Constructive Action: Make It Rain [UPDATE-1]

/196 Comments/in , /by

[NB: check the byline, thanks. Updates will appear at the bottom of this post. /~Rayne]

For more than a year news media have indulged in conventional wisdom about a mid-term election, insisting that the president’s party will lose seats in Congress.

Never mind 2018’s blue wave, though — a tsunami during which Democrats took control of the House by 40 seats.

News media have interspersed this with their easy go-to, the time-worn “Dems in Disarray” bullshit, refusing to frame the lack of traction on Biden agenda legislation as continuing obstruction by the GOP which retains a stranglehold on half the Senate.

Never mind the deliberate and overt GOP obstruction throughout Obama’s two terms in office, or the votes of GOP’s congressional caucus to obstruct the certification of 2020 election after a GOP president whipped up an insurrection under news media’s gaze.

Don’t readily accept news media’s positioning on Congress going into the mid-term elections, the same media which lost its way during Trump-Bannon flood-the-zone-with-shit era.

We can make our own flood. We can make it rain.

~ ~ ~

That nasty Floridian GOP hairpiece with a mouth, Matt Gaetz (FL-1), decided to puff up his ego and stir up shit by bullying a Latinx teen from Texas, Olivia Julianna.

He implied only unattractive women are concerned about reproductive rights.

He had absolutely no fucking idea what kind of wasp nest he stuck his puny dick in.


She went after him as he continued his bullying.


She didn’t back down.


Olivia began fundraising for reproductive health care.


She even thanked the Florida Man.


State and national media interviewed her, and fundraising snowballed.

Until this evening’s benchmark:

This 19-year-old GenZ for Change activist didn’t take crap from obnoxious Matt Gaetz lying down. She tore after him using her heightened media profile to raise money for a cause she believes in.

Olivia Julianna made it rain. You can help her make it rain, too. Piss all over Gaetz’s parade.

~ ~ ~

Speaking of piss, the GOP Senate caucus decided to urinate on veterans and their health care needs:


They didn’t just block the Promise to Address Comprehensive Toxics Act (PACT Act), they celebrated it.


Satirist-entertainer Jon Stewart was infuriated.


Stewart’s rage might make it rain.

But I know you can make it rain by supporting VoteVets’ endorsed candidates.

~ ~ ~

Pennsylvania is a good news/bad news story.

The good news: a new poll shows PA Senate Democratic candidate Lt. Gov. John Fetterman kicking carpetbagging Republican candidate Mehmet Oz in the ass.

The bad news: three Pennsylvania counties — Berks, Fayette and Lancaster — are still screwing with primary election results, setting a negative tone ahead of the mid-term elections. A court hearing began Thursday, documented in this Twitter thread:


All three counties are strong/solid GOP. The congressional districts they’re in — PA-09, PA-11, PA-14 — have been tweaked slightly during redistricting since the state lost a House seat.

One of these districts, though, has NO Democratic candidate running:

PA-09
Dan Meuser (Incumbent) (GOP)
Amanda Waldman (Dem) — grossly underfunded

PA-11
Lloyd Smucker (Incumbent) (GOP)
Robert Hollister (Dem) — also grossly underfunded

PA-14
Guy Reschenthaler (Incumbent) (GOP)
No candidates filed for the Democratic Party primary

It not only makes zero sense why Berks, Fayette and Lancaster counties are refusing to certify their primary elections, but no sense why the Democratic Party hasn’t provided more funding to the Democrats in PA-09 and PA-11, and why there’s no Democratic candidate in PA-14

Furthermore, it makes no goddamned sense why the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee is throwing money at a MAGA GOP candidate in Michigan’s MI-03 Grand Rapids area district, while there’s inadequate funding and no candidate in three of Pennsylvania’s House races while Fetterman may help all down ticket races in what looks to be a mounting wave election.

Somebody make it rain for Amanda Waldman and Robert Hollister in PA-09 and PA-11. Force the GOP incumbents to work for their seats since they’re not doing much else for Pennsylvanians.

