They plan to burn every molecule of carbon on Earth

NPR host Mary Louise Kelly talked to congressional reporter Barbara Sprunt about what happened when the Senate took up the impeachment of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. This was after two months of the House waiting for the right time to deliver the articles of impeachment. Short answer: The Senate rejected the articles and did so rather quickly. There will be no trial. Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said:

We felt very strongly that we had to set a precedent that impeachment should never be used to settle policy disagreements.

I heard from another source that Moscow Mitch essentially said he did not like setting a precedent that the Senate didn’t take the House articles of impeachment seriously. I’m with Chuck on this one. Ariana Figueroa of Michigan Advance wrote a much more detailed account of the proceedings. She included the series of votes and the Republicans attempts to force a trial or postpone the trial. It came down to Democrats approving Schumer’s point of order that neither article of impeachment actually contained an impeachable offense. All votes were along party lines, though Sen. Murkowski voted “present” for the first article. Pakalolo of the Daily Kos community reported that Jerome Powell, chairman of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, identified an important component that is keeping the Fed from meeting its 2% inflation target. That is insurance. The price of auto insurance is up 20.6% from a year ago and home insurance went up 11.3% in 2023. Pakalolo quoted UPI:

Experts attribute the escalating insurance premiums to various factors, including the impacts of climate change and rising prices for car parts. These factors drive up insurers’ costs, prompting them to pass on the expenses to consumers through higher premiums. As insurance costs continue to climb, they exert upward pressure on overall inflation rates, complicating the Federal Reserve’s efforts to manage monetary policy and stabilize prices.

Pakalolo then discussed how climate change is a big factor in making some regions of the country uninsurable. How might we protect Boston from sea level rise? A hotter climate means larger and stronger weather events, such as hurricanes, wildfires, gale-force storms, and flooding. There was the Bipartisan Infrastructure deal to help the nation prepare but that was a lot smaller than what is needed. On to a quote from Reinsurance News with data from Bloomberg Intelligence:

According to BI, global insured losses from natural disasters in 2023 are estimated at $118 billion, which is well above the 2017-21 average of $97 billion. The BI team also explained that more than 50% of the top 20 global reinsurers held or cut their natural-catastrophe exposure in the January 2023 renewals.

A reinsurer is an insurance company for insurance companies for the times when a payout for a storm is more than an insurance company can handle. All this comes to homeowners not being able to get insurance either because the costs have risen too high for their budget or too many companies have decided that a region (such as Florida) is too risky and have pulled out from doing business there.

To be clear, drastic sea level rise is baked in and will destroy coastal cities. Wildfires are baked in. Despite ignoring all the blinking red lights over the past decades, humanity will have to lie in the bed that we have made. There will be no do-over for the climate crisis. The best we can hope for is preventing the worst impacts, and that window is closing. Once a home is uninsurable, the owner can’t find a buyer to get a mortgage. The banks will want their money back, the little gals and guys will be on their own, and fossil fuel companies will not pay a dime to help. They plan to burn every molecule of carbon on Earth, and they know we will let them do it.

If a home can’t be insured it loses a great deal of value. Pakalolo discussed Acapulco, which was hit hard by hurricane Otis last October. Recovery and rebuilding has barely begun because of insurance problems. A lot of tourist accommodations are gone. The destruction has limited fumigation efforts and mosquitoes are spreading an outbreak of dengue fever. A quote from Rainforest Action Network:

Insurance companies are abruptly dropping customers, and premiums are doubling and tripling. Why? The cost of protecting customer from climate disaster has become too high. And yet, insurers continue to insure fossil fuels. Sit in that irony for a sec.

Kerry Eleveld of Kos discussed new polling by Civiqs. It didn’t ask which candidate was ahead, but asked what is motivating people to vote they way they intend. Would you be upset if the other candidate became president? That was a tie at 48%, so half of the electorate will be upset no matter who wins. Would you be very happy if your person won? Biden: 28% Nasty guy: 38% Would you be okay with him winning? (Is he at least better than the other guy?) Biden: 17% Nasty guy: 9% Are you extremely motivated to support your candidate? That was the case with 63% of voters. Biden: 62% Nasty guy: 78% Are you extremely motivated to vote against the rival candidate? Nearly 80% said that’s the case. Biden: 85% Nasty guy: 77%

This election is going to come down to which candidate voters simply can't stomach. And with third-party options available, the Biden campaign has to make the possibility of a Trump victory absolutely intolerable to a solid majority of voters.

In a pundit roundup for Kos Greg Dworkin quoted Jamelle Bouie of the New York Times:

The states’ rights case for determining abortion access — let the people decide — falters on the fact that in many states, the people cannot shape their legislature to their liking. Packed and split into districts designed to preserve Republican control, voters cannot actually dislodge anti-abortion Republican lawmakers. A pro-choice majority may exist, but only as a shadow: present but without substance in government.

Eric Tucker, Sarah Brumfield, and Lea Skene of the Associated Press reported on the latest about the Baltimore bridge collapse. The ship ran off course because it lost electrical power and the ship could not be steered or slowed. This report says there were signs of electrical problems before the ship left port. There is now an FBI investigation to go along with the inquiry of the National Transportation Safety Board. Another body was recovered. It was in a construction vehicle in the bridge wreckage. The family requested the name not be released. Three bodies are still missing. Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott announced legal action to hold responsible all entities accountable for the tragedy. The ship Dali is owned by Grace Ocean and managed by Synergy Marine Group. They filed a routine petition under US Maritime law to seek to limit their liability to the value of the vessel’s remains after an incident. Attorneys for the victims argued against the petition. If the ship’s electrical problems were fixed before it left port the accident and the deaths could have been prevented. Timothy Pratt, in an article for Capital and Main and posted on Kos, reported on “In Her Hands,” a pilot program in Atlanta to give 654 women an average of $850 a month for two years. It was a success. For Shamarra Woods it allowed her to pay off debt and afford child care. That allowed her to keep her job at a company that eventually promoted her.

Now a group of academics has completed a report on the first year of the two-year program. “In Her Hands” has had some initial success in paving a road out of poverty. The new data, when added to the results from dozens of other studies, has supporters of guaranteed income hopeful that policymakers will see the benefits of dedicating public funds to the idea, at the federal, state, or local level. One obstacle addressed by research findings, they note, is the longstanding narrative with roots in the Reagan-era “welfare queen” trope about poor people being “undeserving” of no-strings assistance. ... As with others researching guaranteed income, [Stephen] Roll [of Washington University of St. Louis] said findings continue to refute the belief that giving money to people in poverty will “allow people to not work, and stay home.” He said the studies show “the vast majority of people [receiving guaranteed income] don’t leave their jobs, and they use the money either to pursue their goals or to supply staples on the table.”

100,000 tons of mass doesn't "bump" anything

I’ve been thinking about the bridge collapse in Baltimore that happened a couple days ago. I didn’t say anything before because I thought it was well covered in the news. However, there are a couple things about it that have caught my interest. First, when the ship lost power and steering they told people on shore immediately. That gave police enough time to stop traffic, but alas not enough time to warn the repair crew on the bridge. That’s why there are six dead and not dozens to hundreds. I wouldn’t want to be in the cars on the bridge approach, stopped by police, then feel the shudder and watch the bridge I’m waiting to cross suddenly disappear. There would be a mix of emotions of annoyance that I’d now have to take the long way home along with extreme thankfulness that the police car blocked my way. The second thing of interest is the collapse. I watched the video and that bridge went down in ten seconds. That video is, I’m sure, available online. There are now lots of photos of the ship with bridge wreckage across its nose (as in the photo at the top of this post). I realized the ship didn’t bump the bridge support, it destroyed it. There is no bridge support in the photo. That’s why the roadway collapsed. RustyRobot of the Daily Kos community revels in big ships like the Dali that crashed into the bridge. There is a previous photo of the Dali at the top of his post with a lot fewer shipping containers than it has now. This post includes a lot of stats on the ship and a description of the engine, which is a huge thing. Emily LeCoz and Trevor Hughes of USA Today reported on tugboats used to get the big ships into port. Well, not so much anymore because many big ones have their own maneuvering engines. In this case the tugs pulled away before the ship lost power and could have prevented the collapse. The article also talks about the huge size of these ships. The earliest container ships, the ones from the 1980s, could hold 4,300 containers. Modern ones can hold five times that, the largest holding 24,346 containers. The Dali, as loaded now, is estimated to weigh 100,000 tons. That amount of mass hitting a bridge support is going to destroy that support. The ship is now likely snagged on the underwater remains of the support. Today’s news said that two more of the bridge repair crew were recovered from the water. They were inside their truck. Four are still missing and authorities believe they and their vehicle is tangled in the bridge wreckage and can’t be recovered until the wreckage can be pulled up. The next step is to get a crane on a barge beside the Dali and begin to unload it. One is to arrive tonight. Some of the containers contain hazardous materials. That first link above (repeated here) is to a pundit roundup for Kos by Chitown Kev. He adds the closure of the Baltimore harbor to other world wide shipping hassles – low water in the Panama Canal, reducing throughput, and Houthis attacking ships heading for the Suez Canal. Then Kev quoted an article about the conspiracy theories popping up around the bridge collapse and the long list of culprits conspiracists are trying to blame. Then on to... Charles Blow of the New York Times discussed the continued attack on black women even after the departure of President Gay. The attacks are led by Christopher Rufo, “a right-wing provocateur and instigator.” Blow wrote:

This is, after all, part of Rufo’s plan, having announced, “Game on,” after helping to push out Gay. The veracity of the complaints doesn’t matter; the reputational harm — to the accused and to the idea of inclusion — is the goal. The narrative here is about innate and pervasive inferiority, ineptitude and fraudulence by women and minorities, specifically Black women in this case. And it must be understood that the subtext, the inverse, of minority inferiority is therefore white supremacy.

