Dont try this with your friends pic.twitter.com/JNtjjHgaSQ
— Fun Viral Vids đ (@Fun_Viral_Vids) March 30, 2023
- By now, everyone old enough to read, or watch, or hear, knows about the indictment.
tengrain at Mock Paper Scissors provides to readers a gift link, with free access bypassing the paywall, to a frequently updated Washington Post account of the legal process.
- Professor PZ Myers flowcharts the Trump indictment process with each step in each possible turn.
- driftglass speculates on the the coming booking with what the fingerprints might look like.
- In Letters from an American, noted historian Heather Cox Richardson puts the new Trump indictment into historical perspective.
Formally charging a president has never happened before. The popular media narrative is that we have entered uncharted waters.
Well, maybe not entirely unmapped.
Key historical path:
Mayors have been indicted and convicted. So have governors: in fact, four of the past ten Illinois governors have gone to prison. Vice presidents, too, have been charged with crimes…
- John Scalzi at Whatever points out that the current grand jury accusations are the most minor imaginable, considering the major Trump crimes that are common knowledge. He may escape all consequences of all criminality no matter how many indictments come down.
But we have to start somewhere, and we have finally started.
- Tommy Christopher reports on the expert reaction of veteran reporter Maggie Haberman: the indictment and coming arrest, with processing and fingerprinting, all have joined to become much more frightening for mr Trump than is generally reported.
Key quote:
This is somebody who has spent more than four decades trying to avoid being arrested or being indicted. And so this is a really scary moment for him, despite whatever he says.
- Wisconsin conservative James Wigderson has a suggestion about what we should see as unAmerican:
And… we're going to the Jew-bashing card now. You know what's really un-American? Putting a political figure above the law. https://t.co/GAcFwSU51N
— James Wigderson (@jwigderson) March 31, 2023
- Will legal charges against Trump actually make him a martyr?
In News Corpse, Jon Stewart eviscerates the martyr argument with a quick bit of sarcasm.
- At The Onion, conservatives explain their reaction as Trump’s indictment is confirmed.
- Disaffected and it Feels So Good says the impending Trump arrest is positive news for at least two Republicans.
- Polls show Trump surging and DeSantis falling among Republicans, right? The Palmer Report crunches the numbers and comes up with a more complete conclusion: DeSantis is weaker than a weak and weakening Trump.
- At Scotties Playtime, it looks like a big win for Disney after Ron DeSantis picks a fight with Mickey Mouse.
- Kevin Drum has one reservation. A non-trivial possibility.
- Reacting to next week’s prospective arrest of mr Trump, Julian Sanchez has his own modest suggestion, despite a moral reservation.
Iâd be morally annoyed that he evaded dying in prison, but âTrump flees to Venezuelaâ may be the best outcome for America. https://t.co/M00HOFmtbU
— @normative@mastodon.social (@normative) March 31, 2023
- The polling was done earlier in the week, before news broke of the actual indictment. Ted McLaughlin at jobsanger has the numbers. 98% of Americans had already made up their minds about mr Trump.
- Vixen Strangely, at Strangely Blogged, watches mr Trump’s Waco rally that became a mini‑rally, pays attention to the speech, and concludes that the massive‑evil‑to‑be‑feared has withered to a shriveled sort of evil. The movement has spiraled into a constricted scale model of its former bitter self. Still dangerous, but diminished.
Key description:
The power of the movement is in things like the sneaky little white powder envelope with a death threat left for Alvin Bragg, and scores of telephonic death threats and associated stupid angry shenanigans. What sad lives these people have that this is how they express themselves.
- Green Eagle is amazed at the deterioration of Republican public truthfulness, as evidenced by Republican leaders insisting on their 5th Amendment rights. The large green bird has a suggestion.
- Andy Borowitz reports as Tucker Carlson submits a doctor’s note claiming he would be unable to raise his right hand in court.
Key satiric orthopedic excuse:
Any attempt to raise said hand would result in excruciating, unbearable pain
- CalicoJack in The Psy of Life goes issue by issue to demonstrate that the MAGA movement represents the OPPOSITE of Follow‑the‑Leader politics.
- A critic of Dave Dubya takes a swing at defining Wokeness as a group who follow Karl Marx. Dave takes a swing at those who think like his critic.
Key observation:
Everything the radical Right hates is âwokeâ âCRTâ or âMarxismâ because they will ALWAYS unilaterally redefine anything they hate as âwokeâ âCRTâ and âMarxismâ.
