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Monday’s Hopium
It’s still good today, and if I get to it, today’s will be here today!
The Campaign Goes On And We Cannot Let Up
We Should Be Deeply Grateful That Donald Trump Is Safe, Unharmed And Back On The Trail
JUL 15, 2024
Happy Monday all. I had a hard time writing this morning. So much has happened since I last wrote to you on Saturday. Where to begin? We should all be grateful the shooter missed, and that Donald Trump is safe and unharmed. Democracies resolve differences at the ballot box and not with bullets. I have no idea how the shooting will impact this election, or what happens next. Polls conducted last week found the election close and competitive, with neither side having a clear advantage. Today Biden is at 270 Electoral College votes in the 538 forecast despite lingering and legitimate concerns about his candidacy. As I said in my video overview of the election from late last week we can and should win this election, but we need to stay together and not give into fear, factionalism or red wavy Trump has superpowers thinking.
So let’s start today with this reminder:
In the last few months we’ve gotten repeated and powerful confirmations of the success of the Biden Presidency – inflation *fell* last month and is running at the Fed’s target rate over the past six months, crime and murder rates are way down, gas prices are down, the flow to the border is down. We’ve had the strongest economic recovery of any advanced economy in the world, the best job market since the 1960s, the lowest uninsured rate in American history, the deficit is trillions less, the Dow has broken 40,000 and all three indices continue to hover in record territory. Domestic oil, gas and renewable production continue to be at all time highs leaving America more energy independent than it has been in decades. The Wall Street Journal has called the American economy the “envy of the world,” and the Economist recently wrote about the unprecedented start up boom America is experiencing right now. Biden’s big three investment bills have dramatically accelerated the energy transition necessary to combat climate change and will be creating opportunities and jobs for our workers for decades to come. The President has reinvigorated the Western alliance, been an historic champion of democracy and freedom, and campaigned to help successfully defeat the fascists in recent European and French elections.
Joe Biden promised to make things better for all of us, to get us successfully to the other side of COVID. And he has. He has been a very successful President for America and virtually everything you will hear this week at the GOP convention about the Biden Presidency will be lies.Subscribe
Here’s Governor Josh Shapiro this weekend celebrating the life of Corey Camperatore who was killed at the Trump rally on Saturday: (video on the page)
Here’s a passage from David Frum’s powerful new essay in The Atlantic this morning (gift link):
When a madman hammered nearly to death the husband of then–House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Donald Trump jeered and mocked. One of Trump’s sons and other close Trump supporters avidly promoted false claims that Paul Pelosi had somehow brought the onslaught upon himself through a sexual misadventure.
After authorities apprehended a right-wing-extremist plot to abduct Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer, Trump belittled the threat at a rally. He disparaged Whitmer as a political enemy. His supporters chanted “Lock her up.” Trump laughed and replied, “Lock them all up.”
Fascism feasts on violence. In the years since his own supporters attacked the Capitol to overturn the 2020 election—many of them threatening harm to Speaker Pelosi and Vice President Mike Pence—Trump has championed the invaders, would-be kidnappers, and would-be murderers as martyrs and hostages. He has vowed to pardon them if returned to office. His own staffers have testified to the glee with which Trump watched the mayhem on television.
Now the bloodshed that Trump has done so much to incite against others has touched him as well. The attempted murder of Trump—and the killing of a person nearby—is a horror and an outrage. More will be learned about the man who committed this appalling act, and who was killed by the Secret Service. Whatever his mania or motive, the only important thing about him is the law-enforcement mistake that allowed him to bring a deadly weapon so close to a campaign event and gain a sight line of the presidential candidate. His name should otherwise be erased and forgotten.
It is sadly incorrect to say, as so many have, that political violence “has no place” in American society. Assassinations, lynchings, riots, and pogroms have stained every page of American political history. That has remained true to the present day. In 2016, and even more in 2020, Trump supporters brought weapons to intimidate opponents and vote-counters. Trump and his supporters envision a new place for violence as their defining political message in the 2024 election.
Fascist movements are secular religions. Like all religions, they offer martyrs as their proof of truth. The Mussolini movement in Italy built imposing monuments to its fallen comrades. The Trump movement now improves on that: The leader himself will be the martyr in chief, his own blood the basis for his bid for power and vengeance.