Kev also quoted Ken Chitwood writing for Sojourner’s reporting that evangelicals are looking for their pastors to preach sermons on the politics of immigration. There are a lot of verses about being kind to the foreigner and the traveler. There are sites that have gathered those appropriate verses together (Kev has a link to list for the King James Bible). Anton Troianovski and Milana Mazaeva of the NYT wrote that Putin has another problem on his hands after the concert hall attack. Though Putin blames Ukraine (without evidence) the attackers were from the predominantly Muslim Central Asian country of Tajikistan. That is stoking lots of anti-migrant and anti-Muslim rhetoric online.

For Mr. Putin, the problem is magnified by the competing priorities of his war in Ukraine. Members of Muslim minority groups make up a significant share of the Russian soldiers fighting and dying. Migrants from Central Asia are providing much of the labor that keeps Russia’s economy running and its military supply chain humming. But many of the most fervent supporters of Mr. Putin’s invasion are Russian nationalists whose popular, pro-war blogs on the Telegram messaging app have brimmed with xenophobia in the days since the attack.

On to the cartoons in the comments. Clay Jones shows two elephants in a car falling from a broken bridge. One says, “If anyone asks... We voted for the infrastructure bill.” A cartoon from John Buss suggests a companion to the gold sneakers and nasty guy Bible is a nasty guy gold plated crucifix, which has his image instead of Jesus. One can supposedly find it at Trumpcrucifixation.com. One posted by Swankie Frankie shows the nasty guy in a prison yard with the caption “The wall that will ‘Make America Safe Again.’ ” I had written that I didn’t care who Robert F. Kennedy Jr. chose for his vice presidential candidate. I still don’t, though there are a couple things related to the choice that are worth mentioning. The first is by Mark Sumner of Kos. It seems Kennedy’s biggest criteria for his partner is that Nicole Shanahan is rich, as in billions rich. That’s important because a candidate can donate as much as they want from their personal funds, where other donors have limits. On the downside, she’s only 38 and she has no experience in government. Also, her billions, if she donates that much, won’t turn Kennedy into a winning candidate. He can only be a spoiler. The other thing was reported by Marisa Lagos of NPR. She played a clip from one of Shanahan’s speeches. One sentence sounds pretty good and has implied references to the tobacco industry and Big Oil’s reports on climate change.

We have to rid science of the corporate bias that contaminates it today.

Except the “corporate bias” she wants to eliminate is that vaccines are good. And...

LAGOS: “But by playing on people's doubts about institutions, she is sending a clear signal to those who already believe those conspiracies, says Yotam Ophir, a professor at the University at Buffalo who studies misinformation.” ... OPHIR: Conspiracy theorists always use a grain of truth, a kernel of truth, to kind of support their claims. That's what makes those stories so compelling. LAGOS: He says it's all part of a populist playbook in which people who already have power present themselves as outsiders who can fix things in order to gain more power.

Lagos also talked to Mike Madrid, who is a Republican Political Consultant (so keep some skepticism). Madrid said the national division isn’t so much right against left, but...

We have to start talking about establishment versus populism, outsiders versus insiders, people who are looking to just kind of break down institutions and use institutions as a target to say, this is what ails us.

And a populist could attract enough votes in swing states to swing the election. A while back, during a cold snap, I lamented my forsythia would not bloom. But the cold ended and today was sunny and pleasant – high about 50F (10C). And the forsythia has done all right. Not every one of the little blooms opened, but enough did that they look pretty decent. Here are a couple photos, first from my biggest shrub.

And from the shrub that I thought least likely to bloom this year.

Good enough! I now have my annual clouds of yellow out of most of my side and back windows. A few years ago I wrote (and I’m not digging up the post) that we should work hard to lessen the effects of climate change for the sake of chocolate. This half-minute report was on NPR this morning:

Good morning. I'm Debbie Elliott. Cocoa prices have hit all-time highs. Producers say poor crop yields in the face of climate change in West Africa, where 70% of the world's cocoa supply is grown, is to blame. Some chocolate makers are raising prices, while others are shrinking their candies. Even Easter can have a Grinch. It's MORNING EDITION.

Crumbling infrastructure is theft by white people

I finished the novel Shtum by Jem Lester. It wasn’t until the last sentence of the book that I got a glimpse of what the title means. Thankfully, the blurb on the back of the book says it is Yiddish for silence. The setting is London and story is narrated by Ben Jewell. He has a son Jonah who is ten and on the severe end of the autism spectrum – he doesn’t speak, still wears a nappy, and can get quite violent when his needs are not met the way he wants. There is also wife Emma and father Georg, who is Jewish and uses a few Yiddish words. The main issue in the book is how to set up the next step in appropriate education for Jonah. Two nearby schools, supposedly designed up for autistic kids, are clearly not able to meet Jonah’s needs. A third, much farther away, would be quite suitable, but much more expensive. But they don’t accept money from the parents (not that Ben could afford it). They money must come from Ben’s district government. And they have to be convinced the extra money is necessary. Lawsuits have to be filed. Emma tells Ben that the case will have a better chance if the family splits up and Ben files as a single father. So Ben and Jonah move in with Georg. There are a lot of scenes of Ben caring (or trying to) for Jonah. Georg helps too. At times Jonah can make that difficult – he can go from freshly bathed to needing an urgent bath in about the time it takes Ben to turn around. There is another important aspect of the story – Ben is an alcoholic. He treats most attempts at discussion as an attack. So for much of the book he isn’t an appealing character. By the end Ben realizes wordless Jonah is a much better communicator than the speaking adults. Much of the story is autobiographical (I doubt the alcoholism). Lester’s son Noah is also profoundly autistic and Lester had the same kind of battle for Noah’s education. I bought the book because it is compared to The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon, which I read and enjoyed several years ago. I also enjoyed the stage play based on it. That book is narrated by a mildly autistic teenager. This one is by the father of a profoundly autistic boy. I enjoyed it. Mark Sumner of Daily Kos gave an update on COVID. He hasn’t done this in a while. Studies, summarized in Nature show the virus came out of the Hunan “wet market” and not out of a lab. There are about 60K new cases a day in the country. Because of home testing that number is low. The average deaths per day has been hovering at 475 and has been stable for five months. Even a mild case can damage the heart, leading to medical problems and a burden on the health system later. There may be 10-19 million people with long COVID, about 3% to 6% of the population. And that number is growing. The pandemic is not over. Yet, mask requirements are being dropped. The good news is vaccines work and the updated vaccines geared to the latest variants are even better. Keep your boosters up to date. The latest prank by Ron DeathSantis is to go to Texas (because Florida doesn’t have the necessary bodies), lure migrants onto chartered planes, and land them in Martha’s Vineyard without telling the locals they are coming. The migrants are being well taken care of. (Perhaps gay and trans people might appreciate the flight out of a red state.) That gimmick prompted Bradley Moss, a national security lawyer, to tweet:

Since Texas and Florida no longer wish to handle their role as border states (whether by land or water), and instead wish to use migrants as political pawns, I guess we should stop spending billions of federal taxpayer dollars funding border fortifications in their states. I guess we can stop spending federal resource breaking up human smuggling operations in Texas, since they want to play politics.

At the end of August I wrote about the crumbling water system in Jackson, Mississippi. The system lost pressure because of a flood on the Pearl River. The system has been crumbling for a couple decades. Part of the problem is white flight. The other part of the problem, as I wrote at the time, is:

The Republican majority state legislature isn’t about to make things easier for a black majority city, even if it is the city where they have to come to work.

Last I heard the Jackson water system was back up to full pressure, but what came out of taps was quite brown. Michael Harriot, writing for The Grio adds some more facts. Jackson isn’t the poorest city in Mississippi. However, it has the highest percentage of black people. The other poor cities are majority white and their water systems are just fine. The legislature is in Republican control and is 71% white in a state that is 58% white. Jackson is 5.6% of the state’s population, yet generates 7.7% of the sales tax revenue (as of 2019). Sales tax is the states largest source of income. In 2022 the state had a $1.46 billion surplus. When Jackson applied for $42 million for infrastructure repairs – about 2% of what it contributes to the state – the legislature denied it. The city is getting back much less than it contributes to the state. The cities with water problems – Jackson, Flint, and Baltimore come to mind – are black majority. Water is a necessity that is being denied. Harriot calls this theft and welfare for white people.

