It takes courage to be a kind person not age. This is beautiful 😭❤️❤️ pic.twitter.com/VAAeBEC9U3
— 💪🎭..Rai ji..💪🎭 (@Vinod_r108) January 15, 2024
- Frances Langum watches Fox hosts perform twist dancing to avoid talking about the Biden economy.
- CalicoJack in The Psy of Life looks at polling crosstabs and figures out which subset of voters are most likely to throw the election to Trump by abandoning Biden for Kennedy.
- The Palmer Report nominates Tuesday, February 6 as the day that destroyed Donald Trump.
- tengrain at Mock Paper Scissors sees the coming Colorado decision as SCOTUS trying to rise the South again.
My thought:
- From the great Andy Borowitz:
- So the Trump immunity appeal gets a decision.
mr Trump’s basic point is that future Presidents will be inhibited by the fear that any renegade local prosecutor can bring charges for any old thing after a term ends.
The Appeals panel says nope.
At The Moderate Voice Joe Gandleman takes a close look at the reasoning in the immunity decision, and online reactions
Key reaction/quote:My favorite part was this:
“It would be a striking paradox if the President, who alone is vested with the constitutional duty to ‘take care that the laws be faithfully executed,’ were the sole officer capable of defying those laws with impunity.”
Game Set. Match.
— Gen Michael Hayden (@GenMhayden) February 6, 2024
- A-a-a-a-nd Trump immunity goes to SCOTUS.
Dave Dubya also looks at the logic of the appeals panel ruling on Trump immunity, and hazards an informed guess on how the Supreme Court will handle it.
- Cato’s Julian Sanchez, posting on Threads, is hopeful about a Supreme Court ruling:
- Tommy Christopher brings us part of an interview with a former Trump attorney. The immunity Appeals panel verdict has to irritate mr Trump, but he will especially take personal offense that they referred to him as a citizen.
Key quote from attorney Tim Parlatore
I mean, I think that he’s probably taking it more personally, particularly the parts about citizen Trump. I think that he’s probably more concentrating on that.
- Vixen Strangely at Strangely Blogged looks into the overarching Trump claim of presidential immunity for what laws he broke, his claims that he broke no laws, his claims that he was not responsible for the insurrection, his claim that there was no insurrection, and Republican squirms and wiggles as they struggle to make it all true.
- Green Eagle is hopeful that mr Trump’s crimes will catch up with him at the ballot box, but is dismayed that a near majority of voters are unaware he has even been indicted.
Key fault line:
As I have said for years, Democrats could crush the Republican party into oblivion without hardly trying; what they cannot do is crush the Republicans and the press working together.
- Our favorite Earth-Bound Misfit finds it hard to believe a MAGA conspiracy theory involving an FBI plot against mr Trump, considering stunning FBI ineptitude during the search for stolen documents at Mar‑A‑Lago.
- In Letters from an American, historian Heather Cox Richardson finds another disturbing pattern within the disturbing pattern of Republican meltdowns. Members of Congress are now deciding what laws to support on the basis of threats.
Key method behind the madness:
Trump’s actions are not those designed to win an election by getting a majority of the votes. They are the tools someone who cannot win a majority uses to seize power.
- The Onion compiles the most convincing Taylor Swift conspiracy theories.
- Iron Knee at Political Irony views the new anti‑Trumper Republican ad attacking Republicans on border security.
- Master of Rant Max’s Dad analyzes, as only he can, the lost Republican border bill opposed by the Republicans who support it.
- driftglass makes the obvious point: Texas Governor Greg Abbott is a self‑described Christian who works hard to wrap migrant kids in razor wire with the aim of drowning them.
- M. Bouffant at Web of Evil finds radio crime going to a new high as thieves, in the darkness of night, manage to steal a 200 foot high broadcasting tower.
- PZ Myers already has a low opinion of columnist Thomas Friedman, which is not elevated as Friedman compares the populations of Lebanon, Yemen, Syria and Iraq to wasp‑infected caterpillars requiring fiery extermination.
- Ted McLaughlin at jobsanger brings an obvious thought from Jennifer Rubin: change the Gaza players – pretty much all of them.
- News Corpse has Tucker Carlson in Moscow to kiss up to Vlad Putin.
