Gun Control Now A Matter Of National Security

Why Gun Control Is Now a Matter of National Security

Opinion
By Steven Simon, Jonathan Stevenson
04/22/2021 06:30 PM EDT
https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2021/04/22/why-gun-control-is-now-a-matter-of-national-security-484323

Steven Simon, an International Relations Professor at Colby College, served on the National Security Council during the Clinton and Obama administrations, including as Senior Director for Counterterrorism.

Jonathan Stevenson, a Senior Fellow at the International Institute for Strategic Studies and Managing Editor of Survival, served on the National Security Council as Director for Political-Military Affairs, Middle East and North Africa, from 2011 to 2013.

For all the tragic mass shooting headlines this year, the American gun control debate seems permanently stuck. Last week, nine people were killed by AR-15 fire in Indianapolis; before that, 10 died in Boulder, and eight in Atlanta. Despite the anguish over the past month — and despite a push by President Joe Biden — Congress looks unlikely to take any immediate action.

We share Biden’s view that the level of U.S. gun violence is a “national embarrassment.” But as National Security Council veterans who have specialized in counterterrorism — with direct experience involving far-right American terrorism, burgeoning jihadism, and Northern Irish extremism in the 1990s — we also see a new threat rising, one that has the potential to change the urgency of the debate: the growing, and heavily armed, American militia movement, which made a show of force on January 6.

Armed demonstrators protest outside of the Michigan State Capitol on January 17, 2021 in Lansing. – Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images

Increasingly, as militias acquire and stockpile weapons, they’re turning guns from a public-health concern into a threat to national security. And it’s possible that if proponents of reform — including advocacy groups, congressional leaders and Biden — began addressing it that way, they’d have a chance of energizing the debate against the National Rifle Association and its allies. Indeed, the shock of the insurrection has increased the political burdens of an NRA in internal disarray and offered a new perspective on the need for significant gun control legislation.

As America learned on January 6, anti-government militia groups are more than willing to jump walls, break doors and disrupt the underpinnings of our democracy. These groups, with transnational ties, also enjoy easy access to high-power, high-capacity, small-caliber semiautomatic weapons—many of which can be converted to fully automatic. The concern isn’t that these weapons will somehow enable militias to challenge the U.S. military on the battlefield, which they certainly will not. It is that they make mass casualty attacks against political or cultural adversaries both easy to carry out, and easy to frame as inspirational events of the kind that mobilize insurrection.

The executive orders Biden issued earlier this month imposing restrictions on gun kits and devices that turn pistols into rifles are marginal safeguards and rather thin gruel overall. But his call for reviving the federal ban on assault weapons is more promising and an acknowledgment that serious action is required. An important additional measure would be more rigorous required background checks. At least one key Republican senator, Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, has expressed openness to working with Biden on a gun bill.

Generating bipartisan consensus for an effective crackdown on firearms will always be difficult. While gun control is now unlikely to lose existing supporters, it is also unlikely to win many new ones. But reframing the issue as a national security imperative could galvanize passive backers now focused by the assault on the Capitol on maintaining political stability in the United States. A plausible objective would be to

Didn’t Feel The Bern? It Was Because Of Hillary.

Donna Brazile, publicity photo

There are probably plenty of reasons to dislike Donna Brazile, the twice-former interim DNC Chair – not the least of which was the discovery that, following a WikiLeaks email dump, she’d been sharing debate questions with Hillary, and subsequent to a second release of the tranche, she resigned in shame from her position at CNN as a political commentator/pundit.

Perhaps she was trying to redeem herself, or, maybe she was trying to hold a light illuminating the damning evidence of HRC’s unethical behavior and corruption (though not illegal), or maybe she was hoping to drive another nail into Hillary’s political coffin, or “throw some others under the bus,” and even if it was a cathartic political “kiss and tell,” her motivation for what she wrote is not the question.

It is ~what~ she wrote in her book “Hacks: The Inside Story of the Break-ins and Breakdowns that Put Donald Trump in the White House” that tells the story.

She discovered that because of the party’s fiscal indebtedness, a backroom deal had been struck with Hillary and the DNC in August 2015, just

Banana Republicans Go Off Half-Cocked

The idiom to “go off half-cocked” came from incidents in which a flintlock or matchlock gun would fire prematurely, before the trigger was pulled.

As used in modern context, it means:

• to take a premature or ill-considered action; to act too soon, prematurely, or without reflection;

• to do or say something without preparing for, or thinking about it;

• to go into action too early, or without thinking.

That certainly seems to be the case with several Banana Republicans recently. Banana Republicans lead Banana Republics, right?

An article published last week by the notoriously unreliable British tabloid “The Daily Mail” – which is infamous for habitually and recklessly publishing sensationalistically inaccurate fear-mongering stories – stated a deliberate lie which falsely claimed that President Joe Biden’s climate proposals would deliberately limit Americans’ red meat consumption.

Shortly after that scurrilously false story was published, numerous

Telling Tall Tales: Shared Mythology in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam

Today I happened upon a description of a beer made by Cigar City Brewing of Tampa, FL – Double Barrel-aged Hunahpu’s – which is a 2016 release of an Imperial Stout, aged in rum barrels & apple brandy barrels and blended together.

As rated and ranked by the crowd-sourced beer enthusiast’s website BeerAdvocate, where reviewers rate beers according to various measures of quality, not upon “popularity” based upon sales volume, per se, Hunahpu’s Imperial Stout was graded 100, which is a perfect score, and was ranked 2nd within the category of Imperial Stouts, had a 3rd overall weighted rank, while the website’s contributors gave it an overall rating of 4.78 out of 5 truncated mean for all beers on the site. Its flavor notes read “Stout aged on Peruvian cacao nibs, ancho and pasilla chiles, cinnamon and Madagascar vanilla beans aged in apple brandy and rum barrels before being blended together.”

After having read the review notes, I navigated over to the Cigar City Brewing site to see the brewery’s page for the brew, to see what they said about it, and read that they describe it as being:

“Extremely dark in color with a brown head with notes of big notes of chocolate and espresso, moderate notes of vanilla and cinnamon and mild notes of tobacco and chilis. Flavor opens with a big blast of chocolate and moderate espresso with notes of dark toffee and interjecting notes of vanilla with lingering hints of cinnamon and tobacco and chili notes with a mild Scoville heat in the finish. Extensive aging in both rum and apple brandy barrels adds candied apple, allspice, vanilla and oaky tannic qualities to this rare and complex stout.”

I also found the following about the beer’s curious name:

Did you know?

In Mayan mythology, Hun Hunahpu was the father of the Mayan hero twins Hunahpu and Xbalanque. Hun Hunahpu, along with his brother Vucub Hunahpu, was tricked by the Dark Lords of the underworld and slain. Hun Hunahpu’s corpse morphed into a cacao tree, his head becoming a cacao pod, which in typically awesome mythology fashion, spit upon the hand of a young maiden named Xquic who promptly became pregnant with the hero twins. The twins would ultimately grow up to avenge their father and uncle and defeat the Dark Lords and ascend the heavens to become the moon and sun.

That’s quite a tale, to be certain, and as I read it, the preposterous absurdity of it all was reminiscent of another well-known fairy tale told by observant Jews, Christians, and Muslims alike.

Artist’s depiction of the Hebrew exodus

That tall tale is of Moses, regarded as

Missouri Republican Lawmaker Ousted For Child Sex Abuse Of Adult Daughters

Once again, Banana Republicans are caught with their pants down.

---

ajc.com

Republican Missouri Lawmaker Expelled Over Child Sex Abuse Charges By Adult Daughters

Rick Roeber expelled after GOP House-led investigation

By Tim Darnell, Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Saturday, 24 April 2021

The Missouri House of Representatives voted Wednesday to expel a suburban Kansas City lawmaker over allegations he sexually abused two of his children years ago.

By an almost-unanimous vote, the GOP-led House expelled Rick Roeber, a Republican who was elected in November to represent the Lee’s Summit community.

Republican child sex abuser Rick Roeber of Missouri State House

The vote came after an ethics committee report on Monday that formally accused Roeber of sexually abusing two of his now-adult children when they were 5 and 9. The committee found their allegations credible.

The expulsion was the first time the Missouri House had expelled a member in more than 150 years.

No one opposed Roeber’s ouster, though one lawmaker voted “present” to sidestep taking a position.

“It is unacceptable what he has done to the home life of these children,” GOP House Speaker Rob Vescovo said, according to The Associated Press, during a speech from the chamber floor. “And I find him in the worst capacity to represent the people, and more specifically represent the children, of the 34th District or the children of the state of Missouri.”

Roeber previously told the committee that he didn’t sexually abuse his children.

Several of Roeber’s children testified to House investigators this year he also frequently beat them with a belt, choked them and once drowned a litter of puppies.

One child who said Roeber was sexually abusive told investigators that

On The Dole: Marjorie Taylor Greene Profits From Low-Income Federal Subsidy Program

Is Georgia Representative Marjorie Taylor Green Pretending?

Cue Eric Clapton’s 1989 hit “Pretending.”

Clay Bennett is a native Alabamian, and Pulitzer prize-winning, long-time political cartoonist for the Chattanooga Times-Free Press.

While Marjorie Taylor Greene has claimed business success credentials as a candidate for Georgia’s 14th Congressional District – while spouting the bizarre lies and not-even-specious rhetoric as part of the QAnon conspiracy – what she has NOT said is that Federal subsidy of low-income housing, and Federal tax credits associated with them, has played a significant role in that “success.”

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution recently published an investigative article about Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, the Republican QAnon conspiracy theory supporter who moved her campaign headquarters from the state’s 6th to the 14th Congressional District exclusively in order to campaign for the U.S. House of Representatives. The Constitution does not require a Member of Congress to reside in the district they represent, only the state.

The 14th CD is located in the state’s uppermost northwest corner, bordering Alabama and Tennessee, a portion of which is considered part of the Chattanooga, TN Metropolitan Statistical Area.

Located slightly north of the state’s capitol city, from 1992-2018, GA’s 6th CD has, until recently, been a largely Republican-dominated suburb of the Atlanta MSA which has produced the likes of Newt Gingrich, Johnny Isakson, and former Secretary of Health and Human Services Tom Price.

Georgia’s 14th CD includes Dalton, which has long been known for the numerous carpet and floor covering firms which supply a significant portion of all carpet sold domestically and internationally, and with at least 150 factories, is colloquially known as the “Carpet Capitol of the World.”

It is in that region that Marjorie Taylor Greene projected herself to district 14 voters not as a “carpetbagger,” nor as a “scalawag” – even though she is an opportunist Republican profiteering from Federal poverty programs – but as a business owner/entrepreneur alongside her spouse, Perry.

The term “carpetbagger” refers to:

“a traveler who arrives in a new region with only a satchel (or carpetbag) of possessions, and who attempts to profit from or gain control over his new surroundings, often against the will or consent of the original inhabitants.”

While scalawag refers to:

“White southerners who, for various reasons, saw more of an advantage in backing the policies of Reconstruction than in opposing them.”

And in an ironic video she recently shared with her supporters, she attempted to cast aspersions upon, and belittle fellow Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a Democrat from New York’s 14th CD with whom she indicated that she’d spoken, and challenged her to a debate on her “Green New Deal” saying that “she just has a government job” – the same type job Greene has.

