Wondering on Wednesday (v206)

Ready... Set... Wonder!

What's got me wondering tonight? Here's just a sampling.

Do you wonder if Rand Paul and Tucker Carlson got together and decided to tag-team Dr. Fauci, or was it an incredible coinkydink that they both hit out within such a short period of time? Honestly, at any moment I half expected either one of them to shout "You're not the boss of me!" in Fauci's direction, Carlson in particular. 

Now, I realize that things have changed over the course of the pandemic, and what's happening on the ground now is not the same was was happening on the ground back in January; heck, I'd have to wonder about anyone who didn't realize that. The data have changed, the projections have changed, the guidance - and guidelines - have changed, and they'll likely continue to do so. But for Carlson to say that Fauci stuff was 'buffoon-level' was, well, pretty ridiculous, even for someone on Fox. Can't wait to see how the rest of this plays out, and how the other 'buffoon-level' talking heads handle it. 

Speaking of Fox News, I see they've taken Tara Reade off their banner, after she was right there, front and center, for a long time. I wonder why they've moved on?  If you're wondering who or what replaced her, have no fear - I've got you covered.  Here's the old banner, and the new.

What else is going on? 

I wonder if the folks who have been so upset about criminals being released from prison because of the coronavirus  threat are upset about Paul Manafort, Michael Cohen, and Michael Avenatti being released for that reason? And, if there is outrage, will those three get the same share of it? 

I listened to a little bit of the Supreme Court hearing on citizen Donald Trump's taxes. I was happy that there were no random toilet-flushing noises when I was listening - and I still wonder whether the flushing that was heard  during one of the earlier virtual sessions was Brett Kavanaugh 'breaking the seal," as it were. I did get to hear Clarence Thomas ask a question, too; I wonder if he likes the cases, or if he likes the format? Thomas, you may know, once went 10 years, three years, and one year without asking any questions from the bench. 

And now, let's close it out with some good news, shall we? Here are two wonderful stories for you.

• A while back - in March, actually - a Kansas farmer sent an N-95 mask to my Sonofa Gov, Andrew Cuomo, with a note asking the gov to make sure the mask got to a doctor or nurse working to treat COVID-19 patients. Cuomo told the story at one of his daily press briefings. As often happens with stories like this, things snowballed, the farmer got some unwanted fame, and ended up having a dream of his lifetime come true. I won't spoil it for you, but it's a good one.   

• We've seen incredible pictures of how the environment is healing as people around the world shelter in place, factories stop kicking up tons of pollution, airlines limit flights, and so on. An Australian diving tour company, normally busy with tourists, has instead been busy planting coral on the Great Barrier Reef since their country shut down tourist activity. 

And let's wonder what else people will be inspired to do, to try, to give to others, as we continue down this crazy road. 

What are you wondering about?

Sunday School 3/10/19

I wandered around three classrooms this morning. I'm not sure exactly what I was looking for, so I'm not exactly sure if I found it or not.

Let's start with Face the Nation and Ed O'Keefe's interview with Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), one of the declared presidential candidates. He kicked things off with her recently announced plan to break up tech companies, asking her why it needs to be done. Her answer?

Because the giant tech companies right now area eating up little, tiny businesses, startups - and competing unfairly. 

The thing is, Warren says, the platform companies should not be competing with people who use their platforms, putting their items ahead of the competition in the search returns, and so on.

So what I'm saying is we've got to break these guys apart. You want to run a platform? That's fine, You don't get to run a whole bunch of the businesses as well. You want to run a business? That's fine. You don't get to run the platform. Think of it this way, it's like in baseball. You can be the umpire or you can own one of the teams, but you don't get to be the umpire and own the teams.

So Facebook would have to sell off Instagram, Amazon would have to sell off Whole Foods, and "all those little businesses that they're running, competing businesses. Yup."

O'Keefe asked who the federal government was to tell these companies they had to do this; Warren mentioned long-standing anti-trust laws.  But, she's not anti-market, she pointed out, she's pro-markets-that-work:

The way markets work is they have to have rules and they have to have a cop to enforce them. A market without rules is theft and I'm not in favor of theft, I'm in favor of markets that produce real competition. 

She talked about taxing the ultra rich, noting that the top 1/10th of 1% will pay about 3.4% of their total net wealth in taxes while the 99.9% will pay about 7.4% and that's not fair because (paraphrasing here) when all of their inherited wealth was actually being earned by their families way back in the day, they did it on the backs of the rest of us -- along the lines of Obama's "you didn't build that" but in a way that seemed to be less offensive, if not more accepted. We 99-per-centers educated all of those workers back then, and built the roads, bridges, and factories, and so

So what we're really saying is look, just put a little back in the kitty. This is what we're asking for. Pay a fair share, so the next kid has a chance to build something great and the kid after that and the kid after that. 

