The Enemy is in the House 

Bizarro Loops: Bad news, Trump is still the man in GOP circles and, as the NY Times’ Paul Krugman puts it, as a result the Republican party is stuck in a “doom loop of bizarro.” That doesn’t sound bad if you believe that the Republican party given it’s increasingly racist, xenophobic, and conspiracy laden underpinnings and its antiquated, hate filled social policies is on its way out to be replaced by one with economic policies that you may or may not agree with but that are at least debatable.  Unfortunately, the Republican party, appears to be doubling down on crazy and as it currently stands, is only one seat away from regaining control of the Senate, a few seats short of retaking the House and one election cycle away from recapturing the presidency. Yesterday, after meeting with Trump at Mar a Lago, House GOP Leader Kevin McCarthy and someone from Trump’s orbit with a Twitter account proudly circulated a picture of the two of them standing shoulder to shoulder, grinning cheek to cheek while announcing that McCarthy has invited Trump to speak at the GOP’s upcoming Palm Beach shindig.  In addition, despite the barrage of the horrible coming to light about Congresswoman QAnon Marjorie Taylor Greene, like her assertion that last year’s California fires were caused by “space laser” wielding Jews led by the “evil” George Soros, McCarthy, who asserts that he is going to have a “talk” with her, appointed her to the House Education committee, because what better place for a conspiracist who claims that all those horrifying school shootings were false flags performed by crisis actors?  Speaker Pelosi called out Greene’s appointment to the Education committee as “beyond the pale,” questioning what Republican leadership was thinking, or if they were really thinking at all.  She did that while also saying that she may need to pass a supplemental budget to fund the additional security now needed to protect legislators and staff from future attacks because the “enemy is in the House.”  In an effort to make her point, she’s seriously considering bringing a vote to the House floor on a measure to expel QAnon Greene.  It won’t get the supermajority that’s needed to pass but it will force Republicans to once again show their true colors. Those are the colors that Florida Congressman/dad of Nestor Matt Gaetz showed by rallying against Liz Cheney, who at least for now remains the number three on the House Republican leadership team, in her home state of Wyoming yesterday.  His performance included a taped message from Don Jr.  Notably Gaetz did that just one day after the very disingenuous or worthless or both McCarthy “directed” House Republicans to put up a united front.  One of those House Republicans, Ohio’s Jim “Gym” Jordan announced that he has no plans to run for the Senate seat being vacated by Rob Portman.  Jordan may have reached his decision because his screaming shtick doesn’t play well outside of his gerrymandered district, because he’s concerned about the renewed attention it would focus on his failure to call out all that sexually abusive behavior he turned a blind eye to during his coaching days, and/or because he wants to assume Liz Cheney’s leadership position. Bottom line, with the Texas Republican party adopting a QAnon slogan, the Oregon Republican party moving further to the right side of lunacy and Arizona’s sanctioning Cindy McCain, Jeff Flake and Governor Ducey, the party is off the rails and may well be taking the country with it.

Executive in Action:  Mean time back in the real world, or at least the world not controlled by Krakens and crazies, Joe Biden spent yesterday rolling back some Trump imposed rules that banned US foreign aid from being used to fund family planning organizations that provide abortion services as part of their women’s reproductive health services.  He also began a review, government speak for getting legalities in order so his executive actions stick, of a Trump policy that cut off funding for US based family planning organizations, like Planned Parenthood, that provide abortion referrals and/or procedures.  At the same time Biden announced the reopening of ACA/Obamacare enrollment, an action intended to help out those who lost their health insurance as a result of the pandemic.  Many state exchanges have facilitated late enrollment but those living in states that rely on the Federal exchange had been unable to access insurance because keeping the exchange open wasn’t exactly a Trump priority and surprise, surprise Trump left office before providing that oft promised “due in two weeks” perfect new health insurance plan.  Shifting gears so to speak, just one day after President Biden announced his intention to replace the US car fleet with all electric vehicles, General Motors announced its plans to go all electric with all its vehicles except trucks by 2035. That’s big. Not so big, the NY Times’ editors criticized Biden for issuing so many executive actions, apparently they are back to #ButHerEmails false equivalency.  

Viral Musings:  News out of the vaccine world is a bit confusing due both to the number of vaccines approved or close to getting approved and because of concerns about effectiveness against some of the more troubling new variants. Novovax, not to be confused with Pfizer, Moderna, AstraZeneca or J & J, the likely next to be approved in the US, reports that preliminary results indicate that its vaccine is around 95% effective against the original virus, 89% effective in the UK but only around 60% effective in South Africa. The AstraZeneca vaccine, developed together with Oxford University, which is already being administered in the UK might not work well in those over 65, though the data there is incomplete.  Pfizer believes that its vaccine works against the UK and South Africa variants though the antibodies generated in response to the South Africa variant are slightly less effective whatever that means. That’s consistent with earlier reports from Moderna. Both Moderna and Pfizer are already working on a booster to improve performance to the extent necessary. Keep an eye on J & J, its results are due in shortly and if, as expected, the company gets preliminary approval for its one dose wonder, a lot more shots will make it into US arms soon.

433,206 Dead (+3992)

26,193,700 shots done  (+ 1,541,100)

(source: CNN)

Have a safe weekend.  Double mask up. 

 

Pizza Rat

Putsch Chronicles:  We keep on learning more and more about the events of January 6, none of it good, which goes far towards explaining why Republicans are so nervous about what will come out during the impeachment trial that they are trying hard to avoid.  The toll on the ill prepared, inadequately garbed and armed Capitol police is horrifying, about 140 of them were injured including several who have sustained brain injuries, one with two cracked ribs and two smashed spinal discs and another who is likely to lose an eye.  Yesterday it was reported that another officer who was injured during the attack has committed suicide bringing the attack’s death toll to six.  Of course, with only a few exceptions the Republican message is that we should all move on because focusing on a coup attempt is so divisive and you have to know that the cast of characters that held thirty-three hearings on Benghazi wouldn’t want to do anything other than promote unity.  The Department of Homeland Security doesn’t have a new head yet because Republicans in the Senate are doing their best to impede the confirmation of Biden’s nominee Alejandro Mayorkas because his and their immigration views are not simpatico but that hasn’t stopped DHS from raising concerns about further domestic terrorist attacks.  Yesterday Homeland officials issued an advisory warning that there remains a heightened threat from domestic extremists, the advisory isn’t focused on a specific event, but officials are and have been concerned for some time that people opposed to government authority, the presidential transition and COVID restrictions could continue to “mobilize to incite or commit violence.”  These concerns extend back to November, but under the prior administration issuing warnings about anything related to white extremism was verboten. It’s not clear what the domestic terrorists have in mind but quite a few in Congress including NY’s Hakeem Jeffries, all of the Republican house members who voted for impeachment and others in Democratic leadership have received threats. Count former VP Pence among the threatened, he’s back home in Indiana but his exact whereabouts are not known as he and Karen, neither of whom have spoken with Trump since the coup attempt, have been moving around a lot to avoid running into any of those carrying a noose with his name on it. Also on the domestic terrorism front, one of the Michigan militiamen accused of conspiring to overthrow Michigan’s government, kidnap Governor Gretchen Whitmer, and put her on trial for “treason” has pleaded guilty and has also agreed to cooperate with Federal authorities, not good news for his partners in crime. Apparently he’s not the only rat in the pizza parlor, something weird is up with Proud Boy leader Enrique Tarrio.  Tarrio who was arrested two days before the January 6 insurrection and charged with possession of some high capacity rifle magazines and for setting fire to a Black Lives Matter banner during a December pro-Trump demonstration in DC wasn’t around on January 6^th because he had been ordered to leave the city after his arrest.  Yesterday it was revealed that he has been a “prolific” informer for Federal and local law enforcement.  Not surprisingly he denies that he’s ever informed on his friends and racist compatriots, but his convenient banishment from Washington right before the coup attempt raises lots of questions about what he knew and what Federal officials may have known in advance of the putsch.

Viral Musings: Yesterday, Biden’s virus task force, led by Jeff Zients, the White House’s Coronavirus coordinator rather than Biden himself, held their first of what is now going to be thrice weekly press conferences.  Though the technology of their zoom presentation was awful, for a while it appeared as if the Kraken or worse yet Kayleigh McEnany the soon to be Fox commentator had gotten into the video feed, their message was refreshingly truthful, chock full of facts and science and in some cases overly long and somewhat boring, just the way scientists more skilled in their fields of expertise than in giving horse and pony shows should sound.  The sobering news from CDC head Rochelle Walensky is that though infection rates are trending downward for now, given that mortality is a lagging indicator another 90,000 will die from COVID during the next month, sad but not surprising given that just under 4000 died yesterday. On the vaccine front, virus guru Fauci mentioned that the much anticipated one shot J&J vaccine that hopefully will get emergency approval in a few weeks, ran some of its trials in South Africa.  That means that we should know more about all of the vaccines’ effectiveness with regard to the concerning South African variant.   