“2. As a business woman in the construction industry, I’ve spent the last two decades alongside my husband, Perry, building our company and creating in jobs. The politicians in DC and really at all levels of government have let us down.”

2. As a business woman in the construction industry, I've spent the last two decades alongside my husband, Perry, building our company and creating in jobs.

The politicians in DC and really at all levels of government have let us down.

— Marjorie Taylor Greene 🇺🇸 (@mtgreenee) December 15, 2019

The top of her campaign platform was

TN GOP Governor Bill Lee Expected To Sign “Show Us Your Genitals” Law

50th Tennessee Governor Bill Lee (R)

It makes me wonder… why are Banana Republicans so interested in others’ genitals – especially CHILDREN’S GENITALS?

Sounds VERY creepy to me.

In fact, it sounds very much like something a pedophile would do, or support.

What’s the possibility, eh?

Now, I’m not suggesting that the bill’s authors are pedophiles, but “if it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck,” it’s probably a cow… right?

Maybe a pedophile influenced, or wrote the bill, eh?

But then, why are Tennessee’s GOP legislators listening to pedophiles, eh?

Of couse, this sounds very much like a remedy in search of a problem, rather than vice versa. Seriously. I mean, how “bad” a problem is the so-called “problem” it purports to remedy?

I’ve yet to read any news items about any such matters. You know… something like “Man Shoots Trangendered Victim In Public Toilet,” or “Teacher Shoots Transgendered Teen In Lockerroom” something else patently and absurdly similar. After all, we’re assaulted daily, 24/7 with

Houston, TX Hospital System To Fire Employees Who Refuse COVID-19 Vaccination

Houston Methodist Hospital, a not-for-profit 8-hospital system – 4 of which are ANCC Nursing Magnet status accredited – and academic medical center, with over 2502 beds in the Houston, Texas metro area, has publicly announced that they will fire any employee who refuses to get a COVID-19 vaccination.

The Houston Press and Houston Chronicle reported today, Thursday, 22 April 2021, that Bob Nevens, the hospital chain’s Director of Corporate Risk and Insurance, and Jennifer Bridges, a Houston Methodist Registered Nurse at the system’s Baytown facility, are on schedule to be fired soon if they don’t comply by obtaining a COVID-19 vaccine within the hospital system’s deadline of June 7, 2021.

Dr. Marc L. Boom, MD, the hospital system’s CEO, had the idea to require all employees to get vaccinated against COVID-19 in order to keep their jobs, and offered $500 incentive bonuses to any employee who demonstrated proof of vaccination. Houston Methodist was the first hospital system nationally to make COVID-19 vaccination mandatory for employees.

Houston Methodist Hospital

And to this point, a clear majority – 84% – of the hospital system’s 26,000 employees have received at least 1 COVID-19 vaccine dose as of Tuesday this week, according to Houston Methodist’s Director of Public Relations Stefanie Asin.

Houston Methodist’s Human Resources Department has stated that the hospital system will consider requests from employees who don’t want to be vaccinated for medical or for religious reasons.

However, neither Mr. Nevens nor Nurse Bridges are refusing COVID vaccination on those grounds. And neither Mr. Nevens, who is a 10-year hospital system employee, nor Nurse Bridges, who is a 7-year employee, consider themselves “anti-vaxxers,” and both have for many years received the annual influenza vaccine.

Mr. Nevens and Nurse Bridges have both said that their reluctance to receive COVID-19 vaccinations arises fromtheir concerns with the vaccines’ emergency approval by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, rather than the more well-known and much lengthier standard, traditional, and much more well-known approval process.

Nurse Bridges said that as a Registered Nurse, “I’ve taken every vaccine you’re ever supposed to take. We just want more

Prediction: South Dakota GOP Governor Kristi Noem Will Report COVID-19 Infection Soon

Why?

She and Ted Nugent were snuggling together on the same aircraft for several hours while Ted was COVID-19 positive.

The backstory:

The once-and-former rocker, “Jailbait” singer/songwriter, and Motor City Moron Ted Nugent recently announced that he had become infected with the COVID-19 virus.

LEFT to RIGHT: Donna Mosing, spouse of Greg Mosing; Kristi Noem; Ted Nugent, spouse of Shemane Nugent.

However, a week before he made that announcement, Nugent’s wife Shemane posted a photo on Instagram which cross-posted to Twitter, of them standing with South Dakota Republican Governor Kristi Noem and Republican donor Greg Mosing and his wife, Donna, alongside a private jet aircraft. None of them were wearing any type of protective nose/mouth covering.

She wrote: “Thank you for a great trip with Governor Kristi Noem, on Rockstar One (think Air Force One!).”

https://www.instagram.com/p/CNoaOJ3MyFj/

Thank you Greg & Donna Mosing for a great trip with Governor Kristi Noem on Rockstar One (think Air Force One!) #adventure #adventuretime https://t.co/xjoFybKYHc

— Shemane Nugent (@ShemaneNugent) April 14, 2021

Publicly available data for the aircraft – N131GM – shows that

Birmingham, Alabama Mayor Randall Woodfin Pardons 15,000 Cannabis Offenders On 420

Birmingham, Alabama Mayor Randall Woodfin has used the executive authority of the mayor’s office to issue blanket pardons for all misdemeanor marijuana-related offenses issued by the city from 1990-2020.

His actions were on April 20th, a day adopted by cannabis advocates as their celebratory day, and he Tweeted that,

“Today, I issued a pardon of 15,000 people convicted of marijuana possession in Birmingham between 1990-2020. These pardons are

What Is Inflation?

An inflation is defined as when prices in general go up. Not every price, and not each price the same amount, but a general rise in prices is all that the word “inflation” means. Goods and services, in general, go up in price. Number one.

Number two: Simple. The people who decide on prices are employers – the people who own and operate businesses – ’cause that’s where most goods and services come from. And under a private enterprise system, the individuals who set the prices are the owners, operators, chief executives of corporations. So the first question to understand, first point, is that, if you have a general rise in prices, it’s the business community that’s doing that.

Now, the next question: Why would the business community do it?

Well, the first answer again, is simple – is because it’s profitable. It’s the easiest, quickest, and best way to make more profits – which is to take whatever it is you’re producing, and charge more for each unit of it that you sell. In other words, to raise the price. So in many cases, there’s an inflation because businesses are raising prices to make more profits.

But of course, business

Ted Nugent Has COVID-19

After denying its existence, the washed-up once-upon-a-time rock musician, pedophile, and Motor City Moron

Ted Nugent has announced that he has become infected with COVID-19.

Not COVID 18, COVID 17, COVID 16, COVID 15, but COVID-19.

Perhaps this is Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure, v2.0, eh?

Y’know, deep within, I had a feeling that it would only be a very short matter of time before he changed his tune… after becoming infected.

And sure ‘nuff… that’s what happened!

Musician Ted Nugent said yesterday, Monday 19 April 2021, that he tested positive for COVID-19 and had been experiencing intensely severe symptoms, even though he called the pandemic a “hoax” in the recent past.

During a FaceBook Live broadcast yesterday he said, “I was tested positive today. Everybody told me I should not announce this, but can you hear it, I have had flu symptoms for the last 10 days and I thought I was dying. I got the Chinese shit. Just a clusterfuck. I got a stuffed up head, body aches… oh my god, what a pain in the ass. I literally can hardly crawl out of bed, the last few days but I did. I crawled.”

[When faced with stark reality, suddenly, his tune changed. Fascinating.]

He also expressed

Former Vice President Walter “Fritz” Mondale Has Died

Former Vice President Walter F. Mondale, photographed at his Mill District condo on April 30, 2019, in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

In 2007, former-Vice President Walter “Fritz” Mondale (1928-2021) was asked to describe his proudest accomplishment in President Jimmy Carter’s administration.

He said, “We told the truth, we obeyed the law, and we kept the peace. It may not sound like much, but if you’ve got that, you can handle the rest.”

Fritz Mondale died peacefully in his sleep, April 19, 2021, of natural causes, surrounded by family, at his Minneapolis, Minnesota home, aged 93.

President Biden acknowledged Mondale’s passing in remarks made from the White House, and said in part that,

“Through his work as a Senator, he showed me what was possible. He may have been modest and unassuming in manner, but he was unwavering in his pursuit of progress; instrumental in passing laws like the Fair Housing Act to prevent racial discrimination in housing, Title IX to provide more opportunities for women, and laws to protect our environment. There have been few senators, before or since, who commanded such universal respect.

“He not only created a path for himself, he helped others do the same. Walter Mondale was the first presidential nominee of either party to select a woman as his running mate, and I know how pleased he was to be able to see Kamala Harris become Vice President.

“In accepting the Democratic Party’s nomination for President, he described the values he was taught to live by: “to play by the rules; to tell the truth; to obey the law; to care for others; to love our country; to cherish our faith.”

“As a Senator, an Ambassador, a Vice President, and a candidate for President, he lived and spread those values.”

Then-former Georgia Governor Jimmy Carter, LEFT, and Vice Presidential running mate Minnesota Senator Walter Mondale celebrate Democratic primary victories at Mondale campaign headquarters in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on March 13, 1984.

Walter Mondale made history by being the first candidate of any party to name a female as a Vice Presidential running mate.

He chose

Banana Republicans Are Liars

U.S. Banana Republican Representative for Illinois’ 3rd Congressional District Jim Banks – just look at the smirking smug look on that mofo’s face.

Banana Republicans are liars.

Period.

Full stop.

They will say, or do, anything to get, and retain, power.

Their last leader was a Liar of the First Order. Nothing he said could be believed.

Nothing.

Ever.

Nothing that he and his über-wealthy multi-millionaire henchmen – also known as his cabinet and administration – did ever benefited the working families of America.

Nothing.

Ever.

They don’t give a shit about you, until something happens to them.

Look at Kentucky U.S. Representative Andy Barr, a Banana Republican who ostensibly represents the 6th Congressional District in that state. His wife died aged 39 of MVP – Mitral Valve Prolapse – after being diagnosed with it some years earlier. Sure, that’s a sad thing to have happen. And it happens much more frequently than one would imagine. But, this is the VERY first time that a Banana Republican has done any goddamn thing about it.

Why?

Because it affected them, not you.

They’re inherently selfish bastards.

So now, Banana Republican Andy Barr of Kentucky has written a bill that has bipartisan support – H.R.1193 – Cardiovascular Advances in Research and Opportunities Legacy Act, aka the CAROL Act, after his late wife’s name – that would provide funding for research into heart valve diseases. How thoughtful, of him, eh?

He didn’t give a rat’s rip until it affected him. And then, it’s WE MUST DO SOMETHING ABOUT THIS HORRIBLE PROBLEM!

What we need to do is eliminate the hypocritical Banana Republicans.

Just look at the miserable POS Wilbur Ross, the lying asshole who was his Secretary of Commerce, who sought to exclude counting people in the Census, and actually went to a Supreme Court fight to attempt to shaft Americans.

Fortunately, the SCOTUS said “NO,” to his illegal, and anti-Constitutional ideas.

And then, there’s the scumbag who was POS45’s Postmaster General, Louis DeJoy, who aided and abetted

Republican Tennessee Governor Bill Lee Has Lost His Mind

A gun in every pocket.

Not a chicken in every pot.

No pot there, either.

Not even medical.

The state wants people to kill each other.

But not in the womb.

