Sunday School 8/28/22: Extra Credit

For your Sunday School Extra Credit, we're going down the hall to the right and into the Fox News Sunday classroom for the panel discussion. Jennifer Griffin hosted, and her guests were Josh Kraushaar (Axios), Catherine Lucey (Wall Street Journal), and regulars Karl Rove and Juan Williams. 

First up? President Biden's recent comment about a subset of Republicans; here are the two statements he made that are causing a bit of consternation among the Righties. The first statement was made as he was speaking at a fundraising rally in Maryland.

What we're seeing now is either the beginning or the death knell of an extreme MAGA philosophy. It's not just Trump, it's the entire philosophy that underpins - I'm going to say something, it's like semi-fascism. 

And later, he said, after calling Maryland's Gov. Larry Hogan "a Republican you can deal with,"

 We disagree, but at least he's within the mainstream of the Republican Party. I respect conservative Republicans. I don't respect these MAGA Republicans. 

So, here's Griffin's question to Williams:  How similar is this to Hillary Clinton and her 'deplorable' comments? Williams started with a date: January 6, 2021. Clinton's widely (and often purposefully) misconstrued statement happened before that date, and Biden's was after it. 

After January 6th, you had the reality that there were a group of people, Trump supporters, who attacked the Congress of the United States to stop the certification of a legitimate, fair election. You had people in the crowd who wanted to threaten, if not hang, Vice President Pence. You had a situation where there were Trump officials who were pressuring state officials to manufacture votes and send phony electors to the Congress of the United States. I think if people behave that way, then they can be -- they can expect to be called semi-fascist, fascist, because it's antidemocratic action. You're acting against the constitution of these United States. And I think, you know, without being dramatic, that's how democracy dies. They were trying to undermine, to subvert this Constitution.

He also pointed out the second comment Biden made, which differentiated between Trump's extreme MAGA Republicans (RINOs, in these pages), and mainstream, conservative Republicans. And he also noted another network's poll saying "the idea that this democracy is under attack is a number one concern of American voters. 

Karl Rove begged to differ with Williams, saying

Joe Biden, President Biden, was attacking Republicans generally. He was not talking but the people who assaulted the Capitol that sits to the south of us here. He was attacking the entire party... This was - this was not in keeping with what the president promised us. My whole soul is in it, he said, in his inaugural, bringing America together, uniting our people, uniting our nation. That was after January 6th. We must see each other not as adversaries but as neighbors. We should treat each other with dignity and respect. He was not treating his political opponents with dignity and respect.

Williams strongly disagreed, Rove said Biden never said anything about conservatives, and eventually Griffin told the two to stop barking at each other so she could ask Kraushaar about Republicans (she didn't specify which kind she was referring to) cancelling ad spending "in several key states, like Arizona."

In response, Kraushaar talked about Biden's confidence, and "the fact that he is now going after Republicans suggests a certain confidence that he think some of these Republican candidates are too far to the right." And, he said, it's not the GOP overall, it's specific races.

There are a lot of races like that where Republicans are going to have to figure out where to spend the money because some of these candidates are just a little bit too far to the right of the swing states that they're running in.

Griffin asked Lucey whether Biden's student loan debt plan is "just a play to get young voters and minorities" to vote in the midterms. Lucey remined everyone that Biden campaigned on doing this, and using income limits for eligibility shows 

they see this as a - a policy decision that was important to make. I think, in some ways, the thing to think about more with November is less - is, you know, certainly this could motivate a certain group of voters, but there's a lot of candidates, there's a lot of Democrats who aren't huge fans of this decision...who think that this could be a problem for them in November. So, you have that dynamic playing out.

 Turning to Mar-a-Lago, Rove was asked if Trump's in trouble, and he said "Well, I think he's in trouble with public opinion." He talked about the 184 classified documents - 700 pages worth - that were turned over in January, and then the new set of classified documents from the search this month. He said "apparently" everything's out of Trump's hands, and he hopes

the former president has no exposure on this. It would tear our country apart if he were now to be indicted, particularly after Hillary Clinton was not indicted over - over the - the use of a - of a private email server to share classified information. But he -- those documents should not have left the White House. They should not have gone to Mar-a-Lago. The Presidential Record Act of 1978 forbids it. And the president himself, former President Trump said, they could have had them back anytime they wanted and that long ago, all they had to do was ask. Well, apparently, they were asking...

Williams said

I think it's clear the Department of Justice was justified in this step. And, boy, if Hillary Clinton had done this, I think a lot of people's hair would be on fire.

Kraushaar said there's legal jeopardy for Trump,  

but I think the politics are a lot more mixed because it's clear he mishandled classified information. Is it incompetence or is it malice, that's the political question.

Incompetence? Malice? Is malicious incompetence a choice?

See you around campus.

Sunday School 8/28/22

Let's dive right in with your Sunday School lesson with Sen. Roy Blunt (R-MO) in the This Week classroom with George, who started by asking if there should have been any documents at Mar-a-Lago. 

Blunt said "we need to know more" about what was found, and wondered why the Intelligence Committee he sits on didn't know anything about this before the top-secret poop hit the fan. He did say they are expecting a briefing soon.

George tried again, and a third time, at which point Blunt said he's careful with documents, butwhatabout Hillary Clinton and James Comey? The fourth time, Blunt said "he should have turned the documents over and apparently had turned a number of documents over." And, he wondered

why this could go on for almost two years and less than 100 days before the election, suddenly, we're talking about this rather than the economy or inflation or even the student loan program you and I were going to talk about today?

On student loan forgiveness, Blunt's a no - he thinks the plan is "monumentally unfair" to folks who didn't attend college because they couldn't afford to go, and to people who paid back their loans, and to people got educated without loans. Besides, it's

just bad economics... I think it's going to have a long-term, devastating effect on a student loan program that worked pretty effectively until about ten years ago when the federal government assumed responsibility for that program.

That Guy from Vermont was up next, offering his take on loan forgiveness. He explained 60% of the benefits will go to folks with Pell grants, and 87% is going to folks making less than $75K a year. He noted how "shocking" it is to some GOP colleagues when "the government actually... does something to benefit working families and low-income people."

