Wondering on Wednesday, 6/15/22

Ready... Set... Wonder!

So, what's wonder-full tonight? 

The folks over at Fox Entertainment continue beating the drum about the 'assassination attempt' on Justice Bret Kavanaugh and how, if he were a liberal instead of a conservative, the Dems and the media would be apoplectic over the whole thing. That was one of the featured topics of a Fox News Sunday interview this week., in case you missed it.

That got me wondering how the network covered the 'workup' on Justice Sonia Sotomayor the FBI found when investigating Roy Den Hollander, the man who killed the son of a federal judge in New Jersey a while back in 2020. 

Would you be surprised that I found only one article about that threat, which is the same number of articles as there were about Justice Sotomayor's children's book, and about her mangled pronunciation of the vice president's name? You shouldn't be. 

We've got another January 6th Committee hearing tomorrow; it was postponed from today to allow the team to get the multi-media presentation ready. Rep Zoe Lofgren (D-CA) said the postponement "is not a big deal. It's just technical issues." and that's fine. I mean, it's not like someone was having a baby or anything; that happened with Monday's hearing, when former Trump campaign manager Bill Stepien had to miss his in-person testimony when his wife went into labor. 

We did get to hear from fired Fox News political editor Chris Stirewalt, who was in on the decision on election night, when Fox was first to call Arizona for Donald Trump. "We were able to make a call early. We were able to beat the competition" he testified. Not only that, but as Deadline reported, 

After Nov. 7, when networks called the race for Biden, Stirewalt said, Trump’s chances of winning were “none,” barring something totally unexpected from happening. He said that Trump was “better off to play the Powerball” than betting he would win the election.

And, there's this 

Stirewalt said that they “knew it would be significant” calling the state, but “we already knew Trump’s chances were very small and getting smaller” based on the data they saw. 

So, what's the wondering on this? First, did anyone get Trump a Powerball ticket? Did he win anything? And finally, is anyone surprised that the guy from Fox was bragging about beating the competition?

What else? Well, there were some primaries yesterday, and there were some Trump-endorsed candidates who lost (but not many) and some who won, including all the races in Nevada where Trump made an endorsement. And, Sarah Palin will be one of four candidates moving ahead to the special election to finish the term of the late Rep. Don Young, who passed away in March. 

What's fascinating about the Alaska votes this year? It's not Palin; it's that Alaska moved to ranked choice voting this year. And if you're wondering, here's what it means: 

The special primary, where voters chose one of 48 candidates on the ballot, was Saturday; the special general, where voters will rank the top four candidates from the primary, is set for Aug. 16. 

Simultaneously, two more elections — a regular primary and general — are scheduled to elect Alaska’s member of Congress for the next full two-year term, which starts in January. The regular primary election is scheduled for Aug. 16, on the same day and same ballot as the special general. That means voters will be asked to rank the four candidates in the special election, then pick one of 31 candidates in the regular primary. 

The regular general election, where voters will rank the top four of the 31 candidates, is Nov. 8.

Now, I'm a fan of ranked choice voting; it was used in the NYC elections last year, but the rest of our state doesn't have the option, and I wish we did. I don't relish having to choose from over 30, or over 40 candidates for a single race, but being able to send someone to office who earns at least 50% of the vote would be a treat. I wonder, how do the rest of you feel about ranked choice voting? Have you used it? Do you want to? Drop me a message or leave a comment.

Finally, on tonight's broadcast of ABC's World News Tonight, David Muir repeatedly mentioned that Dolly Parton had done something newsworthy. He had it in his opening 'here's what we're talking about tonight" segment, and teased it at every break. When it was finally the last minute of the broadcast, we got the scoop: Parton had donated $1M to Vanderbilt University Medical Center. "I love children..." Parton said; and we love you, Muir said, to close the show.  

Parton's great, Muir's the host of "the most watched show on all of television" so, what's to wonder about on this? Going back to the first story in the post, and the "fanboy" comment about Kimmel, I can't help asking, is there any more "fanboy" news anchor than Muir?