That’d be wrong.

Shooting people to kill them, is A-OK.

Shooting pregnant women is not.

Might harm the unborn, you know.

Tennessee’s Republican Governor Bill Lee has signed NRA-written legislation that allows any adult aged 21, or older, to carry a handgun either openly, or concealed without any special training, education, or permit. Active duty Military Service Members aged 18 to 21 are excepted.

Tennessee’s Law Enforcement Agencies throughout the state, including the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation, have told the Governor that they thought his idea was poor policy, but he ignored them, and signed into law a bill that removes restrictions on carrying firearms, either concealed, or openly.

Tennessee Republican Governor Bill Lee (RIGHT) signs HB786 as the bill’s sponsor, Republican Representative William Lamberth of Portland, District 44, observes.

Despite law enforcement’s opposition to his legislation that would end gun permits in Tennessee, Governor Bill Lee told a gathering from the National Rifle Association that his legislation would “make Tennessee safer.” However, he failed to mention how it would.

A spokesman for the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation told a Senate committee, “The bureau has been consistent [in opposition] on this from a public safety standpoint.” The TBI and Tennessee Sheriff’s Association oppose eliminating requirements for concealed carry gun permits.

Governor Lee’s Press Secretary Casey Black said, “The ‘Constitutional Carry’ legislation is a key priority in the governor’s public safety package, which is focused on protecting law-abiding Tennesseans’ Second Amendment rights, while also significantly increasing penalties for criminals who steal firearms.”

Advocates point to permitless carry which is often misnomered as

Tennessee’s Republican Legislators Seek To Cut Unemployment Benefits Time

Tennessee’s Republican State Legislators Have Lost Their Minds

Republican-written legislation being considered in the Tennessee General Assembly would kick to the curb over 65,000 unemployed Tennesseans who have lost their jobs due to the COVID pandemic.

Republicans are seeking to cut in half the time frame for collecting unemployment benefits.

Richie Townsend, 39, an East Nashville resident and former bartender at Rolf and Daughters in Germantown, has struggled to find work after losing his restaurant job when the COVID-19 pandemic struck in March 2020.

In the time since, he’s held various unstable, low-paying jobs from which he, and others, have been fired over three times, due to no fault of his own. During those times, he has applied for, and has been granted access to his State Unemployment Compensation, a type of insurance paid for by employers, and backed by the state government, which all 50 states have.

Fortunately, he has benefits remaining, but only because of the extensions granted by Congress.

He’s recently started a new job in Franklin, but even as the state told him it is expediting his request for benefits, he’s reached out to his state House member but hasn’t gotten any payments on his latest extension.

“It sounds like an over-exaggeration by our local government to try to react to the fact that unemployment was extended for a year and a half in total,” he said.

Though he hates to admit it, Townsend says he’s

Alabama Is Sorry, Stupid, And Lazy

News reports this morning are stating that in the matter of the unionization vote at the Amazon facility in Bessemer, AL slightly over half of all ballots sent out were returned.

Of the nearly 5800 ballots mailed out to Amazon employees at their Bessemer, Alabama facility, only about 55% were returned.

Only 3,215 ballots were received by the National Labor Relations Board in the election.

There were 5,867 ballots were sent out to Amazon workers in early February – that’s a 54.798% return rate.

At 1025 CST today, unofficial results were that the “NO” votes on the question of unionization were 1,798, while the “YES” votes were 738.

Amazon challenged 505 challenged ballots, and there were 76 voided ballots.

At the conclusion of the tally, an official from the National Labor Relations Board – a Federal governmental entity – said that “Challenges are not sufficient in number to affect the results of this election.”

In January, the NLRB

The Alabama Attorney General’s Office Has IDIOTS Working There

This matter was just brought to my attention.

The figure 0.3% is 3/10ths of 1% (three tenths of one percent) – NOT “three one-thousandths” as they incorrectly wrote.

Any grade school child should be able to tell the difference.

Note the emboldened text highlighted in purple on the lower portion of the page.

And examine the dates…

NO ONE has caught that gross error since the time it was written – 2 years 4 months 20 days
or 28 months 20 days
or 124 weeks 3 days
or 871 calendar days

and updated –
1 year 7 months 26 days
or 19 months 26 days
or 86 weeks 2 days
or 604 calendar days.

If the folks working in that office are that dimwitted, or lazy – take your pick – what does that say about the rest of the state government?

Remember: Steve Marshall’s incompetency is precisely why former Governor Bentley wanted him in that office, in order to avoid prosecution.

The history of it all is utterly Machiavelian – Steve Marshall fired Matt Hart, a former Federal Prosecutor who was a tenaciously aggressive and fearsome Special Prosecutor for the State, who

Alabama Secretary of State John Merrill Caught With Pants Down

Looks like John let the little head do the thinking for the big head.

He also likes anal sex – something his wife apparently doesn’t give him.

Yes… it’s true:

Alabama Secretary of State John Merrill has been caught red-handed in an extra-marital relationship, much to the chagrin of his cult-like followers who were hoping he would campaign for the soon-to-be-vacated U.S. Senate seat held by almost-nonagenarian Democrat-turned-Republican-since-1994 Richard Shelby (b.1934), who has occupied the office since 1986, which is up for grabs in 2022.

“He was such an idiot. And he would talk, just… I don’t know if you ever met him outside of looking like he’s a professional, he’s a total [sic] different person. He’s sometimes funny, and he’s charismatic, and he has a sense of humor… but then, when the real John Merrill stands up, then you’re kinda’ like ‘uggh.'”

– Cesaire McPherson, 44-year old Legal Assistant, and lover to Alabama Republican Secretary of State John Merrill in phone interview with National File about their extramarital sexual relationship

Of note, the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service on December 17, 2020 updated their report “Membership of the 116th Congress: A Profile” which found that the average age of the average Senator was 62.9 years, while the average age of the Members of the House of Representatives was 57.6. At the time of the report, there were only 3 African American Senators – Kamala Harris, D-CA Corey Booker, D-NJ, and Tim Scott, R-SC. Since Kamala Harris is now Vice President, there are now only 2 African American Senators. And, the oldest Senator in the 116th Congress was Dianne Feinstein, D-CA, born June 22, 1933, who was then aged 85.

Merrill’s official statement said that, “With the end of my term coming up in January of 2023, I have been presented with a variety of options for where my path in public service could lead. I have decided that I will not be a candidate for any office in 2022.”

In a confession to the Advance Local Media LLC-owned AL dot com news group, John Merrill said further that,

Happy Easter, er… Happy Fertility Day!

For Christians, today is Easter Sunday. It’s their annual high holy day which corresponds with the Spring Equinox in which they celebrate the alleged resurrection from the dead of their god, Jesus of Nazareth, whom they also call Jesus Christ, whom they believe to be God incarnate, and the “son of God,” even though in their story book, Jesus only referred to himself as “the son of man,” NEVER as “the son of God.” NEVER.

Of course, they’ll fight you tooth and nail in disagreement that Jesus of Nazareth is not their god all while saying “praise Jesus!” and making similar exclamations, but in the same breath, they’ll capitulate and confuse things by saying there’s a “trinity” of three separate divine beings whom they identify as “the Father,” “the Son,” and “the Holy Spirit” whom they claim are not separate, but are separate, and are “co-equal” yet distinct and unique.

Entire religions – actually, “denominations” – have been formed around the various interpretations of those blatantly absurdist claims. Baptists, Methodists, Presbyterians, Episcopalians, Church of Christ, Church of God, Church of God  in Christ, Mormons, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Seventh Day Adventists, Cumberland Presbyterian, are but a few, and that’s just here in the United States.

Abroad, there’s Greek Orthodox, Russian Orthodox, Armenian Apostolic, Armenian Catholic, Armenian, Coptic Catholic, Coptic Orthodox, Anglican, Anglican Catholic, and on, and on, and on, and on. Some have said there are probably tens of thousands of different denominations and sects of Christianity, while others say there are but a few hundred. And yet, the odd thing is, that while they’re all “doing their own thing” they pray and seemingly ask for “unity” which they call ecumenism.

Bottom line? It’ll never happen. Not until they all give up their own private interpretations, traditions, and everything about their religion.

There’s a long-standing joke – there’s ALWAYS truth in humor, and it serves to remind us of the matter about which it takes light-heartedly, and even

The End Of Cannabis Prohibition Is In Sight

Legalizing, taxing, and regulating cannabis is a smart move for the same reasons that legalizing, taxing, and regulating beverage alcohol was. Because Prohibition was so phenomenally successful, you know.

But here’s something else to consider: There has NEVER been one documented death from cannabis consumption. Not even one. Ever.

That cannot be said of alcohol.

There is quite a bit of truth in the remark that no government can be a “nanny state” to continuously monitor its peoples actions, and prevent anything bad from ever happening to them.

We must be afforded freedoms and liberties, and part of those freedoms and liberties include risk-taking.

But as far as risk goes, with cannabis, consumption of it has nominal risk in comparison to many other things.

And eventually, we all die, anyway.

Few have ever examined the history of cannabis prohibition, and have simply swallowed – hook, line, and sinker – propaganda from Nixon’s “War on Drugs” machine which was part and parcel of his “Southern Strategy” to win over racist Democrats, aka “Dixiecrats” who eventually became Republicans.

But the history of cannabis prohibition goes back to at least 1937 with the Marijuana Tax Stamp Act, which was passed in response to a wave of anti-Mexican sentiment that was sweeping across America, beginning on the West Coast, and moving eastward.

Harry Anslinger, who lived in that era, and is considered the first head of the Federal agency that is now the Drug Enforcement Administration (a law enforcement agency under the aegis of the Department of Justice), was a virulent racist, and as an excellent propagandist himself, he never failed to miss an opportunity to blame cannabis for every horrible, violent crime, consumption of which he claimed was the root cause of terrible things like:

“Marihuana influences Negroes to look at white people in the eye, step on white men’s shadows and look at a white woman twice.”

-and-

“There are 100,000 total marijuana smokers in the US, and most are Negroes, Hispanics, Filipinos, and entertainers. Their Satanic music, jazz, and swing, result from marijuana use. This marijuana causes white women to seek sexual relations with Negroes, entertainers, and any others.”

Yeah.

There’s probably nothing more that needs to be said.

But there are some things that should be said – such as research has shown that Blacks and Whites consume cannabis at about the same rate, but Blacks are arrested at a significantly greater and disproportionate rate than Whites. That is true in all 50 states.

If unequal enforcement of law that skews against Blacks is not evidence of racism, I don’t know what is.

And with remarks like “…the primary reason to outlaw marijuana is its effect on the degenerate races,” it’s easy to understand why Harry Anslinger is the root cause to blame.

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Schumer Says Senate Will Move Ahead On Marijuana Legalization
By Celine Castronuovo, 04/03/21 12:31 PM EDT

Senate Democratic Majority Leader Charles Schumer of New York has vowed to move forward with legislation to federally legalize marijuana, even if President Biden resists such a move.

In an interview with Politico which was published today (Saturday, 03 April 2021), Schumer said he “will have an ongoing conversation” with Biden on the legalization of cannabis to “tell him how my views have evolved” on the issue.

However, the Senator said that if the President, who has

GOPers Are Petty Little Sons Of Bitches

Tit for tat.

Just like something a petulant 4-year old child would do.