We do not let other humans suffer alone

Michigan’s COVID data, based on numbers from yesterday, are bad. The peak in new cases per day in the past week is 9198. I think the peaks usually happen on Mondays because data doesn’t get reported on Sunday. This new peak is 48% higher than the 6191 new cases from seven days before. It is also 40% higher than the 6580 cases from three days before. This peak number is likely to be revised. And the revised number will still be bad. Even more troubling this past week’s peak is 10% higher than the peaks in April, at 8378, and in November a year ago, at 8337. The deaths per day in the week before last hit 60 and above three times. This is below the death per day of last April, though not by much. The data for this past week is still being gathered. All I hear from state officials is they are monitoring the situation very closely. No new mitigation measures are being considered at this time. Our government – state and federal – is failing us, beaten by Republicans. Kerry Eleveld of Daily Kos reported that Republican donors are furious at the Republican members who voted for the first big infrastructure bill. That’s 13 in the House and 19 in the Senate. Many of the members helped negotiate the deal. Wrote Eleveld:

Again, infrastructure is a bill supported by nearly two-thirds of the American people, but Republicans have become such a bona fide cult that making common cause with Democrats to benefit the country is grounds for expulsion.

Donors being furious means that members are getting death threats (though I can’t say the threats are coming from the donors).

Indeed, the House GOP campaign chief, Rep. Tom Emmer of Minnesota, simply shrugged off the death threats some of his colleagues have endured since they cast a vote for the bill. "Unfortunately, in the world we're in right now, we all get death threats, no matter what the issue is," Emmer told CNN this week. Get used to it, America. Death threats are the new norm, courtesy of the Grand Old Party.

I see no recognition (and, alas, didn’t expect any) from Emmer or anyone else in the Republican Party that their actions and those of the nasty guy has greatly increased the death threats against public officials. There is also no mention of how they might change what they’re doing to reduce the death threats. Perhaps they didn’t expect the threats to be made against themselves? The Build Back Better human infrastructure bill is on its way to the Senate. It includes money so that low income families can afford child care. Laura Clawson of Kos reported that religious child care providers are howling about being left out (as Republicans claim). Wrote Clawson:

So it’s not that religious child care providers couldn’t take federal subsidies under the Build Back Better proposal. It’s that they couldn’t do that while also discriminating against staff or families and their children for any reason attributed to faith.

Yeah, the important aspect of their faith they want to protect is the ability to discriminate. From a post last Monday Joan McCarter of Kos discussed Joe Manchin’s current objection to the Build Back Better bill is because it will contribute to inflation. McCarter pointed to several economists who dispute what Manchin is claiming. Then McCarter turned to that inflation. She quoted a Wall Street Journal report that some of the biggest corporations are making inflation happen on purpose. Since many consumers are now resigned to price rises these corporations are raising their prices by more than what would be necessary to cover their own rising costs. Nearly two thirds of US publicly traded corporations have fatter profit margins this year than they did in 2019. What is driving inflation is corporate greed. One way out of that is to raise taxes on corporations. Another is with the kinds of investments in the BBB. Kyle Rittenhouse is the 17 year old (at the time) who went to Kenosha, Wisconsin to help white people protect local businesses during protests following the death of a black person. He ended up killing two white men and wounding a third. As the jury at his trial started deliberating whether he was guilty of murder or some lesser charge, I thought he probably wouldn’t be convicted of murder, but surely there would be an appropriate lesser charge. He wasn’t old enough to buy the gun he was toting. I doubt he had been properly trained in its use, including the proper way to keep from shooting people. What was this kid doing with that gun? The jury announced he was acquitted of all charges, the murder charges and whatever the lesser ones were. I’ll let your look elsewhere for details. Instead, I’ll let Leah McElrath explore another side of the aftermath. In one thread she quoted Imani Perry:

This case is a reminder that throughout US history white people, who reject white supremacist thinking, have been subject to white supremacist violence.

And replied:

Here @imaniperry perfectly describes how rage against “race traitors” is part of the systemic dynamics of white supremacy.

Then she quoted Olayemi Olurin:

Verdicts like the Rittenhouse case are meant to discourage white people from being allies in the fight against racism. It’s how the system tells them if they choose to be an ally, they are in danger and won’t be protected. It’s meant to scare people into slowing the movement.

And replied:

Exactly, @msolurin. The system of white supremacy and those who are its foot soldiers target white people engaged in anti-racism purposefully to try to keep non-white people isolated.

A quote from Renée Graham:

Perhaps more white people will now recognize that white supremacy is an existential threat to their lives, too.

McElrath replied:

And even when it doesn’t threaten our lives, it robs us of our humanity to the extent that we invest ourselves in its defense.

And a quote from Hannah Drake:

And please know this verdict was a message to White people, White people that dare defend Black lives. This verdict was a message to you.

And replied:

This verdict was a judicial manifestation of the particular rage felt under white supremacy toward those perceived as “race traitors.”

In a second thread McElrath wrote:

We are feeling anger because we feel love for one another. Our challenge now is to act out of that love. Love is not just a feeling. Love is a verb. Acting from a place of love rather than hatred distinguishes antifascists from those we fight. This is a call to action: action from a place of shared humanity and solidarity rather than perceived superiority and divisiveness. Love as a verb is not sentimental. It is constant, fierce, protective, and—often—self-sacrificing. Why am I talking about love? Because things are going to get worse. Rooting our actions in love enables us to fight for a lifetime without becoming the abyss into which we stare. I am humbled to know many courageous people around the world who fight from a place of love and who have sacrificed for the greater good.

McElrath then linked to a thread by Linda Tirado. Here’s part of it:

But it all comes to this: When they warn us, when they tell us what they’ll do to us for what they consider betraying the race We have to laugh at them. Because they are Lilliputians and they know that they’re dying out and they are terrified of a level playing field. And if they do hurt you, which is a non-zero chance Wake up in the hospital and laugh at them some more because they failed again. The point, the whole entire point Is that we do not let other humans suffer alone. Not when we can stand with them and in front of them. Not when we could help shoulder the burden and the risk. Black lives matter, to borrow a phrase, and we with faith in humanity know that. It is important on days like today to stand and be counted. So that those who are threatened by white supremacy, those who have no choice but to fight or die, know that they do not face this alone. And so that those who would uphold white supremacy see white faces against them.

Politics of revenge are exactly what the base craves

Yesterday evening the House was getting ready to vote on the Build Back Better Bill – the human infrastructure bill. Then Republican leader Kevin McCarthy used his prerogative as head of his party to talk as long as he wanted. Mark Sumner of Daily Kos reported that turned out to be eight hours. When I heard that McCarthy spoke I thought there might be some phrase I could rebut in this here blog. But no go. Sumner explained:

The result was a speech where “rambling” would doesn’t begin to cover the incoherent and disconnected claims, stitched together by occasional arm waving and table-pounding designed to show that McCarthy is just as angry, vindictive, and nonsensical as Trump. As Rep. Jaime Raskin reported mid-way through this event, McCarthy managed to speak for over four hours without producing “a single memorable phrase, original insight, or even a joke.” And then he did it for four more hours. Which makes it even more … is there a word that means something is remarkable for being absolutely unremarkable?

So, no text to dissect. Instead, we can enjoy the tweets from Democratic members as they sat through it all, gathered together by Dfh1 of the Kos community. From Adam Schiff:

If you took the worst orator in the world Gave him the worst speech in the world And made him read it for the longest time in the world That would be a lot like listening to Kevin McCarthy tonight. Except, probably better.

Andrew Solender of Axios wrote about one quotable line and the reaction it got:

"Nobody elected Joe Biden to be FDR," McCarthy says in his floor speech. "I did!" one Democrat pipes up. "Me too!" says another.

That first Democrat has been identified as Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez. Sumner quoted Eddie Vale who noted that instead of Democrats passing the bill in the evening McCarthy’s performance meant it was passed the next morning “at a much better time for press coverage.” Frank Pedraza commented on the post by Dfh1:

Trump has ripped McCarthy’s spine and keeps it in his closet at Morgue-a-Lago. Kevin takes comfort in knowing that the former [guy] has his back.

Alas, McCarthy can demonstrate he’s a big bag of wind, yet remain a threat to the country and democracy. Laura Clawson of Kos discussed the censure of Rep. Paul Gosar, mentioned yesterday, and McCarthy’s response:

The fact that House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy not only opposed the censure of one of his members for blasting out a depiction, however fictional, of himself murdering a coworker and attacking the president of the United States, but threatened retribution against Democrats if and when Republicans take the majority in the House, shows the extent of the problem. McCarthy wasn’t just voting against the censure of his member—he was saying that the censure was so illegitimate as to justify him in planning, well ahead of time, to exact retribution against Democrats. “You censured our guy and removed him from committees for the murder-fantasy video, so we’re going to do the same to your members for … whatever.”

