Not in Our Kansas!  🌻🌻🌻

Primarily Yours:  Kansas has spoken and it turns out that even in a very red state, one that the Former Guy won by 15 points in 2020, voters, particularly women but also the men who get it, care about maintaining reproductive rights. Despite a huge effort by the anti-abortion forces, including a $3 million expenditure by the Catholic church, the results weren’t even close, the pro-choice side prevailed with 59% of the vote.  According to the NY Times the results in Kansas “suggest” that voters in 4 out of 5 states would vote like Dorothy and Toto, rejecting initiatives that seek to eliminate their right to abortion. The question now is whether a sufficient number of those voters will prioritize reproductive rights enough to also vote against anti-abortion candidates when they aren’t voting in a single issue referendum.  If they do, Democrats stand a good chance of maintaining control of the Senate, perhaps even increasing their majority because virtually all of the Republican candidates for the Senate in the key swing states are anti-abortion. If voters don’t prioritize reproductive rights, the right to abortion will be in jeopardy everywhere as most if not all of those anti-abortion candidates are on record saying that if they make it to the Senate they’ll vote to impose a federal abortion ban. That anti-abortion contingent now includes Blake Masters, the tech billionaire Peter Thiel funded, FG endorsed candidate, who won the Republican contest to face off against Arizona’s pro-choice incumbent Democratic Senator/former astronaut Mark Kelly.  Masters isn’t just anti-choice he’s also on record questioning the legality of contraception (yup, contraception), labeling newest Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson a “pedophile apologist” and calling for the imprisonment of virus guru Fauci.  In other Arizona news, Republicans voted an all insurrectionist slate for state offices including far right Oath Keeper Mark Finchem as their candidate for Secretary of State and election denier, FG fan Kari Lake as their gubernatorial candidate.  Lake will face off against current Secretary of State and now the Democratic nominee for Governor Katie Hobbs.  Arizona’s electorate is just about evenly split between registered Republicans, Democrats and independents. Those Democrats and a critical mass of independents are going to have to do some very heavy lifting to keep the leadership of the state out of dangerously insane, insurrection friendly hands.  Michigan is another state where Republicans continue to move further and further to the right.  Their candidate for Governor who will face off against Democrat incumbent Gretchen Whitmer is Tudor Dixon, a former conservative commentator, who was endorsed by the FG and is backed by former Education Secretary Betsy DeVos and her billionaire family.  Tudor is another one so opposed to abortion that she rejects it even in cases of rape or incest.  

Batty Signals: Conspiracy theorist and far right radio host Alex Jones missed the bat signal, the one about destroying incriminating texts and emails.  Two days ago, the attorney representing one of the Sandy Hook Elementary School parents suing Jones for his false assertion that the massacre had never happened and other equally horrific lies having to do with kids as crisis actors, revealed that Jones’ lawyers had accidentally sent him a whole bunch of Jones’s phone records, including his texts.  In addition to revealing that Jones had committed perjury, those texts likely include some conversations that Jones who was knee deep in coup activities had with members of the FG insurrectionist squad on and around January 6^th 2020 which is why they are now being sought by the January 6^th committee. As to that bat signal, apparently it was received by some of the FGs former appointees at the Defense Department, including acting Secretary of Defense Chris Miller, former chief of staff Kash Patel and former Secretary of the Army Ryan McCarthy because they, unlike Alex Jones but like those at Homeland Security and the Secret Service, conveniently wiped their phones clean of incriminating communications prior to exiting government.  All that wiping is now being investigated to determine whether or not it was just an ordinary parting activity or whether it was done for some more nefarious reasons.   

Reconciling:  It looks like the Democrats reconciliation package is one very important step closer to passage.  Last night, Arizona’s unpredictable centrist Senator Kyrsten Sinema who had been the remaining Democratic hold out signed off on a bill that no longer eliminates the carried interest provision that hedge funds love so much and that narrows the 15% minimum tax on corporations but instead includes an 1% excise tax on stock buy backs.  At her insistence, the bill now also includes additional drought funding for the Southwest, a shrewd request for a Senator from Arizona.  The bill now awaits final sign off from the Senate Parliamentarian.      

And:  Hungary’s Viktor Orban, the proud Christian nationalist who rants against racial mixing and same sex marriage was greeted with cheers when he spoke at this week’s Conservative PAC (CPAC) convention. His speech followed his faux state visit with the Former Guy at Bedminster Golf Club.  Orban is big on touting his pro-family views in contrast to the thrice married FG who buried a former wife at his golf course to get the tax benefit associated with burial sites.  As to the FG’s spawn, two of them, Ivanka and Jr, finally showed up to testify in the NYS civil probe into their family’s business practices.  They, unlike their younger brother Eric, did not plead the Fifth but it’s fair to assume that their memories were conveniently sketchy.  Their father who is just sketchy, is due to testify shortly.  Also due to testify as part of the DOJ investigation into the false elector scheme and whatever else they’re looking at are former FG White House Counsel Pat Cipollone and his second in command. The Senate voted almost unanimously to sign off on the admission of Finland and Sweden into NATO.  The two outliers were fist bumper Josh Hawley who as noted by his fellow Republican Senator Cotton previously voted for the admission of Montenegro and North Macedonia and Rand Paul.  Hawley voted no, Paul voted present.  If things don’t work out for the two here they can always jet off to visit Vladimir Putin, another one who vehemently opposes all things NATO.  As to Russia, the bad news is that yesterday basketball player Britney Griner was sentenced to serve 9 years in prison for having vape cartridges in her suitcase.  The potentially good news is that this morning Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Moscow is ready to discuss a prisoner swap for her and former Marine Paul Whelan.