Soon enough, America will let the GOP know how utterly disgusted they are with their bullshittery.

It’ll be at the ballot box.

Their days are numbered, and the end is in sight. That’s why they’re taking such utterly drastic and unheard-of measures, including writing restrictive laws prohibiting voting… i.e., fixing problems that don’t exist – except that the problems are that they lost because they’re fresh out of ideas, and utterly out-of-touch with the American people.

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GOP Senators Push To End Major League Baseball Antitrust Status

by Celine Castronuovo, 04/03/21 08:33 AM EDT
https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/546291-gop-senators-push-to-end-mlb-antitrust-status

Republican Senators Mike Lee of Utah, and Ted Cruz of Texas have joined calls to end Major League Baseball’s antitrust exemption following the its decision to pull the 2021 All-Star Game out of Atlanta.

MLB announced

Right Wing Nut Jobs

Protestant Christians of the garden variety Evangelical type think they own God. God is always on their side, and all of their ideas are utterly and absolutely 100% correct and infallible, inerrable, and come from the throne room of Heaven itself. And because they work for Satan, the Democrats are always wrong, and given half a chance, they’ll eat your babies like a suckling pig on a spit, with your blood for a dipping sauce.

That’s what they’d have you believe… because they believe it too. They’re not just “two bricks shy of a load,” they’re full-tilt crazy. They’re conspiracy theorists – note just how many of them voted for Trump, not just once, but twice!

Former President George W. Bush had a saying about that which he made in his “Remarks by the President on Teaching American History and Civic Education,” as delivered at East Literature Magnet School, Nashville, Tennessee, September 17, 2002, 1:05 P.M. CDT:

“There’s an old saying in Tennessee — I know it’s in Texas, probably in Tennessee — that says, ‘fool me once, shame on — shame on you. Fool me — you can’t get fooled again.'”

But, “get fooled again” is exactly what happened.

Rock guitarist/entertainer/musician Pete Townshend of The Who had something to say about that matter, as well, and

Yes, Georgia’s New Republican Vote Restriction Law Makes Illegal Giving Water Or Food To Voters

Many questions have arisen, and comments have been made, about Georgia’s new voting restrictions law.

Republican state legislators who wrote, passed, and signed the bill into law (Republican Governor Brian Kemp was formerly Secretary of State when he campaigned for the Governor’s office… and as a state official, oversaw his own election… nope, no conflict of interest there, eh?) continue to claim that the “integrity” and “security” of the voting systems in Georgia should be strengthened – as if they were insecure to begin with.

They were not.

The essence of what has happened, as many have observed and stated, is that since Republicans lost in the national election for President, and in the Senate election, they’re changing the rules in order to make it easier for them to win next time.

There was NO fraud, NO irregularities, NO insecurity in the Georgia election, nor in any election in the nation. Period.

So, here for your perusal, is the word-for-word reading of the law, including a screenshot of the law as passed, and

Matt Gaetz: Another Drowning Rat From Trump’s Sunken Ship

He’s a “Florida Man” to be certain, and his Twitter bio states as much. He’s the moral equivalent of Jeffrey Epstein. His “NAY” vote was the EXCLUSIVE – the SOLITARY – the ONLY vote against a human sex trafficking bill. And his flimsy “excuse” or rationale why, is as weak as water. He’ll be out soon as just another worthless, hypocritical, flash-in-the-pan piece of GOP garbage.

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Matt Gaetz, On The Ropes From Juvenile Sex Trafficking Investigation, Finds Few Friends In The GOP

by Juliegrace Brufke & Mike Lillis
03/31/21 05:33 PM EDT

https://thehill.com/homenews/house/545850-gaetz-on-the-ropes-finds-few-friends-in-gop

In four years on Capitol Hill, Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) has experienced a meteoric rise to national prominence — one fueled by a close alliance with former President Trump, a penchant for political theatrics and a no-apologies brand of conservatism that’s made him a darling of the right-wing cable outlets.

Matt Gaetz now – with a slicked-back pompadour, and snazzy suit.

Yet this week, facing a federal investigation into allegations of a sexual relationship with an underage girl, Gaetz is finding himself in an unusual spot: On the ropes and virtually alone.

Few of Gaetz’s GOP colleagues are coming to the defense of the third-term Floridian following a New York Times report that the Department of Justice (DOJ) is investigating allegations of sexual misconduct with — and interstate trafficking of — a minor roughly two years ago. And a number of Republicans, while warning against jumping to premature conclusions about Gaetz’s conduct, also suggested they wouldn’t miss him if he were gone.

“I don’t know anything about this situation other than to say he has certainly made enemies and painted a bull’s-eye on his back,” said one Republican lawmaker, who requested anonymity to speak freely on a sensitive topic. “This appears to be a self-inflicted wound.”

Gaetz has vehemently denied that he had a sexual relationship with a 17-year-old-girl — the central allegation of the Justice Department probe, which was launched under the Trump administration. Gaetz contends that he and his family have been targeted by a former DOJ official in an extortion scheme seeking millions of dollars to have the allegations vanish.

In a series of tweets, statements and media interviews Tuesday evening, he maintained that

Matt Gaetz Is A Sexual Predator?

It couldn’t happen to a nicer guy.

https://clerk.house.gov/Votes/2017695?Title=human%20trafficking

Kinda’ “ironic,” wouldn’t you say, that the QAnon conspiracy theory folks who wrongly thought, and therefore targeted the Democrats for alleged involvement in some global child sex-trafficking cabal have sided with the exact ones who are actually participating in that very activity… Republicans.

Remember: Psychological projection – accusing others of the thing you’re guilty of – is a tool/technique extensively employed not only by the GOP, but in droves by the 45th President.

BTW… Matt Gaetz’ official actions as a Member of Congress are rather peculiar.

Matt Gaetz then…

In 2017, Representative Matt Gaetz, a Republican from Fort Walton Beach representing FL’s 1st CD, was the ONLY member of Congress to vote “NAY” on a law that gave the Federal government more power and money to fight human trafficking – S.1536 – Combating Human Trafficking in Commercial Vehicles Act.
https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/senate-bill/1536

THE ONLY ONE.

Vote Question: On Motion to Suspend the Rules and Pass
Combating Human Trafficking in Commercial Vehicles Act

Matt Gaetz now – with a slicked-back pompadour, cuff links, and snazzy suit.

Gaetz Republican Florida Nay

S.1536 – Combating Human Trafficking in Commercial Vehicles Act
Roll Call Vote 695, December 19, 2017, 4:56PM ET
115th Congress, 1st Session
418 YEAS
1 NAY
12 NOT VOTING

NOT VOTING
Bridenstine Republican Oklahoma Not Voting
Brooks (AL) Republican Alabama Not Voting
Cummings Democratic Maryland Not Voting (was sick & getting treatment)

Kennedy Democratic Massachusetts Not Voting
Loudermilk Republican Georgia Not Voting
Messer Republican Indiana Not Voting

Napolitano Democratic California Not Voting
Pocan Democratic Wisconsin Not Voting
Renacci Republican Ohio Not Voting

Scalise Republican Louisiana Not Voting
Smith (TX) Republican Texas Not Voting
Thompson (MS) Democratic Mississippi Not Voting

See also: https://www.orlandoweekly.com/Blogs/archives/2017/12/29/florida-rep-matt-gaetz-was-literally-the-only-person-to-vote-against-an-anti-human-trafficking-bill

See also: https://crooksandliars.com/2021/03/matt-gaetz-under-investigation-federal

Note this: Gaetz tweeted that his father was wearing a “wire” by the FBI.
Why would he broadcast that information, thereby spoiling the investigation?

…and my father has even been wearing a wire at the FBI’s direction to catch these criminals. The planted leak to the FBI tonight was intended to thwart that investigation.

No part of the allegations against me are true, and the people pushing these lies are targets…

— Matt Gaetz (@mattgaetz) March 30, 2021

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Matt Gaetz Is Said to Be Investigated Over Possible Sexual Relationship With a Girl, 17

by Michael S. Schmidt, Katie Benner
March 30, 2021, Updated 6:52 p.m. ET
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/30/us/politics/matt-gaetz-sex-trafficking-investigation.html

Republican Florida Representative Matt Gaetz, age 38, a close ally of former President Donald J. Trump, is being investigated by the United States Department of Justice over whether he had a sexual relationship with a 17-year-old and paid for her to travel with him, according to three people briefed on the matter, who also said that Federal officials are investigating whether, or not, Mr. Gaetz violated federal sex trafficking laws.

Representatives for the Justice Department and the F.B.I.

Alabama GOP Politicians Meddle In Healthcare To Deny Treatment

Should government exercise control over its citizens to the extent that:
a.) Certain types of private health care is illegal;
b.) Certain people are denied care?

Should your neighbors (aka “the government”) have the right to tell you, and/or your family, what you can, or cannot be treated for by a licensed healthcare professional?

Suppose someone said, “Well… I don’t think you need to be treated for

Cindy Hyde-Smith… a Mississippi joke of a U.S. Senator

Yesterday, Cindy Hyde-Smith, a White Banana Republican United States Senator from Mississippi made some genuinely STUPID remarks in a Senate Rules Committee hearing.

She’s the same Cindy Hyde-Smith who not too long ago infamously said “If he invited me to a public hanging, I’d be on the front row,” in Tupelo, MS after Colin Hutchinson, cattle rancher, praised her on November 11, 2018.

I’ll let the Wonkette site headline speak for me… at least in part – on her current stupidism.

Cindy Hyde-Smith Is A Mississippi Goddamn Moron

by Evan Hurst
March 24, 2021; 4:20 PM

“In the Senate today, during the Rules Committee’s big hearing on HR1/S1, the “For The People” Act, which among other things would protect the right to vote for ALL eligible Americans, Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith, a Republican from Not Georgia, let us know why she thinks people shouldn’t be able to vote on Sundays, and definitely not in Mississippi.”

First of all, she’s a Banana Republican.

Secondly, she attended a segregated, Whites-only High School.

Thirdly, she’s from Mississippi.

Fourthly, she’s a Trump sycophant.

Need I continue?

But ANYONE can view her remarks in context in the links below. Also, her remarks are transcribed as follows.

The FULL Committee hearing may be viewed here:
https://www.rules.senate.gov/hearings/watch?hearingid=92E7CB0D-5056-A066-6054-8B48164806BF

The pertinent excerpt occurs here:
https://www.c-span.org/video/?c4954273/user-clip-ms-sen-cindy-hyde-smith-sunday-god

Her remarks begin at 2:46:10 as Committee Chair Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar acknowledges Mississippi Senator Hyde-Smith, who then states, “Before we start, I have a question for the Chair,” addressed to Chair Amy Klobuchar, which Chair Klobuchar acknowledges, and bids her to continue, which she does, as follows:

Quoting Lincoln: Did he REALLY say that?

You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can not fool all of the people all of the time.

That statement is almost always misattributed to Abraham Lincoln, but there is NO EVIDENCE to support any claim that he ever said such a thing.

President Abraham Lincoln, albumen silver print photograph made February 1865 by Alexander Gardner

Think of it as “fake history.”

It is perhaps the most famous of apparently apocryphal remarks which are widely misattributed to the late, former President.