Politics:  Yesterday Biden detailed his plan to shift the US away from fossil fuels while creating millions of jobs in renewable energy, conserving “vast swaths” of public lands and water with a focus on poorer areas where mostly minority populations have suffered the most from dumping and related pollution. He plans to replace government owned gas guzzling vehicles with electric ones, buying them from US auto makers.  Think more charging stations so that those USPS trucks and maybe the rest of ours can run on easily charged batteries.  His plan is aggressive evidenced by the fact that Congresswoman AOC is smiling while the fossil fuel industry  and their bought and paid for representatives not so much. Biden’s plan will involve passing a lot of his related legislative agenda through reconciliation to avoid coming up against the dreaded filibuster assuming West Virginia/coal country Senator Joe Manchin doesn’t get in his way. Biden also plans to take advantage of the precedent set by Trump who funded a lot of his wall by claiming that building it was a national emergency.  There will be pushback, lots of it but come on, melting ice caps, flooded cities, countless hurricanes, sounds like an emergency to me.  In other news, House GOP leader Kevin McCarthy, who sees visions of life as the Speaker whenever he hits one of his Mr Pillow pillows, will be visiting with that prior president today in Florida to discuss politics and the like because while he who shouldn’t be named is gone from office, he still wields a lot of undeserved influence.  That’s the same Kevin McCarthy who told his warring factions that they shouldn’t be dumping on each other but should be focused on thrashing Democrats.  He also promised to have a serious talk with Georgia’s  QAnon Congresswoman Greene to address things like that video of her harassing David Hogg one of the more articulate/famous Parkland School survivors. Representative QAnon is on record saying that the Stoneman Douglas school attack, like the one at Sandy Hook elementary school and the 2017 Las Vegas shooting were staged to raise the popularity of gun control measures.   

429,214 Deaths

24,652,600 Shots         

 

Pins and Needles

Impeach, Impeach:  Two weeks ago when Mitch McConnell said “I have not made a final decision on how I will vote and I intend to listen to the legal arguments when they are presented to the Senate” he raised hope that Trump inciting a violent insurrection might well have been a step too far even for him.  Well, that moment in time appears to have passed.  Yesterday, McConnell together with 44 other Republican Senators voted to support Senator Rand Paul’s challenge to the constitutionality of conducting a trial of an out of office president.  He also threatened a scorched earth policy against Democrats if they ever get rid of the legislative filibuster. Only Republican Senators Susan Collins, Ben Sasse, Mitt Romney, Lisa Murkowski and Pat Toomey voted alongside all of the Democrats in opposing Paul’s challenge.  The vote took place after McConnell had Jonathan Turley, the so-called constitutional expert who testified in defense of Trump during his first impeachment, meet with his GOP Senate caucus to make the case that impeaching an out of office Trump would be unconstitutional.  By the way, Turley’s opinion, like some of his early views on impeachment is all too convenient for Trump and is not widely held by Constitutional experts including a number at the conservative Federalist Society.  There is a precedent for impeaching an out of office official, in 1876, the House voted unanimously to impeach Secretary of War William Belknap hours after he rushed his resignation to  President Ulysses S. Grant in an effort to avoid the humiliation of an impeachment.  Anyway, while some of the Republican Senators who voted in support of Rand Paul’s call to end the impeachment saga now, a few others suggested so quietly that no one could hear them that they might still be open to finding Trump guilty, though no one really believes that their whispers count.  At least Susan Collins and Democrat Tim Kaine are skeptical.  According to Axios the two are quietly raising the idea of censuring Trump instead of moving forward with the trial. That’s probably not in the cards and really who thinks that the equivalent of a wrist slap would mean anything to Trump? 

Not Over Yet: By the way, it doesn’t appear that the insurrection is quite over yet. QAnon websites are spreading the word that the January 20^th inauguration of Biden was a false flag, that the real inauguration takes place on March 4, the date specified in the Constitution before it was changed in 1937 after ratification of the 20^th Amendment. Concern that there will be more violence in Washington on and in the run up to March 4^th is the reason that so many National Guards troops are still guarding the capitol. As to the January 6 “festivities” more and more reports are coming out about how poorly it was handled despite credible intelligence that the Proud Boys, Oath Keepers and the 3 Percenters, all far right groups with large former and, as it turns out, current military and law enforcement membership were on their way to the “rave.”  The Washington Post reports that according to the commander of the DC National Guard the Pentagon restricted his authority ahead of the riot, requiring higher-level sign-off to respond that cost time as the events of the day “spiraled out of control” and the increasingly violent insurgents got close to killing Pence, Pelosi and a few others.  If concerns about more demonstrations aren’t keeping you up at night, Senator Patrick Leahy’s health should.  The 80 year old Vermont Democrat/President Pro Tempore of the Senate was sent to the hospital last night by the Capitol physician “in an abundance of caution” after he reported feeling ill.  Leahy was later sent home, a good thing for lots of reasons, not the least of which is that Vermont’s governor is a Republican.  

Politics as Usual: Tony Blinken was confirmed as Secretary of State yesterday by a vote of 78 to 22 with Rand Paul, of course, leading the charge against him.  In addition to Paul, the usual cast of characters, including Senators Cruz, Hawley, Lee, Blackburn and Tuberville were among the twenty-two Republicans who voted against Blinken.  By the way, not that he is to be believed, Missouri’s “Fist Bump” Hawley who appears to be bleeding both Twitter followers and financial support now says that he’s not running for president in 2024. As to the president,  Biden has kept busy fulfilling a lot of the promises he made on the campaign trail.  He ended the military transgender ban that Trump imposed for no other reason than to placate the religious right, you know those guys who had no problem with him lying and cheating, his multiple marriages and his screwing around with playmates and porn stars but couldn’t deal with transgender people fighting for their country.  Biden also put a halt to the zero tolerance police that resulted in all those family separations at the border and after giving a speech on racial inequity signed a series of executive actions intended to redress racially discriminatory federal housing policies, end the use of private prisons, recommit the federal government to Tribal sovereignty and to combat discrimination against Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders “intensified” during the pandemic by the last guy who to this day calls COVID the Chinese virus.

Viral Musings:  Of immediate concern to everyone, Biden also addressed concerns regarding vaccine sufficiency, announcing that the government will be purchasing 200 million more doses, 100 million each from Pfizer and Moderna, a 50% increase over what had been on order, to insure the ability to vaccinate 300 million by the end of the summer. The US population stands around 328 million, so the ability to vaccinate 300 million could if it comes to pass actually leave us with extra doses as not everyone is expected to line up or qualify for a shot.  Additionally, he announced that states will be receiving about 15% more doses over the coming weeks, while also promising that state officials will be told their delivery amounts three weeks in advance to allow them to schedule appointments with the confidence that supplies will actually be available for those who show up for those hard to get shot slots. Just about everyone agrees that more doses sooner would be far better but at least now there is a plan and more certainty about vaccine supplies.  Yesterday in my signoff I suggested wearing two masks, that’s not just me being paranoid, more and more experts, including virus guru Fauci are now advocating double masking especially when in more crowded areas.  So please give serious thought to wearing a cloth mask over a surgical one when heading out to run errands or going anywhere near an elevator. 

The Crazies:  Pillow man Lindell has been banned from Twitter for continuing to share misinformation about the election.  A review of Georgia Congresswoman/QAnon representative Marjorie Taylor Greene’s social media accounts reveals that during 2019 she endorsed shooting Speaker Pelosi in the head and hanging Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.  Her defense of course is that someone else must have hijacked her Facebook account.  The Kraken strikes again?

425,250 dead

23,541,000 Vaccines Administered

#Wear2Masks    

 

Dogs in the House

Major and Champ: That barking you hear in the background of President Biden’s White House press moments, it’s not your imagination, it’s Major and Champ, Biden’s two German shepherds. The pups have finally arrived from Delaware.  Also barking, from afar is the last resident of the White House. He had one of his slimmed down coterie of aides “reassure” Republican Senators that he’s still a Republican and that, contrary to rumors, has no plans to start his own party.  That’s probably true, mostly because starting a new party is hard work, and as we know working hard is not his forte, but the real reason he had that message delivered was to make it clear to them that he’s still the head of their party and that they’d better vote against his conviction or else.  While it still remains highly unlikely that seventeen Republican Senators will vote against him, he may have lost one of them yesterday.  Ohio’s Rob Portman who had previously said he was running for reelection in 2022, announced that he’s changed his mind due to “partisan gridlock.” He joins North Carolina’s Richard Burr and Pennsylvania’s Pat Toomey, two other Republicans who previously announced their planned Senate retirements.  For a brief moment in time Democrats thought that they stood a chance of taking Ohio out of Trump’s column in November.  They didn’t, Trump took the state by eight points.  However, Ohio’s other Senator, Sherrod Brown is a Democrat who won his 2018 reelection bid by seven points so in addition to making it easier for Portman to vote his conscience in the upcoming impeachment trial, his departure makes the Ohio seat a possible pick up for Democrats, a big reach but not an impossibility if they find a sufficiently populist, centrist candidate in Brown’s mold.  A number of names are already being floated, including Tim Ryan, the Congressman who briefly ran for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2020.  He’s already announced that he’s looking into running. Of course, a number of Republicans are now looking at the seat as well, including the truly horrifying Jim “Gym” Jordan.  Though it’s not clear that Jordan, who holds a very gerrymandered Congressional seat, has what it takes to win statewide, we’ve been shocked before. As to Pennsylvania, the Democrats already hold one of its Senate seats and populist Lt. Governor John Fetterman, the guy who wears shorts all winter, has already indicated an interest in running for the soon to be open seat.  While we’re focused on the Senate, though the 2022 Senate map favors Democrats a few of the more vulnerable newbies will be on the ballot again because their 2020 were special elections. That means that Arizona’s Mark Kelly who is finishing out John McCain’s term and Georgia’s Raphael Warnock who is finishing out Johnny Isakson’s term will both be up again, which explains why you may already be receiving campaign solicitation emails from both of them.  And of course, Trump being who he is, ugh just typing his name hurts, he’s also going after Republican Congresswoman Liz Cheney as well as the other nine House Republicans who voted for his impeachment and Georgia’s Governor Brian Kemp for refusing to overturn his Georgia loss.  To that end, he’s got Florida Congressman/Trump fanboy Matt Gaetz heading to Wyoming to stir up trouble for Cheney who wants it known that in Wyoming real men don’t wear make-up, a snide reference to Gaetz’s over the top primping, and he’s encouraging former Georgia Congressman/failed Senatorial candidate Doug Collins to primary Kemp who’s up for reelection in 2022, likely against the Democrat’s favorite dragon slayer Stacey Abrams. 

