Wondering on Wednesday 4/17/24

 

Ready... Set... Wonder!

So far, seven jurors have been seated in former president Donald Trump's election interference trial. 

Trump loves that the media keeps referring to it as a 'hush money' trial instead of an election interference trial, because we all know he's against election interference. And if people thought that's what he was on trial for, they might not want to buy his Bible or something. 

I wonder, though - and not for the first time - why the media constantly plays right into his hands by dumbing everything down and going for clicks. There must be some unwritten rule they follow - and it's all of them, all the time. It does a massive disservice to us, and to their profession. 

Trump loves to attack everyone who opposes him, on everything, and his MAGA Campers fall in line with him on that. Everyone's fair game on the interwebs, especially Stormy Daniels, who was paid to keep quiet about her relationship with Trump. 

I don't think they expected her to fight back, but she does. One of his supporters posted, "Stormy Daniels is a parasite that would sell anything for a dollar," to which she replied, "Not true. I wouldn't sell Bibles."  I'm not really wondering much about this; rather, I'm enjoying picturing a 400-pound guy, wearing golden Trump sneakers and full MAGA regalia, sitting on his bed sulking because a stripper got the best of him.

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Speaking of trials, the House GOP finally figured out how to get to the Senate chambers, and the eleven managers strolled across the hall with the Articles of Impeachment against DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, kicking off the impeachment process in the Senate. 

So far, they've voted on having a floor debate on why a trial is needed (defeated); a motion to debate the articles in closed session (defeated); amendments to move to closed session (defeated), and to adjourn (defeated); a motion to block a motion to kill the first article (defeated); a vote to kill the first Article (passed); another motion to go to closed session (defeated); and a motion to adjourn (defeated). 

One of the motions to adjourn, made by Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA), requested adjournment until "May 1, 2004," which brought a bit of levity to the floor. Kennedy corrected the year to 2024 while allowing that the earlier date was "probably preferable."

After that motion was defeated, another one was put up that would have the Senate adjourn until November 6th - the day after election day. I wonder if anyone will be able to top the stupidity of that.

I think it's safe to say the GOP's effort to 'get Biden' by impeaching one of his Cabinet secretaries is not going to succeed, not that I wondered for a moment that it would. 

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Remember when Republicans were all up in arms about states potentially keeping Trump off the ballot? Here's a reminder, featuring New Hampshire Republican Party chairman Chris Ager:

Whatever happened to letting the people decide? Let’s let the people decide, and let’s have a free, fair, open donnybrook of an election, and whoever wins, let’s rally behind them and move the country forward. 

Well, the Ohio GOP seems pretty comfortable with ballot-blocking now. Candidates need to be certified by August 7th. Because the Democratic National Convention isn't until August 19th, the Democrats offered to provisionally certify the Biden/Harris ticket, noting that it had already secured the votes to win the nomination. They used the same argument as the GOP did.

If President Biden and Vice President Harris are not listed on the ballot as the Democratic Party candidates, their supporters in Ohio will be stripped of the opportunity to associate with their preferred candidate.

There's no option for provisional certification, according to the state's Attorney General; the best hope is for legislative action by May 9th, allowing an exemption to the deadline. There's precedent for this - it just happened in 2020, when both parties had late conventions, and the legislature did the right thing. But this is 2024, and the times are very different.

I think it's a Democratic problem, Senate President Matt Huffman, R-Lima, told reporters last week. There should have to be a Democratic solution. That hasn't been proposed to me.

Is it any wonder so many people think our elected officials are hypocritical jerks? 

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Speaking of hypocrites, let's look at Arkansas Sen. Tom Cotton, who seems to have issues with protestors, or at least, with protestors who block traffic while calling for a cease-fire in Gaza. If they were on a bridge in his state, he suggested that civilians should take matters into their own hands and toss them over the side.

