Politics Plus

It’s been a hectic day here at the CatBox.  CCC may have found me a new CatBox.  Tomorrow, please expect no more than a Personal Update.  I’m wheeling to the Golden West Building about sixteen blocks away with a CCC Manager to check it out and see if it can accommodate my needs.  That will also interfere with my EOM routine here, so the new poll and monthly report will probably be late.  My second article was Samantha Bee, but her videos from yesterday’s show have been removed from YouTube.

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 2:28 (average 4:19).  To do it, click here.  How did you do?

Short Takes:

From YouTube (MSNBC Channel): Uncovered Secret Memo Could Shed More Light On President Trump Firing Comey

Drip… Drip… Drip… RESIST!! VOTE BLUE!!

From Alternet: Federal prosecutors have charged two brothers with bilking Republicans across the country of “more than $50 million” in a giant scam where they posed as conservative political action committees (PACs) dedicated to furthering right-wing causes like supporting law enforcement and opposing reproductive rights.

“These nine PACS—which collectively raised more than $23 million between 2014 and 2017, and more than $50 million the last 10 years—were scams, operated to enrich the defendants and their co-conspirators,” the federal indictment said. “The PACs targeted victims across the country, including in the Southern District of New York, raising funds on the fraudulent basis that donations would support education regarding, and the political campaigns of those who supported, ‘autism awareness,’ ‘law enforcement appreciation,’ and pro-life causes.”

“In truth and fact, virtually all of the money raised was paid to the scheme participants or else used to perpetuate the fraud through additional telemarketing and fundraising expenditures,” the indictment continued. “Less than 1 percent of all donor money to the PACs was spent on political contributions during the relevant time period.”

The brothers had the audacity to compete with the party’s own sheeple fleecing.  Either way, SCAMS are all Republicans have to offer. RESIST!! VOTE BLUE!!

From Daily Kos: The study was sui generis: Two Harvard Law professors, Alma Cohen and Crystal S. Yang, set out to analyze 1,400 federal judges’ sentencing practices over a 15-year period affecting more than 500,000 defendants. The results were predictable but disheartening.

They unearthed a stunning number of influences on sentencing, from years of experience and level of racism in a state to the party of appointment. Its major finding: Republican-appointed judges give black defendants harsher sentences than their white counterparts.

“Republican-appointed judges sentence black defendants to three more months than similar nonblacks. … These differences cannot be explained by other judge characteristics and grow substantially larger when judges are granted more discretion.”

Three months’ discrepancy accounts for 65 percent of the baseline racial sentence gap, meaning the average sentence disparity between similarly situated white and black defendants. The convictions driving the gap: serious drug and violent offenses.

Racism is a plank in the Republican platform. RESIST!! VOTE BLUE!!

Cartoon:

It’s a lazy day, because, after the holiday weekend, news is scarce, but I filled the time with chores.

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 3:22 (average 5:10).  To do it, click here.  How did you do?

Short Takes:

From YouTube (MSNBC Channel): Democrats Work To Level Election Field, Undo GOP Gerrymandering

Anytime Scott Walker, Fartfuhrer of Fitzwalkerstan, takes it in the sphincter, TC does a one-legged happy dance. If we doing it across the country, so much the better. RESIST!! VOTE BLUE!!

From Daily Kos: On Aug. 7, progressives have another chance to flip a key GOP-held House seat from red to blue in Ohio’s vacant 12th Congressional District, and Daily Kos is pleased to endorse Democrat Danny O’Connor in this special election.O’Connor has deep roots in Ohio and has served as Franklin County Recorder since 2016, where he swiftly instituted reforms to make the office more responsive to veterans (for whom his office provides ID cards) and the homeless, by implementing a plan to store birth certificates so that they can more easily apply for housing. And he practiced the progressive values he believes in by instituting the Recorder’s Office’s first paid family leave program.