Impeach, Impeach:  The House impeachment managers ceremoniously marched their Article of Impeachment over to the Senate last night.  The February 9^th impeachment hearing will be presided over by Vermont Senator Patrick Leahy, the Senate’s President Pro Tempore. Leahy replaces Chief Justice John Roberts who presided over Trump’s last impeachment trial because the mango maniac/insurrectionist is no longer in office and because Roberts, who didn’t enjoy his last impeachment experience, has no interest in a repeat performance.  Though his report won’t be out in time for the trial, the DOJ Inspector General has announced that he has opened an investigation into reports that Trump was working with the head of the civil division to overturn the election results.  In other Senate news, Majority Leader Schumer and Republican leader McConnell finally agreed on the terms of their power sharing agreement.  McConnell gave up on his demand that Schumer commit to keeping the legislative filibuster intact. The turtle saved face by noting that the filibuster is unlikely to go away given Democratic Senators Sinema and Manchin’s statements that they are for keeping it. The agreement paves the way for Democratic Senators to take over the chairmanship of all of the Senate committees.  Even before the agreement was reached, the Senate confirmed Janet Yellin as Treasury Secretary with all but fifteen Republican Senators voting her in.  The naysayers included Senators Barrasso, Blackburn, Cotton, Cramer, Crus, Hawley, Hoeven, Lee, Paul, Risch, Scott, Shelby, Sullivan and Tuberville.  No surprise about fist bump Hawley, who has now voted against every one of Biden’s nominees, a sure sign that he, like Cruz, Lee, Cotton, and Paul all harbor presidential aspirations.  As to Alabama’s Tuberville, no one, least of all him, knows why he votes as he does.  

Viral Musings:  Though the data is preliminary news out of Israel is encouraging, early results show a significant drop in infection after just one shot of the Pfizer BioNTech vaccine and better than expected results after both doses.  As to those scary mutated virus variants, Moderna reports that its vaccine works against them though less well, but still adequately, against the South African mutation.  The company is already working on a booster shot in the event one becomes necessary.  Pfizer had previously said that its vaccine works against the UK mutation, they haven’t said much, if anything, about the South African strain but it’s likely that its vaccine, given its similarities to Moderna’s will respond about the same.  We should hear more soon.  As previously noted data on J & J’s one shot vaccine is expected soon, expectations remain that it will be approved for emergency use in the US and rolled out shortly after it gets that hoped for approval, which could be one of the reasons that President Biden revised his too conservative daily “shots in arms” number up to 1.5 million yesterday. As to other vaccines, last night AstraZeneca denied reports that its vaccine which has already been approved for emergency use in the UK had low efficacy in the elderly asserting that data shows it does provoke a strong immune response.  Lastly, Merck is now out of the COVID vaccine game altogether, the company shut down the development of its two COVID vaccines citing “lackluster” performance data opting instead to focus on what they are calling promising COVID therapeutic treatments.  All this vaccine news is rather academic for most people who still haven’t managed to snag an appointment.  And very frustrating to those like the incoming head of the CDC  Rochelle Walensky who reported on Sunday that the Biden administration still doesn’t have a firm grasp on the government’s vaccine supply, something to do with the previous administration’s tracking system.  Who would have guessed that the same crowd that couldn’t keep track of separated kids also can’t keep track of a much larger number of vials?  

Et Cetera: The Dominion Voting machine company filed a $1.3 billion defamation lawsuit against Rudy Giuliani; it turns out that making baseless, business crushing accusations has consequences.  In response, Rudy, who finally admitted that Joe Biden won the election, said that he’s looking forward to the opportunity to prove that all of his accusations were true.  Maybe he plans to call Hugo Chavez and a Kraken or two as a witness?  It’s only a matter of time before Dominion files one of those lawsuits against Trump and why not, Dominion Tower and Dominion Lago are both really nice names.  

421,239

#WearAMask or better yet wear two     

 

 

Takes a Licking, Keeps on Ticking 

Rolexes and Pelotons:  The honeymoon is over, the Biden administration has its first two scandals:  Joe rides a Peloton, elitist and due to its internet connection a security risk and, wait for it, he wears a Rolex rather than a regular Joe Timex. The watch story appeared in the NY Times along side one just a wee bit more alarming, that his predecessor, the guy who fired the White House chief usher so that no one was there to open the door when Biden arrived, plotted with the head of the Justice Department’s Civil Division, Jeffrey Clark, to oust William Barr replacement Acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen.  Apparently believing what he had seen on right wing  media, the not so civil Clark, agreed with Trump’s fever dream, that the election was stolen by all those Black Democrats who managed to vote and get their votes counted in November’s election.  His sympathetic view came to Trump’s attention through the efforts of Pennsylvania Congressman Scott Perry, a member of the Trump fawning Republican Freedom Caucus.  Clark pushed Acting AG Rosen to send a letter to the Georgia state legislature alerting them, falsely, that the Justice Department had opened an investigation into the state’s election.  That letter was to be part of Trump’s pressure campaign to get Georgia to decertify its thrice confirmed legitimate election results, the campaign that also involved ousting Georgia US Attorney Byung Pak, something now under investigation by Justice’s Inspector General.   The not so civil Clark told Rosen that if he didn’t send the letter Trump would replace him, with Clark, of course. Trump who had been pressuring Rosen to open and announce investigations into wide spread voter fraud and the Dominion voting machines, the ones not owned by dead Venezuelan strong man Hugo Chavez, only relented after Rosen and his deputies made it clear that they would resign, triggering a Nixonian era like Saturday night massacre.  As if the NY Times scoop wasn’t enough, late Saturday the Wall Street Journal added that Trump also waged a campaign to get Rosen to have the Justice Department ask the Supreme Court to invalidate Biden’s win.  Rosen, like Barr before him, told Trump that was not going to happen.  So remember when Trump insisted that he had to get Amy Coney Barrett seated on the Supreme Court because he needed five justices to hand him the election if he lost at the ballot box, well he wasn’t kidding, it was part of his grand plan to stay in office, a plan that culminated with the January 6 violent putsch. 

Impeach, Impeach:  Speaker Pelosi plans to present the Article of Impeachment today.  In addition to focusing on the incitement of the January 6 sh-t show, the Article also refers to other nefarious Georgia stuff, like that taped called where Trump asked Secretary of State Raffensperger to find him enough votes to flip the state’s outcome, so it’s fair to assume that this weekend’s NY Times and WSJ reveals will be included. The actual trial isn’t scheduled to begin until February 9, in order to give Trump and his newly hired lawyer South Carolina’s Butch Bowers, a friend of Lindsey Graham, time to prepare a defense while also giving President Biden some time to get a few more of his cabinet members confirmed.  While a number of Republicans, including several of those who showed up on the Sunday talk shows, as well as House GOP leader Kevin McCarthy  are using the delay to say that it’s time to move on, that the impeachment of an out of office president is unconstitutional, and that the impeachment trial unlike a failed putsch would make it hard for the country to heal, a delay could work to Trump’s disadvantage as it’s fair to assume that  more bad stuff is likely going to come out, more than just those violent insurrectionists who insist they broke into the Capitol to lynch Mike Pence and Nancy Pelosi because they were just following Trump’s orders.  Will any new obviously implicating information lead to Trump being found guilty by the gutless Republican contingent, probably not but it won’t make their lives any easier.  A lot will depend on Mitch McConnell and what he decides is in his and his party’s best interests.  Stay tuned, Trump who is threatening to start a third party mostly to keep disloyal Republican’s in line may be gone from office, but not, at least not yet, gone from influence, which goes far towards explaining why the Arizona Republican party sanctioned Cindy McCain, former Senator Jeff Flake and current Governor Doug Ducey this weekend. Ducey who supported Trump was sanctioned for certifying rather than upturning Arizona’s Biden blue election results.

The New Normal:  So it turns out that Joe Biden isn’t all that sleepy. Immediately after his inauguration he hit the ground running, literally, he ran over to NBC’s Al Roker for their traditional fist bump, then he proceeded to sign a slew of executive actions, some COVID related, others that unwound those issued by his predecessor.  Proving that neither he nor his team slept much during the last months of Trump’s term, Biden also sidelined and/or forced the resignation of many of those that Trump try to embed into the civil service or in other positions, like the government funded Radio Free services that had become Fox light.  Unfortunately Postmaster General DeJoy is still here, he can’t be removed until he’s fired by the USPS board, so first Biden has to fill out the board’s open slots.  The complication is that those board members like Biden’s cabinet and a lot of his other appointees require Senate confirmation.  As a result of Biden’s delayed start, so far only two of his picks, DNI Avril Haines and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin have been confirmed.  A third, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen is expected to be confirmed today.  Both Haines and Austin passed easily, once their nominations made it to the Senate floor. Notably Austin was opposed by Senators Josh “fist bump” Hawley and Utah’s Mike Lee.  Those two were also among the ten Republicans who voted against Haines, a crowd that included Senators Blackburn, Braun, Cruz, Ernst, Hagerty, Marshall, Paul and Risch.  That other Republican, Mitch McConnell may no longer be the Majority Leader but he’s still obstructing progress, holding up the power sharing agreement that he and new Majority Leader Chuck Schumer need to put in place given the 50/50 makeup of the Senate. The two are fighting over the status of the filibuster, the provision that requires that most legislation gain 60 votes for passage. Mitch is demanding that Chuck agree to leave it intact; Chuck doesn’t want put anything in writing that commits him to keep it even though he doesn’t have the votes to completely get rid of it as moderate Democrats Senators like WV’s Joe Manchin and Arizona’s Kyrsten Sinema aren’t on board with ditching it right away, a view shared by Biden who wants to first try to build large bipartisan coalitions before going nuclear. Progressives want to ditch the filibuster now so they can move forward with their wish list and they have a point because none of the biggies, like Medicare expansion, climate legislation or immigration reform are going to get enough Republican support to pass with it in place.  For his part while Schumer might agree to retain the filibuster for a while verbally, he is not expected to make that commitment in writing, his progressives would be furious, Congresswoman AOC would use it as an excuse to primary him and Mitch would use it to doom the Democratic agenda.  As to getting bipartisan agreement, late yesterday Biden’s aides held a call with a sweet 16 group of  “moderate” Senators led by Republican Susan Collins and Joe Manchin and also including Independent Angus King and New Hampshire Democrat Jeanne Shaheen to discuss his $1.9 trillion COVID package.  A number from both parties questioned some of the plan, most notably sending $1400 checks to those at the higher end of the eligible income range but there was agreement on parts of it, we’ll have to see what happens next.  By the way, some of the newbies from swing states are up for reelection in 2022, including Mark Kelly and Raphael Warnock, more on that in a subsequent post.       