We enter the GOP’s Convention week with a few things still being true:
Trump is a rapist, fraudster, traitor, felon and the ugliest and most dangerous political figure in our history
And this is what his fascist party wants to do if back in power:
They want Putin to win, the West to lose. The border to be in chaos, and migrants to keep flowing into the country. Americans to lose even more rights and freedoms. The planet to warm faster. 10 year olds to carry their rapist’s baby to term, and for more women to die on operating room tables. Tens of millions to lose their health insurance. More dead kids in schools. Verified rapists in positions of authority. A restoration of pre-Civil Rights era white supremacy. Huge new tariffs which raise prices on everything, and wreck the global economy which has made us prosperous. Big new tax cuts for their wealthiest donors and less for everyone else.. Books banned across the US. Seniors to pay more for insulin and prescription drugs. Foreign governments free to pollute our daily discourse and harass our citizens. Teenagers to work night shifts in meat packing plants and not go to school. The minimum wage to stay at $7.25. Mass arrests and mass deportations of immigrants long settled in the US. Insurrectionists to get pardoned. To end American democracy for all time.
The yound man who shot at Donald Trump on Saturday was a registered Republican wearing a Demolition Ranch t-shirt. A central reason he was successful at getting his shots off is that, unlike almost every other nation in the world, here in the US a 20 year old can legally carry a high-powered rifle in public within several hundred feet of a Presidential candidate and there is nothing law enforcement can do until he fires his weapon. Far right ideologies made Saturday’s shooting possible, and easy enough even a kid could do it. Violence is their goal, their aspiration, as is the ending of “law and order” and democracy itself. And here we are at a remarkably dangerous and consequential moment in our history.
(snip-there is more!)
Reblog from Ten Bears
Always useful info on his page.
Today’s Hopium today!
Trump’s Pick of JD Vance, A Pro-Russia Extremist, Was A Huge Mistake
Join Me and Anderson Clayton This Friday in Raleigh, North Carolina!
JUL 16, 2024
Happy Tuesday all. Got a few things for you today:
Vance, The Extremist – Last night I sent a “quick take” on JD Vance to our paid subscribers. I encourage everyone to head there to get my initial take on the Vance pick and what it means for us. It includes videos of Vance that need to be seen to be believed. The bottom line:
Tonight’s quick take is on JD Vance. I am not surprised Trump picked Vance. Of all the finalists he is most like Trump. This wasn’t a “balance” pick, or an olive branch to non-MAGA Republicans and independents, or an attempt to lower the temperature – it was an in-your-face-MAGA, project 2025-backing, Putin-loving pick.
Vance comes out of the pro-Putin, pro-oligarch, Handmaid’s Tale wing of the GOP. He was the most extreme candidate on the VP short list. The pick was a confirmation of the extraordinary threat Trump is to our democracy, our rights and freedoms, our way of life and the American-led global system that has kept us free, safe and prosperous for generations. While the Biden campaign has paused their battleground ads for a few days, here’s a reminder of what was running in the battleground on Saturday – Putin’s “Lap Dog.” Please watch this ad. It is very good and even more relevant after Vance’s pick.
NBC News has a story this morning which can only be read as the Trump campaign staff already trashing the Vance choice and blaming it on Trump’s sons:
MILWAUKEE — With the clock ticking to the Republican National Convention last week, Donald Trump met privately to discuss his running mate search with two of his closest advisers: his sons.
The conversation quickly turned tense when the former president indicated that he was leaning toward Doug Burgum, until recently the largely unknown governor of North Dakota — but someone whose low-maintenance, no-drama personality would never threaten to outshine Trump.
That’s when Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump chimed in.
“Don Jr. and Eric went bats— crazy: ‘Why would you do something so stupid? He offers us nothing,’” a longtime Republican operative familiar with the discussion told NBC News.
“They were basically all like ‘JD, JD, JD,’” the operative said.
Trump ratified his sons’ recommendation here Monday, selecting Sen. JD Vance of Ohio as his vice presidential candidate. Trump called Vance with the news 20 minutes before announcing it on social media, a source familiar with the call said.
In choosing Vance, Trump made a different calculation than he did in 2016 and leaned fully into his MAGA base. Back then, he looked to his daughter and her husband — the more establishment-friendly Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner — for strategic advice. This time, his red meat-throwing sons have a more central role. And instead of going with a longtime traditional Republican like Mike Pence, Trump chose the MAGA warrior Vance.
The pick of “MAGA warrior Vance” is a confirmation of the ugliness and threat of MAGA. In my view this was a serious political mistake and missed opportunity for Trump, and makes it more likely we can win this election. Work hard this week to educate your networks on what Vance means for the GOP ticket and all of us. Back to work all…….
