Jun 122026
 

lYesterday, Public Citizen revisited a lawsuit they already won to ask SCOTUS to enforce the settlement, “which, again, the USPS agreed to and which requires it to prioritize the timely delivery of election mail to all voters without exception.” This of course was a reaponse to the Apricot Antichrist’s attempt to weaponize USPS by turning it into voter police. It could get interesting.Also,  Malcolm quoted Pete Hegseth as saying “We’re negotiating with bombs. That’s what we do.” (As a veteran, this just makes my stomach churn.)

Archived from Huff Post, not because of a paywall, but because their cookie policy is so convoluted – and time consuming to navigate, and confusing – that I had no idea what I’d be getting you into with the original link. I strongly suspect that the person who has the very worst case of TDS in the world is Trump**(*) – although there are cases to be made for Marco Rubio, Todd Blanche, Pete Hegseth, and others.

I am guessing (and that’s all it is – a guess) that reasers here either do not trade stocks – or, if they do, do so through a trusted financial advisor and may not pay much attention to individual stocks [that would be me – with only a small 401(k) which I mostly only look at when it’s MRD time, though I have been following it periodically thtough the war, and it’s been very stable.) But this is an IPO which even I can see is different – though I could not even come close to explaining it as Robert Reich can. If you do trade, whether first hand or seconf hand, caveat emptor.

This is the Part 2 I promised – but unfortunately it’s for paid subscribers only, and archiving won’t get around that with Substack (I tried.) So we only get the summary of Part 1.

I want to address the International Criminal Court at the Hague (not to be confused with the International Court of Justice – also at The Hague, which is more like a civil court to settle disputes between nations. An international criminal court was proposed as early as 1919, but it took until 2000 for a treaty establishing it to be finalized and signed. We, the United States, signed it in 2000, but never ratified it, and in 2002, when the Rome Statute was passed and submitted for ratification (which 125 nations have done, then or since), this is what the United States said:
“This is to inform you, in connection with the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court adopted on July 17, 1998, that the United States does not intend to become a party to the treaty. Accordingly, the United States has no legal obligations arising from its signature on December 31, 2000. The United States requests that its intention not to become a party, as expressed in this letter, be reflected in the depositary’s status lists relating to this treaty.”
Sounds like Dick Cheney wrote it, doesn’t it. So we are not a member state. I didn’t have time to verify this, but I think a US citizen can be tried in the court, but cannot be arrested on US soil – or the soil of any other non-member state. I also did not have time to look up all the member states, though I did notice that the UK is (and thought of a golf course in Scotland.) We are still a member of the UN and therefore subject to the Mandela Rules, which lay out rules for treating prisoners, which among other provisions specify that, when outside the prison, fot instance, while in court, prisoner be allowed to wear their own clothes. We don’t always require that, but I expect the ICC does,.

Pujo Committee

Primate

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Nov 062025
 

Yesterday, Andy Borowitz had Adam Kinzinger on his show (not for the first time. The full show is only for paid subscribers, but Andy did reveal that Adam has been working on a documentary (with Meidas Touch) called “The Last Republican”, and it’s available now to stream on Apple TV, Amazon, Googleplay and YouTube, and others. I foresee more knitting in my future. Also yesterday, my inbox was very full, and so many of the emaiis were on the giddy side, that I had a bit of difficulty finding takes that were distinct. But that’s OK. We need and deserve a little giddy time.

This is about a half hour video with Joyce Vance and Steve Vladek concerning the murders being carried out by our military in the Caribbean and the Pacific (so far.) Both feel that this is a situation we should be hearing more about, and specifically more pushback from Congress on, even just for legal reasons without analyzing the moral issues. And yes, I realize that when people in their district are starving, that should be Congressfolks first priority. On the other hand, when the only Congressional voice pushing back belongs to Rand Paul, maybe not other Congressfolks’ only priority.

If you can’t spare a half an hour for Joyce Vance, you can read this instead. It’s an analysis of the case of the fellow who threw a sandwich at a Border Control agent (who are separate from ICE.) This is so unimportant that the fact of it going to trial at all is disproportionately important, which sounds like an oxymoron, but isn’t.

Huff Post discusses a concept which explains a lot about how Republicans can live with their cruelty. And I truly do think it can ensnare anyone. I have never told anyone before about this, and I won’t provide details, but I caught myself doing this once when I was about 11 or 12 – and it shamed me so tha I vowed never to do it again. But of course narcissists and Republicans have no shame – and no introspective ability -so it’s not surprising they can and do keep using it. It’s called “violent innocence.” I don’t know how or even if knowing about it can help to combat it in others, although it’s probably useful to combat the tendency in oneself, although at our ages we have probably already done that.

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Jul 222025
 

Yesterday, as is usual for me on Mondays when possible, I relaxed a lot. I did order a grocery delivery for the evening, and received most of it, and put away most of what I received.

It’s been a long time since I heard from Margaret Atwood. She has written a new post called “The Woman Thing, Part 1”. Her starting point is pretty much where she left off earlier – the French Revolution (or Revvie.) That’s because she has been invited to create a video audiobook, has agreed, and has chosen “A Tale of Two Cities.” But I expect her to move on from there and provide insights few people could.

Joyce Vance takes on misogyny. We tried our best to warn people about all of this too. Someone in the comments, probably close to my age, says it is exhausting to think about having to do it all over again. Yes, it certainly is.

https://www.borowitzreport.com/p/obama-posts-video-of-trump-actually
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/donald-trump-barack-obama-ai-video_n_687dff31e4b0502d85e56715

This by Steve Schmidt is the big truth bomb of the day. Not that anyone should be surprised. Allow me if you will to compare humans to pit bulls. Pit bulls are basically big sweet goofballs. But pit bulls can be trained for dog fighting to be vicious killers. The people in charge of ICE detention are like pit bulls trained for dogfighting – all their grievances, both real and imaginary, have been catered to and they have been assured that nothing in their lives they don’t like is their fault, and that they have been terribly wronged. I dont suppose they have been taught much if anything in the way of specific torture techniques, but they are filled with anger and it’s not difficult to translate that into cruelty – in fact, it’s harder not to. Encouraging them to focus on wanting revenge (rather than actual improvements in their lives) has turned them into dogfighting pit bulls. Or, to use a different analogy, if anyone remembers, like those entities in Star Trek episodes who fed upon human misery and needed it to survive. I don’t know how to untrain them, or if it is even possible, but decent people need to know about evil things being done in our name.

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