Viral Musings:  The election and inauguration are behind us but the virus is not.  Quite a few pot shots were thrown at Biden’s 100 million shots in 100 days goal, claiming that given shots administered so far his target is not ambitious enough but much of that talk misses the point.  Biden’s team will exceed that goal if and only if more vaccines are available.  With Pfizer now counting that bonus extra dose in its vials as part of its contractually obligated delivery and Moderna struggling to ramp up production, vaccine availability likely hinges on whether or not the Johnson & Johnson one dose vaccine is approved within the next few weeks. If it is, Biden will easily exceed his 100/100 goal, if not he probably will but not by much.   By the way, Dr Debbie Birx has retired, so of course she spent her weekend defending herself, saying that it wasn’t her fault that she didn’t speak out more forcefully about Trump, hydroxychloroquine and bleach injections, that not being so obsequious would have hindered her in her fight against COVID.  Unfortunately for her she will forever be compared to virus guru Fauci, who managed to do a better, though not perfect, job under similar circumstances.  Though Dr Debbie will always be tainted by her Trump association some people appear to have benefited from theirs. Former press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders, yup that Huckabee, is expected to announce her run to replace terming limited Arkansas  Governor Asa Hutchinson today.  Just another one of those who keeps on ticking.      

25,127,573 million cases

419,220 dead

21,848,700 shots administered

 

Four Hours, 40 Minutes

Welcome Joe!  Yesterday Trump delivered what will hopefully be his last stilted hostage video, he listed his accomplishment or what he believes were his accomplishments but of course failed to mention Joe Biden by name, as he prepared to leave the country, a country suffering the consequences of the American carnage he promised to deliver us from. In contrast, President-elect for just a few hours more, Joe Biden said a tearful good bye to Delaware before heading to Washington DC on a private plane, rather than one provided by the White House.  Biden traveled with his whole family, including the much maligned Hunter who the Republicans, most notably Trump, had tried to weaponize against him.  Then he joined VP elect Kamala Harris and soon to be second guy Doug Emhoff for a stunningly lit memorial service for the now more than 400,000 who’ve died from COVID.  There was a time in America when the outgoing president would have done that already or at the very least would have participated, but as we all know now is not that time.  Today’s inaugural ceremony will most certainly be different than any before it, covered by a, hopefully, super tight security blanket, one short of twelve National Guard soldiers who were axed when they failed last minute screenings, two of those failures due to threatening social media posts.  As unusual as today will be, if both yesterday’s twilight memorial and the virtual DNC convention are any guide it will still be beautiful and joyful and when it’s done we will have a new President and our first woman, Black and Indian Vice President, as well as our first second mensch. Biden will be attending church before the inauguration and quite significantly Republican leadership including Mitch McConnell and Kevin McCarthy will be joining him.  They like outgoing VP Pence, former Chief of Staff Kelly, Anthony Scaramucci and countless other former and soon to be former White House denizens have opted out of attending Trump’s departure shindig at Joint Base Andrews, something that is sure to leave a sour taste in the mango maniac’s mouth. 

Pardons Galore: Around 1:30 AM Mr Mango finally released his pardon list.  In all 143 people received pardons or commutations. Like Obama before him, Trump commuted the sentences of a lot of drug offenders whose sentences were over the top but of course, being Trump his list also included quite a few friends and friends of friends.  Most notably and despicably, Steve Bannon, who’d been indicted for fleecing some Trump delusional fools who’d thought that they were sending their money to a “build the wall” fund was pardoned.  That’s the same Bannon who encouraged and may well have had a part in the January 6 insurrection and who recently said that he’d like to see virus guru Fauci and FBI Director Wray’s heads put on pikes.  Trump also pardoned Elliot Broidy, the Republican fundraiser who first came to our attention during a very early episode of the Trump saga when we learned that Michael Cohen had helped him pay off “his” pregnant Playmate girlfriend; that was before he ended up convicted of influence peddling. The list also includes quite a few former Republican Congressmen/criminals, the incarcerated former Democratic Mayor of  Detroit Kwame Kilpatrick, at least two rap stars, a friend of Jared Kushner who’d harassed and threatened his former wife, and Paul Erikson the one time boyfriend of red headed Russian spy Maria Butina among others with good connections and lots of cash to put those connections to use. As far as we know, no members of the Trump family were on the list, nor was Joe Exotic, Rudy Giuliani or Julian Assange, who Baywatch babe Pamela Anderson was still lobbying for as recently as yesterday.  Separately, and quite unrelated Senator Richard Burr who’d been under investigation for dumping his stock portfolio after getting an early warning about the incoming pandemic, revealed that the Justice Department had ended its investigation into his trades.  That’s not totally surprising, Burr’s trades were modest in comparison to those of his far richer colleagues like former Senators Perdue and Loeffler and the investigation into their actions stopped much sooner.  Does anyone besides me think that maybe Burr got extra scrutiny because the Senate Committee he chaired published several reports that confirmed that the Russians interfered in the 2016 election?  Burr is not running for reelection in North Carolina when his term ends in 2022, good news for  daughter in law Lara Trump who plans to seek his seat. She’s not to be confused with Ivanka who is considering primarying Florida’s Marco Rubio for his.  Oy.   

Politics Unusual:  So far not a single one of Biden’s cabinet appointees has been confirmed.  That’s unusual, due to the failure of Republican leadership to recognize Biden’s win in a timely manner as well as the disruptions associated with the January 6 coup attempt. Of course, Senator Josh Hawley who will forever be known for his fist in the air encouragement of those coup doers, voiced his disapproval of Biden’s choice for Homeland Security, Alejandro Mayorkas. Cuban refugee Mayorkas is still expected to be confirmed but as a result of Hawley’s opposition, his approval will take a bit longer.  Why would we need a Homeland Security head right now anyway, it’s not like anything bad is going on? Hawley claims he’s concerned that Mayorkas won’t be tough enough on refugees and the like, his effort to appeal to Trump’s base but his concern is also because Mayorkas plans to focus on home grown terrorists, those guys that Hawley raised his fist to in solidarity.  People like those members of the right wing Oath Keepers who the FBI says planned and coordinated their part of the attack on the Capitol, making explosives out of bleach, mapping out assault routes and other similarly unpleasant things.  One rather important member of the Senate isn’t just pointing fingers at those Oath crazies, Senate Leader McConnell, or leader until later today when newbie Georgia Senators Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock as well as Kamala Harris’ replacement Alex Padilla are sworn in, is now pointing the finger at Trump. Yesterday, standing before the Senate, McConnell said that the mob that stormed the building had been “fed lies” and “provoked by” Trump to try to stop the counting of votes.  That’s huge and may be an indication that McConnell might actually vote to convict and then vote again to prevent Trump from holding future office, that last part being very appealing to McConnell who wants Trump gone from the scene. It may be too much to hope for as at the end of the day McConnell will do what he thinks is best for him and his party and right now polls show a depressingly large number of Republicans are still team Trump but if McConnell does vote against Trump a significant number of other Senators will follow his lead.  One other thing to watch, though Democrats have the edge in the Senator and Chuck Schumer will step into the leadership role later today, they have equal representation on all the committees so to make things work Schumer needs to cut a power sharing agreement with McConnell and though they’ve been making some progress, the two are stuck on whether or not to keep the filibuster, something that McConnell, especially now that he is out of power, really wants and that Schumer has mixed emotions about, mixed because Joe Manchin is still pro filibuster.    

What’s Next? A number of you have asked whether I am going to keep writing.  For starters I am going to enjoy today, well hopefully things will go well so I can enjoy today.  I started this blog because the crazy things that Trump was doing had me talking to myself,  sometimes mumbling under my breath, something that was far more noticeable before face masks. My initial thought was that writing was an outlet that would keep me from being admitted to Bellevue’s psychiatric wing.  That turned out to be only one of the benefits of the blog, keeping in touch with you, my readers, has been the other.  So let me get back to the question, will I still write?  The answer is yes, because the crazy is unlikely to go away anytime soon if at all, another critical election is only two years away and though that light at the end of the tunnel is growing brighter, I’ve gotten my first vaccine and hope that the rest of you have or will soon,  the pandemic is still here and given the vaccine shortage will be for a while.  That said I am hoping to take a break, maybe write less frequently, especially once the impeachment trial is over.  And of course as always, anyone who wants off my list, should let me know, I am more than cool with that!