What's got you wondering tonight?

TGIF 11/20/20

Wouldn't it be fun to blog like the woman in charge of the GAO tweets?  GSA Administrator Emily Murphy's now-deleted tweet from Wednesday (you can see it here) - the first one she had sent since the election - inspired me to compose the following very important and very confusing sentence.  

Had;j aow4ith pa984ty;;o gnz;dkfn.

Maybe someone good at creating codes could make it mean something - you know, like those tattoos on Jane Doe's body on Blindspot all had some deeper meaning awaiting discovery? 

In addition to that weird tweet, Administrator Murphy has gotten attention from members of the House, some of whom sent this request. They're looking for an "immediate briefing" on Murphy's "ongoing refusal" to give the Biden-Harris team the access - and funds - they're afforded under the President Transition Act. And, they're interested in some recent actions by the president, too. 

We also have questions about last-minute actions taken by the White House related to GSA leading up to the election. On September 2, 2020, president Trump issued an executive order modifying the-longstanding order of succession within GAS to place the General Counsel as fourth-in-line to perform the duties of Administrator after you, your Deputy, and your Chief of Staff. 

And then, less than a week before the election, Trump installed a new GSA General Counsel - imagine that! So, it would seem, there is no limit to the lengths to which he will go to interfere in, well, pretty much anything and everything. 

Speaking of interfering, it seems former Trump chief strategist Steve Bannon is again more interesting in his post-White House life than when he was there. This time, the FTC is interested in hearing from him regarding the Cambridge Analytica data breach from a while back. 

The Federal Trade Commission has asked a federal court to force former Trump campaign CEO Steve Bannon to testify under oath as part of the agency's investigation into Facebook's Cambridge Analytica data breach.

Seems they want to interview Bannon as part of a probe into whether he should be found personally liable for his involvement in the breach, for which Facebook was fined $5B and two of the firm's executives settled with the FTC

And, speaking of "only the best people," there's the president's 40th 4th press secretary, Kayleigh McEnany, who's made so many recent campaign appearances and 'personal' appearances on Fox News, I'm sort of shocked that she even remembered where the White House press briefing room is. But she did, and she was in full campaign mode today, seemingly trying to convince people that there wasn't an orderly transition of power in 2016. Which is a bald-faced lie, except that it can't be a lie, because she said she'd never lie. So now, I don't know what to think (OK, seriously - of course I know what to think, and you do too, right?)

Also, on the not knowing what to think front, I wonder why we're not :hearing from the folks who are always complaining about bail reform...I mean, Kyle Rittenhouse, who gave someone money to purchase what was described as an assault-style weapon, then got a ride from his home in Illinois to neighboring Wisconsin, where he used the gun to kill two and injure another man, has been released after posting a $2M cash bond.  Why is he out on bail? Why aren't people outraged by that? 

I'd put Bannon, McEnany, and Murphy on the bad week list, but Rittenhouse, with the help of the millions of dollars raised for his legal defense, definitely had a good week.

Also of note this week:

• Rudy Giuliani, who found the right place to hold his press conference, and then wilted under pressure (bad week);
• the president, who claimed (again) that he won the election, boasting of his 74 million votes; too bad he lost (bad week):
• Dolly Parton, who donated a million bucks to coronavirus efforts, and ended up helping to fund the Moderna/BioNtech vaccine (good week);
• BioNtech, the German company I've heard pronounced four or five different ways in the past several days. They've got a bit of an uphill battle on that front, I think (mixed week);
• SpaceX, and NASA, and especially the four astronauts who very smoothly went from earth to the International Space Station (great week); and
• Staff Sgt. Phillip Gray, who wrote 270 notes for his daughter - one for each day he'd be deployed - which his wife put in his daughter's lunchbox. (GREAT week!)

I hope it's easy for you to tell what kind of week you had.

TGIF, everyone.