(snip, but don’t stop now, there is more Hopium on the page!)
Oliver Willis Explains
He explains very well, too. And he brings Kal-El, who you’ll see on Mr. Willis’s page.
The Mainstream Media: Joe Biden’s Other Election Opponent
The Media Misses Trump And They Want Him To Win
JUL 16, 2024
David Zaslav, the CEO of Warner Bros./Discovery, the company that owns CNN, tipped his hand about who he wants in the White House in an interview given at the Sun Valley Conference of media and tech bigwigs in Idaho recently:
Asked about the upcoming presidential election, Zaslav said it mattered less to him which which party wins, as long as the next president was friendly to business.
“We just need an opportunity for deregulation, so companies can consolidate and do what we need to to be even better,” he said.
Zaslav’s comments effectively work as an endorsement of Donald Trump’s campaign, because the Biden administration is not handing out rubber stamps to big business seeking to consolidate (and harm consumers). Trump’s four years in office saw his administration hand over power to mega-business, from cutting safety regulations, rolling back environmental standards, and of course rewarding them with a massive tax cut that didn’t stimulate the overall economy at all.
The media industry, in particular, thrived during Trump’s time. Instead of sleep-inducing policy wonkery as they had to contend with during President Barack Obama’s two-terms, Trump lurched from drama to drama and crisis to crisis. When he wasn’t feuding with celebrities or Saturday Night Live, he was pissing off NATO allies, mismanaging a pandemic, or bowing to North Korea’s dictatorial regime. And of course there was the steady stream of racism and misogyny.
Four years into President Joe Biden’s time in office, it is clear to anyone with open eyes that the mainstream press desperately wants to go back to the good old days. They want easy stories and a torrent of clicks to their websites and eyeballs on their broadcasts. They want to be able to churn out a series of bestsellers, compiling information they should have been reporting in newspapers and broadcasts, packaged as buzzworthy scoops to juice book sales.
Like Zaslav, the mainstream media – the New York Times, CNN, Associated Press, the networks and the rest — tipped their hands as they took part in the post-debate media orgy. Biden’s performance was putrid, as he has admitted, but the coverage went above and beyond with the press beating the drumbeat for Biden to drop out of the race louder than a Taylor Swift concert extravaganza.
The press misses Donald, their meal ticket, their path to riches and an easy day at the office. He makes a big show of speaking negatively about his coverage, but like a wrestler working a gimmick to get the audience out of their seats, everyone in this pantomime is playing a role.
There is a symbiotic relationship between Trump and the press that has more in common with the grotesque setup in the horror film Human Centipede than either side of the equation would ever admit in public. Trump feeds them outrage and they process that outrage and generate coverage, which Trump then consumes and produces more outrage out of his other end. And again and again.
Historically speaking, the Democratic Party and liberalism has been annoyingly naive about this dynamic. There is a shared belief that the press, despite everything we’ve witnessed — the 2000 election, birtherism, the Iraq War, Trump’s first campaign and so much more — that the press gives a damn. The notion that they collectively care about the truth and share the concerns of average citizens about what life under an authoritarian Republican presidency would look like is betrayed by the consistent message of their Trump coverage: “We want to go back.”
There may finally be signs of the dam breaking, however. In his interview with NBC’s Lester Holt, President Biden politely pressed back on the tenor of the coverage of the debate.
PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN: Lester, look, why don’t you guys ever talk about the 18 — the 28 lies he told? Where — where are you on this? Why doesn’t the press ever talk about that? Twenty-eight times, it’s confirmed, he lied in that debate. I had a bad, bad night. I wasn’t feeling well at all. And — and I had been — without making — I screwed up. But —
LESTER HOLT: The re — I just ask the question because — the — the idea that you may or may not have seen what some of these other folks have seen. You’re not on the same —
PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN: I didn’t have to see it — I was there. (LAUGH) I didn’t have to see it. I was there. And by the way, seriously, you won’t answer the question, but why doesn’t the press talk about all the lies he told? I haven’t heard —
LESTER HOLT: Well, we —
PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN: — anything about that.
LESTER HOLT: We — we have reported many of the issues that came of that —
PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN: No you haven’t —
LESTER HOLT: — that debate.
PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN: No you haven’t.
LESTER HOLT: Well, we’ll provide you with them.
PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN: God love you.
Media “reporter” Brian Stelter, who has made clear that his role in the ecosystem is not as a reporter but as an advocate for the mainstream press, raised a fuss about the exchange on social media.