Stay safe!  Enjoy today.

xoxo

 

28 Hours

One Eleventh of a Scaramucci:  President elect Joe Biden honored Martin Luther King by volunteering at a food bank, one of those things that presidents not named Trump do. Rather than honoring MLK or inviting the Bidens to the White House for the customary pre-inaugural walk through of their soon to be home, Trump spent his day dotting the “i’s” and crossing the “t’s” on his pardon list, sending out invitations to his 21 gun departure shindig and trying to undo international flight restrictions in the face of a pandemic with concerning mutating virus variants. For good measure, he signed off on a report attacking “identity politics” for making it less likely that “racial reconciliation and healing can be attained by pursuing MLK’s dream,” the right’s response to the NY Time’s Pulitzer Prize Winning 1619 Project which traced the story of slavery through American history and anyway who doesn’t think that Trump is the right guy to weigh in on racial reconciliation? As to that pardon list, it’s due out today, the buzz is that while it will be long, as of now no one named Trump or Kushner will be on it, not because Trump doesn’t want to pardon himself or his kids but because he’s been advised that doing so might lead to more Republican Senators voting to convict him during his upcoming impeachment trial.  That said, Trump isn’t required to disclose the names of everyone he pardons so we might not find out that he, Don Jr and Eric have received a get out of jail free card until some later date when they’ve been indicted for something. On the shindig front, check your inbox, apparently Trump wants to make sure that his farewell ceremony at Joint Base Andrews is really crowded so those not so coveted invitations are being sent to a list that oddly enough includes Trump critics like Communications Director for a minute Anthony Scaramucci and recipients are being encouraged to bring five guests including their favorite Proud Boy and at least one member of QAnon. Regarding the easing of flight restrictions, Biden’s spokesperson Jen Psaki, tweeted that upon the advice of the incoming Biden medical team, they won’t be lifted yet, in fact they’ll be strengthened to “further mitigate the spread of COVID-19.” Get used to science based policy and to hearing from Psaki on a regular basis, though no one’s perfect and Trump isn’t the only prevaricating politician, expect that most if not all of what she says won’t include alternative facts, sure that means there will be less to mock, but we’ll get used to that.  By the way one other Trump edict might not be happening, yesterday Speaker Pelosi who to the extent she ever did, is absolutely not taking Trump’s sh-t anymore, sent a letter to Acting Defense Secretary Chris Miller demanding that he “immediately cease” his plans to place Trump and Devin Nunes loyalist, Michael Ellis into the NSA top lawyer spot.  She cited Ellis’ inadequate and absurdly limited work experience while demanding that the Defense Department’s Inspector General, or acting IG, because in Trump world everyone is only acting, initiate an investigation on how he was chosen for the position over other far more qualified candidates, as if we don’t know the answer to that.  And of course Trump didn’t have the Bidens over for a walk through, why would he do that, he still asserts that he won the election because Black votes aren’t supposed to count.  To be fair the walk through is usually done by the first lady, but as we know by now birther, “I don’t care, do you” Melania is no classier that her current husband.

Russian, Florida, Russia: It’s not just Speaker Pelosi who is taking no prisoners, the Dominion Voting Systems company has had it too.  Mr Pillow, Mike Lindell, is among the long list of right wing pundits, Trump associates and media companies to have received their “imminent lawsuit letter.”  Essentially that letter notifies Mr Pillow  that despite the implausibility and baselessness of attacks against Dominion, he has participated in the “vast and concerted misinformation campaign to slander” the company.  Pillow Lindell responded by saying that he’s okay with all that because he’s got the “proof” to show that his delusional assertions are true.  Spoiler alert he does not but don’t be surprised if the Dominion folks soon own MyPillow, a media company or two and one or more Trump hotels. MyPillow products have now been pulled from Bed Bath and Beyond, Kohl’s, HEB Stores, the Canadian Shopping Channel and Wayfair.   Lindell might want to check with the buyers at GUM, the iconic Russian department store chain to see if they have an appetite for lumpy pillows.  The Russian solution appears to be working for right wing Twitter wannabee Parler, yesterday CEO John Matze announced that he’ll have his service up and running again soon and that it will be hosted by DDos-Guard, the Russian company that also provides web hosting services to the Russian Military. If things don’t work out with GUM, Mr Pillow could try selling his pillows to Vlad’s military and prisons. Sadly, we now know one prisoner who might need one as yesterday Putin incarcerated Alexei Navalny.  The brave dissident who Vlad previously had poisoned with Novichok, returned to his homeland because that’s what dissident heroes do and was immediately incarcerated on trumped up charges.  Trump maybe on his way out but sadly Putin is still doing his thing in Russia.  Florida’s Governor DeSantis appears to be taking a few pages from Putin’s playbook though no one’s poisoned her, well at least not yet, whistle blower data analyst Rebekah Jones was arrested yesterday on one count “against users of computers, computer systems, computer networks and electronic devices” whatever that means.  Jones who was released on bail also tested positive for COVID-19. If only DeSantis focused half as much of his energy on virus mitigation, like mandating face masks and closing bars, things would be better, but forget about that, arresting dissenting data analysts is so much more fun.

And….. : The list of arrested January 6 rioters/thugs continues to grow. The 20,000 or more National Guard soldiers protecting the inauguration are being vetted to see if they share their extremists views, as if there is enough time to figure that out and now concerns have been raised that QAnon members may dress up as National Guardsmen to infiltrate and disrupt the inauguration. And let’s be real, does anyone think that Trump has thrown in the towel yet? Oy.

399,903

Wake Me Up When It's Wednesday 

Soon, Soon, Soon: Wednesday can’t come soon enough.  Sure we’ll be living with the consequences of four years of Trump as neither he nor Trumpism are going to disappear overnight or maybe ever but at least the mad Fascist criminal, dictator wannabee will be gone from the Oval Office, replaced by Joe Biden who is neither sleepy nor hiding in his basement but is going to hit the ground running, unraveling a lot of Trump’s orders and implementing coronavirus mitigation policies on day one when he plans to return the US to the Paris climate accords, repeal the Muslim ban, extend nationwide restrictions on evictions and foreclosures and implement a mask mandate on federal property.  Leading by example, the President elect will also be exhorting everyone, everywhere to mask up for 100 days something that is unlikely to persuade Trump’s diehard fans, particularly the moronic thugs who exposed their faces during the January 6 insurrection.  That crowd which was overwhelmingly made up of Trump supporters including Republican party officials and political donors, far-right militants, white supremacists, off-duty police, members of the military and adherents to the Q Anon myth that the government is secretly controlled by “a cabal of Satan worshipping pedophile cannibals” are unlikely to comply, but then again, isn’t masking mandatory in prison? It’s going to take awhile for all the details about January 6 to come out, but they will come out. By now most of us have seen the horrifying video clips shared by the New Yorker photo journalist who embedded himself among the marauders as they rampaged through the Capitol, while screaming for VP Pence and Speaker Pelosi’s heads. It’s reported that one of those marauders may actually be trying to sell Nancy Pelosi’s laptop to the Russians.  In addition, the AP reports that members of Trump’s campaign played key roles in orchestrating the so-called rally.  It was hosted by a pro-Trump nonprofit called Women for American First which applied for and received the Park Service permits and at least three of the people listed on those permits were on the Trump campaign payroll, including Megan Powers, Caroline Wren and Megan Mulvaney, former Chief of Staff Mick’s niece, so forget about the idea that the rally was a grassroots effort.   The FBI is on the case, and with the help of all those pictures, tweet chains, Facebook postings, disgruntled former wives, estranged children, and phone location finders as well as a few creative Bumble and Tinder women who’ve turned in some picture posting charmers, the list of those getting arrested, put on no fly lists and/or losing their jobs continues to grow. As to what was apparently a huge security failure, Pelosi has tapped Retired Lt. Gen. Russel Honoré, who led the military’s response to Hurricane Katrina to lead an immediate review of the security of the Capitol complex.  Of course, Trump fan boy Senator Lindsey Graham has already weighed in, in addition to  telling soon to be Senate Leader Chuck Schumer that he shouldn’t proceed with an impeachment hearing because it would be divisive, unlike Trump who he insists is trying to unite the country, the kowtowing South Carolinian blamed Pelosi, saying that it was her fault that the Capitol was breached because you know, she’s the Speaker.  Any chance we can get Graham to head out of town on Wednesday with Trump who is scheduled to leave in the morning after first “honoring” himself with a 21 gun salute?  Of course that will be after the much anticipated 100 or more pardons, which are due out Tuesday night.  And some of those pardons come with a price, apparently a bunch of lawyers have been charging a boatload of dough for getting clients into the queue.    