Despite the various citations as being from:
Lincoln’s “Lost Speech” as a Republican candidate for the party’s Presidential nomination at the Bloomington Convention in Bloomington, Illinois on May 29, 1856, or;
On September 8, 1858 in Clinton, Illinois, an account of which was published in “Report in the Bloomington “Pantograph,” September 9, 1858, which is also extant as ‘Speech at Clinton, Illinois, September 8, 1858’ in ‘The Complete Works of Abraham Lincoln, v. 3,’ or;
As being from the 4th Lincoln/Douglas debate September 18, 1858 in Charleston, Illinois – there are NO contemporary accounts or records that substantiate any claim that he ever made any such remark.

The earliest known appearance of any remotely similar statement is found in

Cancun Cruz: It’s Show Time!

Ted “Cancun” Cruz is a goddamn fucking moron.

Nobody likes him.

Nobody in the Senate.

Few in Texas.

Even fewer nationally.

Wouldn’t it be ironic tragedy if he was shot?

Somehow, being shot seems to change people’s minds about firearms laws.

It changed people’s minds after POTUS JFK was assassinated.

It changed racist White Supremacist Alabama Governor George Wallace’s mind.

It changed POTUS Ronald Reagan’s mind.

It changed Reagan’s Press Secretary James and his wife Sarah Brady’s minds.

It changed Arizona U.S. Representative Gabby Gifford and her husband Mark Kelly’s minds.

It changed Louisiana U.S. Representative Steve Scalise’s mind.

It changed peoples’ minds in El Paso.

It changed peoples’ minds in Parkland, Florida’s Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. (Sadly, there’s a list of school shootings maintained here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_school_shootings_in_the_United_States)

It’s amazing how little pieces of lead have power to change people’s minds.

I wonder why?

Of course, none of that applies to Alabama’s 5th District Moron Brooks.

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Cruz Accuses Democrats Of Playing “Ridiculous Theater” In Proposals Following Mass Shootings

By Celine Castronuovo – 03/23/21 12:47 PM EDT

Cancun Cruz

Texas Senator Cancun Cruz (R) on Tuesday accused Democrats of playing “ridiculous theater” by proposing universal background checks and other reforms following mass shootings, which he claimed would take “away guns from law-abiding citizens.”

Cancun Cruz made his remarks during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on gun violence that had been scheduled before of the deadly mass shootings at massage parlors in the Atlanta, Georgia area last week and at a Boulder, Colorado, grocery store Monday evening.

Cancun Cruz said that

Research Study Finds COVID-19 Numbers Vastly Underestimated

This is some of the first proven and confirmed evidence that what we have been told by the experts is 100% accurate and true.

“Typhoid Mary” Mallon (1869-1938), was an impoverished, illiterate Irish emigrant to the United States who worked primarily as a cook, and who became infamous for spreading typhoid fever, which at the time was an incurable, easily-spread, often deadly disease, for which no vaccination existed.

People who DO NOT KNOW THEY ARE INFECTED ARE SPREADING THE DISEASE BECAUSE THEY DO NOT HAVE SYMPTOMS.

It is a REPEAT of the classic example first shown by “Typhoid Mary” Mallon (1869-1938), an Irish emigrant to the United States who worked as a cook (one of the highest paying jobs at the time), and was actively infected with typhoid fever, yet NEVER – NOT EVEN ONCE – showed any signs of infection.

Tragically, however, as was common in the era in which she lived, she had low education and was practically illiterate, and her refusal to heed the advice of experts, and her insistence upon working in kitchens, resulted in the deaths of many people whom she thereby infected with typhoid fever because of her deliberately wanton disregard of advice, and disobedience to the order of law. She, however, claimed that she was being persecuted for being Irish and poor.

Her case was the first, and a prime example of the dangers of ignoring sound expert medical and scientific advice. As well, her case demonstrated the differences in attitudes toward public health between now, and then, because she filed lawsuits against the governmental authorities that detained her, and forbade her from either working, or being in public, and quarantined her. At the time, there was no vaccine against typhoid.

And throughout the remainder of her life, and up to the time she died, she never – not even once – ever showed signs of typhoid fever infection. And she did not die of typhoid fever. She died of

Is It TRUE -or- Is It FALSE?

True -or- False?

1.) Approximately 70% of adult wage earners in households that received SNAP (Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program, formerly known as “Food Stamps”) and/or Medicaid worked full time hours (defined as 35+ hours weekly), and about 50% worked full time hours yearly.

2.) 90% of wage-earning adults participating in either SNAP or Medicaid worked in the Private Sector, compared to 81% of non-participants.

3.) When compared to adult wage earners not participating in SNAP or Medicaid, wage-earning adults in either or both programs were more likely to work in the Leisure and Hospitality industry, and in Food Service occupations.

4.) The single largest majority of adult wage earners who participated in SNAP and/or Medicaid worked for employers with

Idiots Abound

Idiots abound.

They can be found everywhere. And lately, they’ve been popping up as radicalized right-wing nut jobs.

Remember a dude named “Cliven Bundy”?

He’s the asshole from Nevada who owed the United States government tons of money in back-owed grazing fees and in 2014 instigated an armed standoff with Federal agents and other Federal Law Enforcement Authorities in Bunkerville, Nevada where he resided, who sought his detention over his passive-aggressive response to the matter… along with his failure to pay the Bureau of Land Management the contractually agreed-upon fees for the privilege of allowing his cattle to graze upon BLM land.

Cliven Bundy

He had been illegally grazing his cattle herd on public land since 1993.

Later, he was arrested by the FBI at the Portland International Airport while he was on his way to the Malheur fracas. He had become a patsy for the right-wing extremist movement because of Fox News incessant telecasting of the matters surrounding him, and his movements.

Yeah… THAT’s the Bundy we’re talking about. Apparently, he’s no relation to the mass murderer Ted Bundy, or of the fictional teevee character “Al Bundy” of “Married… with Children.” Though, he could be.

Turned out, he’s at least two bricks shy of a load, as well, and made this incredibly racist, bigoted remark at one of is daily “press conferences” whih was picked up by the New York Times.

Mr. Bundy recollected once driving past a public-housing project in North Las Vegas several years ago and at the “press conference” said:

“I want to tell you one more thing I know about the Negro… and in front of that government house the door was usually open and the older people and the kids — and there is always at least a half a dozen people sitting on the porch — they didn’t have nothing to do. They didn’t have nothing for their kids to do. They didn’t have nothing for their young girls to do. And because they were basically on government subsidy, so now what do they do? They abort their young children, they put their young men in jail, because they never learned how to pick cotton. And I’ve often wondered, are they better off as slaves, picking cotton and having a family life and doing things, or are they better off under government subsidy? They didn’t get no more freedom. They got less freedom.”

Bundy has a stable of kids, 14 in fact, all of whom are adults. The eldest is a son named Ammon. He’s an asshole just like his father. The apple doesn’t fall too far from the tree, you know.

Ammon Bundy

Seems that Ammon has gotten himself into more trouble.

Naturally, he’s a

Trump Talks Like A Mafioso

Complete shyster, liar, prevaricator, chiseler, swindler, cheat.

He’ll be indicted by several authorities.

This is simply more damnable icing on the corrupt cake.

The things he says, and the way he says them are purposely ambiguous, so that to even an expert witness in syntax, one would not be able to definitively say that he unquestionably stated a thing certain.

That’s how the mafioso talks. They’re deliberately ambiguous, vague, and speak in riddles and figurative language, such as “I hear you paint houses,” which means “I understand that you’re a hit man and kill people.”

Simply read what he says.

It’s as clear as a bell that he’s being ambiguous. But by the same tone, it’s equally clear what he wants.

“Something bad happened. When the right answer comes out, you’ll be praised.”

-and-

“The people of Georgia are angry, the people of the country are angry. And there’s nothing wrong with saying, you know, that you’ve recalculated. So look. All I want to do is this. I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have. Because we won the state. So what are we going to do here, folks? I only need 11,000 votes. Fellas, I need 11,000 votes. Give me a break. There’s no way I lost Georgia. There’s no way. We won by hundreds of thousands of votes.” 

Neal Katyal, a Georgetown law professor who was Acting Solicitor General in the Obama administration, said Trump’s use of language is “the way that people in organized crime rings talk. I’ve heard the extraordinary excerpts that the Washington Post has and, at least based on those excerpts, it sounds like Donald Trump is talking like a mafia boss, and not a particularly smart mafia boss at that. This is the way that people in organized crime rings talk, and you see it there.”

“This is, you know, the heart of what the abuse of power that our founders worried about so much is — it’s, you know, the idea that the government official can use the powers of his office to try and stay in office and try and browbeat other officials that disagree with them.”

“So, one question is whether or not a high crime and misdemeanor was committed, certainly the tape makes it sound like it has. The second is whether or not there has been a criminal offense and the federal code 52 U.S.C. 20511 prohibits a federal official from interfering in a state election process.”

See also: Free speech or incitement? Here’s how Trump talks like a mob boss.
Mafia members like to use ambiguous language.
By Henry Farrell
February 10, 2021 at 12:20 p.m. CST
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/02/28/how-trump-speaks-like-mob-boss/

Note: We are reposting (with a new introduction) an article from Nov. 9, 2019, written during hearings on Trump’s conversation with Ukraine’s president, as it appears relevant to this week’s impeachment trial.

“Nothing the President said on January 6th was inciteful, let alone impeachable,” the Republican Party is arguing during former president Donald Trump’s second impeachment trial, “and in fact, President Trump urged supporters to exercise their rights ‘peacefully and patriotically.’”

Of course, Trump did not directly instruct his supporters to attack the Capitol, stop official proceedings and threaten members of Congress until they agreed to keep Trump in power, despite the election results. That is not how he talks. In the past, Trump has said that, “I did not make a statement that, ‘You have to do this or I’m not going to give you A.’ I wouldn’t do that.” We know from former Trump attorney Michael Cohen that Trump does not like to say things explicitly when they might get him into trouble. Instead, he prefers to communicate indirectly.

Cohen has said Trump “doesn’t give orders. He speaks in code. And I understand that code.” That’s the way that Mafiosi speak to each other, to avoid trouble. In my book on the political economy of trust, I discuss the oblique ways in which Sicilian Mafiosi communicate with one another and how this affects trust and distrust among them, building on the work of sociologists such as Diego Gambetta.

Popular culture shows how mobsters communicate in code when they are worried about being overheard by law enforcement, using indirect language to describe their intentions, so as to make it harder to pin responsibility on them. Similarly, Trump very possibly never said explicitly that Ukraine would be frozen out unless it helped discredit Trump’s potential election rival. Sondland’s testimony suggests that Trump tried to get Ukraine to hurt his presidential opponent through intermediaries using careful language that left no doubt what he wanted, but did so in a way that would preserve a crucial minimum of deniability.

Ambiguity makes it difficult to prove intent.

There is a reason why mob bosses prefer ambiguous language: it makes it harder to prove charges against them. The same is plausibly true for Trump. That is especially so when much of the jury (in this case, Republican senators) have strong political reasons to want to find Trump innocent. Trump has made a very successful career out of speaking in code, and ruthlessly throwing subordinates under the bus when they do what he wants them to do but then gets caught. It’s unlikely that he is going to stop any time soon.

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Trump Call to Georgia Lead Investigator Reveals New Details

by Cameron McWhirter
Updated March 11, 2021 10:08 am ET

ATLANTA—Then-President Donald Trump urged the chief investigator of the Georgia Secretary of State’s office to

Two Simple Questions

Simple questions deserve simple answers.