Kerry Eleveld of Kos added more:

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy made it exceedingly clear on Tuesday that he not only won't hold his caucus accountable for making violent threats against other members of Congress, but he will actively seek revenge against anyone who insists on the accountability he refuses to provide. ... But these GOP threats of retribution are all par for the course now. The party is effectively filled with a bunch of lawless gang members who foment violence, flout the law, and trample the Constitution, and when anyone threatens to rein them in, the GOP's knee-jerk responses are promises of revenge. ... The game is all about training their voters to believe they have been slighted and disrespected, that Democrats have committed an unforgivable abuse of power, and that Republicans will make them pay for it. That is the GOP platform, and Republicans keep running that play over and over again because their low-information voters aren't capable of seeing past it. In fact, the GOP's politics of revenge are exactly what the base craves—it's among their main reasons for living, breathing, and voting. ... But this is the kind of punitive and twisted leadership Republicans are promising as they eye a potential takeover of Congress next year. They are putting forward no policy solutions for the American people or aspirational bills they hope to enact. Instead what they’re offering is plain and simple: It is the politics of revenge. And that is very clearly exactly what GOP base voters want.

Greg Dworkin, in his pundit roundup for Kos, quoted Will Bunch of the Philadelphia Inquirer who discussed a scenario that might play out in the late winter of 2023:

There’s a climate of disbelief in the nation’s capitol as the GOP-dominated House of Representatives wraps up debate over the impeachment of Joseph Robinette Biden Jr., 46th president of the United States. It was little more than five months since the Republicans gained 43 House seats in the 2022 midterms, many in newly gerrymandered seats, and since the incoming chair of House Judiciary Committee, Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio, started studying a menu of equally off-the-wall options — Hunter Biden’s laptop, the Afghanistan withdrawal, or something unprecedented about the president’s mental acuity — for Biden impeachment hearings. In the end, Jordan and his colleagues — including the radical QAnon conspiracy theorists who’d replaced GOP moderates Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger — decided that the pretext didn’t even matter that much.

Dworkin also quoted Greg Sargent of the Washington Post:

In much of our discourse, Trump-backed GOP primary challenges to sitting Republicans tend to be cast mainly as retaliation for personal disloyalty to the former president. There’s something to that, but the full truth appears to be darker. What this really suggests is that large swaths of Republican voters appear to want to elect people to office who would have been willing to overturn the election on Trump’s behalf, and will be willing to overturn a loss in the future.

Leah McElrath tweeted a quote from an article in The Atlantic about the risk of bipartisanship undermining democracy:

“Biden’s…emphasis on his ability to cooperate with Republicans has stirred concerns…he is obscuring the threat mounting against democratic institutions…More Republicans appear to be radicalizing by the week and Biden is making the GOP seem normal.”

Rebekah Sager of Kos reported that just a few hours before Julius Jones was to be executed in Oklahoma, Governor Stitt commuted his sentence from death to life in prison without parole. That should have been clemency because there is evidence that Jones did not commit the murder for which he was convicted. I’ll let you wade into the details. One reason for mentioning this is to quote a tweet by Leah McEnrath. She quoted a tweet from Marc Lamont Hill:

And please believe that Governor Stitt knew he was going to commute the sentence yesterday. Still, he had Julius Jones undergo all the rituals and rites of execution. This is part of the cruelty and perversion of an immoral state with unmerited power to decide who lives and dies.

Then McElrath added:

Agree. Pushing the announcement until mere hours before execution was scheduled is purposeful cruelty. I’m grateful the decision was made, but the cruelty inherent in the timing and the inclusion of a denial of Jones’ rights to be considered for parole or pardon are undeniable.

Stella Levantesi and Giulio Corsi, writing for DeSmog discussed four major scare tactics climate deniers are using to stop climate action. These tactics were found through an analysis of 300,000 tweets posted since after the Paris climate summit in January 2016. Efforts used to be aimed at undermining the science. Now they’re aimed at attacking solutions, creating fear, and the usual misinformation to polarize people. 1. Doomsday scenarios, in which global economic systems are wrecked by climate change policies. Of course this obscures the global economic systems that are already being wrecked by climate change. These scenarios include the possibility of energy blackouts and shortages. 2. Claims that climate policies aren’t really about fixing the climate but about being a Trojan Horse that would turn America and the world into communist or socialist regimes. 3. Efforts to reduce the methane released by cows are interpreted to mean they will “take away America’s burgers” and force us all to be vegan, then reclaim all that unused pasture land and use it for low-income housing. 4. The full-on conspiracy theories, such as governments manipulating the weather. Learn about this strategy so you can neutralize it. Michael Harriot posted a long thread about Alabama having the deadliest prisons in America. They’re overcrowded, some of them five times capacity. There is a lot of violence between inmates (mostly black) and a lot more violence from the guards (mostly white). They’re terrible at protecting inmates from COVID. And they want to use $400 million of COVID relief money to build prisons – instead of releasing non-violent offenders or training guards, or spending the money on education or health care.

Will the Biden Administration give our money to a racist, corrupt, violent organization to LITERALLY continue slavery? Have you ever MET America?

Maggie Koerth, writing for The Fuller Project, told the story of Roberta Steele to explain why there is a shortage of people to drive school buses. The short version is the title: “Would You Manage 70 Children And a 15-Ton Vehicle for $18 An Hour?” Shortages existed before the pandemic, though are more severe now. The pay at $18 an hour seems decent (fast food workers are fighting for $15), but it is only four hours a day, nine months a year. And because of shortages drivers are covering more routes and not getting bathroom breaks. And some routes aren’t being covered, stressing parents in long lines of cars at schools. Marissa Higgins of Kos reported that Ronna Romney McDaniel, chair of the Republican National Committee announced an effort to recruit LGBTQ voters. The effort would be in partnership with Log Cabin Republicans, who are LGBTQ conservatives who try to be a part of a party that keeps kicking them. But McDaniel got a great deal of pushback and had to clarify the effort wasn’t about giving LGBTQ people a safe space in the party. Certainly not. She just wants their votes. Bill in Portland, Maine, in his Cheers and Jeers column for Kos, included a cool video on how the COVID vaccines work. This video was made by the Vaccine Makers Project. And in last Friday’s post Bill quoted some late night commentary:

Aaron Rodgers says he's an independent thinker who doesn’t want to be told what to do with his body. You ever notice how all the 'independent thinkers' are doing the exact same thing? “I'm an independent thinker—what are my thoughts, Joe Rogan?” —Trevor Noah

Walter Einenkel of Kos reported that Julia “Hurricane” Hawkins set a couple records at a track and field event. First, she set the world for the 100-meter dash for her age group. Second, she defined that age group as 105+. Her time was just under one minute, three seconds. Not as good as the forty second record she set at age 100.

Implicitly endorsing threats and acts of violence

This morning Michigan Radio host Doug Trabou talked to Elizabeth Hertel, head of Michigan’s Department of Health and Human Services. Michigan is now the national leader in new COVID cases per day at about 7000. So what is the government going to do about it? Trabou specifically said in previous high case rates Michigan went into lockdown – closed schools, stopped sports and indoor gatherings, mandate masks, and all those other things that were ordered back in March and April 2020. Are we going to mandate that now? Hertel didn’t directly answer, instead promoting (nor requiring) masks and saying it is good to be vaccinated. I was disappointed in the wimpy response. However, I don’t think Hertel is only to blame. Over the last 19 months the Republican controlled Michigan legislature, with the help of the state Supreme Court, has taken away the governor’s ability to call for and sustain actions to deal with a public health emergency. Hertel didn’t answer Trabou’s question because she wasn’t allowed to. One advantage of living in the Detroit area is being able to listen to Canadian radio. I prefer the CBC classical program in the early afternoon over the Detroit classical station. It also means I hear five minutes of Canadian news during those hours. Over the last few days that news has said a lot about the flooding in southern British Columbia. An “atmospheric river” dumped huge amounts of rain, causing mudslides and washing out roads and bridges. Because of the mountains in the area there are already many towns with just one road through them, a road that is now closed. That means no way to restock grocery stores. Railroads are also closed so no trains from Vancouver to the rest of Canada. Pakalolo of the Daily Kos community reported on the floods and included pictures. Pakalolo also included an explanation of an atmospheric river. This is a band of water vapor, maybe up to 300 miles wide, that acts like a pipe transporting moisture out of the tropics. The amount of water can be up to 15 times the flow rate of the Mississippi River. Over land it causes extreme rain or snow. This particular river’s moisture came from near Hawaii. Rivers from that area are known as a “Pineapple Express.” Climate change means these rivers are bigger and more often. The damage of this particular atmospheric river were made worse by last summer’s extreme heat dome (days of 120F) and fires that closed roads and railroads. Which meant the ground cover was gone, resulting in more and bigger mudslides. Some of the first news I heard about these floods were that a stretch of road was blocked by two mudslides and the people between them couldn’t go anywhere. Some of these towns will be isolated for a while. In many places roads being washed away means they’re gone – somewhere at the bottom of the valley. An opinion piece in last Sunday’s Detroit Free Press quoted a tweet from Robert Reich, a professor at Berkeley and a former Secretary of Labor. I didn’t find the article on the Freep, so I went looking for the tweet. Of course, I found several more of Reich’s tweets to quote. I’m starting with the tweet that prompted my hunt:

We do not have a “labor shortage." Here’s what we do have: -A living wage shortage -A child care shortage -A hazard pay shortage -A health care shortage

And the rest – One:

Reminder: The system enabled Elon Musk to rake in $36.2 billion in a single day last month. Don't buy into the myth that we can’t afford to invest in American families.