She also said if anyone labels her as a socialist, "it's just wrong."

TGIF 3/8/19

It's time again for our weekly look at good weeks and bad, even if we don't have an actual definition of those terms.

It's sort of like pornography, right? We know it when we see it?

Minnesota's Rep. Ilhan Omar had a good week, I think in the end. She made, for the 3rd time, what most people would historically think of as being anti-Semitic remarks - that's right, the 3rd time - and as a result, the House of Representatives decided that the right thing to do was to draft a seven-page resolution that the House thinks that hatred and discrimination of all kinds are wrong.

All of the Democrats voted in favor of the resolution, Rep. Omar included, as did many Republicans - all but 23 of them, in fact.  The fact that the resolution was drafted in such a way as to protect Omar from being singled out for her specific comments gave her a better week than it might have otherwise been. The question for the House leadership, of course, is what happens the next time? Because it seems almost inevitable that there will be a next time.

Meanwhile, NY's Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez used this opportunity to raise money. I'm not sure whether or not those efforts were successful, but I bet she thinks she had a good week.

Who else had a week?

TGIF 11/30/18

What kind of week did you have? 

Was it better than, say, Paul Manafort? I'd say probably. Manafort got himself in to a little hot water with Special Counsel Robert Mueller, will lose his plea deal, and may face new charges and another trial. And, at the same time he was lying and violating his deal with Mueller's team, Manafort's lawyer was sharing information with the president's legal team - pretty ballsy, for sure.  For more information on the trials and tribulations and twists and turns of the Manafort saga, check out this link to stories he's mentioned in from The Guardian.

Was your week better than, say, Michael Cohen's? We now know that he's admitted lying to Congress, which is a bad thing, but he's definitely living up to his 'putting family and country first' mantra much more so now than his old "I'd take a bullet for Donald Trump' mantra of the past - and for that, I like the new Cohen more than the old one. And shame on the GOP for coming to a quick conclusion that there was no 'there' there in their House investigation. You know, the "we love you, man!" probe that was full of nonsense and Nunes... 

The president himself, well, he's not had the best week ever, with these new issues coming out of Mueller's camp. And while 'he' did 'win' the Mississippi Senate runoff between the 'front row seat the the hanging' Republican and 'the guy with the same name as those TV awards' Democrat, Trump and his family (Eric, Donny Jr, and Ivanka) and even Mike Pence all 'lost' the race for the NY House seat, as Claudia Tenney finally conceded to Dem Anthony Brindisi. But, silly me, those House races don't matter, the president doesn't care about them, I forgot.

But there were folks who had really good weeks. Like Riley Morrison, the 9-year-old girl - or should I say, the 9-year-old basketball player - who was disappointed in NBA star Steph Curry, and let him know about it. She wrote him to complain that his signature shoes were only sold under the Boys section of the Under Armour website. Here's an excerpt from Riley's letter to Curry:

I know you support girl athletes because you have two daughters and you host an all-girls basketball camp. I hope you can work with Under Armour to change this, because girls want to rock the Curry 5s, too.

That oversight was quickly corrected - you'll find the Curry 5s under both the Boys and Girls sections of the UA website now. And there's more, as you can see from Curry's response to Morrison. After letting her know the website issue was being corrected, he added:

I want to make sure you can wear my kicks proudly -so I am going to send you a pair of Curry 5s now and you'll be one of the first kids to get the Curry 6. Lastly, we have something special in the works for International Women's Day on March 8, and I want you to celebrate with me! More to come on that, but plan to be in Oakland that night!

And finally, there's a group of people who had also had a really good week. Over 100 NICU nurses at Mercy Children's Hospital in St Louis won $10,000 on the Mega Millions, and promptly donated the money to two coworkers. One had lost her son to suicide, the other's husband is battling cancer. They needed the money more than the winners, and the winners needed to help others more than they needed their post-tax $50 each.

These last two stories made my week a little better; I hope they do the same for you.

TGIF 8/24/18

Raise your hand if you're happy you're not an employee of the Trump Organization, or a friend of the president, or a Trump lawyer, or a former lawyer or campaign official - unless of course, you are one of those, and you got your own immunity deal from the Mueller investigation team or any other prosecutors. You're having a pretty good week, either way.

Raise your hand if you live in Randolph County Georgia and you're happy that the elections board made the right decision today, to keep all of the county's polling places open for the general election this fall. Raise two hands if you're happy it took them less than 60 seconds to do the right thing. You had a pretty good week, too.