- Disaffected and it Feels So Good has the quotes. You’ll never guess who wants to steal your Social Security.
Aw shoot. You guessed!
- One characteristic shared by many extremists is the inability to detect ideological distinctions. Everything is painted in primary colors.
Since all government action is coercive, libertarians see regulation, taxes, sidewalks, driving tests, and air safety requirements as nothing more than steps to soviet style dictatorship.
Libertarian Michael A. LaFerrara is bewildered by an advocate for summer meals for children in poverty, because she is also against abortion bans. After all, you can’t be pro‑rights and anti‑rights simultaneously.
Key broader point:
But the broader point here is a moral one: To be a principled individual rights advocate (individual rights properly understood), one must be against the welfare state and in favor of legalization of abortion.
My translation:
The world being entirely binary, those who favor reproductive choice are still unprincipled advocates of tyranny, if they also want government funded lunches for little kids.
- The Pennsylvania Supreme Court issued a sort of Schrödinger’s ruling. They can’t find a right to an abortion in the state constitution, but they might detect that right in Medicaid coverage.
Imani Gandy and Jessica Mason Pieklo of Rewire News Group go to podcast mic and consider what the hell exactly happened for abortion in Pennsylvania.
They also graciously make available a complete transcript in pdf form.
- North Carolina pastor John Pavlovitz is skeptical of both‑sides arguments, and points to Republicans here in Missouri.
But both parties are the same… https://t.co/ILFHRgNHQj
— John Pavlovitz (@johnpavlovitz) February 8, 2024
- Wisconsin conservative James Wigderson questions a common assertion by Christian nationalists:
What if we discover God is indifferent to our rights? https://t.co/OJAPQRKkE1
— James Wigderson (@jwigderson) February 4, 2024
Then walks it further:I'll even take us a step further. I would take more seriously the claim that we only have our rights because of God if so many didn't consider themselves the Agents of God when they attempt to strip us of our rights.
— James Wigderson (@jwigderson) February 4, 2024
- In Nan’s Notebook, she wonders why atheists preface so many arguments with the “if” clause.
Key clause:
“If there is a god …” or “If God exists …”
Note: The comments are great!
- Vincent at A Wayfarer’s Notes bakes a mince pie, thinks about a few authors, contemplates eccentricity and mediocrity, and comes to a self‑discovery.
- SilverAppleQueen brings us a poignant memory of a 5 year old’s hopeful anticipation of school bus life.
- She doesn’t channel only Trump. Not anymore.
The amazing Sarah Cooper becomes Jeff Bezos back in triumph from orbiting in company made spacecraft New Shepard, conducting an enthusiastic, and hilariously boring, astronaut interview:
- In Happiness Between Tails, the ever generous da‑AL guest hosts author Dawn Pisturino, who finally got published after studying children’s horror fiction.
- Okay, I’m just a boomer, not much into the Marvel world. But this was a fun review. Great to read.
Seems Captain Marvel was a box office hit and, four years later, The Marvels was meh.
Sci-Fi author John Scalzi goes all pluribus on the reasons (There are so, so many, says he), but does settle on one. There are too many cross references to other films, television, and written works. To understand what’s going on, there is too much preparatory homework.
Key disappointment:
With great franchise power comes great franchise responsibility.
- Dave Columbo has FINALLY had it with polls ‑ ‑ ‑ on Yoda:
- Ever wonder if winged Dinosaurs might have scared away insects when they flapped? The Journal of Improbable Research brings us a group of scholars from South Korea who built a dino‑robot to find out.
- Mark Waulberg (No, not Mark Wahlberg, the other Mark) gets sarcastic with a pizza delivery guy:
- Clickbait satirist Reductress has a disquieting way of asking how you like your coffee.
- @whiskeywhistle98 has a hard time balancing her job against her real passion:
- Infidel753 overcomes computer glitches enough to discover some truly captivating images.
- In Georgia baseball, forget the brushback. The Savanna Bananas intimidate the batter with an unusual threat.
- Scotties Playtime leads by example, as Scottie shows us how Ron and he feed their cats, and feed, and feed, and feed their cats.
sleeping! yes – why didn’t I think of that? also, I hate how ballots don’t just show all candidates, not just those from the party one is registered as…