory where definitionally speaking, Evangelicalism has far more to do, at least in the perception of the greater public, with political engagement, partisan political identification, than it does with any particular theology or any real religious conviction, and if you take it a step further, if you look at the exit polling, if you look at some of the social science around this, if you look at the fact that during Donald Trump’s presidency, more and more of Donald Trump’s supporters were self-identifying as Evangelicals even though they were simultaneously attending Church less and less often, I think one might reach the uncomfortable conclusion that perhaps the best definition now for what it means to be an Evangelical, is to be a conservative White Republican Trump supporter, and that is a tragedy on any number of different levels, but I think most profoundly, it’s a tragedy for the Gospel of Jesus Christ.”
Host Alex Wagner then interjected with this profound question (3:50): “If the Gospel is no longer part of the equation, what is it replaced by…do you think MAGA-ism has become a placeholder for a certain kind of religion?”
Tim Alberta: “Yes…I don’t want to paint with too broad a brush, the Evangelical community is large, it’s huge, and it’s complicated…but…we are reaching a place where we are being confronted with some uncomfortable realities about what it means to be a part of the Evangelical movement and frankly, where the line blurs between sort of religious identity and political identity, and is there a merging of the two, and frankly I think that there’s always a danger in politics…of sort of turning political conviction into religious conviction, or worshipping at a certain altar that is not an altar to God, but is an altar to political idolatry or to political identity. That is a danger that has always been there, but it is I think uniquely dangerous in this moment, and to be clear…we have examples from the not so distant past, of a sort of political religion, or at least a civil religion, supplanting, competing with actual religion, and I don’t think that we’re all that far removed from that in this country now, looking at just what happened…in Iowa.”
To conclude the segment, Tim Alberta floated this interesting scenario, which gets right to the fallacy of the Evangelical-MAGA Trumpism alliance. He said (8:19): “If during Barack Obama’s presidency, or while he was running for president, if you had heard him talking with, or promoting a video saying that he was a shepherd to all of mankind, the Evangelical movement would have been up in arms [and rightly so], I mean this is heretical, this is blasphemous and yet, Donald Trump seems to get a pass time and time again for doing these things that no other politician, Republican or Democrat frankly, would get a pass for doing, and we should ask ourselves why. If the answer does not at least start to flirt with this terrain of civil religion, or political religion, then I think that we’re not being honest with ourselves, and if we are being honest with ourselves, if we are willing to engage with the very uncomfortable topic around what happens when Trumpism becomes civil religion in this country for millions of millions of people, and what that might imply moving forward, then we are doing a disservice to our prularistic democracy.”
Bottom line folks, we’ve always operated on the separation of church and state doctrine, and have for decades, shunned foreign theocracies like the ones in Afghanistan and Iran. Author Tim Alberta is absolutely correct when he says, we need to be honest with ourselves, and admit that there is no difference between the Evangelical-MAGA dalliance in the American political scene, and the theocracies in Iran and Afghanistan. Simply put, we need to make a decision as to whether we want to continue with the separation of church and state doctrine, or whether, that time-honored tradition has also been sacrificed at the altar of MAGA Trumpism.
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