Glenn Kirschner – The evidence detailed in the 44-page Trump indictment makes clear: Trump. Is. Done.
The Lincoln Project – More Biden Jobs
Thom Hartmann – You Won’t Believe The Power Behind The Most Corrupt SCOTUS Justice…?
Ring of Fire – Republican Says Trump Is Absolutely Terrified Of Chris Christie
Rescue Lamb Is Obsessed With His Dad’s Guitar
Beau – Let’s talk about the government removing the stigma….
Yesterday, before going to visit Virgil, I started to print my auto insurance ID card (since the new policy had begun 2 days earlier) and nothing was happening. I went to the control panel and also into the details in the print command, and all I can come up with is that my printer had somehow become diconnected and then reconnected itself, with the reconnection making a “copy” in the printer list. I retried, selecting the copy, and got the printout. I don’t know how this happened except that it must have happened within the last three weeks or so. I use the scanner function more than the print function, and the last time I used the scanner, about that long ago, it worked fine. In the process of figuring out what to do today I tried the scanner, and it did not respond until I selected the copy in the device list. If that’s all Greek to you, I apologize, but I’ve never had anything like this happen before, so I really don’t have the vocabulary for it. And I haven’t had time for a deep dive into the manual. I’m just glad I got the card printed in time. Virgil was in good spirits, and we played three games of Scrabble and a bit over. He returns all gretings, especially the lovely anniversary ones. I wore an older sweater because I know he likes it – before he was incarcerated and when he was helping put away laundry, I’d have to go searching for it in his closet – he never put it in mone (and he actually remembered that, when prompted.) As of Saturday, we are now officially getting 14 hours of sun each day, so it gets easier every time now up till midsummer, and will be nice and easy for some time after that. Of course, I’m still tired out.
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Robert Reich – King Charles III
Quote – The British monarchy is an archaic vestige of the country’s feudal past. Some argue that it should be dispensed with altogether. I’m in sympathy with this argument, but I wonder if it misses something…. Here in America, many of us romanticize our presidents and their families, at least at the start of an administration. Remember Camelot?… Because our presidents head the executive branch of the government, the two roles — the projected glamor and the political reality — often get confused, leaving us disappointed if not disgusted…. I’m not suggesting America have a royal family. It’s just that Britain’s infatuation with its own may have some social utility there that we Yanks don’t understand.
Click through for article (and click “Continue reading”). It’s not that long, it’s kind of different, and I think he’s on to something.
Daily Beast – How Bidenomics Has Finally Defeated Reaganomics
Quote – The last thing many of us expected when Joe Biden became president was that he would be a revolutionary. But just over two years into Biden’s presidency, there is no doubt that he has done more to dramatically transform U.S. policy and thinking in more areas than any of his predecessors since Franklin Roosevelt. America had failed to adequately invest in its infrastructure for over six decades when Biden made it a priority once again. Biden’s prioritized investment in combating climate change to a degree that no past administration ever did. On foreign policy, he executed the pivot away from a Middle East and terrorism focus to a long-term commitment to placing the Indo-Pacific region and our rivalry with China atop our list of priorities.
Click through for opinion – which seems wildly optimistic to me, but I certainly hope it’s on target. In a sane world it would be, but if we were living in a sane world, would we ever have attempted trickle-down in the first place?
Food For Thought
Glenn Kirschner – Judge REJECTS Donald Trump’s attempt to delay E. Jean Carroll defamation trial. Trial begins 4/25
The Lincoln Project – How to Manufacture a Debt Ceiling Crisis
Farron Balanced – Former Trump Associate Says Ex President Has Become Too Boring For Voters
MSNBC – Ralph Yarl: Charges filed in shooting of teen who rang wrong doorbell
2-pound Wild Boar Grows Up Believing She’s a Puppy
Beau – Let’s talk about Jordan falling into a trap….
Glenn Kirschner – Jack Smith expands criminal probe, investigates Trump’s wire fraud by fundraising off the big lie
Thom Hartmann – Will Nasty GOP Policy Starve Poor Americans?
Farron Balanced – Jim Jordan Abuses His Power By Attacking Colleges For Fighting Disinformation
Titus and Bradley – The George & Gracie Show: “The 2nd Amendment” (O, man, this takes me back.)
Girl Is Determined To Earn This Cat’s Love
Beau – Let’s talk about confusion, conflation, and currency…. (If you get the Crooks & Kiars newsletter, you’ve seen ads trying to scare you about this.)
Yesterday, someone over at DU pointed out that the closest thing we have to a precedent for charging a President or a former President is the “arrest” of Grant for speeding (in his horse-drawn carriege.) I had forgotten about it, but, yes, this really happened. Grant, however, accepted accountability and paid the ticket. Since this happened in the open, there were no walls, but who would not wish to have been a horsefly on site in order to have seen it?
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Robert Reich – The Undeserving Rich
Quote – Markets depend on who has the power to design and enforce them — deciding what can be owned and sold and under what terms, who can join together to gain additional market power, what happens if someone cannot pay up, how to pay for what is held in common, and who gets bailed out. These are fundamentally moral judgments. Different societies at different times have decided these questions differently. It was once thought acceptable to own and trade human beings, to take the land of indigenous people by force, to put debtors in prison, and to exercise vast monopoly power.
