Magnets and Crystals

On the Road:  President Biden is in Europe seeking to improve relationships with those long term allies that the Former Guy dissed during his days in the White House. He announced that the US will be buying and donating 500 million doses of Pfizer’s COVID vaccine to the international effort.  Jill Biden is doing her part too, she delivered a sartorial message, wearing a jacket with the word LOVE emblazoned in crystals across the back, her way of not so subtly throwing Jilly shade at Melania’s “I really don’t care, do u” border visit garb.  Later in his trip, after he meets with the Queen, hangs with the rest of the members of the G7 and participates in NATO and European Commission meetings Biden is scheduled for a “faceoff” with Vladimir Putin.  The Former Guy who seems a bit bent out of shape that Biden is being so warmly received by our allies, even his one-time buddy Boris Johnson, and that our reputation abroad is now on a steep upswing issued his own comment about Biden’s trip.  Still without a social media platform, he released an old style statement bragging about his days on the road, specifically about his “great and productive” meeting in Helsinki, the one where he freaked many including some of his Republican allies out by siding with Putin over his own intelligence experts, calling assertions that Putin had interfered in the US elections a hoax.  The FG ended his written remarks saying “good luck to Biden in dealing with President Putin –don’t fall asleep during the meeting and please give him my warmest regards!” Note how the mango maniac referred to Putin as “president” but failed to call Biden POTUS, just a little signaling to this fan base, guys like the Three Percenters who were indicted yesterday for conspiracy to overthrow the government.  As to social media platforms, yesterday FG spokesman Jason Miller announced he was moving on from his FG job to take over as president of a tech start up.  That news was met with some surprise by those who wondered what kind of company would hire the married Miller who in addition to being a deadbeat dad to one former girlfriend’s child has also been credibly accused of slipping abortifacient drugs into at least one other former girlfriend’s drinks.  Politico seems to have answered that question, apparently Miller isn’t really leaving the FG’s orbit, the start-up he’s joining plans to develop a “conservative” social media platform, one that will provide the FG with an outlet for his hate messages.  On the Former Guy front, during the week we learned some fairly distressing things about what “his” Justice Department had been up to.  First we found out about their relentless efforts to obtain emails and call records from the NY Times, CNN and the Washington Post in order to find those leaking information about him, efforts that also involved  gag orders that prevented the media companies’ legal departments from alerting the affected reporters about the attempted info grabs. Last night we learned from the NY Times that those “leak” efforts didn’t just target the press, the DOJ also went after members of the House Intelligence Committee, only Democratic ones of course.  Apparently, both Jeff Sessions and William Barr were involved in seizing  the records of Congressman Adam Schiff, a number of his aides, at least one aide’s minor child and a few other not yet publicly revealed Congresspeople.  Those records were obtained by subpoenaing Apple while subjecting the company to a gag order that prevented it from notifying those targeted.   We’re only learning about this now because the gag order prevented earlier disclosure but disturbingly the investigation continued for a while under new Attorney General Merrick Garland, an indication that there is a deep state in the Justice Department, one that’s made up of conservative attorneys rather than those liberals and socialists that the right keeps warning us about.  By the way, according to the NY Times, the DOJ found no leaks from Adam Schiff’s team so while Schiff who the FG targeted with cruel nicknames and threatened to go after for treason appears to have followed the law, the same can’t be said about former AG Barr. You may recall how he refused to give straight answers when then Senator Kamala Harris pummeled him with questions about whether or not the FG or anyone at the White House ever asked or suggested he open an investigation of anyone? Barr who pretended not to understand her questions ultimately never answered directly but did leave the impression that the Justice Department was up to things it shouldn’t have been doing.  It turns out that impression was accurate. It’s fair to assume that we haven’t heard the end of this. Intel Chair Adam Schiff is one very angry guy.  The subpoenas for whatever they’re worth are about to start flying, again.  

Viral Musings:  For the record despite assertions made by some wacky Pillow Guy associated doctor in front of the Ohio State legislature, mRNA vaccines do not turn you into Magneto so forget about your forks suddenly sticking to your heads and pay attention to where you leave your keys because you’ll still have to remember. At least one usually not all that impressive “red” Senator appears to care about his fans and constituents and is trying to do something about the very real and quite distressing red-blue vaccine divide.  Yesterday one time famed football coach current Alabama Senator Tommy Tuberville released a really good video extolling the safety and effectiveness of COVID vaccines.  The message from Tuberville, who revealed that he had gotten vaccinated as soon as he could and that the vaccine was free to all, is important because there are many who won’t listen to Fauci and the like but who will listen to people like him. As to the vaccines, the shelf life of the J & J vaccine has just been extended, a good thing because a significant number of vials are still available, now the government has to get them into arms.  Also, recent studies indicate that the current crop of vaccines work on the feared India variant which to confuse us has been renamed Delta largely because Indian officials were upset with the India moniker. The Delta variant which is very contagious is now dominant in the UK and appears to be showing up more and more here as well. On the mRNA front, it turns out that reports of a higher than usual number of mostly younger men getting myocarditis after receiving their second shot are real and possibly vaccine linked, the myocarditis incidence is still very low – somewhere around 230 cases vs the 100 that would be seen in that population.  The CDC is tracking the cases and plans to meet to further discuss the linkage but so far the view is that the likelihood of getting one of the mostly mild inflammation cases is far outweighed by the benefits of the vaccines.                 

Politics as Usual: Last night a bipartisan group of ten Senators reported that it has reached an agreement on a framework for a proposed infrastructure spending bill that would not include any tax increases. The group of five Republicans (Bill Cassidy, Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, Rob Portman and Mitt Romney) and five Democrats (Joe Manchin, Jeanne Shaheen, Krysten Sinema, Jon Tester and Mark Warner) gave no details, but Reuters reports that their plan would cost $974 billion over five years and $1.2 trillion over eight years, and that it includes $579 billion in new spending. No indication whether Biden or anyone in leadership will be impressed by this plan, which shouldn’t be confused with the one that Shelly Moore Capito had tried to negotiate, but it’s fair to assume that Mitch McConnell will do his best to doom it and that Chuck Schumer will say that it’s not large enough.  In other news, Congresswoman Ilhan Omar got loads of heat from both sides of the aisle for her comments, something about equating the US and Israel with Hamas and the Taliban. Her usual set of supporters said that she said nothing wrong but was just misunderstood but Democratic leadership made it clear that they didn’t agree with her and really could do without her rhetoric especially given that the mid-terms keep getting closer and closer.  She then walked back her statement. Turns out that “both sides” have problem children.      

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