He said there wasn't any squawking about "massive tax breaks to billionaires," adding 1%ers "have a lower effective tax break than working people;" and of course, there are corporations that, "in a given year don't pay a nickel in federal taxes." The fact that both Rs and Ds are unhappy? Well, "... the answer is not to deny help to people." 

The answer is maybe to create a government where -- which works for all people and not just for wealthy campaign contributors.

George asked if that can get done "without more Democrats in the Senate," Sanders suggested the Dobbs decision will have an impact, as will "the gun violence we're seeing."

So, I think there is a reasonable chance that Democrats will retain control over the Senate. I certainly hope we get more than 50 in the Senate, that we get at least 52, so we can start going forward and protecting working people in a way we have not been able to do up to now.

Down the hall, Dana Bash had Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) and Gov. Chris Sununu (R-NH) in the State of the Union classroom. 

Bash asked if AG Merrick Garland should indict FPOTUS. Warren thinks "it's powerfully important" that DOJ can follow the evidence, and if they have it, "they will bring charges and prosecute appropriately. And I support them in that."

Like Sanders, Warren's happy something's being done on student loans. Noting that 40% of folks with student loans don't have a four-year degree, she said the forgiveness "is about America investing in people who work hard, who play by the rules, and who just need a government on their side."

Bash wondered about fairness, and other kinds of debt that the government isn't helping with. Warren said she thinks "a lot about fairness," before reciting her own story of going to college when a semester cost $50, getting a part-time job and being able to pay for her education. That's not the case now, where "our public education system is no longer creating opportunities" for folks without financial means.

Instead, we're saying to these young people, you have got to get an education, but we are going to wrap the chains of debt around you. And, for many, you're going to be paying it for decades into the future, including getting Social Security checks garnished. That's not the America we want.

She didn't address the 'fairness' question, and Bash noted the package doesn't do anything about the cost of education. There are "a lot of problems in the whole system," she said, and this is one tool Biden had to help. She said the Dems "have put multiple plans on the table" to deal with the other issues, but the Rs won't get on board.

We'll close with Sununu, about whom there was some early talk of a presidential run; he's hoping to be re-elected as gov. Bash asked him how concerned he was about the Mar-a-Lago documents, including info related to 'human clandestine sources."  Sununu toed the party line, saying he's concerned about transparency.

...one thing I was very aggressive about was saying, look, if you're going to take unprecedented action and raid a former president's house, well, you better have a strategy for unprecedented transparency. So, I think we're all concerned about what might be in those documents, that some were classified, some weren't, what the serious nature was, but show us. You got to be able to show your cards when you're taking actions like this.

Bash said "you can't show all your cards when you're talking about top secret information," which is the point of the investigation. She asked if he was concerned about "the potential risk to American intelligence and national security."

I think we should -- we should absolutely be concerned. There's no question about that. But I don't know what to be concerned about. No one -- no one seems to. What's the subject matter? What's the dates? What's the times? What are we talking about here? Of course, you can't just open the whole investigation up.

He said he didn't want all the documents on the Internet, but "give us some sense " of what's in them and "what really drove us in there."

So, this is unprecedented. And they had to have an unprecedented strategy, which they clearly didn't have. They're on their heels. They don't know what to do. We just -- we want to see the information, so we can have this discussion, we can talk about the subject matter with some sense.

On the student loan program, here's the best part of his argument.

by the way, the debt is not going anywhere, right? Someone's got to pay it. And, in many instances, because there's no balanced budget, there's no sense of control on the $30 trillion in debt, here's the misery of it. Those individuals that think they're getting the $10,000 or $20,000 off their student loans, it's just getting effectively deferred into taxes down the road, higher taxes down the road, where they will have to pay interest on. This is a political shell game of money. 

 See you around campus.

In Case You Missed It (v104)

Another light week of posts, in an overwhelmingly heavy week of news, conspiracies and threats, primaries, and more. Here's your recap of what made it out of my head. 

I dropped Part Four of A Future Tale, the dream/nightmare series that I've been trying to get my arms around for a while now.  Pere are links to Parts One, Two, and Three, if you want to see why our narrator was trying to deal with an old revolving door - in an alley. 

I put my hand on the brass plate and gave a little push, to see if there was even a chance I could get out this way. At first, there was quite a bit of resistance. That wasn't surprising; who knows how long it's been since anyone else was in this alley? I gave another push, thinking how much this was like pushing the gate at the other end of the alley. When was that, anyway? How long have I been in here? I have no idea.

Finally, on the third push, it actually moved noticeably, if slowly, with a bit of a grinding noise, as if it needed to be oiled. Or, thinking back to when I was a child, maybe it just needed some kids to push and push and keep pushing, going round and round in their little cages within the door, like I did, chasing my older brothers... or, were they chasing me?

Thoughts of anything chasing me right now were unwelcomed, and I pushed those memories aside, focusing on the task at hand: getting this darn thing to move and, hopefully, finding a way out on the other side. I leaned in a bit, putting some oomph into it, and finally, the door moved, with purpose. 

I think I've almost figured the whole thing out - almost - and will have the Epilogue soon. 

For Sunday School, one of the classrooms I sat in on was Face the Nation, where Ed O'Keefe interviewed Rep. Mike Turner (R-OH) on the Mar-a-Lago stuff.  One of his questions? "What use could a former president have for classified or top-secret information once he's left office?" Turner was unsure. 

Well, I don't know. I mean, you would have to ask him. But certainly, we all know that every former president has access to their documents. It's how they write their memoirs...

Have any used Top Secret/SCI documents for that, I wonder? Turner seems to doubt the classification of what was found. He said the FBI said "they were identified as marked classified," and, he said, Trump said he declassified them. He thinks the important thing is the "abuse of discretion" on the part of the FBI.

...we have evidence of the FBI abusing that discretion, and of misconduct on behalf of the FBI...There are real questions as, what is the FBI doing here? ...the rank-and-file FBI agents, everybody agrees we support them. We have great faith in them. But the leadership of the FBI, when they undertake a raid against the current president's political rival, you have to ask these questions.