Two:

The ratio of CEO-to-worker pay was 21-to-1 in 1965 and 61-to-1 in 1989. Today it's 351-to-1. Talk about "inflation."

Three:

The real freeloaders in this country are the rich, not the poor. The United States literally has a yacht tax deduction.

Four:

If you oppose the biggest piece of anti-poverty legislation in decades, are you really pro-life?

New Progress responded with an image showing Universal Basic Income as much more muscular than anything else in reducing poverty. Another responded with George Carlin’s comments on being “pro-life.” I’ve posted this before (years ago) so I’ll only quote the end:

Conservatives want live babies so they can raise them up to be dead soldiers. They’re not “pro-life.” You know what they are? They’re anti-woman. Simple as it gets.

Back to Reich – Five.

Can someone please explain why @Sen_JoeManchin or anyone else worries about the bogus inflationary impact of the $1.75 trillion Build Back Better Act, which is fully paid for by the rich, and not about the real inflationary impact of $8 trillion in military spending?

More on that below. A week ago Rep. Paul Gosar of Arizona posted a video on social media depicting his fantasy of the murder of Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and attacking Biden. On Tuesday the House debated, then voted on a bill to censure Gosar and strip him of committee assignments. It passed 223-207, which got maybe two Republican votes. Brandi Buchman of Kos reported on the censure vote, including liveblogging the floor debate. Gosar claimed the video, now taken down, was a joke. Tom Cole (R-OK) said Gosar did nothing wrong because he did not “intend” for the video to foment violence. Maybe Gosar didn’t “intend” that outcome but there are enough rabid fans out there who would be glad to act on it whether Gosar intended that or not. That’s just one reason why the video is bad. Pelosi condemned Gosar. It is not acceptable to depict killing a colleague. Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy ranted against Democrats trying to destroy the institution of the House. Project much? AOC spoke after McCarthy. She condemned him for his inability to condemn Gosar. It is good Gosar was censured. But he wasn’t expelled. Even Gosar’s siblings called for his expulsion for his “sociopathic fantasies.” I got a fundraising email (from Robert Reich and Move On) that after the censure vote Gosar reposted the video. Leah McElrath tweeted:

Republican officials have—so far—relied primarily on stochastic terrorism to create the violence they desire. (Although there is evidence they’ve also engaged support like funding and Capitol tours…) Nonetheless, we would be naive to imagine that will always be the case. ... Today’s censure of Gosar was critically important and about far more than a single animated video. I am heartened @SpeakerPelosi took this action, and I am appreciative of all the lawmakers who are increasing their own risk by speaking out.

Then McElrath quoted a tweet from Sen. Mazie Hirono, who spoke out:

I never thought I’d see the day where almost the entire Republican party refused to condemn death threats against a member of Congress. They truly are the party of insurrectionists, rioters and vigilantes and believe the rule of law doesn't apply to them.

It is on this day of the censure that the nasty guy endorsed Gosar, though his race is not competitive. That prompted McElrath to respond:

Trump’s supporters understand what he means, and we need to acknowledge it as well: With this unnecessary action at this particular time, Trump is implicitly endorsing threats and acts of violence by Republican lawmakers against Democrats.

Laura Clawson of Kos reported two true things. Yes, inflation is real and high. Also, there is a lot of good economic stories the news media isn’t reporting.

You know what else hasn’t gotten that kind of prominent coverage? The federal minimum wage being stuck at $7.25 an hour for more than a decade. If you want something that will erode people’s buying power, that right there is a factor for millions. It’s not unreasonable for people to freak out about higher prices, especially combined with the stress of more than 18 months of a life-altering global pandemic, plus headlines about supply chain problems that could create scarcities and further raise prices. But when the media puts its thumb on the scale, breathlessly reporting about one set of problems while barely covering either other problems (the ones, like the minimum wage, that point directly to progressive policy solutions) or the good economic news that is also available and true right now, the media is responsible for creating or at least heightening people’s fears. ... We see it when media coverage of rising fossil fuel prices isn’t accompanied by reporting on the possible benefits of investment in green energy, or when media coverage of food prices doesn’t take into account how climate change is fueling droughts and/or floods that hit farming areas and make food more expensive. Inflation is both a reality and a story the media chooses to tell over other stories. It’s an easy story for them to tell. But “531,000 new jobs in October” is also an easy story. “Child poverty drops by 29% in one month thanks to expanded child tax credit” is an easy story. The media makes choices. It has to be accountable for them.

Clawson also reported that now that the bipartisan infrastructure bill has been signed, Republicans that voted against it are taking credit for it. One to do so is Rep. Gary Palmer of Alabama. He bragged about the funding that will be coming to the Birmingham Northern Beltline. A Palmer spokeswoman said he would have voted for it as a stand-alone bill, but didn’t vote for the waste in the total bill. Sure. What other member would have voted for the Birmingham Northern Beltline if the bill didn’t also have something for them? That’s why all these projects are put in one bill. Joan McCarter of Kos reported Biden, Harris, and others in his administration are on the road touting this infrastructure law and reminding citizens which party provided the majority of the votes. As for the companion bill for human infrastructure McCarter reported that Sen. Joe Manchin is still standing in the way. This time he’s worried about inflation, even though economists are saying it will lower inflation, not raise it. Republicans listening to Manchin are gleeful. Sen. Rick Scott of Florida declared the inflation issue “a gold mine.” Which prompted Chuck Schumer to tweet:

“A Gold Mine" That's how Senator Rick Scott talks about Americans struggling with rising costs Republicans don’t have solutions for families But they see political gold in exploiting their struggles We're working to pass Build Back Better to lower costs and support families

Not blogging for several days, then working to get out a big post yesterday, means I missed something important – I started writing this blog 14 years ago yesterday. In that time I’ve written 4759 posts (the count includes yesterday’s post). This is where I would add the count of different topic tags I’ve used. But I see Blogger doesn’t tell me that anymore. I can list the topics I’ve written about the most, though I wonder at times how accurate it is. The top topics, with the number of times I’ve used that tag, are: GOP (798) though it seems to have been at this number for a while Gay marriage / Marriage Equality (691), I changed tags after realizing the second is better Personal (414) the nasty guy (369) Gay Acceptance (295) Michigan (294), this has gone up a lot in the last two years. Fundamentalism (287) Supreme Court (285) Bigotry (259), there are a lot of related tags not counted here Corporate Takeover (258) Coronavirus (254), a tag that didn’t exist two years ago Racism (227) Rigged Elections (227), also a big rise in the last two years Conservatism (224) Authoritarian Rule (220) Barack Obama (217) Building Community (203)

Burnout is the remnant of a fire

My Sunday movie was Joe Bell. The movie is based on a true story. Joe Bell, played by Mark Wahlberg who was also one of the producers. is the father of Jaden, who is gay. Jaden endures bullying at school. While Joe accepts Jaden, Joe is still concerned with how that might look. He also has a bit of an anger problem. After a bad bullying incident and after it looks like a school official thinks Jaden is much of the problem, Joe decides he needs to walk across America from their home in Idaho and talk about bullying and its harmful effects to anyone who will listen. Scenes of the walk alternate with scenes of life at home before the walk. During the walk Joe talks to high schools and church groups. He has a brief encounter with a redneck in a diner. He visits a gay bar in Salt Lake City. He talks with a sheriff in eastern Colorado whose son is gay. Part of the story is Joe coming to terms with his relationship with Jaden. A non-professional review on IMDB said a film like this that discusses bullying is very much needed. Alas, this film isn’t very good at it. Part of this is because in front of a crowd, such as school assembly, Joe tends to not say very much beyond “bullying is bad.” He is much better talking to one or two people. Big Bird of Sesame Street tweeted that he got is COVID vaccine shot. Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas declared that it was “Government propaganda ... for your 5 year old!” Hunter of Daily Kos discussed all that. Cruz isn’t the first to declare Sesame Street is propaganda, though he has a high profile. Sesame Street isn’t the only children’s show targeted as propaganda (I remember the storm around Teletubbies). Big Bird advocated for vaccines back in 1972. And in 1978 Star Wars characters R2-D2 and C-3PO did too. The difference this time is Cruz and other Republicans are declaring vaccines to be bad. They didn’t do that in the 1970s. Have you looked at the propaganda Big Bird and the rest of Sesame Street are teaching kids? Hunter says that includes sharing, compassion, coping with intimidating situations (in ways not including having a fit), and learning letters and numbers.