Impeach, Impeach, Impeach: It’s still unclear when the impeachment trial will start because Pelosi hasn’t sent over the Articles of Impeachment yet but once it does the plan will be for the Senate to split its days in two in order to make time to also confirm Biden’s appointments and to move ahead with his legislative agenda.  Rudy Giuliani who was seen in and out of the White House over the weekend insists that he’ll be leading Trump’s legal team though some of Trump’s advisors say that’s not happening but with the likes of Jay Sekulow and White House Counsel Pat Cipollone not interested in reprising their rolls, Giuliani may be the only one left.  Does anyone know if a co-conspirator can work a case?   By the way Giuliani’s defense plan includes proving that all that faux election fraud was real.  That’s something that puts him in cahoots with Mike Lindell, AKA the MyPillow Man who was seen at the White House on Friday.  Someone should probably tell Mr Pillow that holding easily readable notes calling for your fascist leader to continue with his insurrection/coup strategy, while declaring martial law, and installing Devin Nunes acolyte Kash Patel as the head of the CIA, is more bumbling Clouseau than suave 007.  As to Kash Patel, his name certainly gets bandied around a lot, apparently Trump tried to install him as CIA head Gina Haspel’s senior deputy after the election but she made it clear that she’d resign if he did.  Around that time, Haspel was seen having a highly unusual meeting with Senate Leader McConnell, maybe he put the kibosh on that plan, who knows? We also don’t know where Mitch stands on convicting Trump, if he votes yes, it’s thought that a lot of other Republicans beyond the more outspoken crowd of Romney, Murkowski, Collins, Toomey and Sasse might too, tipping the balance but don’t bet the farm on that.  Unfortunately no one was able to stop Trump’s Acting Secretary of Defense Miller from forcing the installation of another questionable character, Michael Ellis, as chief legal counsel at the NSA this weekend.  That move was done over the objections of NSA director Nakasone. Obviously Biden will replace him on day one, but given Civil Service rules doing so won’t be easy which of course was the point of forcing his installation.   It also won’t be easy to kick out some of those members of Congress who should be shown the door.  And I am not just talking about Ted Cruz or Josh Hawley, who was forced to cancel an Orlando Florida family oriented fund raiser scheduled for next month, by the way who takes their kids to Disney World during a pandemic?  Saying that they “are horrified and opposed to the events at the Capitol and all who supported and incited the actions,” the Lowes Hotel company kicked a defiant Hawley to the curb. Among the others who should be shown the door are Congresswoman Marjorie “QAnon” Taylor Greene who was suspended from Twitter for a measly twelve hours yesterday for spreading election misinformation and Glock toter, misinformation spreader, anti-masker Lauren Boebert whose communications director, a more mainstream Republican who had been assigned to show her the ropes quit over the weekend.  By the way Congresswoman QAnon plans to introduce a resolution calling for Joe Biden’s impeachment even before he takes office.  That’s just the tip of the Republican deplorable iceberg.  Remember when Ilhan Omar was the “worst” ever, well she still isn’t my favorite but she seems positively delightful compared to this crowd and she like the other members of the so-called Squad, including AOC and Ayanna Pressley had good reasons to fear for their lives last week given how the right has demonized them for everything and anything they’ve ever said and a lot that they haven’t. Sadly, protective vests and helmets are selling well in the halls of Congress, good thing that their costs are reimbursable for legislators that is.

Viral Musings: On the vaccine front, the news was mixed over the weekend.  After being told that the Federal Government was about to release their reserves, the states scheduled a lot more shots only to be told that the vaccine cupboard was dry causing a number of hospitals and facilities to cancel appointments late last week.  It turns out that the news while not great, isn’t as bad as that, this week’s allocations will be down but the supply is on its way as the manufacturers have been meeting their production targets.  On Friday, NY’s Governor Cuomo promised that all those scheduled for second doses will get them and over the weekend Virus Guru Fauci repeated that message while adding that the Moderna and Pfizer pipelines were reliable.  He also said that two more vaccines, from AstraZeneca and Johnson and Johnson are getting closer to approval, weeks rather than months away. Unfortunately the death toll continues to climb, at 398k it’s expected to cross through 400k sometime today.  

 Fifty two and one half hours

 

Five Days

Presidents:  One president at a time is the rule but right now we appear to have three.  It’s probably a good thing that the one who is supposed to be running the country gave up even before his bigly election loss.  He’s seething and when not releasing carefully scripted videos, the ones where he still refuses to acknowledge that he lost a fair election and that he had anything to do with last week’s violent insurection, he’s preparing pardons for an overlapping group of co-conspirators and family members and possibly even himself.  The second one is VP Pence who, instead of invoking the 25^th Amendment or convincing Trump to step down early, is standing in for him, heading up security meetings and overseeing whatever still needs to be done to keep the country running through Wednesday, while promising a smooth transition of power to the third, Joe Biden.  Biden is still only the president-elect and though it’s fair to assume he hasn’t sent any Flynn like emissaries to negotiate side deals with foreign powers, he’s saying and preparing to do the things that a president is supposed to do during a crippling pandemic and economic crisis.  Last night he outlined an economic relief package that will, to the extent he can get it through Congress, provide $400 billion to attack the pandemic, accelerate the vaccine rollout and safely reopen schools with another $350 billion going to financially desperate state and local governments, more generous unemployment benefits, federally mandated paid leave for workers and child care subsidies and a much heralded direct payment of $1400 to qualifying individuals, an amount intended to bring the previously approved $600 to $2000. Biden is still promising to get 100 million shots into arms during his first 100 days and though Senate Republicans are unlikely to be receptive to parts of his plan, even they should be on board with funding, fixing and accelerating the vaccine rollout. As to the rollout, Biden who called it a “dismal failure” is expected to announce today that he’s convinced Andy Slavitt, the former Obama official who received accolades for fixing the initially botched rollout of the Obamacare enrollment website to come on board to work his magic for vaccinations.  That’s bad news for those of us addicted to Slavitt’s awesome “In the Bubble” podcast and frequent lengthy but on point tweet streams but great news for the country.  Though the useless and pathetic Trump who disturbingly still controls the nuclear football is doing nothing presidential, his current plan is to stick around until Wednesday morning, when he’ll make a big deal about leaving to the applause of some paid actors as he heads to Mar a Lago before Biden is inaugurated.  That football will go with him but at noon on the dot, its secret codes will expire as another football with updated codes is handed to Biden who, following tradition, will have spent Tuesday night at Blair House, at the invitation of the State Department rather than Trump who couldn’t bear to formally extend the invitation himself.   

Impeach, Impeach, Insurrection:  Every day we learn more about the January 6 insurrection, all of it more horrifying.  Current and former policemen, members of the military, teachers and at least one Olympic gold medalist participated.  Even members of the Capitol police and Congress more than likely lent a hand making the brave actions of those who put their lives on the line to defend Congress that much more impressive, particularly when considering that the largely white crowd of insurrectionists hurled racial slurs at Black members of the Capitol force who at their peril were doing their jobs. FBI Director Chris Wray finally surfaced yesterday, speaking in a meeting hosted by VP Pence who, now that he is untethered from Trump, kept his mask on even when he was speaking.  Wray said that so far 100 Capitol maruauders have been arrested, another 200 suspects have been identified and much more is going on below the surface that he isn’t ready to share.  Additionally the FBI is wading through tens of thousands of tips.  He also warned about an “extensive amount of concerning online chatter,” including calls for armed protests leading up to the inauguration. He provided no good explanation for why the FBI did almost nothing about all the white supremacists on their watch list who made their way into Washington DC before the January 6 horror but did make it clear that this time around everything is being taken seriously.  He’s not the only one taking action, Delta has expanded its no fly list to include anyone and everyone responsible for last week’s events including the people who harrassed Senators Romney and Graham at the airport and in flight. In addition, following Delta’s lead most major airlines will prohibit passengers from putting weapons in their checked luggage, a major hindrance for those who can’t go anywhere without their pistols, Uzis, grenades, or Molotov cocktails.   

Human Resoures:  While most members of the White House staff have already cleaned out their desks, word is that the under indictment Steve Bannon is back, advising Trump possibly to remain first and foremost in his addled brain for one of those coveted soon to come pardons.  Bannon will be competing with Don Jr who has been called in by the DC Attorney General to talk about how he defrauded Trump’s tax-exempt inaugural committee out of $1 million.  Ivanka and Jared  are also facing some heat.  While it might not be a crime to refuse to allow your Secret Service protection contingent to use one of your six bathrooms, forcing them to instead hike to the neighboring Obamas or the Pences or maybe even the bushes, lower case intended, until a $3000 per month apartment can be rented just for the use of its toilet, it is totally sh-tty. That little nugget, or not so little nugget as the case may be, was reported in yesterday’s Washington Post.  On a more serious note, while most of us were focused on Trump’s coup attempt, the Supreme Court revived a restriction on mifepristone, more commonly known as the abortion pill, requiring that prescriptions be picked up in person even during the pandemic because why should women be allowed to control their reproductive destiny and anyway, that rather than insuring that Trump remain in office for ever, is the thing that motivates “his” Justices Barrett, Kavanaugh and Gorsuch.  Lastly, get used to hearing these names:  Diana DeGette, David Cicilline, Joaquin Castro, Eric Swalwell, Ted Lieu, Stacey Plaskett, Joe Neguse, and Madeleine Dean.  These Democratic members of Congress will make up the impeachment team headed up by Maryland Congressman/Constitutional law professor Jamie Raskin once Trump’s impeachment trial begins. Also keep an eye on Alaska’s Republican Senator Lisa Murkowski, who called Trump’s second impeachment as well as the desirability of preventing him from ever serving in office again appropriate as she may well be one of the hopefully many Republicans that vote to convict him.   

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 Clear and Present Danger

Two Times a Loser:  Trump was impeached again yesterday by a vote of 232 to 197, with ten Republicans voting against him this time. Coincidentally or not, 232 is also the number of Electoral College votes he scored during his losing reelection bid. The ten  Republicans voting for impeachment include Liz Cheney of Wyoming, Jaime Herrera Beutler of Washington, John Katko of New York, Adam Kinzinger of Illinois, Fred Upton of Michigan, Dan Newhouse of Washington, Peter Meijer of Michigan, Anthony Gonzalez of Ohio, David Valadao of California and Tom Rice of South Carolina. In the face of the same incoming death threats that some of their wimpier colleagues used as excuses for voting “no,” each of them cast their votes on principle, citing the overwhelming evidence like videos, speeches and Trump’s despicable acts.  While ten might not seem like such a large number, it’s historic, in no other presidential impeachment did that many cross the aisle to cast a vote against their party’s leader. Liz Cheney’s vote, while expected, has some like the despicable Jim “Gym” Jordan calling for her to step down from her party leadership role but she seem unconcerned, playing a long game, possibly believing that as more information comes out about the planning that went into last Wednesday’s attack, she’ll come out on top, eventually displacing Kevin McCarthy as House GOP leader, maybe even becoming House Speaker if or when the Republicans win back the House.  As to McCarthy, he actually acknowledged the evil of the attempted coup and Joe Biden’s victory while voting against impeachment to “unite” the country, too little too late but still enough to infuriate Trump who viewed his statement as a betrayal.  Apparently a very defiant and delusional Trump who still insists that he won the election by a landslide is also furious at Rudy Giuliani, is no longer taking his calls, at least for now, and, the part I like best, refusing to pay his bills or even reimburse him for his travels to hotspots such as the Philadelphia “Four Seasons,”  the one nestled between the porn shop and a crematorium. Speaking of crematoria, Grim Reaper Mitch McConnell who earlier teased that he might be team impeachment, is doing what he does, so despite hopes that he would immediately act upon the House’s articles of impeachment, he’s back to punting any impeachment trial to Chuck Schumer who takes over as leader right after Joe Biden and break all ties voter Kamala Harris’ inauguration next week. 

