💩💩💩💩  🤡 😱 ✡️🌻😱 🤡

💩: Maybe it’s because Trump’s trying to deflect from the attention on the growing splotch on one hand that appears to have inherited a growing new partner on his other hand or maybe it’s that his former Labor Secretary Alex Acosta who was the US Attorney from Florida who cut the sweetheart deal with Jeffrey Epstein  has agreed to sit for an interview, albeit a closed door one, with the House Judiciary Committee, or maybe it’s just that he thinks that tossing 💩 at democracy in what should be a quiet holiday week is the way to go but here we are.  Yesterday, Trump started the day by announcing that he was signing an executive order outlawing cashless bail while also making the “violation of the sanctity of the American flag” a federal offense. New York is one of those states that has eliminated cash bail for most misdemeanor and nonviolent felony charges to reduce the financial burden on those who would otherwise end up in pretrial jail simply because they can’t afford bail.  Though the concept of cashless bail is controversial, statistics show that the percentage of alleged offenders who don’t commit another crime and show up for subsequent hearings is about the same regardless of whether bail is imposed or not. In any case, Trump threatening to withhold funds from states with cashless bail laws is just his way of trying to paint states with Democratic governors as pro-crime, an extension of the rationale he’s using for sending the National Guard into cities in those same Democratically controlled states.  We know this is all politically gamesmanship because he pardoned all the January 6 criminals and isn’t sending the National Guard or any other military arm of government into Republican states that have cities with higher crime rates than DC, Chicago, New York, and Baltimore but with the help of those Republican governors is deploying or planning to deploy National Guard’s from those states in the Democratic ones he’s trying to demonize. His next target is Chicago, where Illinois Governor Pritzker, a likely 2028 presidential contender, has made it clear that he’s not interested, won’t cooperate, and views Trump’s interference as the act of an uncontrolled dictator wannabee.  As to the flag sanctity order, the Supreme Court has twice previously ruled that burning or otherwise showing disrespect for the flag, offensive or not, is protected free speech so it’s meaningless at least until this autocratic leaning court overrules their prior decisions something they might do because Trump is their🤴.       

💩 💩:  Keeping on topic, Trump announced last night that he’s firing Federal Reserve Board Governor Lisa Cook.  Cook responded, that’s nice but since you don’t have the authority to fire me particularly for a crime that I haven’t committed I am not gong anywhere.  Cook is right, not only doesn’t Trump have the authority but his action is unprecedented. He can’t fire Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell who he wants to fire so he’s instead targeted Cook over an alleged mortgage violation.  Also, as previously mentioned, Cook is a Black woman and Trump seems to really enjoy going after Black women and for some reason, perhaps the same reason that his base is okay with him saying that slavery wasn’t such a bad thing, they’re okay with that.  Putting aside the legality of Trump’s action, the issue here is that countries’ economies do far better when their Federal Reserve Banks remain independent. When that independence is breached, bad things tend to happen, like unfettered inflation.  Combine that with Trump’s attack on the independent statisticians who report on items like inflation and hiring to get the picture of what he’s doing.  His strategy is to hope is that no one will notice that the economy is going down the crapper and they can’t afford food if he manipulates data and appoints a crowd of willing cronies to the Federal Reserve Board.  The economy won’t bow to the whims of a feckless dictator so we should all be concerned, very concerned especially if SCOTUS says that firing Cook is okay because of that 🤴thing.

💩 💩 💩: Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the alleged gang member who isn’t a gang member but who much to his dismay has become the poster child for Trump, Stephen Miller, and Kristi “cosplay” Noem’s rounding up of brown, Spanish speaking people with tattoos, was able to spend the weekend with his family before being arrested again when he showed up for his scheduled INS appointment.  That arrest was expected because having made him their poster child for all things evil, Trump and has abettors are determined to throw scads of our taxpayer dollars into deporting him anywhere they can, pronto instead of going after the real violent criminals that most of us want ousted .  After Abrego Garcia turned down the government’s offer to plead guilty to questionable human smuggling charges and then be deported to Costa Rica the government said it would deport him to Uganda instead, a coercive tactic to force a guilty plea because Uganda?  His lawyers have filed a lawsuit to prevent his deportation without due process. Last night, saying that she needs more time to examine what smells like coercion, federal judge Paula Xinis temporarily blocked the deportation to Uganda, ordering Abrego Garcia to remain detained in the US pending further review. 

💩 💩 💩 💩:  A while ago, we learned that Sergio Gor, the head of the White House Personnel Office had a questionable personal past and that despite being responsible for making sure that all hires had filled out their vetting forms hadn’t filled out his, maybe because of that “unusual” past. Yesterday, it was announced that he’s leaving his personnel post.  He’s been nominated to become the US’s next Ambassador to India maybe because ambassadorships are Trump’s newest way of firing by sending inconvenient people far away, think former IRS head Billy Long, former NSA/Signal guy Mike Waltz, and Don Jr’s former girlfriend Kimberly Guilfoyle.  Final 💩 for the day, the Daily Beast reported yesterday that there’s a chance that RFK gets rid of COVID 19 shots altogether. The Daily Beast isn’t always right so take that with a grain of salt.  That said,  the report should not be totally discounted because at least so far no one in RFK’s circle has denied its validity.  In any case, in prior years the new COVID shots have been rolled out in September but, so far, the newest shots have not yet received approval and assuming they do, those under 65 will have to jump through more hoops to get them. As to COVID, we are currently experiencing a late summer boomlet, so test if you’re not feeling up to snuff or are sniffing a whole lot more than usual and do what you are supposed to do as in stay away from people for a few days and talk to your doctor about Paxlovid if you are particularly vulnerable or just don’t have the time to be sick.

#BringThemAllHomeNow