Raise your hand if you're a parent and have sent one or more kids off to college in the past few days, or even if you're sending one off in the next few days - kudos to you! I can only imagine the emotions you must be feeling, and I wish you and your kids all the best.  You've had a good week, too!

If you're the person at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation who decided that this past Wednesday the Foundation should bump up all non-matched donations made to classrooms around the country through the Donors Choose program, raise your hand. As a result of the Foundation's generosity and the encouragement it provided, over $4M was given in one day; over 20,000 teachers in 13,000 schools had projects receive funding from over 40,000 donors. Teachers, students and yes, the folks at the Foundation, had a great week!

We'll end sort of where we started, with one of Trump's former lawyers, Michael Cohen. He's in the news, of course, because of his guilty plea to eight counts, on the same day that Paul Manafort was convicted of eight counts himself. A GoFundMe page has been established to help support Cohen:

On July 2, 2018, Michael Cohen declared his independence from Donald Trump and (his) commitment to tell the truth.

On August 21, Michael Cohen made the decision to take legal responsibility and to continue his commitment to tell the truth.

Michael decided to put his family and his country first. Now Michael needs your financial help - to pay his legal fees.

The Michael Cohen Truth Fund is a transparent trust account, with all donations going to help Michael Cohen and his family as he goes forward on his journey to tell the truth about Donald Trump. 

In two days, the fund has raised nearly $156K of the $500K goal.

TGIF, everyone.

Wondering on Wednesday (v144)

Is your head still spinning from all of the news this week?

Manafort found guilty on eight counts. Cohen admitted guilt to eight counts. Trump knows what he didn't know before when he didn't know anything until he started knowing things unless it wasn't helpful for him to know them in which case he said even if he knew or did things it doesn't matter because they're not illegal, unless they are but even if they are, he didn't know about them or someone else did it and he only found out later.

Michael Cohen used to be his Fixer, when Trump needed a fix for something but now that things have been fixed for Cohen, and not for Trump, Cohen's just a lying dirty rotten lawyer and oh by the way he's always been a lying liar anyway, just ask Rudy. Who thinks the truth is not the truth unless it is, in which case it doesn't matter because even if they told the truth, whatever they did or said is not illegal and oh by the way show us the witches.

Paul Manafort used to be the guy who worked for Trump's campaign for what, 42 days or something? Except it was longer than than and had he been found unanimously guilty on those other ten charges, you can be sure he'd still be the guy who only worked for Trump for a few weeks not a few months but since the jury couldn't decide, Trump can and he's decided that Manafort, a guy who bought really expensive clothes and probably had a gold plated toilet like Trump does now is a good guy who has been treated badly by Mueller and the 13 17 1,000,000 Angry Democrats. And the fact that Manafort has another trial to face, well pardon me boys, but just pardon me, OK?

How horrible must Omarosa the Fired feel - perhaps unhinged? She was the story until she wasn't the story anymore, and there's nothing like being the person everyone wants to hate because when they care enough to hate you, they're talking about you and like the president taught her on his TV show, no press is bad press unless it's a wrinkle in a Manafortian suit or something. But when they stop talking about you because someone else is more important your choices are to claw your way back into the news or die on the vine.

Trump threatened Comey with tapes; he threatened reporters with tapes, he didn't threaten Putin with tapes. Cohen actually has some. Omarosa actually has some. We have no idea who else has any, or who will threaten someone that they have tapes. How many more shoes, how many more shoeboxes of tapes will fall?

Someone at his rally in West Virginia last night tried to say that any man, certainly a man like Trump, would have paid off their paramours because it would be wrong and hurtful to the manly man's wife to have this come out. Not, mind you, that only a person who has an affair can hurt his spouse if she finds out that an affair occurred. Whether it was Stormy Daniels or Karen MdDougal or one of who knows how many other women there might be, I guess they can be blamed for talking about it or trying to, but the 'it' that they want to talk about is the man who cheated on his wife and tried to shut them up with money.

Wondering, this Wednesday, how much lower we will go before we start going back up again?

#MAGA.

What They're Saying: The Manafort Shoe Drops

So, Paul Manafort and his right hand man, Rick Gates, were indicted on a variety of charges, from money laundering to conspiring against the United States. And some overzealous Trump campaign foreign policy advisor volunteer named George Papadopoulos has pleaded guilty and is now a source for the Robert Mueller investigation.

Against that backdrop, what are people saying? Here's a sampling.