Not Soon Enough: The inauguration is still on but with more violence expected and Washington DC turned into a war zone, Biden has changed his plans, despite his affinity for Amtrak, he will no longer be traveling to DC from Delaware by train. Nodding to  Washington Mayor Bowser’s request that people, even Biden/Harris supporters stay home, Airbnb and another system I’ve never heard of have cancelled all Washington area reservations.  FBI Director Chris Wray is warning about embedded violent extremists and has told state law enforcement agencies that going forward there is no such thing as oversharing, they are to forward every piece of intelligence they pick up, so don’t even crack a joke about what could happen next week unless you want those men in black showing up at your door.  New York, the city that warned America about Trump and consistently voted against him, announced yesterday that their cancelling Trump’s skating rink, golf course and merry-go-round contracts, which could cost the Trump organization around $30 million and another bank, this one in Florida announced that it would no longer do any business with Trump.  Additionally, more corporations including Walmart, Marriot and Dow Chemical will not be making contributions to any of those Republicans who voted against certifying the Biden’s victory. How ironic that some in the party of pollution won’t even be able to look to Dow for support.  And Speaker Pelosi, who remains steelier than ever despite the attempts on her life, isn’t just furious with Trump, she over Republicans, and thus far it’s only Republicans who refuse to go through the Capitol metal detectors; she’s putting in place financial penalties for those who raise a stink, planning to deduct up to $5000 for each violation from their salaries.   

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6 Days

One Week More

Impeach, Impeach:  Last night the House voted to push VP Pence to oust Trump via the 25^th Amendment.  Only Republican Adam Kinzinger joined them.  Before the vote, Pence sent a letter to Speaker Pelosi saying that while he would do everything he could to insure a smooth transition to the Biden administration, he had no intention of going the 25^th route because that’s not his thing and anyway what’s an attempted coup and a murder threat or two among friends.  Pence’s decision wasn’t a surprise, nor should Trump take any comfort in the fact that only Kinzinger sided with the Democrats as today the House plans to vote to impeach Trump and not only do they have the votes to do so, some more of those votes will come from Republicans.  In addition to Kinzinger, Liz Cheney, the third ranked Republican stated yesterday that she’ll be voting for impeachment “because a violent mob attacked the US Capitol…..and the president of the US summoned the mob assembled the mob, and lit the flame of the attack.”  Echoing the FBI and the DOJ who finally took to the podium yesterday albeit with only “B” team representation, Cheney also said “much more will come clear in coming days and weeks.”  In addition to Cheney and Kinzinger, Republican Reps John Katko and Fred Upton said that they’ll be voting for impeachment and Peter Meijer, who replaced Justin Amash, the one Republican who voted to impeach the first time around, said he’s leaning in that direction.  Another group of Republicans have come out in favor of censure and though he’s not in the impeachment camp, even GOP leader McCarthy has backed off, well just a little, from supporting Trump.  The bottom line is that Trump will be impeached, again, by the House today and the vote will be bipartisan.  Though Senate Leader McConnell initially said that he wouldn’t start the impeachment trial until right before Biden’s inauguration, citing an arcane provision soon to be Senate Leader Schumer is pressing the creepy Turtle to get moving sooner and it appears that McConnell, who the NY Times reports is secretly pro-impeachment and thrilled to move on from Trump, is leaning towards cooperation. The fact that McConnell could be team impeachment is bigly, even if he doesn’t vote to convict, his wink and a nod to his caucus will make it easier for some of them to go the conviction route and the number who might could approach twenty, though I’ll believe that when I see it.  While two thirds of the Senate would have to vote for conviction for Trump to be ousted, the two thirds refers to those who actually show up to vote so Trump could be convicted even if fewer than 67 vote him out making it likely that a number of Republicans will call in sick, conveniently concluding that they have to go into quarantine. It’s not just a conviction that the Democrats are seeking, they also want to make  sure that Trump can never run for another office again, and who doesn’t think that a number of those Republicans with presidential aspirations wouldn’t want to see that happen. 

Imperfection: Yesterday before Trump headed to Texas to celebrate the pathetic 40 miles of new wall constructed during his torturous four years in office, he attacked the Democrats for engaging in another witch hunt, said that “people say” his speech, the one where he incited the crowds to raid the Capitol, was “perfect.”  No contrition at all, just more encouragement to those deplorables who sadly aren’t done yet. On the deplorable front, NJ Democratic Congresswoman/former Navy Officer Mikie Sherill shared that she believes that a number of lawmakers led reconnaissance efforts on January 5th, providing some of their “constituents” guided tours through the Capitol halls, something that could explain how the attackers knew where to find the offices of some of Congressional leaders. Though she didn’t specify names, some of those possible collaborators could be Arizona Representatives Andy Biggs and Paul Gosar, whose siblings have written a letter calling him a horrible person, and Alabama’s Mo Brooks.  The three were previously identified by one of the rally’s leaders as cooperators. Other possible abettors could be the crowd of Republicans who despite last week’s events and fears of future attacks refused to go through the metal detectors as they entered the Capitol yesterday.  Among those were Idaho’s Ross Fulcher,  Texas’ Van Taylor and Colorado’s Lauren Boebert, the Glock carrier who got into a standoff with Capitol police after her handbag triggered the metal detector alarm.  All of them ending up being admitted even though they failed to cooperate.  Suffice it to say their Democratic colleagues are furious.  Not a good look for either the Republican set or the Capitol police screeners since we’ve learned that though most of them acted bravely on January 6 some were criminally cozy with the marauders. 

Human Resources:  Though Ted Cruz is still in the Senate, his communications director resigned yesterday.  We also learned that Secretary of State Pompeo cut his European trip short after Luxembourg’s Foreign Minister and some EU officials refused to meet with him because they want nothing to do with anyone so closely associated with coup attempter Trump possibly because to paraphrase Russia expert Fiona Hill, who came to most of our attention during Trump’s first impeachment, even a failed coup attempt counts as a coup. And another Democrat, Illinois Representative Brad Schneider, who was sheltering in place with some of those Republican mask refusers, has tested COVID positive. Lastly, Trump has been told that not only is self-pardoning unconstitutional, but that it would expose him to more liability and that he’s so upset about that last tidbit that he might not deliver on those other pardons he’s promised because if he goes down he wants company.  Frankly, I think he’ll still go the pardon route because when was the last time he took advice?     

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Eight Scary Days

What, Me Worry?  One indication that the insurrection is not over is that FBI Director Wray and Acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen haven’t held a press conference.  That’s particularly notable, at best an indication that dealing with the crisis has them overwhelmed, not an excuse, we need to hear from them, but with many already arrested, 150 more under investigation and upwards of 40,000 tips to sort through, they probably really are busy.  According to a piece published overnight by the Huffington Post, late yesterday the new leaders of the Capitol police told members of Congress that they are closely monitoring three separate plans that could pose serious threats to them and to Biden and Harris in the run up to and during the inauguration.  Those plans include assassinating Democratic politicians as well as a few of those Republicans who haven’t been sufficiently loyal to Trump and “neutralizing” the Supreme Court to insure that Trump remains in office. The police are so worried that they asked the briefed members to not share all of what they were told with the public over concerns that doing so would just help those crazies who would like to show up for the “fun” but aren’t yet in the insurgency loop. The HuffPo reporter said that as a result he only included what he could in his article so there’s more that we aren’t even being told.  Notably the police are even worried that one or more members of Congress may be dangerously aligned with the thugs, a fair assumption given that Colorado’s GOP newbie Congresswoman Lauren Boebert, a Glock toting gun enthusiast, tweeted out information about Speaker Pelosi’s whereabout during last week’s attack even after she and her colleagues were told not to share any information about where they were sheltering; her justification was that some of the “patriots” marauding through the halls with weapons and plastic cuffs were her constituents.  Boebert is only the tip of the crazy berg, another new Republican Representative is QAnon advocate member Marjorie Taylor Greene and then of course there’s Alabama Mo Brook, the one who initiated the vote decertification push in the first place. That same crowd refused to wear masks while sheltering and now two Democratic Congresswoman who were being cautious, Pramila Jayapal and 75 year old cancer survivor Bonnie Watson Coleman have tested COVID positive, possibly as a result of their colleagues’ behavior.   

Another Big Lie:  Yesterday, House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy who appears to be starting to wake up to the reality that the tide is turning, that his close adherence to all thing Trump is now a wee bit problematic, had a conversation with Trump where the Loser continued to insist that he won the election while also saying that reports that MAGA maniacs were responsible for the January 6 attack and anything that follows are wrong, that it was actually those amorphous Antifa guys who did all the bad things. Trump may be delusional but even he  knows that’s false, however, having gotten tens of millions of his fans to believe the Big Lie that he won the election, why wouldn’t he think that he could get them to believe that last week and what’s to come in the run up to the inauguration, and probably even afterwards, are the deeds of the left?  One more thing on the protest front, yesterday the FBI warned that violent protests are planned in all fifty state capitals raising additional concerns that Governors, especially those who’ve sent some of their National Guard units to help bolster Washington DC’s defenses, may find themselves exposed at home.  Also Chad Wolf, the acting Homeland Department Secretary who should be working on all this resigned yesterday, he insists that he did so because of recent court rulings that questioned the legitimacy of his appointment not because of recent events.  Before leaving he authorized additional protection for the Washington DC area, but since just last week he insisted that he would be staying until Biden was in office, his early departure is odd, particularly given that he criticized Trump’s rhetoric last week.