He doesn't seem to have the same feelings about the January 6th protestors, though. Cotton was part of a group of GOP Congressmen that filed a brief asking the Supreme Court to throw out the obstruction charge brought against many of those protestors, suggesting that it was too harsh. The charge can result in a 20-year sentence, rather than a kinder, gentler one that would result in a sentence of a year or so, "that is frequently used against most protesters who disrupt Congress."

I can't help wondering how many of those "most protestors" did the same thing as the J6 gang did? How many others have assaulted police officers on their way to 'disrupt Congress,' other than the J6 gang? And I wonder how many other protestors wore body armor and brought bear spray, zip ties, and other assorted goodies in their protest kits? 

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Come with me to Arizona, where Gov. Katie Hobbs vetoed the so-called "Ten Commandments" bill, which would have allowed teachers and administrators to display and read the Ten Commandments in school buildings. Hobbs said she had concerns about the constitutionality of, and the need for, the bill.

Enter Sen. Anthony Kern (R-MAGA Hypocrite), who said

I'm appalled the state's top elected official is abandoning God and the very foundation our country was built upon by not allowing teachers to expose their students to the morals and ethics outlined in the Ten Commandments... When children are exposed to good, noble, honest, and righteous ideas, they are more prone to being better human beings with sound character, able to navigate life's problems with grace, and have a greater chance of treating each other with respect and dignity throughout life.

Kern was present at the January 6th riot, and "his own social media posts strongly suggest" he "actively encouraged the mob, both before and after the attack..."  He was a fake Trump elector, and he tried to get the state's official slate of electors overturned.

I have to wonder whether he wasn't exposed to "good, noble, honest, and righteous ideas," or if he just failed to learn from them.

What's on your wondering mind tonight? 

Wondering on Wednesday 4/3/24

Ready... Set... Wonder!

I saw an article in The Week about 'passive investing' - using index funds to do the work for you, or for your 401(k). The Week, if you aren't familiar with it, presents news items with multiple viewpoints from different media outlets. Here's a bit of the piece on index funds, with my emphasis added.

A market doesn’t work if everyone just “sits back and watches their money grow,” said Katie Martin in the Financial Times. It sounds “a little snobbish” to rail against passive investing, “which has unlocked wealth for millions of people who otherwise might not be active in financial markets at all.” But several recent studies have found that indexed stocks have begun to “show lower sensitivity” even to major economic shocks than their non-indexed counterparts. That turns investing from a process of “seeking out, rewarding, and profiting from successful companies” to a “circular bet” on more money flowing into the market.

The article came out before Trump Media and Technology Group (DJT on the Nasdaq)  went public with a value of some $8B, even though the company has ridiculously poor financial performance.

Is this the kind of company you'd 'seek out and reward,' I wonder?

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Perhaps as many as half a million folks in California got a raise this week, as the minimum wage for most fast-food workers - and only those workers - increased from $16/hour to $20/hour. The raise stems from a bill signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom last fall, and comes a few weeks after workers formed the California Fast Food Workers Union.

Generally, I'm not a fan of politicians singling out a category of workers and changing their minimum wage without adjusting the minimum wages for other low-paid workers, but I don't wonder why politicians do it.

What I do wonder is why so many people think it's OK for the government to make a random distinction between a fast-food worker and a day-care worker, a home health aide, or a janitorial staffer. And I wonder why, when the politicians do this for some but not for all, people are so comfortable telling the other workers to 'just go ask for a raise,' or 'organize and fight for themselves.'

And, of course, I wonder how the pols come up with the convoluted rules they apply. This law applies to "restaurants offering limited or no table service and which are part of a national chain with at least 60 establishments nationwide. Restaurants operating inside a grocery establishment are exempt, as are restaurants producing and selling bread as a stand-alone menu item."  

A shoutout to anyone who can make this make sense. I sure can't.

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This one has me scratching my head with wonder. I was not aware that there's a thing out in the Interwebs asking, "Who actually eats at Arby's?" And, until this morning when I saw this article that Arby's is going to give "skeptics" four free sandwiches this month, to try and convince them how good the food is. According to the company's Chief Marketing Officer, the chain is "putting our money where our mouth is," and that April is

the perfect opportunity for any skeptics out there to try any of the sandwiches they've been eyeing.