“Biden falsely claims that ‘the press’ hasn’t covered Trump’s lies,” he wrote.
But do you see the trick there? He converts Biden’s critique of the media’s post-debate coverage, which was all about Biden’s poor performance and not at all about the torrent of lies Trump told during the event, into another attack on Biden.
The press does not like criticism from the left. The left is supposed to just suck it up and take it and bow before them. Simply because the left side of the aisle does not share Trump’s position that the free press is the “enemy of the people,” that is supposed to be carte blanche for lies, unfair coverage, and agenda-based reporting against Democrats. Nonsense.
Biden was well within bounds to push back on the media’s reprehensible behavior and in fact he should have been more forceful. Because in this election — as in past elections — the Republican Party isn’t his only opposition.
The people who continually carry water for specious and debunked right-wing attacks, like the Swift Boat lies of 2004 or the Willie Horton smears of 1988 or the email faux scandal of 2016 are all the same people: The media.
The Republican Party and conservatives have a steadfast ally in the mainstream press that amplifies their bad faith attacks without context, who abdicate their roles as journalists or fact checkers to operate as stenographers for whatever dumb thing Republicans come up with. When George W. Bush and his team wanted to sell lies about weapons of mass destruction, they didn’t go to Fox News. The went to the New York Times.
Of course the press should investigate and press back on claims from Democrats, and when Democrats lie or massage the facts, the news media should take them to the rhetorical woodshed. That is their job. But for too long they have operated with two sets of standards for the two parties.
What is merely a faux pas by Ronald Reagan, George W. Bush and Trump is seized upon as a major crisis and scandal if the perpetrator is Barack Obama, Bill Clinton and Joe Biden (along with Al Gore, John Kerry and Hillary Clinton). This cannot continue to stand, not without some blowback.
We shouldn’t be here, but this is the world we are in. Democrats and liberals must integrate critiques of the press in their dialogue. It isn’t only Republicans and the right that they must contend with, but also the press that serves as the observers for the public at large. They have shown themselves to be supremely unreliable narrators and the consequences are too severe to just allow them to run rampant over our democracy.
Biden’s exchange is hopefully not just a temporary flash in the pan, but instead should be a pivot point. The media isn’t the enemy of the people, but they have not worked as the public’s ally or advocates either. They aren’t going to get any better so they will require fair, but firm and forceful, correction. So long as they choose to align themselves with the interests of one side over the needs of the shared public good, they have made this bed for themselves and let the chips fall where they may. (snip-a bit More)
Reblog Monday at the Movies
Reblog of Janet’s
Her own commentary is quite good.
HUFFPOST: The New GOP Platform Has An Alarming Agenda Item
The New GOP Platform Has An Alarming Agenda Item
Trump has endorsed a new party platform that tries to make a wildly unpopular idea more digestible to voters.
Read in HuffPost: https://apple.news/AH9mCVraoTr6e6s93tHk51A
Shared from Apple News
Best Wishes and Hugs,Scottie
I think the kids are all right
at least, Target stores believes it. I just saw a back to school ad for Target. A boy was explaining that if it isn’t sharks it isn’t for him. It struck me as a resistance statement, because the Don has no love for sharks. I wanted to mention it, because that gives me a great giggle on the first evening of the Republicans’s dratted convention. Back to school with sharks!
(I looked for it on YouTube, but probably it needs another day or two to be there. I’m sorry about that, but I knew I’d forget if I didn’t post now, right after I saw it. It’ll be around.)
Sharks for resistance! 🦈🦈🦈🦈🦈🦈
Florida is quietly denying transgender residents updated birth certificates
The rejection comes without public notice or new law — even when all other government-issued identification reflects their current gender identity.
Originally published by The 19th – republished per their instructions.
In the past year, Florida’s health department has declined to amend gender markers on birth certificates for both transgender adults and minors. Although the agency says it is basing denials on pre-existing state statutes, transgender Floridians had previously been able to update their birth certificates for at least a decade. Now, they face an opaque process that seems designed to reject all applicants.
Transgender Floridians have been denied updated birth certificates even when all of their other government-issued identification reflects their current gender identity. When applicants provided paperwork detailing clinical treatment for their gender transition and their legal name change,they were still denied.This is at odds with how the agency has handled this approval process for years — and is the latest example of Florida’s state agencies enacting anti-LGBTQ+ policies even when anti-LGBTQ+ laws fail to pass.