- The continuous destruction generated by school shootings brings to my mind the words of a grieving child in Nashville:
The Tennessean: Evelyn Dieckhaus was a third grader at Covenant. Her older sister, a fifth grader, had plans to be baptized in a couple of weeks. Evelynâs sister cried as she said, âI donât want to be an only child.âhttps://t.co/ca2zPBesRM
— Kaitlan Collins (@kaitlancollins) March 28, 2023
But Hackwhackers points out that there are even more victims than those children injured or killed and their grieving families, illustrated by what is becoming an iconic photo from Nashville: a face in a school bus window. - Broadway actor PJ Adzima knows what it takes to stop a bad guy with a gun:
- Our favorite Earth-Bound Misfit makes the case that guns don’t kill people, gun magazines kill people. No, it is not a silly argument.
Key conclusion:
For slaughtering lots of people, it’s not the rifle. It’s not the cartridge. It’s the magazines, which allow for shooting lots of rounds without having to reload. But good luck with doing anything about them. There are probably a hundred million of them out there, if not more.
- Dave Columbo conducts his own Congressional investigation into TikTok:
- Infidel753 celebrates Ukrainian victories, but cannot celebrate Russian deaths. Hard for me to disagree.
Key conclusion:
The Ukrainians must strive to kill as many Russian soldiers as possible, just as they strive to destroy weapons and equipment. They are in a position where they have no alternative. It is part of the horror of war. But most of the dead Russian soldiers in Ukraine, like the Ukrainians they have been made to kill, are innocent victims of Putin’s monstrous criminality and arrogance.
- At The Moderate Voice, retired U.S. Air Force Major and former aerospace/defense executive, Dorian de Wind focuses on the current crisis in Israel. It is as serious as the Yom Kippur war, when Prime Minister Golda Meir guided the nation through a coordinated attack in 1973 from surrounding countries. The difference now is that the danger comes from within, the current Prime Minister, and Bibi Netanyahu is no Golda Meir.
- In The Life and Times of Bruce Gerencser, Bruce explores the remarkable differences as Christian groups regard rules from the Old Testament.
- Nan’s Notebook has questions for readers about varying religious concepts of human souls.
- I have had difficulty with this even before I became a Christian.
North Carolina pastor John Pavlovitz makes the emotional case for applying forgiveness to ourselves.
Key guidance:
Donât let the you in this moment crucify your former self for what that person did or failed to do. Youâve now had time and distance that version of you simply didnât have.
- Sarah Cooper has written a book:
FOOLISH: Tales of Assimilation, Determination, and Humiliation coming this October!! Read more and preorder here: https://t.co/xjnr865ocp pic.twitter.com/ThmRocCm1c
— Sarah Cooper (@sarahcpr) March 30, 2023
- The Strategic Studies Book Club examines A History of Warfare by the late historian John Keegan. Keegan rejects, at least in part, the Clausewitz formula that war is politics by other means. He proposes that war is more a product of culture.
- In Happiness Between Tails da-AL hosts German author Valeska RĂ©on who has completed a work of historical fiction about a real French duchess during the strange reign of Charles VIII. The synopsis is entertaining and informative, but the accompanying video, in German, is especially worth a listen for the background music, especially composed for the book.
- The Journal of Improbable Research warns about misleading titles, with research that is definitely not a Dahmer menu guide for American cannibals.
- Legal analyst Imani Gandy also has other abilities:
Iâve got skills. Green thumb skills. Baking skills. Talking real loud skills. Iâm good with a shovel, I can dig holes, and I am discrete. Wait what were we talking about
— đ€đŸ Imani Gandy đđŸ (@AngryBlackLady) March 28, 2023
- YellowDog Granny has insights into exercise, attitude, self‑image, and life on the highway.
- @whiskeywhistle98 has trouble paying attention (I can relate):
- Clickbait satirist Reductress has valuable advice for any new parent: how to bond with your newborn even though you don’t watch the same shows.
- If you are pathologically happy, with joy interfering with your life: M. Bouffant at Web of Evil is ready to help with a day‑by‑day preview of the week ahead.
- SilverAppleQueen watches an old episode of Perry Mason while hanging out with her cat.
– Podcasts –
tx again for linking my site here & your kind words. sadness doesn’t cover the school slayings – always kid upon kid…