There's just one catch: the 'skeptics' who have been "eyeing" the sandwiches have to be enrolled in the company's rewards program to get the free sandwiches. Call me skeptical, but I wonder how many of the free sammies are going to go to existing rewards members, not to new customers?

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It seems 'the right' found itself in a bit of a snit over Easter Sunday. It seems that 'the left' has attacked Easter with the same zeal as it fights the war on Christmas. First, President Biden dared recognize the annual Transgender Day of Visibility, celebrated annually on March 31st. That's a bad thing, it would appear, when Easter also falls on March 31st - at least according to House Speaker Mike Johnson and the other usual suspects. But that's only half of the problem. 

The other issue? A ban on religious Easter eggs at the Biden White House. I kid you not.

...guidelines for the contest in which kids submit decorated eggs for a White House display specify that the art "must not include any questionable content, religious symbols, overtly religious themes, or partisan political statements. 

There's only one problem: the guidelines don't belong to 'the left' and they don't come from the Bidens. They come from the American Egg Board, which has had the same rules since the 70s. And that means former president Donald Trump attacked Easter using one of the exact same weapons as President Biden used.

So, what am I wondering here? With all the effort 'the right' puts into manufacturing wars by 'the left' against Christian holidays, I wonder why they don't put even one iota of effort into attacking the very un-Christian, unreligious, unpleasant, unpatriotic Easter 'truth' posted by their fearless leader. 

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Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry (R-MAGA) is unhappy that LSU's women's basketball team wasn't on the floor for the playing of our country's National Anthem (not to be confused with "America's most recognized patriotic anthem," Lee Greenwood's God Bless the USA) at their Elite Eight appearance in Albany on Sunday. 

So unhappy, in fact, that he wants the state's Board of Regents to create a policy requiring student-athletes "be present for the National Anthem or lose their scholarships." He even managed to bring his mother into the mix with his tweet on the subject, which said, in part,

My mother coached women's high school basketball during the height of desegregation, no one has a greater respect for the sport and for Coach Mulkey. However, above respect for the game is a deeper respect for those that serve to protect us and unite us under one flag !

Landry apparently doesn't know that college athletes in his state, and others, typically aren't on the court or field for the anthem, which is played several minutes before the game starts. And he apparently doesn't know that they haven't been, for many years. And he apparently doesn't know that the Regents have nothing to do with scholarships. 

It kind of makes me wonder whether he gave this whole thing any thought at all, or if he just shoots from the lip like the guy who endorsed him for governor.

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Oh - in case you're wondering, here's the current status of the GoFundMe to raise money to help the former president pay his judgments. I'll continue to report on this each week, but for now, it looks like it's gonna take a while.

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What's on your wondering mind tonight?

Sunday School 3/31/24: Extra Credit

For your Extra Credit this week, I've opted to highlight a conversation with two religious leaders from Washington, DC: Wilton Cardinal Gregory, the Catholic Archbishop, and the Right Reverand Marianna Budde, the Episcopal Bishop. They spoke with Ed O'Keefe last Thursday, and the interview was shared in the Face the Nation classroom. Here are some excerpts from their conversation.

O'Keefe talked about presidential candidates Donald Trump and Joe Biden, and compared how they 'invoke Christianity."

I know this gets a little tricky. But we have one who is now selling Bibles that also have copies of the Constitution and a Bill of Rights in them. But the other is the second Catholic president, who goes to church every Sunday, who observes the holy days of obligation, and builds his schedule around them, but doesn't talk at all publicly and is uncomfortable speaking about his own faith. Are you comfortable with the role and the level of Christianity in our politics today?

Cardinal Gregory said that faith used to be "the moral voice" that political people would turn to, as the "moral compass." And now?

...I think in some cases it's the political world that's beginning to set or claiming to set the moral voice. We've switched positions. There is a great need, I believe, to place faith in its proper position, which is not necessarily antagonistic to the political arena. But to seize the responsibility of being that guiding principle, that moral light for our people to turn to.