But look, today's announcement has nothing to do with the president, has nothing to do with the president's campaign or campaign activity. The real collusion scandal, as we've said several times before, has everything to do with the Clinton campaign, Fusion GPS and Russia. There's evidence of the Clinton campaign colluding with Russian intelligence to spread disinformation and smear the president to influence the election. We've been saying from say one there has been no evidence of Trump-Russia collusion, and nothing in the indictment today changes that at all. ~ Sarah Huckabee Sanders

They've made an indictment. I really have nothing to add because I haven't even read it, so I'm not going to speculate on something I haven't read. So there's just no point in doing that. ~ House Speaker Paul Ryan

The special counsel has found a reason on criminal violations to indict two individuals, and I will leave that up to the special counsel to make that determination. It doesn't change anything with our investigation. We received document from and had interest in two of the individuals named, but clearly the criminal charges put them in the Special Counsel's purview. ~ Richard Burr, (R-NC), Senate Intelligence Committee Chair. 

The president must not, under any circumstances, interfere with the special counsel's work in any way. If he does so, Congress must respond swiftly, unequivocally, and in a bipartisan way to ensure that the investigation continues. ~Chuck Schumer (D-NY)

Sorry, but this is years ago, before Paul Manafort was part of the Trump campaign. But why aren't Crooked Hillary and the Dems the focus?????

... Also, there is NO COLLUSION! ~Donald Trump 

And finally -- you thought I was going to close with the president's profound punctuation, didn't you?  Nope - not tonight. 

And finally,  I'll leave you with this:

It's clear from Mueller's court documents -- if you read between the lines with your head in a microwave - that the Russia-connected "overseas professor" who met Papadopoulos was actually Clinton wearing a costume. She is known as a master of disguise, which explains how she hid her identity while killing President John F. Kennedy, raiding the US consulate in Benghazi and being Charles Manson. ~Rex Huppke, Chicago Tribune

Wondering on Wednesday (v104)

The Republicans in the Senate are working hurriedly to try and rustle up enough support to drag Mike Pence in for a potential tie-breaking vote, by September 30th, on a last, best chance to repeal the Affordable Care Act and replace it with something that I heard Kentucky's Rand Paul describe as merely taking money away from blue states and giving it to red states.

Jimmy Kimmel, whose son was born with a congenital heart defect, met months ago with Louisiana Senator Bill Cassidy, one of the coauthors of the current bill. At that time, Cassidy coined the phrase 'the Jimmy Kimmel test' which any bill would need to pass, according to Cassidy: coverage for preexisting conditions, no lifetime caps, and insurance had to be affordable. Fast forward to this week, where Kimmel called Cassidy a liar on his show. 

Cassidy says Kimmel doesn't understand the bill. 

No one understands the bill, least of all the people who will be expected to get insurance coverage under it. And the people who are working on the bill don't understand anything other than they said they're repeal and that's what they're going to do, dagnabit. 

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office hasn't chimed in, and may not have the chance to - but pretty much everyone - except 15 Republican governors, that is -  is against it, or afraid of it, or, to Cassidy's point, doesn't understand.

Paul is a no vote already. Susan Collins of Maine, Alaska's Lisa Murkowski and Arizona's John McCain are the other three who should vote against the bill as well, and free up the Senate to enact bipartisan reform to fix the Affordable Care Act and stop trying to bullshit their way into destroying one sixth of the US economy. 

I wonder if they - or any other Republicans - will have the courage to vote no?

Robert Mueller's investigation of the Trump machine - the campaign and, perhaps, the administration as well - is barrelling along, with Paul Manafort clearly in its sights. Reports have said Manafort can expect to be indicted; that the feds picked the lock on his house early one morning to gain entrance for a search; that he met with close Putin allies during the campaign to update them about the campaign; and yes -- there were phone calls that were recorded, and the president is on the recordings. 

Someone suggested there was now no turning back -- Mueller's investigation will result in outcomes, of that there was certainty -- "even if Mueller was fired" by the administration. 

And I wonder two things here: would Trump really have the audacity to fire Mueller?  And will Manafort be the only one?

Finally, and sticking with the investigation aspect of tonight's post, the former Office of Government Ethics (OGE, now known as the OTBE - Office of Turning a Blind Eye) appeared to say it was OK for administration folks to receive anonymous donations - from lobbyists or other interested parties with money to burn - to cover legal fees related to Mueller, Inc. Some will say this is all OK, because Clinton. William Jefferson, that is, not Crooked Lyin Lock Her Up Hillary. 

Seems this question was posed back in the 1990s, and it was deemed to be technically legal, but people were subsequently advised not to take any contributions from lobbyists, anonymous or otherwise. The OTBE clarified that the original decision from 1993 stands, and strongly encouraged a deeper dive for each case. 

Not to worry, though. The RNC has stepped up to offer assistance, and has paid close to $450,000 (so far) to assist with Donald and Donny's legal fees; Trump is also dipping into his campaign coffers to help pay the bills, bless his heart.

And I can't help wondering, again, where is the swamp and who's pulling the plug?