So, here are two sets of questions about two matters.

Each matter has two options.

Choose either a.), or b.) for each of the two matters.

1.) Pertaining to Voting:

a.) Should voting be made easy and uncomplicated as possible?

–or–

b.) Should voting be made difficult and complicated?

–AND–

Should there be a law… v2.0

More questions!

In our last installment – “Should there be a law… ” – we asked 14 questions.

This time, we’re asking a few more.

Actually, 3.4285 times more.

And, that’d be 48.

We’re asking 48 questions this time.

So… what do you think?

Should there be a law (or laws) that addresses these matters?

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1.) Should cash transactions involving United States real estate be subject to anti-money laundering laws?

2.) Should Congress examine the money laundering and terrorist financing risks in the real estate market, including the role of anonymous parties, and review legislation to address any vulnerabilities?

3.) Should Congress examine the methods by which corruption flourishes and the means to detect and deter the financial misconduct that fuels that driver of global instability?

4.) Should Congress monitor government efforts to enforce United States anti-corruption laws and regulations?

5.) Should United States elections be free of interference from foreign governments, including any contribution, donation, expenditure, independent expenditure, or disbursement for an electioneering communication by a corporation, limited liability corporation, or partnership, and should they file with the Federal Election Commission, under penalty of perjury, a statement that a foreign national did not direct, dictate, control, or directly or indirectly participate in the decision making process relating to such activity?

6.) Should foreign nationals be forbidden from participating in any way in the decisionmaking processes of Corporate PACs and Super PACs?

7.) Shall the Federal Election Commission conduct an audit after each Federal election cycle to determine the incidence of illicit foreign money in such Federal election cycle?

8.) In order to prevent money laundering, and improper spending, should corporations, labor organizations, and certain other entities be required to report campaign-related disbursements aggregating more than $10,000 in an election reporting cycle, and not later than 24 hours after each disclosure date file a report of the same with the Federal Election Commission?

9.) Should that report identify each such legal entity and each such beneficial owner who will use that other entity to exercise control over the entity, and the name and address of each person who made such payment?

10.) Should commercial transactions in the ordinary course of any trade or business conducted by the covered organization be exempted from such reports?

11.) Should the integrity of American democracy and national security be enhanced by improving disclosure requirements for online political advertisements in order to uphold the Supreme Court’s well-established standard that the electorate bears the right to be fully informed?

12.) Should regulations on political advertisements provide sufficient transparency to uphold the public’s right to be fully informed about political advertisements made online?

13.) Should transparency of funding for political advertisements be essential to enforce other campaign finance laws, including the prohibition on campaign spending by foreign nationals?

14.) Should digital or online political advertising clearly state who paid for it?

15.) In order to prevent fraud, deceit, and money-laundering, should platforms that sell political advertising be required to maintain records of transactions?

16.) When political advertising is paid for with a credit card by a citizen of the United States who is living outside the country, should they be required to be identified as a United States citizen to the seller by providing the United States address they use for voter registration purposes?

17.) Should broadcast stations, providers of cable and satellite television, and online platforms be required to make reasonable efforts to ensure that political communications made available by such station, provider, or platform are not purchased by a foreign national, directly or indirectly?

18.) Should pre-recorded telephone and video calls made for political purposes announce the political nature of the call at the beginning of the call?

19.) Should shareholders of corporations have the right to know that their money is being spent for political campaigns, and the details of them?

20.) Should Presidential Inaugural Committees be prohibited from soliciting and accepting money from corporations and foreign interests, i.e. should the obtain money or funds from United States citizens only?

21.) Should Inaugural Committees shall file with a report with the Federal Election Commission disclosing any donation by an individual to the committee in an amount of $1,000 or more not later than 24 hours after the receipt of such donation?

22.) In order to protect the integrity of democracy and the electoral process, and to ensure political equality for all, should

Should there be a law…

Let’s talk a few minutes about what should, and what should not be.

For example…

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1.) • Should there be, and should Federal Judges abide by, “a code of conduct, which applies to each justice and judge of the United States”?

2.) • Should there be a DEDICATED ENFORCEMENT UNIT “within the counterespionage section of the National Security Division of the Department of Justice for the enforcement of the Foreign Agents Registration Act of 1938”?

3.) • Should it be illegal “for any person, whether acting under color of law or otherwise, to corruptly hinder, interfere with, or prevent another person from registering to vote or to corruptly hinder, interfere with, or prevent another person from aiding another person in registering to vote”?

4.) • Should “a State motor vehicle authority require each individual applying for a motor vehicle driver’s license in the State to indicate whether the individual resides in another State or resided in another State prior to applying for the license, and, if so, to identify the State involved; and to indicate whether the individual intends for the State to serve as the individual’s residence for purposes of registering to vote in elections for Federal office”?

5.) • Should it be illegal for a political party or another partisan organization to send mail to addresses of registered voters whom they have identified as likely to be unfriendly to their candidate, and then use all the undeliverable returned mail to make what is called a caging list to challenge voters when they show up at polls to vote?

6.) • Should the right of an individual who is a citizen of the United States to vote

Guess Which One?

Which one’s which?

Find the M-16 and the AR-15.

And, did you know?

ALL parts are interchangeable on the M-16 and the AR-15.

Every single one of them.

Why is that?

When Eugene Stoner (1922-1997) of the Armalite corporation originally designed the weapon, it was at the behest of the United States Department of Defense which sought a firearm that was lightweight (under 6 pounds) had a high-capacity magazine (30 rounds), and could penetrate BOTH sides of a steel helmet at 500 yards. It was called the AR15, for Armalite Rifle version 15. There had been several previous iterations to the rifle, all of which were intended exclusively for military use.

The .223 caliber round (the bullet, not the shell/casing) had been introduced to market and made available to the civilian market by Remington, which commercially introduced the .222 Remington as a varmint cartridge in 1950 – a round intended for pest control.

Bullets are measured in size, which is called “caliber,” and refers to its diameter/circumference, and weight, which is measured in “grains.” So, a 60 grain bullet would weigh 3.887935 grams.

Sometimes also called “ball ammo,” bullets so described are lead bullets completely covered with metal, also known as FMJ, or Full Metal Jacket. Unlike hollow point bullets – bullets which have a hollowed-out center – ball ammo/FMJ bullets do not expand upon impact. Instead, they penetrate a target and quite possibly even penetrate the object behind the target.

There are also numerous varieties and shapes of ball ammunition which range from “boat tails,” flat nose (sometimes called dum-dum bullets), and ones with truncated cones. Each shape has a specific use, but all are made for one purpose in mind: Penetration.

Though the years, the development of the .223 caliber round, and the Armalite Rifle proceeded. The military was increasingly interested in both.

In 1957, events began to accelerate with development of both. Eugene Stoner had developed a rifle called the AR-10 in response to the Army’s request for a “small-caliber, high-velocity” (SCHV) cartridge – the entire shell casing and round, filled with gunpowder, a primer, and bullet. And that year, the Infantry Board had agreed upon the preliminary specifications, which called for a 6 pound, select-fire .22″ rifle with a conventional stock and a 20 round magazine. The proposed chambering had to penetrate the standard issue steel helmet, body armor, and a .135″ steel plate at 500 yards, while maintaining the trajectory and accuracy of M2 ball from a M1 Garand, and equaling or exceeding the “wounding” ability of the .30 Carbine.

In January 1963, just as the Vietnam “conflict” was simmering slightly below a boil, U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara ordered the AR-15 adopted to replace the M14 which had been the standard issue infantry rifle, and standard issue for all branches of service for several years. His decision was based upon

CORONAVIRUS may NEVER “Go Away”

Welcome to the “new” reality.

But, just for a moment, let’s play “What if?”

What if the United States’ failed response (because of the inactions and deliberate failures of the previous administration) was the primary cause of the mutated, more virulent variants?

It’s entirely plausible.

Otherwise, how to explain that the United States, with the world’s 3rd most populous nation – China and India each have WELL OVER 1 BILLION MORE – has ABSOLUTELY THE WORLD’S WORST COVID-19 INFECTION RATE?

Other nations, most notably New Zealand, have had phenomenal success in keeping the disease at bay, relatively speaking, as have a few other nations, including China, India, Greenland, Australia, other Scandinavian nations, and… well, you get the picture.

Perhaps there should’ve been a sign:

Choose One: Your Life, or Your Freedom.

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“When Will It End?” : How A Changing Virus Is Reshaping Scientists’ Views On COVID-19

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-variants-insight/when-will-it-end-how-a-changing-virus-is-reshaping-scientists-views-on-covid-19-idUSKBN2AV1T1

CHICAGO (Reuters) – Chris Murray, a University of Washington disease expert whose projections on COVID-19 infections and deaths are closely followed worldwide, is changing his assumptions about the course of the pandemic.

Murray had until recently been hopeful that

Crybaby Boeing Seeks To Divert Attention From Themselves

Ummm… No, Boeing.

You’re just getting your ass kicked, and your hat handed to you, and you want to divert attention from your losing self.

Your ridiculously asinine claims aren’t even specious.

Face it… you’re old and in the way. And you’re becoming corrupt.

You’ve had your heydey, and it’s over now.

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Boeing Cites Risks In Design Of Newest Airbus Jet

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-airbus-design-boeing/boeing-cites-risks-in-design-of-newest-airbus-jet-idUSKCN2AU2RJ

PARIS (Reuters) – Boeing Co has raised concerns over

Trump & Republicans LITERALLY Destroyed United States Government

Alejandro Mayorkas, Department of Homeland Security Secretary, White House press conference, Monday, March 1, 2021

“The prior administration dismantled our nation’s immigration system in its entirety.”

– Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, Monday, March 1, 2021, White House briefing room press conference

That has been, and continues to be, the primary modus operandi of the former Grand Old Party, now known as the Banana Republican party – tear it down.

https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/press-briefings/2021/03/01/press-briefing-by-press-secretary-jen-psaki-and-secretary-of-homeland-security-alejandro-mayorkas/

“Let me explain to you why it is hard and why it is going to take time. I think it is important to understand what we have inherited, because it defines the situation as it currently stands. Entire systems are not rebuilt in a day or in a few weeks. To put it succinctly, the prior administration dismantled our nation’s immigration system in its entirety.

“When I started 27 days ago, I learned that we did not have the facilities available or equipped to administer the humanitarian laws that our Congress passed years ago. We did not have the personnel, policies, procedures, or training to administer those laws. Quite frankly, the entire system was gutted.

“In addition, they tore down

How To Quickly Vaccinate Everyone

This morning, bright and early around 0300 (that was the timestamp upon it, I was blissfully asleep then), I received an email from a friend and his better half whom are expats in Kitahiroshima on the island prefecture of Hokkaido, in northernmost Japan, near where her parents reside.

He wrote in part that “Vaccinations for coronavirus have started here but only for those with the highest priority (which makes sense).”

In that message, he also included a copy of an email communique from the United States Department of State which read in part, “The United States Government does not plan to provide COVID-19 vaccinations to private U.S. citizens overseas.”