Bishop Budde expressed concern about how the "message of Christianity is being distorted" in the country, calling it a "cause for deep concern," and more.

I feel it's a – it's an abuse of the faith. And I have to be very careful because I'm not perfect in my understanding of what it means, A, to be a perfect Christian, I'm not a perfect Christian and I'm not a perfect American, but I think we are walking on very thin ice now. I would encourage anyone who buys a Bible to read the Bible and in particular to read the teachings of Jesus, and then to set our policies if we're going to call ourselves a Christian nation against the highest aspirations that Jesus calls us to.

The two faith leaders disagreed a bit on what kind of Catholic President Biden is; Cardinal Gregory said "he could say he's very sincere about his faith," but referenced the term "cafeteria Catholic," one who chooses "that which is attractive" while dismissing "that which is challenging." Budde said, "Or, as Thomas Aquinas would say, you allow your conscience to guide you."

O'Keefe wondered if there's "something on the menu he's not ordering," in Cardinal Gregory's view.

Well, I would say there are things, especially in terms of the life issues, there are things that he chooses to ignore or he uses the current situation as a political pawn rather than saying, look, my church believes this.

 Again, Bishop Budde countered with what I think is a more balanced view.

It's also possible to be a practitioner of the faith as a public leader and not require everyone that you lead in your country to be guided by all of the precepts of your faith, right?

O'Keefe said that seems to be what Biden believes, and Budde concurred, saying that's how she interprets it. She also spoke from her experiences worshipping with Biden at Washington's National Cathedral.

I will say the one thing about him that I admire tremendously - there is not a funeral of a state's person or a state person's spouse that he does not attend, stay through the entire service, and speak from the pulpit as in eulogy, and I find that example to be an expression of authentic faith.

When asked, Cardinal Gregory said he "would not put a lot of emphasis" on any sort of "Biden impact on the pews," and he added some not unexpected perspective on the 'cafeteria Catholic' comment.

He does attend church regularly with great, you know, devotion. But he also steps aside some of the hot-button issues or uses the hot-button issues as a political tool, which it's not – it is not the way I think we would want our faith to be used. The issues of life begin at the very beginning and they conclude at natural death. And you can't – you can't pick and choose. You're either one who respects life, and all of its dimensions, or you have to step aside and say, I'm not pro-life, I'm, you know, on one side of the equation I feel that I could support this dimension of life, but in others, I would step aside.

In response, Bishop Budde offered this.

I love the spectrum of life. I think you can be in adherence of the spectrum of life and still respect a woman's right to choose in reproductive health and including when to have an abortion in the early stages of pregnancy. So I'll just say that as a Christian I believe that that's possible and still hold to the full spectrum of life.

I appreciated how the two faith leaders spoke about their positions, but I'm surprised that the bulk of the conversation focused on how President Biden lives his faith, and nothing about president Trump and his faith. I'm not sure whether O'Keefe opted to lead the conversation towards Biden, or if his guests didn't want to talk about it. 

I think it was a disservice not to delve into how the guy who makes money selling Bibles commands so much respect from people who self-identify as 'religious.'  Maybe next time, I guess...

FYI, here's my Easter message from several years ago. Like Bishop Budde, I'm not a perfect American, or a perfect anything else, for that matter, but I appreciate the value in making an effort to be a better person, regardless of whether or not I check a 'religion' box on a form somewhere.

See you around campus.

Sunday School 3/31/24

We begin the Easter edition of Sunday School with Dana Bash and her Good Friday conversation with Senator Rev. Raphael Warnock (D-GA); here are some excerpts from that conversation, which aired in the State of the Union classroom.

Rev. Warnock said the message he'll be sharing with his congregants is "the good news of Easter is that evil and injustice will not have the last word," and that "Truth crushed to earth will rise again."