In 2023 and 2024, trans minors and adults who applied for amended birth certificates received denial letters from the state health agency’s Bureau of Vital Statistics. In those letters, reviewed by The 19th, thebureau says the paperwork that has long been accepted to update gender on birth certificates — like proof of clinical treatment and a legal name change — no longer works.
“Specifically, the documentary evidence does not establish that the sex identifier on the birth record contains a misstatement, error, or omission,” one denial letter from March 2024 reads.
The denial letters also offer conflicting requirements. One, from August 2023, states that for trans minors, “documentary evidence established prior to the child’s seventh birthday is required.” In another letter, the bureau says that trans adults trying to update their birth certificates must provide documentation “established prior to the registrant’s 18th birthday.” Many transgender adults did not know they were trans as children, or did not pursue gender-affirming care as children even if they did realize their identities — rendering either requirement difficult, if not impossible, to navigate.
Simone Chriss, an attorney with the Southern Legal Counsel in Florida and the director of the organization’s transgender rights initiative, has worked with around 80 clients who she says have all been denied updated birth certificates since last August. None of their appeals, including an administrative hearing overseen by Florida’s health agency, have worked. As a result, none of them have been able to update their birth certificates.
“Most are just being ignored,” Chriss said. “I’ve filed many. There’s at least five that I have pending at this moment that the department hasn’t responded to.”
The Florida Department of Health and its Bureau of Vital Statistics did not respond to requests for comment.
Republican lawmakers in Florida have repeatedly failed to pass legislation that aims to prevent transgender people from being able to obtain accurate birth certificates. This year, a proposed bill to require that state identification and licenses reflect Floridian’s sex assigned at birth failed to pass. Last year, a bill that would explicitly prohibit gender markers being changed on birth certificates also failed to pass. Despite the lack of legislation, Florida agencies have moved to enforce such restrictions on their own.
In January, the Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles told local officials that the state would no longer allow transgender people to update their driver’s license with their correct gender. That move was not prompted by any new law, and was simply based on a new agency policy. LGBTQ+ and legal experts believe the rule likely takes Florida out of compliance with federal law, which the state disputes.
Now, Florida’s Bureau of Vital Statistics within its health agency has reversed course on birth certificate updates, arguing that discrepancies between sex at birth and gender identity do not constitute a paperwork error in need of fixing.
Updating all of the necessary identity documents is costly. The name change fee in Florida is $400 andfingerprinting for the background check as part of that name change is $50. The requirement of a doctor’s letter for updating the gender marker on a birth certificate means paying out of pocket for a doctor’s visit or at least a copay. Then, there’s the $20 application fee to amend the birth certificate; applicants may also pay more if they opt for rush service.
For many transgender Floridians, the entire process appears to have ended on a brick wall, with no public notice that a policy change has taken place and no clear path to access accurate documentation. And the new policy appears to be based on a definition of sex that excludes transgender people — a change from what was put on the books less than a decade ago.
In 2018, Florida relaxed its conditions for updating gender markers on birth certificates following pressure from LGBTQ+ and legal advocacy groups. Until then, the state had required proof of sex reassignment surgery in order to change the gender marker — which at least twelve other states still do, according to the Movement Advancement Project. After 2018, Florida’s health agency began accepting letters from medical providers documenting clinical treatment for gender transition. This broadened the scope of who could apply for new documentation since some transgender people never pursue surgery.
Across the country, only five other states do not update gender markers on birth certificates. Many transgender people pursue this documentation as they legally change their name or update their gender on their driver’s license or Social Security card.
Without accurate personal documents that align with their gender expression and other forms of identification, trans people face harassment or discrimination when going about their daily lives, like when applying for a job or enrolling in a new school. The risk of being “outed” by an incorrect piece of paperwork can have dangerous consequences for trans people, especially in a state considered dangerous for LGBTQ+ people.
“Despite making, I think, very compelling arguments as to why the department is violating the rights of transgender people born in the state of Florida, they have come back with the same rationale over and over for denying it,” Chriss said. “Which is … ‘sex doesn’t change.’”
Right now, the best option for trans Floridians seeking an updated birth certificate is to update all of their other government-issued documents to reflect their gender identity, Chriss said. Passports, a primary identification document, can be used in most cases instead of state identification.
“It’s clear the only avenue or the only route to reversing or striking down this policy is using federal impact litigation, like we have in all the other areas where trans folks’ rights have been eroded in Florida. We are planning to challenge this in federal court as well,” she said.
Scottie's Playtime 