Turner's right: there are real questions here, but he and all the other Rs seem incapable of asking the most important ones: What the hell was Trump planning to do with all of this stuff? Why did he keep it, knowing as he since before he left the White House that the information is not his? And, my favorite, what would the Rs be doing if the person stashing this kind of stuff insecurely was a Democrat? 

In the State of the Union classroom, Jake Tapper talked with Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-TX) on all of this, and even gave Crenshaw some breathing room on 'skepticism' but pointed to law enforcement and asked if they weren't innocent until proven guilty.

Yes, again, people signing off on it doesn't mean it's -- it doesn't -- that it has precedent. It doesn't. This is a very unprecedented measure. And you know that when you're going after an ex-president who may run again, that this is -- this is automatically political. You can't -- you cannot separate the legal aspects of this from the political aspects of it. You can't. And it doesn't seem to me like they have acted responsibly as a result of that. And look, again, why not just ask him? Why not just ask him?

OK, the "why not just ask him?" is a barnful of Texas longhorn bull shit (two words on purpose) and either (a) Crenshaw hasn't read any of the news on this issue, (b) he's covering for Trump out of fear, or (c) he's an idiot.

Remember, everything is unprecedented until someone does it. In this case, how many ex-presidents who may run again have allegedly taken TS/SCI and other classified documents with them after losing an election, have lied to the government about it, have paid liars to lie to the government about it, have a record of cavalier handling of national security, including in the very place that was searched, and of destroying documents? 

The idiocy only increased as the week went on, but I turned to a different subject for Wondering on Wednesday, mostly because I couldn't take it any more. Much of the post was about primaries in New York, one of which garnered a lot of attention in the national media and tea leaf-reading parlors: the race to fill the seat of former Rep. Antonio Delgado, who resigned to become our Lt. Governor.  Democrat Pat Ryan

won the "bellwether" race, as multiple media outlets referred to it, campaigning on a woman's right to choose being a national issue, not a state issue, while Marc Molinaro, the Republican, ran on crime and inflation. How much does this matter in the overall scheme of things, I wonder? I'm not convinced it's indicative of anything, really...

It's funny how so many media outlets jumped on the Ryan win, and how many have been so keen on interviewing him since then. Another race got less national attention, but may have deserved more, I'm not sure. It's about the power of a huge Trump supporter, endorsing a horrid fellow New Yorker and a smarmy fellow New Yorker - and losing both races. 

I can't help wondering how Rep. Elise Stefanik, the number three RINO in the House is feeling today. (A RINO, in these pages, is a MAGA Republican). Stefanik strongly supported the deplorable Carl Paladino in the primary for NY's new 23rd district; Paladino lost to NYS GOP chair Nick Langworthy. Stefanik also strongly supported Steve Wells in the primary for NY's new 22nd district. Wells lost to Brandon Williams. 

House GOP Leader Kevin McCarthy might not have had a great morning, after the Paladino loss. It's been reported that McCarthy and Rep. Steve Scalise, his Number Two, weren't happy with Stefanik 'going rogue' with her endorsement. I wonder how today's leadership chat went?

The stuff that I didn't let out of my head? It was more Mar-a-Lago stuff, the RINOs reactions,  student loan forgiveness, the RINO (and the Dem) reactions, and stuff like that. There's already so much noise out there, I decided to hold back. We'll see how long that lasts...

See you later for Sunday School, if not sooner. 

Wondering on Wednesday 8/24/22

Ready... Set... Wonder!

Where do we start tonight's wondering? 

Right here in my neck of the woods - in the Empire State - where I find myself wondering why so many national political reporters are talking today about the Dems losing a prominent House member in New York, when there was literally no possible way that two Dems could survive a primary for the same district? The only question in this one was who would survive:  Rep. Carolyn Maloney, chair of the House Oversight Committee, or Rep. Jerry Nadler, chair of the House Judiciary Committee. Nadler won easily.

I read an article in a major national newspaper today about the Nadler/Maloney battle, and was not shocked to see many comments complaining about the redistricting process in NY. No one was complaining about efforts by the Dems to gerrymander five seats blue; rather, the complaints were that a judge didn't accept their efforts the way judges seem to accept the bad Republican maps. And I wonder, if you think gerrymandering is wrong, why are you mad when the courts agree with you? 

Another race in NY that's gotten a ridiculous amount of nation attention was the election to see who would fill the remaining months of former Rep. Antonio Delgado's term (he resigned to become our Lt. Governor). Pat Ryan won the "bellwether" race, as multiple media outlets referred to it, campaigning on a woman's right to choose being a national issue, not a state issue, while Marc Molinaro, the Republican, ran on crime and inflation. How much does this matter in the overall scheme of things, I wonder? I'm not convinced it's indicative of anything, really; NY's a pro-choice state; the 19th district's been blue since 2018; and Ryan will be on the ballot again in November, trying to win the seat in the new 18th district. If he wins that, it might mean something. Until then, I don't think so.

I can't help wondering how Rep. Elise Stefanik, the number three RINO in the House is feeling today. (A RINO, in these pages, is a MAGA Republican). Stefanik strongly supported the deplorable Carl Paladino in the primary for NY's new 23rd district; Paladino lost to NYS GOP chair Nick Langworthy. Stefanik also strongly supported Steve Wells in the primary for NY's new 22nd district. Wells lost to Brandon Williams. 

House GOP Leader Kevin McCarthy might not have had a great morning, after the Paladino loss. It's been reported that McCarthy and Rep. Steve Scalise, his Number Two, weren't happy with Stefanik 'going rogue' with her endorsement. I wonder how today's leadership chat went?

And then we've got President Biden's student loan forgiveness program, announced today. There's lots to dive into on that, and I've got a few bookmarked articles to digest tomorrow. I did wonder, though, at how hard the media worked to find Dem-leaning economists to chime in and say how bad an idea it was - and it wasn't even Larry Summers, the favorite DLE of all.

What's on your wondering minds?

Sunday School 8/21/22

We've got three Congressman in the classrooms today. 

Ed O'Keefe talked with Rep. Mike Turner (R-OH), the ranking member on the House Intelligence Committee, in the Face the Nation classroom. 