Sesame Street has taken on subjects like death, like hunger, like homelessness—and it is all slanted, slanted maliciously against Republican lawmakers who have fought like hell to make sure death, hunger, and homelessness are meted out to whatever Americans might deserve such fates. Teach children about going hungry, and they'll grow up to support free school lunch programs. Teach children about homelessness, and they might treat their homeless peers with compassion and respect. ... Republicanism is devoted to pushing falsehoods and fictions out to their base for the sake of stoking whatever fears can be stoked. It is a movement that now rejects election results, rejects medicine, and rejects anything else that comes from “elites” whose expertise contradicts the stories fascist liars would prefer to tell. Big Bird may be taking on Republicanism’s most well-known leaders, but it’s not a fair fight. The bird has them outclassed by a wide margin.

Rebekah Sager of Kos documented the organizations, starting with the Koch group, that are promoting and funding opposition to Critical Race Theory.

These deep pocket groups used Virginia’s non-degreed Karens as the face of CRT (a curriculum that isn’t even taught in their kids’ schools) because these GOP-backed entities knew they could count on their PTA moms who’ve historically been there to fight the good fight against Black and brown people, and this was an issue they could quickly unite them around. ... The GOP has found its dupes again. This time it’s a bunch of racist suburban moms who are fighting a desperate battle against having little Johnny and Karen learn about their violent colonizer history in this nation. Of course, all of this is just smoke and mirrors; once again, the Republican party is using these people and their fear simply to gain power.

In the title for this post Sager says these billionaires who fund this anti-CRT campaign really don’t care about CRT. That may be true because their children won’t be going to these public schools. So, are these billionaires simply using the racism of their base to keep them enraged and engaged and themselves in power? Are these billionaires doing it because they are also racist and glad they can stir up their base to push for racist policies? I think it is both. Stirring up racism to gain and keep power is a supremacist action. Imposing racist policies is also supremacist. I strongly doubt racism isn’t in their thinking. Chitown Kev, in his pundit roundup for Kos, quoted Sudhakar Nuti of STAT.

It’s not like vaunted medical institutions like the one I’m working for don’t know about burnout. They devise all sorts of ways to reverse exhaustion, like free dinner for a week, listening sessions, or a thank-you-for-working-during-the-pandemic Patagonia jacket, imagining my life can be fixed with an opportunity for reflection and another fleece. There’s an underlying assumption in burnout discussions: that it can always be remedied with some notion of self-care. What’s never spoken is that burnout is the remnant of a fire. I’ve never seen a piece of charred wood and thought that some time by itself and some water will restore it to its former state. Burning can cause irreparable damage, and I haven’t heard anyone admit that about becoming burned out.

Joan McCarter of Kos reported the Service Employees International Union, one of North America’s largest – has announced support for expanding the Supreme Court to restore the court’s legitimacy. The reason for their stand is the members of the union “stand in the unique position of being the targets of a long-running, coordinated, and well-funded effort to strip them of their organizing and other rights via federal-court litigation.” Many of its members are also targets of new voter suppression laws. Bill in Portland, Maine, in his Cheers and Jeers column for Kos, included the top ten highlights of the recently passed (and soon signed) infrastructure bill. $110B to repair roads and bridges, $65B to get high-speed internet to everyone, funds to upgrade and expand public transportation with cleaner vehicles, $66B for Amtrak, $7.5B for electric vehicle chargers, $55B to upgrade water service and eliminate lead service lines, $65B to upgrade electric infrastructure, $50 for adding resilience to climate change and cyber attacks, $21B to clean up the environment, and $42B to modernize airports, ports, and waterways. Georgia Logothetis, in her pundit roundup for Kos, quoted Paul Krugman of the New York Times on why the nasty guy constantly declared infrastructure week, which never happened.

It wasn’t just incompetence, although that was part of it. The bigger story is that the modern Republican Party is constitutionally incapable — or maybe, given recent behavior, that should be unconstitutionally incapable — of investing in America’s future. And, sad to say, pro-corporate Democrats, whom we really should stop calling “centrists,” have some of the same problems.

The infrastructure bill and the Build Back Better (social infrastructure) bill are no longer linked. A procedural move in the House by what’s being called the Sabotage Squad forced a vote on one while delaying the other. This squad is made up of “centrist” Democrats (the term “squad” was first used to describe a few progressive Dems). This report from before the delinking is by McCarter. There is now fear that the sabotage will continue until there is nothing left of it. Kerry Eleveld of Kos reported an NBC News poll that showed in October 2020 84% of Republicans were confident that elections were counted accurately. That was about the same with Democrats. In October 2021 only 41% of Republicans were confident of an accurate tally. That’s a 43 point drop. There was a ten point drop among independents. The change in confidence among Democrats was not reported. Eleveld wrote:

Trump's success in stoking distrust of U.S. elections among his fervent base now poses a domestic terror threat to the country. Earlier this week, a PRRI poll found 30% of Republicans agreed with the idea that "true American patriots might have to resort to violence in order to save our country." The sentiment was particularly high among those who said they believed 2020 was "stolen" from Trump, with 39% of that cohort endorsing potential violence.

David Neiwert of Kos reported that before the election BuzzFeed compiled a list of 13 candidates for various levels of office around the country were present at the Capitol attack. Eight of them won their election. Their wins demonstrate the effectiveness of the conservative campaign of baldface gaslighting – such as claiming the mob were just tourists. The gaslighting campaign will continue. There will be 57 state and local officeholders who attended the attack and will be up for reelection in 2022. Marissa Higgins of Kos reported the Navy has christened a new ship, the USNS Harvey Milk. This is a tanker ship that will refuel aircraft carriers while the big ships are at sea. Yes, this is the Harvey Milk of San Francisco who pushed for LGBT rights, served in the city’s Board of Supervisors, and was murdered in 1978. Prior to that Milk was in the Navy. His career was cut short when his superiors noticed he hung out at a park frequented by gay men. He was given a less than honorable discharge. Higgins wrote:

The decision to name this ship after Milk actually dates back to 2016, when Ray Mabus (who at the time served as Navy secretary) declared that the six new oilers would be named in honor of civil rights advocates. Rep. John Lewis, Lucy Stone, Robert F. Kennedy, Earl Warren, and Sojourner Truth are the others.

Higgins also wrote about an intriguing election results. The seven member City Council of Salt Lake City now has four members who are LGBTQ. Two – Amy Fowler and Chris Wharton – won reelection. Two more – Darin Mano and Alejandro Puy – are new members. Mano is also the first LGBTQ Asian and Puy is the first LGBTQ Latin on the Council. This seems odd because Utah is so conservative. But SLC is a much more progressive place and the state is making progress. Higgins also reported that more than 80 LGBTQ candidates won last week. Once they are sworn in there will be over a thousand queer elected officials in the country. This is huge!

The nation can afford to take care of everyone

I downloaded Michigan’s COVID data on Saturday. In new cases per day the state hit 4990 This is the highest number of cases since June (peaks in April and November are above 8300). The CDC reports that cases across the country have been falling since early September, including in such hard hit states as Florida and Texas. Michigan is one of five states where cases are still rising (I don’t remember the other four and didn’t look for them). In contrast to previous surges in cases, this one has been a slow and steady rise over three and a half months. The peaks in deaths per day for the last five weeks (some of which have been adjusted) are 41, 47, 42, 42, and 33 (the last one likely to be adjusted). Joan McCarter of Daily Kos titled a post with “Biden’s Supreme Court commission proves to be the farce we all expected.” Her opening paragraph:

The “blue ribbon” commission appointed by President Joe Biden to study the problem of Republican court packing, particularly at the U.S. Supreme Court, has gone beyond being an ineffective and useless body (as most blue ribbon commissions usually are) to being downright dangerous. It released a draft report Thursday, ahead of a scheduled Friday meeting, full of Federalist Society narratives and Republican lies.

Since the commission was created in April the court has allowed the Texas abortion ban to go into effect, and blocked Biden’s extension of the eviction moratorium and his end of the “remain in Mexico” policy. They did this and more through the shadow docket where there is no formal argument and opinions are unsigned. In regular business they gutted the Voting Rights Act and made it harder to unionize. All that since the commission was created in April. Some of the things in the report: * Doubting that ideological balance should be a goal. * Justices aren’t partisan because they don’t always rule along partisan lines. * Saying that refusing to confirm Merrick Garland to the Supremes in Obama’s last year is standard practice. * Christine Blasey Ford’s sexual assault allegations against Brett Kavanaugh lacked “evidentiary support” (wrong – her testimony was evidence, besides the FBI botched its investigation of Kavanaugh). McCarter quoted a tweet by Southpaw, who quoted Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse’s statement on the commission’s report. Whitehouse said the report left out several things, some of which are: * During the last three nominations and confirmations the Federalist Society received enormous anonymous donations. * Anonymous checks, up to $17 million, funded advertising related to the confirmations. * There is a fast lane of cases of politically loaded cases that get to the Supremes through deliberate losses at lower courts. * There have been 80 cases with evident Republican donor interest and all 80 were won on a 5-4 vote (before Barrett joined the court). Much of Whitehouse’s complaints of the court are because of the power of the Federalist Society. So there is one thing Biden should do with this report: trash it. I listened to this week’s bonus episode of Gaslit Nation, the one I can listen to as a donor to Gaslit Nation on Patreon. I did not read the transcript of this week’s regular episode. I listened to the bonus because hosts Sarah Kendzior and Andrea Chalupa answer listener’s questions and I had asked a question (though I’m not sure how one goes about asking a question, so maybe they didn’t see the one I posed). My question wasn’t included. Before Kendzior got to the questions she discussed Merrick Garland. I didn’t take notes while I listened, so I won’t go into details. Here’s the general idea: Merrick Garland got the reputation of being a warrior against GOP because the GOP controlled Senate refused to consider him for the Supreme Court. But that reputation is not true. Garland was put in charge of the Department of Justice because he is a friend of the nation’s criminal elite and his job is to protect them. One of those friends is Jamie Gorelick. She’s been a friend since he was in college and she hired him as her assistant when she was deputy attorney general under Bill Clinton. She is also (as stated in the episode’s description)

an exemplar of the Big Law corruption we discuss so much on this show, that nexus where state corruption, organized crime, and corporate corruption meet under the protection of a broken system of lawyers and lobbyists.

