The Designated Fall Son

The Usual Suspects:  Not wanting to boost Trump’s ratings, I mostly avoided watching night one of the Republican convention which is only fair because from what I hear they mostly ignored the coronavirus, not all that surprising as according to a CBS/YouGov poll 57% of Republicans think that 177,000 is an acceptable death count.  Makes you wonder what they’ll think when the number reaches 250,000 or whether they, like Kellyanne and George Conway’s oldest daughter Claudia who is now claiming that she has been a victim of child abuse, hate their parents.  From the snippets of the convention that I did catch and from what I read, I understand that the Republicans rolled out some token minorities including their go to Black politician, Senator Tim Scott, presidential aspirant Nikki Haley, the Indian American former SC Governor/UN Ambassador who asserted that there is no discrimination in her American while also mentioning how she was discriminated against while growing up, and a number of the other usual suspects.  By suspects think current and future felons including the McCloskeys, the very litigious St Louis couple who in addition to threatening BLM protesters passing by their home with a rifle and a handgun, because doesn’t everyone stand on their balcony with guns, once destroyed a beehive producing honey for Rosh Hashanah at a neighboring synagogue because they could. There’s something particularly cringeworthy about giving gun wielding bullies air time on a day when another Black man was hospitalized, the victim of another police shooting while also saying that your party is the best option for Black voters, you know those people who are trying to “invade” the suburbs.  On the felon front, it looks like son Eric who is scheduled to speak tonight could be the family’s designated fall guy.  Yesterday, NY Attorney General Letitia James revealed that she’s been seeking testimony from Eric related to her investigation into whether Trump and the Trump Organization committed fraud by overstating the value of assets to obtain loans and tax benefits.  Apparently Eric agreed to meet with her team and then reneged asserting his “constitutional rights.”  Those are the rights you really worry about when you believe revealing what you know could result in a civil case becoming a criminal one. The timing of AG James’ announcement might raise eyes, but then again it’s not like the Republicans who have been going after Joe Biden’s son Hunter would ever do something like that?  On the “son” front Don Jr did speak last night and judging by the condition of his eyes he either has an advanced case of pink eye or has dipped into someone’s drug supply, similarly girlfriend Kim Guilfoyle who screamed her entire speech to an empty auditorium appeared to be under the influence of something, either that or hearing loss is another as yet unreported after effect of COVID. Tune in tonight, surely there will be more of the same including a speech by Melania, ones by both Eric and Tiffany and a totally norm busting presentation by Secretary of State Pompeo calling in from Israel.  

Postal Wars:  Postmaster General DeJoy was back on the hot seat yesterday, testifying in front of the House Oversight Committee.  Republicans complained about the Democrats complaints, accusing them of inventing a crisis where none existed  possibly because they  unlike their Democratic colleagues missed all the times that Trump said that he would be happy to defund the USPS if that’s what it took to upend voting by mail.  For his part DeJoy is either totally clueless, pretending to be so, or both.  He couldn’t answer some basic questions about postal rates and practices and kept blaming unknown officials at the Postal Service for the service cutbacks implemented under his watch.  At one point he even said that he didn’t want to know who had ordered the limits on overtime that he said he never approved, implying that if he didn’t know who, he couldn’t do anything about it.  He didn’t think that there was anything wrong with mail trucks going out empty as long as they were on time, mail delivery be damned. And as to those decommissioned sorters, he kept on insisting that they were due to be dismantled anyway, ignoring that a disproportionate number of them were taken out of service in blue leaning districts.  He’s not off the hook yet, but this is the Trump administration so he probably will get away with what he’s doing and despite Democratic efforts to extract promises about ensuring timely ballot delivery and the return of some of those sorters, questions remain besides it’s not like anything DeJoy said should be believed. On the voter fraud front, though Trump and his team are still pushing the narrative that mail-in voting will lead to widespread voter fraud, a Trump appointed Pennsylvania judge isn’t buying it. He put a halt to a Trump campaign lawsuit against some new mail-in friendly voting provisions after the Republican lawyers failed to provide him with any examples of voter fraud.  

Et Cetera;  Yesterday Liberty University’s Jerry Falwell Jr laid the blame for his scandalous behavior on his wife, saying that it resulted from severe emotional stress relating to her affair with their pool boy.  That’s the pool boy whose business he invested in a few years ago.  The pool boy also weighed in with some accusations of his own.  Suffice it to say all of their behavior violates those strict moral standards that students at Liberty U are expected to maintain.  Liberty U reports that Falwell has now resigned but late yesterday Falwell disputed their assertion.  Apparently he’s still working out the terms of his exit.  It’s fair to assume that he, like the indicted Steve Bannon, will not be speaking at the Republican convention this week but who knows, he’d fit right in.  Former Arizona  Senator Jeff Flake and former RNC Head/MSNBC pundit Michael Steele won’t be speaking either, the two have joined the growing list of former and current Republicans endorsing Joe Biden for president.