On the Mar-a-Lago search, Turner said releasing the affidavit would help explain how the FBI justified "raiding...and spending nine hours in the president's house," when they had other options they could have used. And, he said, "the American public want" the AG focused on things like "human and drug smuggling at the border... Chinese espionage, out-of- control crime in our cities."

He said his committee's concerned about "an allegation of classified documents," and that the DOJ should show them what they went to find, and what the "imminent national security threat" was. He's also concerned about the resources devoted to the search, "when we have real imminent national security threats, like Chinese espionage, the border, issues that -- things that are going on in Ukraine."

And when O'Keefe asked "what use could a former president have for classified or top-secret information once he's left office," Turner was unsure. 

Well, I don't know. I mean, you would have to ask him. But certainly, we all know that every former president has access to their documents. It's how they write their memoirs...

Have any used Top Secret/SCI documents for that, I wonder? Turner seems to doubt the classification of what was found. He said the FBI said "they were identified as marked classified," and, he said, Trump said he declassified them. He thinks the important thing is the "abuse of discretion" on the part of the FBI.

...we have evidence of the FBI abusing that discretion, and of misconduct on behalf of the FBI...There are real questions as, what is the FBI doing here? ...the rank-and-file FBI agents, everybody agrees we support them. We have great faith in them. But the leadership of the FBI, when they undertake a raid against the current president's political rival, you have to ask these questions.

We have "great faith" in the people, but we want to defund or even abolish the organization... And, when is the "real question" ever going to be," what is the former president doing?" Never, it would seem.

In the Meet the Press classroom, What's-his-name talked with Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney (D-NY), chair of the DCCC; he was asked if it was "fair to say now, there's no moral victory" for the Dems; either they keep the House, or they lose. Maloney agreed, but pointed to what he called "a summer of strength" and said the Ds are "going to buck history by making history." 

Look, we know that we need to get things done. That's the hard path that we've chosen. The other side has had a summer of stumbles, obstructing veterans' health care, ripping away 50 years of reproductive freedom, and now trying to defund the FBI and ignore a serious threat to our national security with Trump's latest scandal. We're going to address real problems. We think that's going to bring it home.

On the laughable question from What's-his-name, on whether the Ds "put party over country" by running ads talking about MAGA candidates, Maloney said "Absolutely not."

The moral imperative right now, Mr. Todd, is to keep the dangerous MAGA Republicans who voted to overturn our election out of power. There were 139 of them who voted against the results of the election back in January 2021...We believe that by running a commercial that called our opponent an extremist who was too conservative for Western Michigan, we teed up the choice in the fall.

Maloney was asked if "cynical moves like this" are why "everybody hates both political parties." He said his job "is to win elections for the Democrats and I take that seriously," again noting the importance of not letting McCarthy become speaker. There will always be "difficult moral questions, philosophical questions about tactics," he said. Indeed.

Finally, we've got Jake Tapper and Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-TX) in the State of the Union classroom. Tapper wondered if Crenshaw, a former Navy Seal, is bothered that there was apparently classified information at Mar-a-Lago?

Yes. Well, look, you know me, Jake, and I'm not wanting to withhold criticism, and even make my own side mad. I want to get to the truth...but I will be honest with you here. It -- this -- it's hard to justify what the Department of Justice did here, in my opinion. 

It's not a question that it's bad to have classified material in a non-SCIF environment, right? So, that's a non-secret, compartmentalized infrastructure there. That's wrong. But there's ways to mitigate that. There's ways to resolve that issue. 

Besides, Trump's "been cooperating with them on these issues for a while now, for months." That's why the Rs, even the ones who don't think much of Trump, he said, are coalescing on the issue of the unjustness of the government taking these steps. 

Tapper said skepticism is fine, but there was signoff by a judge, and he wondered if law enforcement isn't innocent until proven guilty. 

Yes, again, people signing off on it doesn't mean it's -- it doesn't -- that it has precedent. It doesn't. This is a very unprecedented measure. And you know that when you're going after an ex-president who may run again, that this is -- this is automatically political. You can't -- you cannot separate the legal aspects of this from the political aspects of it. You can't. And it doesn't seem to me like they have acted responsibly as a result of that. And look, again, why not just ask him? Why not just ask him?

Remember, everything is unprecedented until someone does it. In this case, how many ex-presidents who may run again have allegedly taken TS/SCI and other classified documents with them after losing an election, have lied to the government about it, have paid liars to lie to the government about it, have a record of cavalier handling of national security, including in the very place that was searched, and of destroying documents? 

That Trump is unprecedented doesn't give him a pass, especially since the Rs say this is all about accountability - just not for the guy who had his house searched. Maybe this is one of those "difficult moral questions, philosophical questions" mentioned in the Maloney interview.

I do agree that Marjorie Taylor Greene and AOC "can go join the defund law enforcement club if they want."

See you around campus.

A Future Tale (Part Four)

In Part One of our Future Tale, our narrator took a walk in the city where she's lived for decades. 

She entered an alley in Part Two - a very strange alley, which we experienced with her in vivid detail. 

And in Part Three, she faced a decision on how to get out of it: step into a ridiculously out-of-place revolving door, or go back, through the terrorizing part of the alley, to the gate where she entered.  Here's where we left her.

The thought of stepping into the hug of that door was paralyzing.

I stood there for what seemed like an eternity; in reality, it was probably only a minute or two, as I considered my options. I had only two choices, I realized: try the door, or go back the way I came. Slowly, I turned my body slightly to the right, and took the measure of the alley.

Where there had been the giant screen, I saw nothing. Where I had seen all those dimly lit, frightening doorways, I saw only solid walls. I could barely make out the gate at the end of the alley, still shrouded in the confusing mid-day darkness.

I turned back to the left, towards the revolving door, and to the right again, in the direction of the gate, where this all started. I turned both directions again, and a third time, before making my decision.

Choking back my fear, I started walking.

Which way did she go? Let's find out. 

Towards the revolving door I went, with more than a little bit of trepidation. 