Follow the Money: As to the Republican crowd, Kevin McCarthy, whose hopes to become Speaker in 2022 may be circling the drain, isn’t the only one now facing headwinds.  More and more major corporations now say that they won’t make political contributions to any of the Republican House or Senate members that voted against the certification of the Electoral College votes. That’s not only a bigly problem for anti-confirmation voters McCarthy and his side kick Steve Scalise who as House Republican leaders are tasked with bringing in the bucks to maintain their positions and to fund the 2022 midterms but it’s a problem for the Senate as well where Florida’s Senator Rick Scott who also voted against certification was recently put in charge of the Senate’s campaign arm, a role he sought to bolster his presidential ambitions. He is now facing calls from that suddenly “concerned” crowd to pass his campaign role on to someone else.  Two notable additions to the list of companies that will no longer be funding the Republican crowd are Hallmark and Deutsche Bank.  Hallmark, based in Missouri, specifically mentioned their disgust with hometown Senator, newest pariah Josh Hawley.  Deutsche said that they will no longer do any business with Trump or his family, a position also announced by the lesser known Signature Bank. Signature bank which has a long term relationship with the Kushners, also called for Trump to step aside early. It’s not just money, Trump has also lost football’s Bill Belichick, last night the New England Patriots coach who was due to receive a presidential medal of honor from Trump on Thursday, said due to last week’s events and his commitment to things like patriotism, freedom, democracy and racial equality, Trump can take that medal and stuff it.  Well he didn’t use those words, but that’s what he meant.

Impeach, Impeach:  It doesn’t appear that Trump plans to follow Signature’s advice to step down.  Reports are that Trump and Pence finally sat down for a tete a tete yesterday afternoon.  The White House press office reported that it was a very pleasant meeting, it wasn’t but it also doesn’t appear that Pence is going to trigger the 25^th Amendment so impeachment number two is on, unless of course Pence is stealthier than anyone thinks he is.  After all Trump standing idly by while his fanboys called for Pence’s neck in a noose, why do something about that?  As to the impeachment, this time around it’s far more likely that some House Republicans will cross the aisle and vote with their Democratic colleagues, even third in line Replublican Liz Cheney appears to be impeachment curious.  The articles of impeachment are narrow, specifically focused on Trump inciting violence against the US government rather than things like all that new information that’s come to light about his continuing efforts to find election fraud in Georgia or the voicemail message that Rudy G, who will probably be kicked out of the New York Bar Association shortly, accidentally left on the wrong Senator’s voicemail. That’s the message that was supposed to go to Alabama’s Tommy Tuberville, urging him to hold up the confirmation of four more states’ votes.  The reason for the narrow impeachment narrow focus is to make it more palatable for some of those “curious” Republicans to vote with their Democratic colleagues.  As to what happen next, despite earlier reports that Speaker Pelosi might hold back refering the impeachment to the Senate until after Biden takes office and gets some of his priority legislation passed, the talk now is about getting articles over to the Senate immediately. 

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Impeachment Redux 

Just Checking In:  How’s the new year treating you?  As far as I can tell so far it’s not much different from 2020, except of course for the insurrection which is not over yet as reports are that future attacks are in the offing, in various state capitals and in Washington DC, putting current inauguration plans in jeopardy. With the death count at 374,341, the virus is even more out of control than the Trump mob and we’re on the verge of another impeachment, only this time rather than relying on descriptions of a “perfect” call we’ve got receipts in the form of selfies and videos and those videos are truly horrific, especially the one of Capital police being beaten while Trump was doing his Epstein jig to the music in his protected studio.  The terrorists, and to be clear, they’re terrorists rather than demonstrators, got frighteningly close to doing far more damage than they pulled off, which isn’t to say that they didn’t pull off far too much.  It’s becoming increasingly clear that those responsible for the protection of the Capitol failed miserably, and that while some of that was due to a 9.11 type failure to imagine the worst that could happen as well as general incompetence, it’s more than likely that when a thorough top to bottom analysis of last week’s events is completed, it will be revealed that some high up in the administration, particularly one or more of Trump’s recently placed supplicants at the Defense Department, including acting Secretary Chris Miller and former Devin Nunes aides Kash Patel and Ezra Cohen Watnick were among those who, under the direction of their orange leader, intentionally disregarded the obvious threat largely because the maniacs were Trump fans rather than Black Lives Matter racial equity protestors or even Bill Nye the Science Guy whose pro science rally resulted in the call up of more troops.  That said, there were some heroes including Officer Brian Goodman who at his own peril misdirected a horde of threatening thugs keeping them away from where many Senators were sheltering and Officer Brian Sicknick, ironically a Trump supporter, who died from injuries sustained while doing his job. Sadly, another Capitol officer, Howard Liebengood committed suicide over the weekend. On a scale of one to ten Speaker Pelosi is level fifteen furious, she’s not just talking another impeachment, she’s doing it, telling VP Pence that she’ll only halt the process if he forces Trump out of office. Though there have been reports that Pence is considering going the 25^th Amendment route because he’s beyond hurt that Trump, who throws everyone around him under the bus, paid off his long time loyalty by doing the same to him, he’s been largely silent.  The bottom line is that we have no idea what is really being discussed nor how dire things really are which is saying a lot because we do know that concerns about Trump’s instability are so heightened that Pelosi has spoken with Pentagon officials to limit his ability to play with his “football.”  Nor do we know if Pence would even be able to get enough of the remaining cabinet members, a group that includes Secretary of State Pompeo who appears to still be on the Trump bandwagon and supplicants Alex Azar, Ben Carson and Wilbur Ross, assuming he’s not on life support somewhere, to cooperate though it is worth noting that Treasury Secretary Mnuchin who sometimes acts like he cares about stability or at the very least market reaction, cut short his Saudi Arabia jaunt short to rush back to Washington. As to those two women who supposedly moderate Trump’s worst instincts, Melania was busy doing a photo shoot while her husband was egging on his marauding fanbase and refused to be interrupted because, come on, it was a photo shoot for her planned cocktail table book and Ivanka’s publicist wants us to think that despite her tweet calling the goons patriots, a tweet that she later deleted, that she was doing her best to get her father to calm his fans and that it was her influence that got him to issue his video, the one that looked like a hostage tape and that he now regrets because he doesn’t want any of his fans to think that he really wants a peaceful transition to take place. And on the gossip side, for what it’s worth, the Daily Mail reports that Melania plans to file for divorce shortly.  I really don’t care, do you?  

Lies and Consequences: Though it’s still likely that Trump won’t be forced out early, or at least until he gets back from his trip to examine his wall in Alamo, Texas, not that Alamo but still an Alamo, he is suffering some consequences for his actions, not from most in the Republican hierarchy as with few exceptions, that crowd insists that pushing him out early would be divisive, because divisiveness is only a problem when the perpetrator isn’t Trump?  The slapback is coming from the social media companies. Trump has lost, at least temporarily, access to Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Reddit, Snapchat, YouTube, TikTok, Shopify and Pinterest and a number of cash apps, among others.  That loss of Pinterest must really hurt because where else can he post pictures of his golden toilets and Shopify, holy Devin’s cow, no more MAGA hat sales.  Twitter says its ban is permanent, which is totally freaking Trump and his fan base out. Twitter is so serious that the company’s staff spent the weekend shutting down Trump aides and family members when they tried to send messages on his behalf.  In addition to slamming the companies for trampling on his First Amendment rights,  a call that a number of his most dedicated Congressional sycophants echoed,  Trump called for his fans to all migrate to the alt right Parler platform where calls for insurrection are not just allowed, but de rigueur. Unfortunately for Trump Apple and Google pulled Parler from their app stores.  They were quickly followed by Amazon which booted Parler from its web hosting service which is a bigly deal.  Parler CEO John Matze initially claimed that he had many other hosting options but later admitted that he’s been having a hard time finding another company to pick him up while also confessing that his law firm has dropped his company.  Parler will probably be back online eventually, but for now they remain dark.  As to the First Amendment, it applies government not private entities despite Trump and his enablers assertions to the contrary.  It’s not just the social media companies, the PGA has cancelled plans to hold their 2022 championship at Trump’s Bedminster course and also announced that they will not hold events at any of his other courses.  A number of corporations, including Marriot, Citibank, and Blue Cross/Blue Shield have also taken action, announcing that they will not be making political donations to any of the members of Congress who voted against confirming the Electoral College results.  JP Morgan took things a step further saying that they are putting a freeze on all political contributions, a little bit of bothsiderism given who the trouble makers are right now. Count Senators Josh Hawley and Ted Cruz among those most affected by all this. A number of their local papers and Senate colleagues are calling for them to resign and former Missouri Senator John Danforth who mentored Hawley now says that supporting him is “the worst mistake” he’s ever made “in his life” something that former Democratic Senator Claire McCaskill/current MSNBC pundit who Hawley unseated would most certainly agree with.  Over the weekend, newbie Arizona Senator Mark Kelly’s twin brother and fellow astronaut teased that he’s considering challenging Cruz next time he’s up for reelection, unfortunately Cruz isn’t up again until 2024, still identical twins in the Senate would be kind of fun.  Maybe by then the Vindmans will be back in government too. Of course, the twinning assumes that we make it through the next two weeks and that all those insurrectionists leave Washington which won’t be easy for some of them as a few who have not been arrested at least so far have been put on no-fly lists and might have to walk all the way home to wherever it is they came from.

Nine Days