Pillow Talk 🤡 😱 ✡️🌻😱 🤡

Dumb and Dumber:  Yesterday, Mike Lindell the election denying pillow man announced that he is running for Governor of Minnesota. The field of Republicans lining up to challenge Democratic Governor Tim Walz who is running for a third term is large so Lindell might not end up as the Republican’s candidate but his entrance into the field says a lot about the 🤡 🚗 that the GOP has become.  Also, yesterday we learned that the Department of Justice had once again failed to convince a Virginia grand jury to indict NY Attorney General Letitia James.  AG James hasn’t committed mortgage fraud, but Trump is so down the retribution rabbit hole that his abettor AG Bondi keeps trying to placate him, wasting our tax dollars on frivolous indictment attempts. Bondi is also trying to force a confirmation vote for insurance lawyer/beauty queen Lindsey Halligan in order to legitimize her status as a Virginia US Attorney, but at least so far, that’s not going anywhere because as much as he’d like to please Trump, Senate Leader Thune continues to abide by the blue slip convention and neither of Virginia’s Democratic Senator are willing to provide a blue slip for Halligan. Thune is doing that because he knows that while Trump will be gone someday, Republicans will want that blue slip privilege if Democrats ever regain control of the Senate.  Because all of this wasn’t enough wheel spinning and stupidity for one day, last night Trump announcing he was pardoning Tina Peters, the former Republican clerk of Mesa, Colorado, who was found guilty of trying to breach the state’s voting systems to “prove” Trump’s false claims of mass voter fraud in 2020.  Tina Peters, currently serving a nine-year jail term in a state facility, was found guilty of a state crime, so Trump’s pardon is performative, even he knows that, but much of his base, or what’s left of it doesn’t and those who do love that he’s trying. Clearly, given the state of the economy and the health insurance crisis Trump needs that base more than ever because as evidenced by recent election results and yesterday’s Indiana redistricting fail, his hold over Republican politicians is starting to crack. Despite his threats, which included promises to primary anyone who voted against the redistricting amplified by death and bomb threats from his crazies, the redistricting attempt which had already passed in the Indiana House failed in the Indiana Senate by a vote of 31 to 19 with 21 Republicans joining all ten Democrats in opposition. In theory the redistricting would have resulted in two additional red congressional seats leaving all nine of Indiana’s House seats in the hands of Republicans. When asked about the loss, Trump said he hadn’t really been involved in the debacle, odd given all the tweets proving otherwise, including one threatening to cut off federal funding for Indiana’s roads, National Guard bases, and other major projects if the redistricting plan didn’t pass.  Indiana is a very conservative state but as evidenced by former VP Mike Pence, every now and then conscience trumps conservatism.  Who knows, maybe a few of the state’s legislators aren’t happy that Trump was okay with their former governor being hung on January 6.  

Economics 101:  Fed Reserve Chair Jerome Powell announced a 25-basis point cut in the federal funds rate but also expressed concern about inflation saying that but for Trump’s tariffs, inflation, currently at 3%, would be closer to 2%.  Clearly that’s a message that the tariff loving Trump who is itching to replace Powell before the May end of his term as chair with someone like his oozing economic advisor Kevin Hassett didn’t like hearing. Trump also couldn’t have been happy with Powell saying that plans for future rate cuts should be put on hold for the immediate future. As to inflation, it’s not just about the cost of housing and groceries, health insurance costs, a component of core inflation is going up, up and away.  Yesterday, the Senate voted down several health insurance options although Republican Senators Murkowski and Dan Sullivan of Alaska, Susan Collins of Maine, and Josh Hawley of Missouri all crossed the aisle to support Democrat’s preferred solution, the extension of the expiring Obamacare subsidies for three more years.  There are also around a dozen House Republicans who would vote for some form of a subsidy extension so while the subsidies will probably expire at year end maybe a lifeline is still possible, though probably not. Obamacare isn’t perfect but it continues to be hard to understand why so many Republicans think pushing people off insurance or providing them with only $2,000 to pay for their care or to buy useless plans is an acceptable alternative.  But then again, this House and Senate voted to cut Medicaid and other related health care programs by $1 trillion to fund tax cuts for the wealthiest and all that bailing out of farmers and bombing fishing/drug boats costs money too, not to mention the costs associated with increasing the department of Homeland Security’s fleet of planes or all those ads featuring ICE Barbie Noem.  On the health care front, measles is still out there.  South Carolina is experiencing an “accelerating” outbreak with the majority of the cases occurring among unvaccinated children and teenagers and we’re entering flu, COVID, and RSV season.  Though as reported in Bloomberg a study from the CDC notes that COVID vaccines reduced the risk of an emergency or urgent care visit by 76% for children aged 9 months to 4 years and by slightly more than one-half for those in the 5 to 17-year age bracket, RFK’s crowd continues to attack the COVID vaccine while also casting aspersions at the ones for flu and RSV.  What could go wrong this winter when swarms of sick people of all ages, many without health insurance show up at financially strained hospital emergency rooms assuming that is that they can find one that’s still open.

More 💩: ICE Barbie is either woefully ignorant or a bad liar or both.  Yesterday when asked during her Congressional testimony how many US Military veterans had been deported, she said that none had been.  Unfortunately for her Democrat Rhode Island Representative Seth Magaziner had the receipts in the form of a zoom call with a decorated veteran who’d been deported to Korea. A few other family members of deported vets were also in the audience.  The flustered Noem rushed out of her testimony claiming she had to leave early to attend another “important” meeting that everyone knew was cancelled.  It’s hard to figure out what exactly is going on with our “war” with Venezuela except that we’ve now moved on from only bombing drug boats to capturing ships full of oil, and a number of members of Congress are concerned that War/Beer Hegseth is destroying or planning to destroy the videos of the so-called double tap murders. That’s a concern that extends to the DOJ’s Epstein files, the ones that are due to be released soon.  Keeping with the theme of pedophilia and misogyny, the NY Times has a piece out about how the infamous Tate brothers, who’ve been credibly accused of violence against women of all ages were allowed to fly to the US from Romania where they were being held for their criminal activities. The NYT reports that son Barron was one of the people who pushed for their release.  The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. And lastly, as a parting shot Margie Q is trying to get enough Republicans on board for a motion to vacate the chair to unseat Speaker Mike Johnson.   

Happy Hanukkah.