That was really the only choice... I mean, what sense would it make to go backwards? As I asked myself that question, the answers were numerous: I know what I'll find there; I've been there, done that, and so I know exactly what to do; they know me there, and I know them, so it'll be easier; the future is a scary place, especially right now, so why put myself through that? Why not go back the same way I came?

At the same time, I didn't want to go back through that alley, that very strange alley, with all the time-shifting, am-I-looking-ahead or am-I-looking back stuff that was, truly, frightening. There must be a better way, I thought, and that meant tackling whatever was waiting for me in the revolving door. 

I put my hand on the brass plate and gave a little push, to see if there was even a chance I could get out this way. At first, there was quite a bit of resistance. That wasn't surprising; who knows how long it's been since anyone else was in this alley? I gave another push, thinking how much this was like pushing the gate at the other end of the alley. When was that, anyway? How long have I been in here? I have no idea.

Finally, on the third push, it actually moved noticeably, if slowly, with a bit of a grinding noise, as if it needed to be oiled. Or, thinking back to when I was a child, maybe it just needed some kids to push and push and keep pushing, going round and round in their little cages within the door, like I did, chasing my older brothers... or, were they chasing me?

Thoughts of anything chasing me right now were unwelcomed, and I pushed those memories aside, focusing on the task at hand: getting this darn thing to move and, hopefully, finding a way out on the other side. I leaned in a bit, putting some oomph into it, and finally, the door moved, with purpose. 

I kept up steady pressure on the door, and then I was fully inside it, and that made me stop for a brief second. I stood, holding my breath, feeling my heart start to beat a little faster. And then, throwing caution to the wind, I pushed, hard, once more, and around I went. I couldn't tell if there was a door on the back side for me to duck through; I was moving quickly now, surprisingly fast given the outward appearance of the door. 

I started pushing again, walking and pushing, pushing and walking, thinking this has to be the biggest revolving door ever. It seemed to take forever to make it to the front, where I entered, and then to move around to where I expected an exit to be. I went fully around a second time; I'm not really sure why. On the third trip around, I slowed enough to spot an opening, right where it should have been, if this was a normal revolving door. I took a deep breath, and jumped into the darkness.

I landed, awkwardly, barely managing to stay on my feet, and waited for my senses to adjust. What did I hear? What could I see? What did it feel like, wherever I was now? As before, it seemed like an eternity for me to get my bearings. And when I did, I realized I wasn't in a room, I was outside still. 

I felt a breeze, the kind the wind makes, not the breeze from a fan or air conditioning. I could hear traffic - cars, and trucks, and the funny noise made by buses that run on natural gas, and the obnoxious sound of a motorcycle, racing almost above my head. That made me duck, and I laughed at how silly I must have looked, had anyone been there to see me.

As my eyes adjusted, I could see broken glass, fast food trash, empty cans, and a very tall wall to my right. Was I actually back in the alley again? I couldn't be!

I looked up the wall, and higher, seeing the huge beams and girders above. I put my hand  on the wall, feeling the vibrations that told me I was underneath the elevated highway that bisects my city, in one of the 'cheap-monthly-rate' parking lots, cheaper by their distance from the city center. I slowly moved towards the light I could see to my left, and eventually made it out from underneath the interstate and into the fading daylight. 

Left was west, and as I looked far down the street, I could see the setting sun off in the distance, and make out the streetlights, the traffic lights, familiar buildings, and people on the sidewalk. 

I headed in that direction, towards the place I started my walk, however long ago.

In Case You Missed It (v103)

I'll be honest, gang - I wasn't much into writing last week. 

Was it the barrage of news from Trumpworld? The never-ending proclamations of obsequious devotion to Trump from frightened pols on the right? The attempts at a graceful retreat from supporting him by the pundits who have shamelessly promoted him for the past seven years? Was it the weather? I don't know... 

Here's your recap of the two posts I squeezed out of my head.

For your Sunday School, I offered up dueling senators Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) and Mike Rounds (R-SD), who were in the MTP classroom with Andrea Mitchell. We'll start with Klobuchar, who described the process for viewing documents labeled SCI, which stands for sensitive compartmented information.

...special room, no staff, no phone, not even a Fitbit, both because of the information in them, and because we don't want them to fall into enemy hands, in any way. And, she noted, that's why they shouldn't be removed from secure spots.

And Mar-a-Lago, where you can check out croquet sets and tennis rackets and golf clubs, that's not one of them.

Later in the interview, she talked about the former president's supporters, including elected officials.

...This is the kind of thing that result(s) when you've got a president that attacks law enforcement and attacks the law. I thought in the old days the Republican Party used to stand with law enforcement. And I hope some of them do today because this kind of rhetoric is very dangerous to our country... These are career men and women that are simply doing their job... this is beyond politics. 

Rounds, for his part, did what the good RINOs do: he questioned the move to search the former president's home, and doubted AG Merrick Garland's statement that they exhausted all other options. 

... you know, this is a very historic attempt and a challenge really in, with regard to looking at a former president, and whether or not they want to bring any kind of charges against him. This is a change, and this is something that will go down in history, and it will be studied for years to come. 

I hope Rounds understands that not only will the search of Mar-a-Lago be studied for years to come, but so will the fealty of politicians like him, the elected officials that sold their souls (and assorted other body parts) to a man singularly undeserving of their devotion. 

Another official RINO attack? (And yes, here at veritable pastiche, the RINOs are the Trumpers), there was the whole gamut of 'concern,' and of 'trust' that they themselves have been shattering in defense of the Orange Menace. For example,

...there's concern out there. And believe me, Republicans out there are questioning, "Why in the world are you going after a former president right now, but you didn't go after other individuals who clearly had classified documents or information that was sensitive and you did not do that in the previous administration?"

Here's the thing about that part: folks on the Right (and others, to be sure) screamed from the rooftops that Hillary Clinton got a pass from the FBI and the DOJ. But the FBI is led by a Trump appointee, and there's a new AG, and they're doing exactly what everyone said should have been done last time out. But now, of course, it's somehow wrong to do the right thing? 

Yeah, we'll be studying this stuff for years...