Gay CA Democrat of the Kos community discussed (mostly quoted) a report by CNN about the cuts Sens. Manchin and Sinema are demanding be made to the $3.5t human infrastructure bill in Congress. First, Sinema was in a snit over a “breach of trust” because Pelosi didn’t call a vote by the end of September for the bipartisan infrastructure bill already passed by the Senate. Pelosi didn’t because there was also an agreement the two bills would be advanced together. Sinema is using this as an excuse for her bad behavior. On to the bill itself. Both Manchin and Sinema say it is too big. They want something below $1.9t. Then the article got into Manchin’s specifics. He doesn’t want Medicare to cover dental, vision, and hearing (and Bernie Sanders and other progressives say removing that coverage is a red line). He doesn’t like the enhanced paid family/medical leave. And ... Manchin, coal man that he is, rejected aggressive climate measures. He justified it saying Biden’s target of reducing emissions by 50% by 2030 won’t happen. Besides, he said, we’re in the midst of an energy crisis (no, we’re not, said those of us who lived through the energy crisis of the 1970s). Rebekah Sager of Kos reported that a new poll shows Sinema is loathed in her home state of Arizona. If she was running next year she would face an incredibly tough Democratic primary. Her current antics are putting her on a path out of office. Joan McCarter of Kos reported Manchin and Sinema, plus a few conservative Democrats in the House, are trying to force a choice between Medicare vision plans and extending Medicaid to twelve GOP states that refused to do so under the Affordable Care Act. McCarter, who noted that conservative Democrats again pit vulnerable communities against each other, wrote:

It’s an unnecessary trade-off. Because the nation can afford to take care of everyone, it should be the number-one principle of elected Democrats: no person left behind.

McCarter quoted Mark Pocal, who again made the point about how the cost of this bill is less than half of the Defense budget already approved. Rep Pramila Jayapal, head of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, which is holding firm, said:

A lot of people have asked: “Isn’t something better than nothing?” And the answer, quite simply, is no. Because when it comes down to something rather than nothing, it’s the same people who are forced to settle for nothing over and over and over again.

Meteor Blades, Kos staff emeritus writing the Climate Brief, wrote:

Without passage of a bill containing aggressive programs, Biden’s team is going to have a devil of a time in Glasgow at the climate summit persuading China, India, and Brazil that he can even deliver the U.S. pledges on emissions cuts, much less that their nations should do better than they are. ... It’s actually easier to respect a numbskull like Sen. James “Snowball” Inhofe, who wrote an entire book calling climate change a hoax and seems to truly believe it, than Manchin, who pretends he’s down with the science even as his bank account gets ever fatter feeding off the teat of the fossil fuel industry.

Some good climate news: Laura Clawson of Kos reported Interior Secretary Deb Haaland announced plans to have seven, maybe more, lease sales for offshore wind farms. The areas for lease will be along the East Coast, in the Gulf of Mexico, and off the coasts of California and Oregon. This is a step towards Biden’s pledge of 30 gigawatts of offshore wind by 2030. No movie tonight. I watched the Detroit Symphony Orchestra livestream last evening, then spent this afternoon teaching handbell techniques. So the two felt like my escape from daily stresses.

Blah, blah, blah

I had a nice day in Ann Arbor today. Beautiful weather too. The day included lunch with my friend and debate partner – the emphasis on friend today. Then I wen to the University of Michigan Museum of Art. Through all the decades I’ve lived in Southeast Michigan this is my first time to that museum. What drew me was the exhibit Oh, Honey, a Queer Reading of UMMA’s Collection. It will be there until February 20. A few months ago I saw a gay themed exhibit at the Flint Institute of Arts. The art was interesting but was annoying in how small it was, how few pieces of art. This one was ... smaller. So why are LGBTQ themed art exhibits so small? Also of interest was a room of Western art in which the racist past of several works was explored. For example, one painting is of the son of a wealthy English family. Yeah, rich people commission paintings of themselves and offspring. It is a way of declaring who they are. Towards the end of the description it explains his grandfather (or maybe father) got his wealth through the African slave trade. I got through the museum in about 75 minutes, though I didn’t read every explanatory sign. And I just glanced at the Asian pottery. Young Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg spoke at the Youth4Climate summit in Milan, Italy. It was a time for the youth to discuss the climate situation before the adults meet at the World Climate Summit and COP26 in Glasgow, Scotland in November. Business Insider quoted just a bit of Thunberg’s speech. The words from national leaders “sound great but so far have not led to action.” Then:

Build back better. Blah, blah, blah. Green economy. Blah blah blah. Net zero by 2050. Blah, blah, blah.

Amy Westervelt, an investigative journalist, tweeted a thread:

Periodic reminder that the window of opportunity for moderate solutions on climate was slammed shut in favor of oil company profits for 30 years and now all of the options are extreme. The only choice we have left is choosing radical change and thereby getting to shape it somewhat or waiting to see what extreme changes Mother Nature has in store. I meet people all the time who think we have more say than that, and that a comfortable path still exists. That not rocking the boat is still an option. Generally these folks are the ones who still value compromise and civility over survival. Truly sorry, but time to wake up. The other day someone asked me what the climate movement was going to do to appeal to moderates and I had to point out that actually all anyone did for decades was try to appeal to moderates and win over climate deniers and *gestures everywhere* perhaps time for a new thought?

Eric Holthaus, a Rebel Nerd of Meteorology, responded:

There is no separating justice from radical, transformative change in all aspects of society. They are the same. We are in a climate emergency even if everyone doesn't know it yet. Knowing this is what made Greta sail in a boat across the Atlantic. Knowing this is what's making millions of Gen Z young adults unable to imagine their own futures and unwilling to have kids. Knowing this (and apparently not caring) is why Biden is still OK'ing new oil drilling. You can't un-know something this profound. It will shape every part of your life, or it will slowly eat away at the back of your brain while you pretend everything is OK. That's life in 2021. Everything is not OK. We have to change the whole system. It's all connected.

From today’s news it sounds like Congress managed to pass a spending bill to keep the government functioning for perhaps another ten weeks. There’s still the debt ceiling to raise by mid October and Republicans are saying they will contribute no votes, even though they contributed about $8 trillion to the national debt while the nasty guy occupied the White House. Then there are those physical and human infrastructure bills to pass, the bills that have been in the news for several months. Kerry Eleveld of Daily Kos reported that a big holdup on the $3.5 trillion human infrastructure bill is Sen. Kyrsten Sinema. She refuses to support the existing bill but is also not negotiating. In negotiations one give a counter offer or at least explain what she doesn’t like in the package. And she refuses to say. It seems she wants the House to vote on the $1 trillion physical infrastructure bill already passed by the Senate. But progressives rightly fear that once that bill is approved support for the bigger bill will collapse. I’ve heard over the last few days a reminder they money from that $3.5 trillion bill is to be spent over ten years. That’s $350 billion a year. And that’s smaller than the annual defense budget. Nicholas Wu, who covers Congress for Politico, tweeted a photo of a couple of signs displayed by fans at a (Washington DC?) baseball game. The signs say:

Dems don’t f--- this up. Our lives are not a game. Pass 3.5T.

In another of Greg Dworkin’s pundit roundup for Kos with several good quotes, I’ll start with a quote from the first commenter, who goes by Learn and referred to the other Senate obstructor, Sen. Joe Manchin.

Basically Manchin is representing his personal interest in having power… if he agrees to anything, he loses it.

Dworkin quoted tweets from Asawin Suebsaeng:

anti- COVID vaccine rhetoric is killing GOP voters. But for Trump, other prominent Republicans, and Fox and other conservative media, it's a cash cow. So… good for them, I guess! "One Fox News insider…described the anti-COVID-mandate segments and vaccine-resistant commentary as 'great for ratings.’ Another…said the numbers clearly demonstrated…[this issue gets] 'our viewers more excited or engaged than’” virtually every other kind of segment these days.