In my reply, I wrote in part,

AOC is a better Representative than Ted “Cancun” Cruz is a Senator

(L-R ) Congresswomen Sheila Jackson Lee, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Sylvia Garcia help distribute food at the Houston Food Bank on February 20, 2021 in Houston, Texas. – Texans are in need of aid after an unprecedented and deadly “polar plunge” burst pipes and left millions in the US state shivering without power or clean water for days. (Photo by Elizabeth Conley / POOL / AFP)

You KNOW things’re bad when a renown New York City Progressive Democrat has more chutzpah, and gets more things done for Texans than does their ne’er do well, out-of-touch privileged U.S. Senator Ted “Cancun” Cruz.

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https://www.cnn.com/2021/02/22/politics/alexandria-ocasio-cortez-texas-fundraising-future/index.html

The Stunning Political Power Of AOC

Analysis by Chris Cillizza, CNN Editor-at-large
Updated 3:51 PM ET, Monday February 22, 2021

(CNN) – Last Thursday, New York Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D) announced her plan to raise money to help victims of the extreme weather — and power grid failure — in Texas.

On Sunday night, her office confirmed that she had raised almost $5 million for that effort in less than 96 hours.

Obviously, the most important thing here is that millions more dollars will go to Texans still struggling to find potable water and deal with the damage from last week’s deep freeze. (Ocasio-Cortez also traveled to the state over the weekend to see the situation firsthand.)

But it’s also extremely important

Donald V. Watkins, Sr. Is A Convicted Federal Felon

Update: Saturday, 20 February 2021
NOTE: TO THE READER: As you read any story anywhere mentioning, involving, or written by Donald V. Watkins, Sr., it must be borne in mind that he is now a Federal Convict, and along with his son, Donald V. Watkins, Jr., was found guilty of numerous charges.

“Donald Watkins Sr. was convicted of seven counts of wire fraud, two counts of bank fraud and one count of conspiracy.
Donald Watkins Jr. was convicted of one count of wire fraud and one count of conspiracy.”

As of the date of this note, he is in Federal Custody at

Feel Like Overturning A Few Elections? Here’s Where It’s Now Happening.

Imagine for a minute, if you can, what it would be like for your elected Representatives and Senators, at either the State, or Federal level to literally “undo,” or attempt to “undo,” an election that was in every way conducted properly (meaning ethically, honestly, and openly, in accordance with all applicable laws), simply because they didn’t “like” the way The People voted – the results or outcome of the election wasn’t to their suiting, or liking.

There was such an attempt at the State level by the former President – the most notably infamous one being an hour-long phone call to the Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, of which there is a publicly available audio recording of the entire call (transcript of entire call here), in which the former President said numerous times “I just want to find 11,780 votes” (Joe Biden won Georgia by a margin of 11,779 votes) – trying to enlist Secretary Raffensberger’s assistance in his effort to “find” votes which would dishonestly, unjustly, inequitably, and illegally “throw” the election to himself.

The Fulton County, Georgia District Attorney and the Georgia State Attorney General’s Office are both investigating that matter in order to determine what, if any, election-related laws were broken in the course of that phone call, which may include “the solicitation of election fraud, the making of false statements to state and local governmental bodies, conspiracy, racketeering, violation of oath of office and any involvement in violence or threats related to the election’s administration.”

The audio taped recording of the Trump-Raffensperger phone call is quite likely much worse than any of the numerous covert so-called “smoking gun” audio tapes of Richard Nixon’s presidency. Nixon’s numerous recorded conversations with staff, and others, including of his phone calls, which detailed his involvement in the numerous crimes of the Watergate burglary/break-in, also revealed him to be paranoid.

And cockamamie conspiracy theories aside – especially and particularly the one of “The BIG Lie,” as told by the former President – NO ONE made any overt, or clandestine effort or attempt to “steal” any election from anyone. PERIOD.

But the point of the matter is this:
There are
GENUINELY
now-ongoing efforts
to literally “undo”
the results of honest elections
in the United States.

No, this is NOT a joke… and, NO this is NOT a conspiracy theory.

It is a documented fact.

What does it say for democracy and the democratic process if the expressed will of the people is somehow, overridden, undone, or cancelled?

Yeah… it’s that “cancel culture” thing.

And it is Republicans who are doing it.

Remember the thing about “psychological projection” – a morbid behavior in which people deny or defend in themselves the very characteristic or behavior they abjure and detest in others? It’s a type of “blame shifting,” and a refusal to accept either reality or responsibility.

Read for yourself the following 2 news items to learn what GOP-Banana Republican types are doing in some states.

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Marijuana Foes Deploy New ‘Playbook’ To Thwart State Legalization, Upend Election Results

By Jeff Smith
Published February 18, 2021
https://mjbizdaily.com/marijuana-legalization-foes-aim-to-overturn-election-results/

Efforts to thwart voter-approved marijuana legalization in Mississippi, Montana and South Dakota are evidence of a “playbook” that reflects new legal strategies and greater willingness among local government officials to nullify election results, experts say.

Those efforts – led by anti-marijuana politicians and other opponents – threaten to stop or delay the implementation of new medical and recreational cannabis markets that would generate hundreds of millions of dollars in sales a year.

In Idaho, some state lawmakers are

Details On Texas’ Electrical Power Grid Production Problems

The Texas Interconnection, which covers 213 of Texas’ 254 counties, is managed by the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT). Counties NOT included: Bailey, Bowie, Camp, Cass, Cochran, Dallam, El Paso, Gaines, Gregg, Hansford, Hardin, Harrison, Hartley, Hemphill, Hockley, Hudspeth, Hutchinson, Jasper, Jefferson, Lamb, Liberty, Lipscomb, Lubbock, Marion, Moore, Morris, Newton, Ochiltree, Orange, Panola, Polk, Sabine, San Augustine, San Jacinto, Shelby, Sherman, Terry, Trinity, Tyler, Upshur and Yoakum. (Total = 41)

By now, you’ve likely read or heard numerous stories of Texans’ suffering because of electrical power outages, that are now becoming rolling blackouts.

And, perhaps as well you’ve read that deregulation has been a significantly influential part of the problem.

And then, you may have also read or heard that failure to properly insulate and protect against wintry weather conditions has been the preliminary finding of a root cause analysis.

But you may also wonder why other states or nations which regularly experience much colder temperature extremes don’t have the same kinds of problems that Texas has.

Scandinavian countries, Minnesotans, Michiganders and Mainers all regularly have much cooler temperatures and wind power, but their windmills and electrical power grids don’t stop operating like the ones in Texas did. And Germany, Switzerland, Austria, Hungary, and other European nations also regularly have cold weather that doesn’t shut down their power grid. So, what gives?

The weather-related failures of Texas’ natural gas (NatGas) infrastructure that has resulted in this present and most unfortunate crisis, are because NatGas pipelines froze in the very time of year and season in which they are most heavily relied upon.

Again, states and nations with much colder climes don’t seem to have the kinds of problems that Texas is experiencing. And there remains at least 42 signatory nations with permanent, year-round research stations in the Antarctic, which also have electricity. So again, why exactly did natural gas pipelines freeze in Texas? Water is the primary thing that freezes, right?

With single-digit temperatures, Texas’ Natural Gas pipelines froze up because there was moisture in the gas. Like moisture on the exterior of an iced beverage glass, cold temperatures cause moisture to condensate, and once liquefied, then exposed to freezing temperatures, gas pipelines were literally blocked with ice, and in some cases, the compressors lost power. It’s common for Natural Gas to be stored underground, which is also where it originates. So in its “raw” state, or untreated condition, it is not uncommon for water – either as liquid, or vapor – to be present in the unrefined gas, which in turn, must be “dried out,” or dehumidified to certain levels in order to be salable and usable.

In response, pumps which were used to deliver Natural Gas then slowed down. The Diesel engines which were used to power the pumps refused to start. And from there, it was a cascade of failures – a “domino effect” – one power plant after another went offline. Even 1 of Texas’ 2 nuclear reactors went dark, hampered by inoperable equipment. And to be certain, the nuclear power plant wasn’t “crippled” in the sense that it was incapable of operations, but a decision – in the interest of safety – was made to shut down the plant because a critical component – a sensor – was not working because of the cold temperatures. Further complicating matters, the NatGas that was available was prioritized for heating residences and businesses, rather than for generating electricity.

–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

“The measurement of moisture in natural gas is an important parameter for the processing, storage and transportation of natural gas globally. Natural gas is dehydrated prior to introduction into the pipeline and distribution network. However, attempts to reduce dehydration result in a reduction in “gas quality” and an increase in maintenance costs and transportation as well as potential safety issues.. Consequently, to strike the right balance, it is important that the water component of natural gas is measured precisely and reliably. Moreover, in custody transfer of natural gas between existing and future owners maximum allowable levels are set by tariff, normally expressed in terms of absolute humidity (mg/m3 or lbs/mmscfh) or dew point temperature.

“Prior to transportation, water is separated from raw natural gas. However some water still remains present in the gaseous state as water vapor. If the gas cools or comes in contact with any surface that is colder that the prevailing dew point temperature of the gas, water will condense in the form of liquid or ice. Under pressure, water also has the unique property of being able to form a lattice structure around hydrocarbons such as methane to form solid hydrates. Ice or solid hydrates can cause blockage in pipelines. In addition, water combines with gases such as Hydrogen Sulfide (H2S) and Carbon Dioxide (CO2) to form corrosive acids. Water in natural gas also increases the cost of transportation in pipelines by adding mass and as water vapor has no calorific or heating value it also adds to the expense of compression and transportation. When natural gas is sold, there are contractual requirements to limit the concentration of water vapor. In the United States the limit or tariff is expressed in absolute humidity in units of pounds per million standard cubic feet (lbs/mmscf). The maximum absolute humidity for interstate transfer is set at 7lbs/mmscf. In Europe, bodies such as EASEE-gas make recommendations on the maximum permissible amount of water vapor in the gas. EASEE-gas has approved a limit of -8°C Dew Point, referenced to a gas pressure of 70 Bar(a). This recommended limit is generally being adhered to in the gas industry across Europe.”

–– “Moisture Measurement Technologies for Natural Gas,” By Gerard McKeogh, Regional Product Manager, GE Measurement & Control

ASTM D4888 – 20; Standard Test Method for Water Vapor in Natural Gas Using Length-of-Stain Detector Tubes

“Water content of high pressure natural gas: Data, prediction and experience from field,” by Kjersti Omdahl Christensen, Torbjørn Vegard Løkken, Even Solbraa, Cecilie Fjeld Nygaard, Anita Bersås;

Equinor, a Stavanger, Norway-based international energy company, engaged in exploration, development and production of oil and gas, including wind and solar power. They sell crude oil and are a major supplier of natural gas, with activities in processing, refining, and trading.

–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

Of course, politicians

Racist Radio Shock Jock Rush Limbaugh Dead

Right Wing Political Pundit-Radio Entertainer Rush Limbaugh caught Hell for one of his caustically outrageous diatribes… again. This time, his target was a woman. Next up, children.

A portion of the Wikipedia entry on Limbaugh, which has since been removed.

Hell yawns wide to receive his rotted, cancer-riddled, tone-deaf, racist, drug-addled corpse.

Good riddance.

Just desserts, you know.

He had no pity for others.

Others will have no pity for him.

The racist son-of-a-bitch got what he wanted:
“A medal for smoking cigars.”