My other post was what a post-search Trump fundraising letter would have looked like. The letter, Let's Fight This - TOGETHER!  led us down the twisted, tangled mess of excuses we've heard from the horse's mouth. And, of course, he attacked everyone close to him. Well, almost everyone close to him...

Those worthless sons of mine were probably out golfing or something, or maybe Donny Jr was home waiting for what's her name, the "The Best is Yet To Come!" girl I paid $60,000 to for introducing Don Jr. to the crowd at the Ellipse on January 6th - what a waste of money she is! And how on earth was she married to that incompetent commie nutjob in California, Gavin Newsom? And now she's my son's fiancé? What did I do to deserve this?

And my beloved Ivanka was home with those Beautiful grandchildren of mine, aren't they Beautiful? They are the most beautiful grandchildren a man could have, right? Just Beautiful, through and through.

And toilets. Don't forget the toilets. 

And then, when they reached out to me last year, I had no idea there was anything being stored at my beloved Mar-a-Lago that I wasn't supposed to have. I thought I had taken care of most of the stuff anyone would worry about; that was ripped up and disposed of at the White House. 

And what about that Crooked Hillary flunky, Maggie Haberman, the third-rate NY Times reporter - half the kid her parents were, for sure, sharing those pictures... who takes pictures of other peoples' toilets?

And remember when I complained about having to flush and flush and flush? Yeah, well now you understand right? Damn 'green' toilets. You gotta flush and flush and flush them, it's a mess. Horrible.

There was more, of course - lots more - in the fake mother of all fundraising letters. The sad part is, the real letters will include much of what I had in the fake one - maybe not the part about the kids and the toilets. The worst part? The real letters will be damned effective - he'll take in a few nother million bucks from the faithful, for sure, like all good cult leaders do.

So - you're all caught up with last week; we'll see what this week brings. 

Let's Fight This - TOGETHER!

A Special Message from

the Twice-Impeached 

45th President of the 

United States

They've got it all wrong, the Lame Stream Media, the liars on CNN and MSDNC and the failing New York Times and the Bezos Washington Post and all the rest... they've got it All Wrong. 

Let me give you the Truth about what's happening here. 

First of all, I didn't lose the election. 

I didn't lose the election, so there was no reason for me to pack anything, so I didn't pack anything, because I won and wasn't going to be leaving. And I'd still be your President, Right Now, and there wouldn't have been a problem if only Georgia had found those 11,780 votes like I asked them to, and like Lindsey asked them to, and like Rudy asked them to, and like everyone else asked them to. 

Or Arizona, too, if they had done the right thing. Or Michigan, or Nevada, or  Pennsylvania, or Wisconsin. So if they had just done the right thing, none of this would be happening right now, and all my documents would be safe and the Country would be safe, our Borders and our Stock Market and our Taxes - everything would be safe, if they had just done the right thing. 

But they didn't and when that wimp, that un-American, un-Patriotic traitor Mike Pence refused to do the right thing and send it back to the states like he was supposed to, I was stuck. I swear, my Secret Service guys should have just grabbed him and stuffed him in the SUV. Worthless. 

Anyway, Melania was so frazzled that we were leaving - she had more decorating to do, and stuff to document just like she was doing on January 6th and didn't know anything about what was happening, she really didn't - she was upset, she loved it here - she just started throwing stuff in Tupperware bowls and tubs and stuff, even the jewelry I gave her, the ungrateful wench. 

And there I was, alone. Jared was, I don't know, showering all day long or counting his Saudi money with his crook of a father - why did I pardon him again? 

Those worthless sons of mine were probably out golfing or something, or maybe Donny Jr was home waiting for what's her name, the "The Best is Yet To Come!" girl I paid $60,000 to for introducing Don Jr. to the crowd at the Ellipse on January 6th - what a waste of money she is! And how on earth was she married to that incompetent commie nutjob in California, Gavin Newsom? And now she's my son's fiancé? What did I do to deserve this?

And my beloved Ivanka was home with those Beautiful grandchildren of mine, aren't they Beautiful? They are the most beautiful grandchildren a man could have, right? Just Beautiful, through and through.

So the staff people, the ones that I hadn't scared off,  the staff came running up to the residence with boxes every day, packing, packing, boxing up everything they could get their hands on, I don't even know what they put in all the boxes, the stuff was just thrown in, all willy-nilly, and then the boxes were stuffed in the truck and off everything went to my Beautiful, Historic, Important Mar-a-Lago, the most Famous house in all the world.

I barely managed to get my hands on the compromising photo books, and my pictures of Vlad - it was crazy.

And then, when they reached out to me last year, I had no idea there was anything being stored at my beloved Mar-a-Lago that I wasn't supposed to have. I thought I had taken care of most of the stuff anyone would worry about; that was ripped up and disposed of at the White House. 

And what about that Crooked Hillary flunky, Maggie Haberman, the third-rate NY Times reporter - half the kid her parents were, for sure, sharing those pictures... who takes pictures of other peoples' toilets?

And remember when I complained about having to flush and flush and flush? Yeah, well now you understand right? Damn 'green' toilets. You gotta flush and flush and flush them, it's a mess. Horrible.

And in January when I gave them boxes, they were boxes I had never even seen before, maybe someone found them in the back of Melania's closet, that's why I didn't know anything about them. And so, they took the boxes and I thought that was it. They even got back that meteorological map of Dorian - just like I told you, Alabama was in danger the whole time! 

And then they said other stuff was missing.

And so I let the lawyers handle everything, and they all said we gave everything back, and that's what they told them, so I just assumed that there was nothing left. They even signed something, saying they had given everything back, I didn't even know we had anything, I didn't pack anything.

And then we heard from them again - good lord, don't these people have anything do to other than pester me about boxes of stuff I know nothing about? Why aren't they trying to put Crooked Hillary in jail? Why the hell aren't they publishing all the stuff off Hunter's laptop, all the Biden Crime Family stuff, instead of trying to pretend there's a Trump Crime Family? What a lie! Everything I have, I've earned the hard way, ever since I was a kid. Even my bone spurs, hard-fought battle but I got them.