Then a quoted tweet from Michael Knigge:

After a German election in which the lead switched among *3* parties & that ended w/ a narrow, upset victory for party widely deemed unlikely to win at the outset, no top candidate has questioned the legitimacy of the democratic process. Sounds trivial, but isn’t.

Then a quotes about the media. One from Mark Jacob who tweeted a thread:

I used to edit Page 1 stories for the Chicago Tribune, including many from Washington. In this thread, I explain why the media (including me) have been unintentionally complicit in the rise of fascism that threatens our democracy. Mainstream media have long tried to treat Republicans and Democrats equally. Some, like me, thought that was the way to be fair. In fact, it was the way to be lazy and not have to sort out the facts. Just quote a Democrat and quote a Republican and you’re done. When I edited political stories, I went so far as to count the quotes from Republicans and Democrats, thinking an equal number would make us fairer. I didn’t think I was helping either party. I thought I was helping the readers. I was wrong. ... The Republicans have overwhelmed the media with corruption. They’ve created scandal fatigue, prompting journalists to do something I call ethics norming. That’s when something that would have been a huge scandal in the recent past is considered normal now. The Republicans have pulled off quite a trick. If news is defined as something unusual happening, GOP corruption is not news because the party is so widely corrupt. Some media have turned off their outrage impulse and decided that corruption is normal.

And tweets from Greg Sargent:

Dems hoped to "shame" McConnell on the debt limit. Instead they're sputtering with limp outrage while Mitch gets "savvy" points from the media. Time to nix the debt limit in reconciliation. Force Republicans to be the ones howling with ineffectual outrage. I want to clarify something. Whatever the particular approach, what's important is the overall posture: One that sees the limitations of shaming Rs and recognizes that their bad faith gets rewarded by bothsides media coverage. Numerous procedural possibilities flow from this.

Dan Diamond tweeted an image and video of a particular protest. Peter Staley, Gregg Gonsalves, and James Krellenstein, veterans of HIV/AIDS protests, put a huge pile of fake skeletons in front of the house of Ron Klain, White House Chief of Staff. The pile looks to be twice the height of a man. They say the skeletons symbolize the deaths of people in other countries waiting for COVID vaccines while the Biden administration focuses on third doses for Americans. Commenters debated whether it is appropriate to protest at a government official’s house. In a tweet posted before the funding bill passed and a government shutdown still possible, Dan Price wrote:

Before the pandemic, there was 1 person worth $100 billion. Now there are 10. Before the pandemic, those 10 people were worth $650 billion. Now they are worth $1.4 trillion. And the Senate is ready to shut down the government and deny vital services to avoid taxing them at all.

Also before that bill passed, Ronald Brownstein responded to a New York Times tweet saying Republicans have warned they will block spending and debt ceiling bills in the Senate. Brownstein wrote:

Just to be clear, Senate Democrats & Biden are directly providing Republicans the hammer with which to batter the national & world economy through a debt default-by upholding the filibuster rule that allows McConnell to make this threat. It's the Dems' choice to empower the GOP.

Eleveld reported the dropping approval rating for the Supreme Court – 57% of Americans say the court has gotten “too partisan.” After quoting a few more numbers Eleveld added that such a number means it is time for serious discussions of court reforms.

Set it to a billion trillion quadrillion dollars and be done with it

I picked up my car today. A couple days ago I took it to a repair shop because the alternator wasn’t doing its thing. I took a day to decide I did want to repair it, even though the price was close to the value of the car. Then it took the shop two days to get a new alternator. Timing was getting tight because I had an afternoon doctor appointment I made two months ago and probably couldn’t reschedule for another two months. I was also out of time to call someone to give me a ride. Thankfully, the repair was done in plenty of time and the shop’s shuttle service was reasonably prompt. I got to the appointment in time. Then I went to the grocery. Because I didn’t have a car for three days I was beginning to run out of some foods. Hunter of Daily Kos discussed the debt limit. That’s the amount of money the government is allowed to borrow. Since Congress continually has deficit budgets (I believe the last surplus was in the late years of the Bill Clinton presidency), Congress keeps having to raise the debt limit, causing a fight each time. Which they must do again by mid October. As for this year’s game of chicken...

I'm not sure there's been any past Republican effort as lazily nihilistic as the one that's currently forming, however. The seemingly unanimous take of Senate Republicans, as guided by (of course) Sen. Mitch McConnell, is that the debt ceiling of course needs to be raised as rote responsibility of government—and that Republicans will absolutely block attempts all attempts to do so so that Democrats have to do it without them. It's not a "we must reduce the debt" stance. It's not an attempt to play chicken with the nation's credit rating or an attempt to shut down government this time around. The Republican position this time is that while this paperwork may be a necessary part of government, it's better for Republicans to not do that governing so they're just ... not going to. ... Republicans don't intend to use their position to negotiate anything. They just don't wanna do it so they're not going to. Instead, their plan is to make Democrats do all the governing, then run midterm campaigns blasting Democrats for doing it. CNN reports that McConnell's intent is to make Democrats "own" a newly raised debt ceiling by forcing them do it through unconventional means, after all but a handful of Republican senators wrote a letter declaring both that the nation "should not default on our debts under any circumstances" and that if "Democrats threaten a default" it will be their fault for not ramming it through despite Republican attempts to block it. ... So then, Democrats, just erase it. Don't just boost the cap to whatever number will put us in this same position 10 or so months from now; get rid of it. Set it to a billion trillion quadrillion dollars and be done with it. That also can be done in reconciliation, since Republicans are demanding the Democrats use reconciliation to address it, and will defuse this particular bomb so that Ted Freaking Cruz and friends cannot blackmail government every damn year in order to boost his fundraising numbers.

Kerry Eleveld of Kos reported on a new poll from Quinnipiac University. The poll showed a negative 37%-50% job approval rating of the Supreme Court. That’s the lowest approval rating for the court during the time this poll question has been asked, which started in 2004. It is also a steep drop from July 2020 when the rating was approval 52% to 37%. On Monday Eleveld reported the House Ways and Means committee released their tax plan. They say it will raise $2.9 trillion to almost pay for the $3.5 trillion Build Back Better plan it will be a part of. Other sources say the bill would raise about $2 trillion. Some of the provisions: * Partially roll back the 2017 corporate Republican tax giveaway. * An increase in taxes for those earning income over $400K * A surtax on those earning over $5 million. * An increase in the capital gains tax rate, though smaller than expected. * An increase in the minimum tax on overseas earnings. This will slow down the wealth gap, which is at levels not seen since just before the Great Depression. While the bill is a start many progressives say it doesn’t go far enough. The super rich can still pass their estate to heirs without taxes. Of course, Republicans claim it will hurt the working poor the most. Sure. On Tuesday Eleveld reported on what’s going on with that $3.5 trillion bill. There’s timing – the House is close to a self-imposed deadline while Sen. Joe Manchin complains the bill is being rushed. There’s the price – progressives and Pelosi are saying $3.5 trillion is the minimum while Manchin is saying that’s too much. And there’s the tax hikes, discussed before. Aldous Pennyfarthing of the Kos community wrote that MSNBC host Mehdi Hasan brought out a clip from eight months ago of Manchin saying the infrastructure bill might need to go as high as $4 trillion. At that time he was concerned the package might not be big enough. Pennyfarthing suggests what changed his mind is that the fossil fuel industry provided a generous lining for his pockets. Also on Tuesday Eleveld reported that the For The People Voting Rights Act has been tweaked a bit and is now the Freedom to Vote Act. The tweaking was done to please Manchin and a few other centrist Democrats, though is still robust enough that progressives will still support it. Pleasing Manchin is surely the point. He called it a “step in the right direction.” Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said that Manchin is now discussing the bill with Republican colleagues to see if he can get ten votes from them (a big surprise if he does). Eleveld listed the various components of the bill. It sets minimum standards in several areas – for 15 days of early voting, for vote by mail, for voter IDs. It also requires paper ballots, disclosure of dark money, and protection of election workers. I’m disappointed in one provision. It allows states to choose their method of redistricting, though it lays out federal mapmaking criteria that are enforceable in courts. I had hoped it would demand redistricting be done by independent citizen commissions as I helped make happen here in Michigan. The big question is whether Manchin’s investment in the bill and his inability to get ten Republicans will get him to support ending the filibuster. The independent redistricting commission in Michigan is hard at work creating new maps they’ll bring out for public comment over the next couple months. A few weeks ago the commission went before the state Supreme Court and said can we get an extension on our constitutionally mandated deadline? The court said no. The commission now just says we’re not going to make our deadline. That deadline is next week. They’re not done in time because the census data was late. Bill in Portland, Maine, in his Cheers and Jeers column for Kos, quoted late night commentary. Here’s one:

Being president isn’t a fun job right now. Climate change, murder hornets, and of course the relentlessly-maddening fact that Joe Biden has to ask people to take a life-saving vaccine. It's like if we're skydiving and he has to convince us to open our parachutes. —Jimmy Kimmel