Deregulation Has Caused Texas’ Energy Problems

Texas Electrical Energy Deregulation map
The Texas and Dallas deregulated energy service areas are divided into six Transmission and Delivery Utility (TDU) Companies. Those TDUs are:
• Texas New Mexico Power Company (TNMP)
• Sharyland Utilites
• AEP North (American Electric Power)
• AEP Central
• Oncor (most of DFW, Dallas-Fort Worth included)
• CenterPoint (Houston and surrounding areas)

While it’s cold – and yes, it’s a Polar Vortex (see the motion gif showing 2 months of daily changes at the bottom of this page) – it’s NOT like the Polar Vortex of February 2019.

But if you’ve been wondering WHY Texas is having problems delivering electricity right now with a relatively minor cold snap moving through much of the United States, and other states aren’t, wonder no more.

Texas has a DEREGULATED energy/electrical power grid.

Texas, which is the nation’s the largest energy producer and consumer, is the only state in the nation to have and use its own power grid.

There are three electrical power grids in the Lower 48 states:
1.) The Eastern Interconnection;
2.) The Western Interconnection, and;
3.) The Texas Interconnection.

For more information, see:
U.S. electric system is made up of interconnections and balancing authorities
https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=27152;
See also:
Learn More About Interconnections
https://www.energy.gov/oe/services/electricity-policy-coordination-and-implementation/transmission-planning/recovery-act-0.

Texas’ electrical power grid is called ERCOT, which is

Senate Banana Republicans Are Spineless Jellyfish

More Compelling Evidence That Senators Are Members Not Of Congress, But Of The Cult of Trump

Banana Republicans in the United States Senate are a bunch of spineless jellyfish.

And… Kentucky Senate Minority Leader Moscow Mitch “The Bitch” McConnell is their leader.

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An Impeachment Manager Says Republicans Privately Told Her She Made A Compelling Case To Convict Trump, But They Acquitted Him Anyway

• Delegate Stacey Plaskett (D-Virgin Islands) was a House manager in Trump’s second impeachment trial.

• She told CNN some Senate Republicans privately told her she “made the case” for conviction.

• But she said they already planned to acquit Trump and didn’t want to “stand out on a limb” by convicting.

A House impeachment manager says Republican senators told her privately that she “made the case” to convict former President Donald Trump, but they still voted to acquit him.

Delegate Stacey Plaskett, a Democrat from the Virgin Islands, told CNN’s Chris Cuomo on Monday about the interactions she had with unnamed Republican senators during Trump’s second impeachment trial last week.

“I had Senators, even after we presented, who stopped me in the hallway, Republicans, who said that we had made the case, but yet they were going to vote to acquit the president,” Plaskett said.

Plaskett said she tried to win these senators over by saying they could vote to acquit Trump, but not vote to disqualify him from holding office in the future – a vote which would have taken place after conviction, and only requires a simple majority.

“The response was,

Mitch McConnell: Acquittal Vindicated the Constitution, Not Trump

U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice Joseph Story (1779-1845), Daguerreotype portrait by Matthew Brady’s Studio c.1844/45

Joseph Story (1779-1845) was an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, nominated by President James Madison, who served in office from February 3, 1812 until September 10, 1845.

He was also: Republican Congressman from Massachusetts, 1808-1809; Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, 1811-1845; Acting Chief Justice, 1835-1836, 1844; Professor of Law Harvard University 1829-1845.

He is perhaps most renown for his work “Commentaries On The Constitution of the United States” which was first published in 1833, though he authored several other books on the law, and Constitution.

The United States Constitution states in part as follows:

Article I, Section 3, Clause 7:
Judgment in Cases of Impeachment shall not extend further than to removal from Office, and disqualification to hold and enjoy any Office of honor, Trust or Profit under the United States: but the Party convicted shall nevertheless be liable and subject to Indictment, Trial, Judgment and Punishment, according to Law.

Article II, Section 4:
The President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.

Justice Story wrote about the matter of impeachment at great length, and in part wrote that:

§393. It is obvious, that, upon trials on impeachments, one of two courses must be adopted in case of a conviction; either for the court to proceed to pronounce a full and complete sentence of punishment for the offence according to the law of the land in like cases, pending in the common tribunals of justice, superadding the removal from office, and the consequent disabilities; or, to confine its sentence to the removal from office and other disabilities. If the former duty be a part of the constitutional functions of the court, then, in case of an acquittal, there cannot be another trial of the party for the same offence in the common tribunals of justice, because it is repugnant to the whole theory of the common law, that a man should be brought into jeopardy of life or limb more than once for the same offence. A plea of acquittal is, therefore, an absolute bar against any second prosecution for the same offence. If the court of impeachments is merely to pronounce a sentence of removal from office and the other disabilities; then it is indispensable, that provision should be made, that the common tribunals of justice should be at liberty to entertain jurisdiction of the offence, for the purpose of inflicting the common punishment applicable to unofficial offenders. Otherwise, it might be matter of extreme doubt, whether, consistently with the great maxim above mentioned, established for the security of the life and limbs and liberty of the citizen, a second trial for the same offence could be had, either after an acquittal, or a conviction in the court of impeachments. And if no such second trial could be had, then the grossest official offenders might escape without any substantial punishment, even for crimes, which would subject their fellow citizens to capital punishment. [emphasis added]

§394. The constitution, then, having provided, that judgment upon impeachments shall not extend further, than to removal from office, and disqualification to hold office, (which, however afflictive to an ambitious and elevated mind, would be scarcely felt, as a punishment, by the profligate and the base,) has wisely subjected the party to trial in the common criminal tribunals, for the purpose of receiving such punishment, as ordinarily belongs to the offence. Thus, for instance, treason, which by our laws is a capital offence, may receive its appropriate punishment ; and bribery in high officers, which otherwise would be a mere disqualification from office, may have the measure of its infamy dealt out to it with the same unsparing severity, which attends upon other and humbler offenders.

– Joseph Story, “Commentaries On The Constitution of the United States” §393, §394, p278-280, Book III, chapter X; 1833

How the cowardly, weasel-like jellyfish of a man “Moscow Mitch, the Bitch” McConnell could POSSIBLY use the word “vindicate” in reference to the United States Constitution is beyond the scope of imagination – however derelict and perverted it may be – and it is definitely most perverted.

McConnell wrote “Our job wasn’t to find some way, any way, to inflict a punishment. The Senate’s first and foundational duty was to protect the Constitution.” -and- that “The text is unclear” about impeachment, whether “the Senate can try and convict former officers.”

McConnell had also earlier written a “dear colleague” letter to his fellow Banana Republicans in the Senate, in which he wrote in pertinent part that “I am persuaded that impeachments are a tool primarily of removal…”

His mind is like concrete – thoroughly mixed, and permanently set.

The cases of Tennessee United States Senator William Blount – impeached July 7, 1797, on charges of conspiring to assist in Great Britain’s attempt to seize Spanish-controlled territories in modern-day Florida and Louisiana, tried December 17, 1798–January 14, 1799 – and Ulysses Grant’s Secretary of War William Belknap – who tendered his resignation March 2, 1876 only moments before the House impeached him, was tried March 3–August 1, 1876 – demonstrate very clearly that officials may be tried on impeachment charges after they’re out of office. Or else, it completely absolves any official of any responsibility for any act of criminal wrong-doing while in office. It is the intellectual and moral equivalent of saying “so-and-so doesn’t live in Texas anymore, and moved to Minnesota 10 years ago, so s/he can’t be tried for murder or any crimes committed while residing in Texas.”

To assert as much is so absurdly preposterous that it defies imagination.

It’s an ethically reprehensible, morally wrong and judiciously untenable to deny anyone – including society – justice. And that is, in effect, what has happened with Donald Trump; society has been denied justice for the reprehensible, morally repugnant, and outright illegal acts of Donald Trump while in office as the President.

McConnell claims that Trump can be tried in other courts, and cites Justice Story’s writing that:

“There is also much force in the remark, that an impeachment is a proceeding purely of a political nature. It is not so much designed to punish an offender, as to secure the state against gross official misdemeanors. It touches neither his person, nor his property ; but simply divests him of his political capacity.” –– §406, chapter X, book III, p289

“And the final judgment is confined to a removal from, and disqualification for, office ; thus limiting the punishment to such modes of redress, as are peculiarly fit for a political tribunal to administer, and as will secure the public against political injuries. In other respects the offence is left to be disposed of by the common tribunals of justice, accord- ing to the laws of the land, upon an indictment found by a grand jury, and a trial by jury of peers, before whom the party is to stand for his final deliverance, like his fellow citizens.” –– §407, chapter X, book III, p290

But, rest assured: Trump is completely free and clear of any charges related to impeachment. However, there are other charges at the state level which he may face for things he did while in office, including most notably, attempting to persuade Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensberger to manipulate the results of the election in that state to throw the election to Trump’s favor. The Fulton County District Attorney, and Georgia State Attorney General are investigating that matter.

And just to be utterly and absolutely certain, the word “vindicate” is defined as meaning:

1. To clear of accusation, blame, suspicion, or doubt with supporting arguments or proof: “Our society permits people to sue for libel so that they may vindicate their reputations” (Irving R. Kaufman).
2. To defend, maintain, or insist on the recognition of (one’s rights, for example).
3. To demonstrate or prove the value or validity of; justify: The results of the experiment vindicated her optimism.
4. Obsolete To exact revenge for; avenge.
(American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition.)

1. to clear from guilt, accusation, blame, etc, as by evidence or argument

2. to provide justification for: his promotion vindicated his unconventional attitude.

3. to uphold, maintain, or defend (a cause, etc): to vindicate a claim.

4. (Law) Roman law to bring an action to regain possession of (property) under claim of legal title

5. (Historical Terms) Roman law to bring an action to regain possession of (property) under claim of legal title

6. rare to claim, as for oneself or another

7. obsolete to take revenge on or for; punish

8. obsolete to set free
(Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged, 12th Edition 2014)

1. to clear, as from an accusation or suspicion: to vindicate someone’s honor.

2. to afford justification for; justify.

3. to uphold or justify by argument or evidence.

4. to maintain or defend against opposition.

5. to claim for oneself or another.

6. Obs. to avenge.

7. Obs. to free.

8. Obs. to punish.
(Random House Kernerman Webster’s College Dictionary, © 2010)

“Moscow Mitch, the Bitch” McConnell is a Banana Republican from Kentucky, Senate Minority Leader, the biggest weasel in Washington, D.C., and an ardent, though oblique, supporter of the Cult of Trump.

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Acquittal Vindicated the Constitution, Not Trump

wsj.com
Sunday, February 14, 2021
by Mitch McConnell

January 6 was a shameful day. A mob bloodied law enforcement and besieged the first branch of government. American citizens tried to use terrorism to stop a democratic proceeding they disliked.

There is no question former President Trump bears moral responsibility. His supporters stormed the Capitol because of the unhinged falsehoods he shouted into the world’s largest megaphone. His behavior during and after the chaos was also unconscionable, from attacking Vice President Mike Pence during the riot to praising the criminals after it ended.

President-elect Donald Trump leaves a meeting with Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, at the U.S. Capitol November 10, 2016 in Washington, DC Zach Gibson/Getty Images

I was as outraged as any member of Congress. But senators take our own oaths. Our job wasn’t to find some way, any way, to inflict a punishment. The Senate’s first and foundational duty was to protect the Constitution.

Some brilliant scholars believe