As he describes himself as a "Matthew 25 Christian," Bash wondered if people, not just in the US but around the world, "have gotten away from" that theme of "caring for strangers and being welcoming towards people of all different backgrounds." Warnock said how we treat our neighbors and how we take care of those "who are most marginalized is a central tenet" of that chapter, and he said there are "some 2,000 verses in the Scripture" talking about how to treat the poor.

Sadly, you wouldn't know that listening to some of the loudest Christian voices in America today that are often mean to poor people in the name of faith. I don't know what Bible they're reading.

Bash turned to Trump's encouraging folks to buy his $60 licensed Bible, and played a clip from his video; I had that clip, and more, in my  OrangeVerse post last week.

All Americans need a Bible in their home. And I have many. It's my favorite book. It's a lot of people's favorite book. I'm proud to endorse and encourage you to get this Bible. We must make America pray again. 

Warnock noted "The Bible doesn't need Donald Trump's endorsement," and said

The sad thing is that none of us are surprised by this. This is what we expect from the former president. If he's not selling us steaks, he's selling us a school whose degree is not worth the paper that is written on. If he's not selling us a school, he's selling us sneakers. And now he's trying to sell the Scriptures. At the end of the day, I think he's trying to sell the American people a bill of goods. And that worked in 2016, although he did not win the popular vote even in 2016. It did not work in 2020. And I don't think it's going to work in 2024.

Talking about the other documents you get for your $60 - the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and whatnot - Warnock said getting into the Bible business is "risky business for someone like" Trump.

because the folks who buy those Bibles might actually open them up, where it says things like, thou shalt not lie, thou shalt not bear false witness, where it warns about wolves dressed up in sheep's clothing. I think you ought to be careful. 

Bash brought up House Speaker Mike Johnson saying President Biden acknowledging March 31st as the annual Transgender Day of Visibility was "abhorrent" and that Biden "betrayed the central tenet of Easter," which falls on March 31st this year.

...apparently, the speaker finds trans people abhorrent. And I think he ought to think about that. The fact of the matter is, as you said, March 31 has been a day to lift up transgender people who endure violence and bigotry. Easter, the date changes every single day. But this is just one more instance of folks who have -- who do not know how to lead us trying to divide us. And this is the opposite of the Christian faith.

Next, Bash talked with Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY), who's been calling on Speaker Johnson to allow a vote on aid to Ukraine for quite a while now. Lawler thinks they'll finally get one when the House returns from the Easter break., saying "critically important for our allies," and that "we cannot shirk on our responsibility to uphold and defend democracies across the globe."

He's one of the members behind the 'Defending Borders, Defending Democracies Act' which would provide assistance to Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan, and also bring back the 'remain in Mexico' policy and Title 42. He said he's spoken with Johnson directly, and is "confident that he is going to bring a bill to the floor."

His thinking on Rep. Marjorie Flamethrower Taylor Greene (R- You Kidding Me?) and her threat to boot Johnson, Lawler was direct. 

I can't speak for her... But, as I said the day that she introduced it, it's idiotic. And it's not going to actually help advance the cause that she believes in... Infighting does nothing to help advance any of those issues or policy positions. And, in fact, it undermines our majority.

Bash noted Lawler is one of only four House GOP members supporting a federal law allowing IVF, and asked if the rest of his party is "on the wrong side of this issue." Lawler said that if the Rs want to be "a party that supports life, then we should be fighting to protect the ability of families to become parents," and that the people aren't interested in "extremism."

Bash asked a couple of Trump-behaving-badly questions; in a nutshell, Lawler thinks everyone needs to tone it down and watch what they say. On the specific issue of Trump attacking another judge (and the judge's family), he thinks "families should always be off-limits." And, he added, instead of focusing on things the media likes to pay attention to,

... I think the focus of this campaign and this election should be on the American people and the issues facing the American people. 

Next, I dropped in on the MTP classroom, where Kristen Welker talked with GOP Rep. Don Bacon of Nebraska. Welker noted that Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelenskyy announced on social media that he had spoken with Speaker Johnson on the issues his country is facing, saying "Quick passage of U.S. aid to Ukraine by Congress is vital." 