'Put a new lock on the door', they said - 'it's not secure enough,' they said. So we did, and even that wasn't good enough, they wanted the camera footage and they sent a subpoena, and still we were cooperating with them, just like from the beginning when the White House Staff filled the boxes and put them in the truck and then they came and picked stuff up. 

Just like I've said all along, if they wanted the boxes back, I would have given them back, but they never asked. And once they sent the subpoena, why should I give them back the boxes? Just because they sent me a subpoena? 

I've gotten hundreds of subpoenas in my life, and I never just do what they ask me to, that's ridiculous, especially when Trump is under attack, all the time, my entire life. I've been sued more times than anyone in history! My legal files are the biggest you've never seen! They're massive, way bigger than Obama's! I can show you - mine are bigger, no question about it.

And it doesn't matter anyway, because I declassified everything - every single piece of paper, photo, post-it note, article, white paper, briefing book, eyes only piece of paper they shoved under my nose - I declassified it ALL - all at the same time. They must know that, everyone knows that - I can do it, and I did it, and all of this is stupid. Nothing is classified anymore, I declassified all of it, I stood right there over the boxes. 

Oh, wait that's not how I did it, I had no idea what was in the boxes, the staff took care of that. But I declassified everything, everything in the residence was declassified, even if it wasn't classified in the first place. 

And even if I didn't, it doesn't matter, because all of this is old stuff now, since they kicked me out of my White House in January 2021, that bastard Mike Pence, we should have hung him, just like I said. So how can something a year-and-a-half old be a threat to Our Great Country? 

Well, it was Great once, now it's a Third World Country with the libs and Sleepy Joe and Carmella and Drunk Nancy and Cryin' Chuck and the Radical Left Squad and the Woke Mob in charge - what a Mess they have made of our Beautiful Country, right? Antifa and BLM and all the rest...

And now that we've got this NEW Witch Hunt, after the Fake Russia Russia Russia and Impeachment#1 and Impeachment #2 and Mueller's Fake Witch Hunt, now we've got another one to deal with and I tell you, real Americans are just not going to stand for this anymore! We must FIGHT to get Our Great Country back again. And that's exactly what I'm going to do.

Because these documents that I never took and didn't know I had and they could have had back at any time just by asking for them and they're not top secret any longer because it's old stuff on old paper, and besides, I declassified EVERYTHING, and this RAID on my Beautiful Home, the most Beautiful, Famous home in the world, ask anyone, this Raid and this Unlawful Search - they touched Melania's clothes, can you believe that? I think one of them even put on her I Don't Care Do U? jacket, we saw that on the camera, I'm sure we did.

These are just the tip of the iceberg that's going to hit Our Country if we don't stop the woke mob, the lazy liberals who are trying to turn us into a Fourth World Country and if there weren't any of those last week, we're the first and best Country ever to become one. And don't believe any of that Climate Change crap; if it was so warm, why do we still have icebergs? And that iceberg aiming for America right now? 

Civil war, I tell you. Some people are saying we're on the verge of a civil war.

I even called Merrick Garland - and have you ever heard anyone so wimpy? His mother Judy, boy could she sing, right? He sounds like a little kid up there, trying to convince his parents he wasn't out drinking with what's her name, that Renate person... oh wait, that's a different judge, never mind. 

Anyway, Garland, I called him, asked him what I could do to calm things down after HE raided MY house, SEIZED my documents that I never had and even if I did have them, it doesn't matter because there's nothing wrong with it, and besides, I declassified everything back in January before I left Washington so I wouldn't have to be there for the Fake Inauguration of the Fake President. 

Here I am, trying to help, and what do I get? NOTHING! Merrick Garland, he didn't even take my call. We get nothing, Patriots - you and I, we get nothing. But that's all going to change. 

With your help, and your prayers, and your donations, we will Fight this Together! We Love You. You are all Beautiful, Special people. Stand back and stand by, and if you do that near an FBI office, that's even better. 

We Love You. 

And we will fight this together.

Rush your Generous Donation to the

Protect Melania's Wardrobe and Keep The "Justice" Department 

and the Liars at the FBI from Ruining Our Great Country PAC

right away (you can just ignore the highlighted box

making this a daily contribution - that's just a joke). 

We love you. And together We. Will. Save. America.

And if you donate within the next 45 minutes, we'll make sure

the President sees your name at the top of the list of America-loving Patriots.

And if yours is the lucky name he circles with his Presidential Sharpie,

you could win tickets to his next rally. 

And remember to vote against

Liz Cheney. Even if you don't live in Wyoming. 

Thank you for your support. 

You're a helluva Patriot.

Sunday School 8/14/22

I'm picking and choosing my guests today, starting with Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) and Sen. Mike Rounds (R-SD) who talked with Andrea Mitchell in the Meet the Press classroom. Here's a recap of their conversations related to the FBI's Mar-a-Lago search.

Klobuchar said her first reaction to what occurred is "to stand with the men and women of the FBI who are simply doing their jobs," and cautioned even though we know many of the documents recovered were marked some level of classified, we don't know what's in them. She also described the process for senators to view this type of document: special room, no staff, no phone, not even a Fitbit, both because of the information in them, and because we don't want them to fall into enemy hands, in any way. And, she noted, that why they shouldn't be removed from secure spots

And Mar-a-Lago, where you can check out croquet sets and tennis rackets and golf clubs, that's not one of them.

Mitchell asked if maybe there was a different way to get the documents, and Klobuchar reminded her what AG Merrick Garland ("someone of just utmost credibility and integrity") that negotiating hadn't worked. 

But what really happened here was a judge looked at this and said, "Yeah, there's evidence, enough evidence to warrant a search warrant to go in there and retrieve those documents that are of high national security classification." These are the nation's secrets.

She wouldn't play the "should Trump be indicted?" game, other than to say that, in America, "the law is king. The president isn't king. And I would add to that, the former president isn't king. Everyone has to follow the laws." 

And finally, she didn't mince words on the rhetoric from Trump supporters, including elected officials.