His opponent, on the other hand, is an arch-conservative. Republican state Sen. Troy Balderson opposed expanding Medicaid in Ohio, even though it was backed by his own Republican governor and his GOP colleagues in the legislature. But of course, that’s not enough: He also supports repealing the Affordable Care Act altogether. And naturally, he’s voted to defund Planned Parenthood and has pledged to “build Trump’s wall.”

Danny O’Connor for Congress! RESIST!! VOTE BLUE!!

From Alternet: A reporter for Breitbart News courted a black Bernie Sanders campaigner to switch allegiances to Donald Trump in 2016 — and then convinced him to work for the right-wing website and encourage his fellow African American voters to sit out the presidential election.

Bloomberg News reported Tuesday that Bruce Carter, the founder of Black Men for Bernie, revealed his story to the website after falling out with his former employers when they ceased paying him in the weeks following the 2016 election.  [emphasis added]

I wonder how many voters were fooled by this paid race-traitor. RESIST!! VOTE BLUE!!

Cartoon:

Down with Fitzwalkerstan!

By way of explanation, my building takes several temporary RCP residents.  They are street people that have no place to go, when they are released from hospitals.  While they are here Central City Concern tries to get them into programming, but most care only about getting high.  After they are back on their feet, they move on.  Many are so addled that they have no idea how to live in decent facilities.  Most of the kitchen fires here come from RCP trying to cook when too loaded to do so.  Does that make it more clear?  WWWendy is due in 30 minutes.

WWWendy just left.  Chores all done.  She says Hi.

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 3:24 (average 4:49).  To do it, click here.  How did you do?

Short Takes:

From YouTube (Parody Project Channel): SAD WORLD (Parody of) Mad World (9/25/2017)

All that seems so mild compared to how much Trump has devolved since. RESIST!! VOTE!!

From Washington Post: Just before Christmas, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. pulled up to the massive Richard J. Donovan Correctional Facility, a California state prison complex in the desert outside San Diego that holds nearly 4,000 inmates. Kennedy was there to visit Sirhan B. Sirhan, the man convicted of killing his father, Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, nearly 50 years ago.

While his wife, the actress Cheryl Hines, waited in the car, Kennedy met with Sirhan for three hours, he revealed to The Washington Post last week. It was the culmination of months of research by Kennedy into the assassination, including speaking with witnesses and reading the autopsy and police reports.

“I got to a place where I had to see Sirhan,” Kennedy said. He would not discuss the specifics of their conversation. But when it was over, Kennedy had joined those who believe there was a second gunman, and that it was not Sirhan who killed his father.

“I went there because I was curious and disturbed by what I had seen in the evidence,” said Kennedy, an environmental lawyer and the third oldest of his father’s 11 children. “I was disturbed that the wrong person might have been convicted of killing my father. My father was the chief law enforcement officer in this country. I think it would have disturbed him if somebody was put in jail for a crime they didn’t commit.”

In my opinion, one of the things that JFK, RFK and MLK have in common is that all were murdered by the Republican Reich. RESIST!! VOTE!!

From Crooks and Liars: Is the Republican National Committee offering wealthy Chinese investors access to Trump in exchange for campaign contributions?

Nooooooooo. I mean, why WOULD they? That would be improper. Illegal, even! Pay no attention to that letter with "the insignia of a real Republican committee raising money for the party and President Trump’s reelection campaign, it purported to offer a handshake and a one-on-one photo with the president for $100,000 — a “VIP” trip “to be remembered for a lifetime.” That’s all completely innocent, and the RNC knows nothing about that, they promise!

Also, completely innocuous is the upcoming fundraiser on May 31st! Ignore, if you would, the two Chinese companies charging two or three times the price of the campaign fundraiser’s ticket, promising access to and photos with the president of the United States. The RNC knows noooooothing about that.

And the emoluments march on. RESIST!! VOTE!!

Cartoon:

It’s time to fight the Nazis again!