She asked Bacon, a supporter of aid to Ukraine how confident he was that a bill would pass.

Well, Speaker Johnson is an honest man. He truly walks his faith. He doesn't talk his faith, he walks his faith, he shows it. He's committed to making this the first, the top priority, when we return back to Washington, DC.

He said most of his colleagues support military aid, but don't support humanitarian aid that the Senate included in their bill. He and three others, including two Dems, have a $66B bill that would provide aid to Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan, plus border security. Their bill would allow for amendments, which might make it more palatable.

...I know the speaker also wants to have, like, the Repo Act, where we repossess some Russian assets to help them pay for this. Also, maybe, some lend lease segments to the bill. So, some of this may become in the form of loans.

They also want to try and force Biden to give Ukraine different weapons, "higher-tech, more capable" arms to "help them prevail on the battlefield," including the ATACMS guided missiles. Welker pointed out that Biden has been asking for funding to pay for those - for seven months - and the House has held things up. 

Bacon wants there to be some kind of 'bicameral, bipartisan solution," and that he doesn't want to pass a bill if it would pass the Senate. Welker noted the Senate had passed a bill, which the House famously voted down, at Donald Orange Jesus Trump's urging.

Yeah. Well, it didn't have a lot of bicameral support, at least on the Republican side. Why is that? You have about almost $30 billion in humanitarian aid and there's not a lot of support for that amount of humanitarian aid going to Ukraine. We think the EU could do a lot more humanitarian than they are. They just did a $50 billion humanitarian aid and Germany has committed more. We think our role should be more military aid because that's what we're good at. 

I had to pause the video at that point, it being Easter Sunday and all; I shouldn't have been surprised, since it was an R saying it, but still.

When asked whether he thought Johnson could lose the speakership over this issue, Bacon said 

It's possible, I'm not going to deny it. We have one or two people that are not team players. They'd rather enjoy the limelight, the social media. And the fact is with the one-seat majority – and we'll end up with a three- or four-seat majority after some special elections – out of 435 people, it's a very narrow majority. And one or two people can make this a minority.

Personally, he prefers to "work with the team," and doesn't think they need 100% agreement on everything. He also thinks the Dems are tired of the dysfunction over the speakership, and would take steps to keep Johnson from losing the vote if it came to the floor. There might be a standoff after the Ukraine bill is handled, but he hopes Johnson will prevail if it comes to that. 

On impeaching the president, folks he's talked to "say there's not a specific crime" and he'd need that or a misdemeanor to be in favor of the move. But is it time to drop the whole thing?

I don't know if it's time, right now. But I do think we're probably nearing the conclusion of this investigation. And I think it was important for the American people to see that, yes, there's $24 million in foreign money that the family raised and all the hidden LLCs that the money was moved around in. But that is, in itself, not a high crime or misdemeanor.

Welker asked about the Biden-in-the-pickup video image that Trump shared (the same question Bash asked Lawler) and got a similar answer: he doesn't support that, he wants both sides to raise the bar of civility, and said we're better than that.

We're the strongest country in the world... we are the best country to live in, but we're not going to remain that way if we treat our opponents in this way...We've got to be a lot better at how we dialogue with the opposition... 

And because she just can't take an answer for an answer, she pushed him for something more by asking if he thought it was OK that Trump was attacking the families of the judges in his many cases. Bacon said he'll lead by example and focus on the issues.

And I think in Nebraska, in the Midwest, we don't like the nastiness, you know? We have a phrase here, "Nebraska nice," and it's real. 

She then asked, "And, on this Easter, what is your message about bipartisanship and the possibility of working together on something like" rebuilding the Francis Scott Key Bridge? 

... I think our faith calls for the golden rule. It calls for, like, you know, the fruits of the spirit in Galatians, that we should treat each other with respect, decency. And I think, as Christians, sometimes we forget that in this political debate... we've got to hold a higher bar here and remember the gold rule, as we work out the issues facing our country. 

See you around campus.