...This is the kind of thing that result(s) when you've got a president that attacks law enforcement and attacks the law. I thought in the old days the Republican Party used to stand with law enforcement. And I hope some of them do today because this kind of rhetoric is very dangerous to our country... These are career men and women that are simply doing their job... this is beyond politics. 

Switching to Rounds who, according to Mitchell, "earlier this week" said the search "must be justified" and that he "had serious questions about the integrity of the Justice Department," she wondered if his questions have been answered, given what was found and why they went in. 

Uh, that's a no. He says there's more information to be released; certainly, releasing the affidavit used to get the signed search warrant would help.

At least that would confirm that there was justification for this raid. But remember, this is also a case of where we're going to have more questions as they continue to develop, as they look through the information, the material that they've garnered at Mar-a-Lago. Perhaps they will share some of what their concern was...

He seems to think the AG is not believable when he said they exhausted all other options, saying

... you know, this is a very historic attempt and a challenge really in, with regard to looking at a former president, and whether or not they want to bring any kind of charges against him. This is a change, and this is something that will go down in history, and it will be studied for years to come. 

After sharing pointed, partisan comments from three fellow GOP senators (Graham, Paul, and Tim Scott), Mitchell wondered if what was found justified the search, after "months and months" of trying to get cooperation. Again, Rounds said DOJ needs to prove they did everything they could - but also, he noted, there's "one constitutional issue that has not been talked about" - whether a "president can declassify or classify certain items."

And I think constitutionally back, I believe it was in 1988, there was a Supreme Court decision, U.S. Navy v. Egan, in which they actually talked about whether or not a president could classify and declassify. And it's never really been litigated. But it appears that a president can classify or perhaps declassify information. And if that's the case, then the question would be, and I think it will be litigated as this moves forward, whether or not that was completed while the president was in the White House at that time.

And, of course,  

...there's concern out there. And believe me, Republicans out there are questioning, "Why in the world are you going after a former president right now, but you didn't go after other individuals who clearly had classified documents or information that was sensitive and you did not do that in the previous administrations?"

Again, he raised the trust issue, saying if they (DOJ/Garland) can come forward and put all their cards on the table (even though this is an ongoing investigation), they should, and fast.

...they should do that as quickly as they can, and they should share that with the American people because this is a time in which -- with regard to the institutions in this country -- we want the American people to have faith in their institutions. We want them to see that they're not, that they're not political, and that they're not being politicized, particularly during an election year.

Of course, in the meantime, his fellow Republicans, and the former president himself, will continue sowing thousands of pounds of seeds of distrust with the American people in an election year, because they really don't want us having faith in our institutions. They've shown that, repeatedly, in the past seven years.

I trust I'll see you around campus. 

In Case You Missed It (v102)

A short week in terms of posts, with just your four weekly features making it out of my head.

For Sunday School, I visited What's his name in the MTP classroom, where he interviewed Stacey Abrams, the Dem's choice for governor of Georgia. One of the topics? Abortion. Abrams described her well-reasoned position, including that 

you don't apply "arbitrary gestational limits."  It's a medical decision, she said.

And when we give it back to doctors, when we tell women and their doctors to make these choices, what we are saying is we respect the responsibility that women have and the obligation that doctors have...we should not be setting into law these moving targets that do not reflect the reality that women face when they're sitting in that doctor's office.

Later, what's his name asked if she was willing to compromise with a Republican legislature. Sadly, that insulting question is relevant, given so many progressives can  seem to be unwilling to take a win. 

As someone who served in the legislature for 11 years and was lauded by both parties for my ability to navigate, I will certainly get the best law we can. But we begin making decisions based on what it should be. And then yes, of course, you work towards what you can get. But we have to start with a governor who actually believes that a woman should have the right to control her body and to control her economic freedom.

Also in the classroom? Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-DE), talking foreign policy.

For your Extra Credit, I broke with my new tradition of sticking with one classroom, and strolled down to CNN's State of the Union to hear from Sens. Blumenthal and Graham, in a part sharply partisan/part bipartisan interview. The bipartisan part was on foreign policy, the partisan part was on the Inflation Reduction Act. 

Here's how it went on the new hiring at the IRS, which is being grossly distorted by the Rs, and poorly messaged by the Ds. Shocking, I know. Here's Graham:

 ...Hiring 86,000 more IRS agents, if that makes you feel better, you have missed a lot. They're coming after waitresses, Uber drivers and everybody else to collect more taxes. So, if you think growing the IRS is good for you, you're wrong.

Blumenthal thinks that's just silly. Uber drivers and "everybody else" is going to be OK, because the IRS will be targeting the "highest-income Americans." 

The idea that there's going to be this army of IRS agents defending -- descending on the average American is just preposterous. Tax fairness is what we need. And for the biggest corporations in this country to pay no taxes, for them to do stock buybacks that benefit the shareholders, but, for example, in the case of oil companies, they are making three to four times what they did just last year. What are they doing with those excess windfall profits? Lowering gasoline prices? No. They aren't doing stock buybacks. They ought to pay a tax on it. 

And I think there ought to be rebates to consumers from those excess profits.

What he said was fine; what he didn't say was a massive opportunity missed. I'll have more on that later.

What a week to be Wondering on Wednesday, right? I focused on the week's hot topic, the execution of a search warrant at Mar-a-Lago. Here's a bit of that.

I also can't help wondering if the same person who wrote Trump's American Carnage Inaugural address also wrote his Third-World Country statement about the FBI search?

And I wonder, does Trump remember back in 2018, when signed a law strengthening the penalties for mishandling documents from one year to five years? We know he was hoping it would apply to Hillary Clinton, but now, it might apply to him. 

And, for your TGIF, I shared the unsealed documents related to the search, and the particular statutes under the US Code that were referenced in them.

18 U.S. Code Chapter 37 - ESPIONAGE AND CENSORSHIP § 793 - Gathering, transmitting or losing defense information

18 U.S. Code Chapter 101 - RECORDS AND REPORTS § 2071 - Concealment, removal, or mutilation generally

18 U.S. Code Chapter 73 - OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE § 1519 - Destruction, alteration, or falsification of records in Federal investigations and bankruptcy

Was it a good week for anyone, really? 

See you back here later for Sunday School, and more.