Click through for full article. Is the idea of “The Deserving Rich” a real thing? I think not. But it’s been around for a long time. If you remember Jesus’s remark about the rich getting into heaven is like a camel getting through the eye of a needle, you may remember his listeners were sghast, and aske, “If they can’t get in, then can anyone?” The name “Prosperity Gospel” may be new but the illusion is not.
The 19th – Nearly 300,000 women served during the Iraq War. Two decades later, they remain ‘the invisible veterans.’
Quote – Theresa Schroeder Hageman, a political science instructor at Ohio Northern University who served as a nurse in the Air Force from 2005 to 2010, said that she’s noticed that veterans like herself who served during the post-9/11 conflict years don’t always claim the veteran status. Schroeder Hageman said she cared for active-duty and veteran patients at one of the country’s largest Air Force hospitals, but she was never deployed overseas. “Sometimes I don’t claim the status because I didn’t deploy, so I feel less than, which is silly,” Schroeder Hageman said. “You think, ‘I’m not a real vet.’ Some women who were deployed but didn’t serve outside the wire will say they’re not a real vet.”
Click through for story. I would say to vets like Schroeder Hageman, “Claim it. It may get ignored. Claim it anyway.”
Food For Thought
Glenn Kirschner – NY authorities preparing for Trump indictment; Trump’s lawyers says Trump will turn himself in
PoliticsGirl – Must Do Before April 4!!
Ring of Fire – Texas Republicans Push ‘Bounty Hunting Bill’ Targeting Drag Queens
Robert Reich – This One Thing Would Increase Wages By $300 Billion
Spicy Kitten Needs To Be Wrapped in Purrito
Beau – Let’s talk about what went down over Ukraine….
Glenn Kirschner – Michael Cohen testifies in NY Grand jury; Trump refuses to testify in grand jury; indictment nears (Cohen is not a target of the grand jury before which he is testifying. A big difference – which Glenn taught me.)
Farron Balanced – Republican Lawmaker Has Complete Meltdown Over 4th Grader’s Rainbow Drawing
Robert Reich – What Silicon Valley Bank’s Implosion Means for You
Armageddon Update – This MOTHERTUCKER!
Pittie Thrown Away In Trash Does The Happiest Zoomies Around His New Yard
Beau – Let’s talk about an enduring math problem in Ukraine…. (for once, I knew this before he did. I’d call that a scoop!)
A few days ago, the newsletter I get every week from the Project on Government Oversight included a request for me to edit, sign, and send a letter to President Joe asking him to fire the IG of DHS. Most of the time I am not able to add much of anything to the letters that groups draft asking for change. This one was different. I never liked even the idea of a Department of Homeland Security – it seemed too nationalistic to me from the get-go. And the longer it exists, the less I like it. If we must have an agency that combines the functions which come under DHS (as opposed to having those functions split up, as we did before it was formed), then it absolutely needs to be subject to the State Department. Our national security is totally contingent upon our foreign relations, and those are not helped by DHS continually and blatantly breaking international law. I do get it that with the nation so ridiculously divided now may not be the best time to absorb DHS into State. But at the very least, it needs a tough IG of unimpeachable integrity, and Cuffari, the current holder of that post, is exactly the opposite. And I put most of that into the letter before sending it. Here’s the link, and besides the letter, there is some background on Cuffari and his – I’ll be overly generous and call it incompetence (but I absolutely believe there’s also malice there.)
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Crooks and Liars – Epstein’s Brother: Jeffrey Ran From 45 Because Trump Was A Crook
Quote – According to what Jeffrey’s brother, Mark, told Business Insider, his now-deceased brother distanced himself from Trump because the former President was “a crook.” Imagine being too slimy for a pedophile. And there is unaired footage of an interview by Jeffrey Epstein conducted by Steve Bannon after his brother forwarded it to him in the spring of 2019.
Click through for story – it’s short. Just for the benefit of anyone whose first reaction is, “Mark is his brother. Of course he would try to put Jeffrey in the best light [or in this case the least awful light],” some people’s families do tell the unvarnished truth about them. Stephen Miller. Paul Gosar. That does not necessrily mean I believe Mark, but I won’t just dismiss what he says either.
Robert Reich – The real story behind the Silicon Valley Bank debacle
Quote – The surface story of the Silicon Valley Bank debacle is straightforward. During the pandemic, startups and technology companies enjoyed heady profits, some of which they deposited in the Silicon Valley Bank. Flush with their cash, the bank did what banks do: It kept a fraction on hand and invested the rest — putting a large share into long-dated Treasury bonds that promised good returns when interest rates were low. But then, starting a little more than a year ago, the Fed raised interest rates from near zero to over 4.5 percent. As a result, two things happened. The value of the Silicon Valley Bank’s holdings of Treasury bonds plummeted because newer bonds paid more interest. And, as interest rates rose, the gusher of venture capital funding to startup and tech companies slowed, because venture funds had to pay more to borrow money. As a result, these startup and tech companies had to withdraw more of their money from the bank to meet their payrolls and other expenses.
Click through for details. Responsible parents teach children self – discipline, not only for the sake of society, but to help their children to succeed, because, without self-control, you won’t. Responsible governments regulate – and that’s really for the same reasons. This case may be less egregious than some others we have seen. What will it take to convince people that regulation is NOT a bad thing?
Iterestingly, HEather Cox Richardson also concentrated on the bank failur in he Letter from an American.
Food For Thought
Let’s see them do this with those other constants.