Make it rain in PA-14 by recruiting a Democrat for write-in, if that’s still a possibility.

~ ~ ~

I smell petrichor, do you?

Consider this an open thread.

~ ~ ~

UPDATE-1 — 12:30 P.M. ET — 29-JUL-2022 —

Olivia Julianna published a statement with an ask:

It’s not enough to fund reproductive health care while reproductive rights remain at risk and stripped away in some states.

Make it rain for the reproductive rights champions.

Democratic Governors’ Association Protect Reproductive Rights Fund at ActBlue

WI: Re-elect Gov. Tony Evers
MI: Re-elect Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and AG Dana Nessel
IL: Re-elect Gov. JB Pritzker

PA: Elect Josh Shapiro and John Fetterman and Austin Davis as Lt. Gov.
GA: Elect Stacey Abrams and Raphael Warnock
TX: Elect Beto O’Rourke and Mike Collier and Rochelle Garza
OH: Elect Tim Ryan
NC: Elect Cheri Beasley

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196 replies
  1. Rayne says:

    In re MI-03 — Seriously, this is NOT a time to rely on past efforts to fuck with GOP primaries save for crossover voting during the primary. Michigan MAGA types are rabid; MI-03 in particular, much of which was once held by Justin Amash, is just too dicey thanks to the rural component in the western portion of the newly drawn district. What an effing gamble.

    In re Olivia’s fundraiser — as of 1:45 am ET, the total raised had exceeded $1.3M with a new stretch goal set to $1.5M. I can’t wait to see what happens the next time some stupid GOPr tries to piss off Olivia.

    • cmarlowe says:

      Agree on MI-03. I live near blue Chicago but have relatives that live in western MI-03. There are a fair number of people (AKA MAGA-nuts) they used to socialize with but don’t talk to anymore. The divide is real.

      If Meijer wins his primary and that seat in November, that is one R congressman that I would not lose any sleep over. Yes I know we need to hold the House, but Dems should leave that particular primary alone.

      • Rayne says:

        I think the DCCC believe the redistricting helps Hillary Scholten if the GOP can be split between the MAGA and Meijer to MAGA’s benefit, but given the rabidity of the MAGA constituents in west MI, I don’t see Scholten pulling it off. Meijer has built in name cred which is tough to overcome here AND constituents don’t like games.

        Meanwhile the GOP flipped a seat in Texas during a special election; the amount of money DCCC spent on that seat was an embarrassment, buying an English language TV ad for Democratic opponent Dan Sanchez. The fucking arrogance of DCCC…no wonder at all Dems are losing Hispanic/Latinx voters.

        • Leoghann says:

          That special election in Texas was indeed terrible, and even moreso given that Mayra Flores is 100% Q-head. The Texas Dems were handicapped there because their expected candidate had some sort of personal issue and had to drop out. That district, along with all the rest (duh) is up for election again in November, and you can bet that no one on the blue side will be taking anything for granted.

        • kellyg says:

          I think the DCCC is thinking about the MI-03 race the wrong way. Where I live was not in Meijer’s district in 2020. So the Republicans here did not vote for Meijer. My county is now in MI-03. But there is a definite hate for Meijer in the area. Most of the TFG cultists see Meijer as a traitor. Getting Meijer on the ballot forces those cultists to either vote for Meijer or not vote. They’ll never vote Dem. So Meijer could lose out on a pretty significant voting block. The cultists here love John Gibbs. Also, the moderate Republicans and never Trumpers will still vote for Gibbs because he is pro-life.

        • Ginevra diBenci says:

          Also too, almost all “pro-life” candidates support the death penalty enthusiastically.

      • pH unbalanced says:

        Yeah, not to mention that the message it sends to GOP members of Congress who might be inclined to occassionally work with Democrats is *terrible* — please vote your conscience on impeachment, and then we’ll make sure it haunts you in the primary? Yeah that’ll help convince people to cross the aisle for votes.

        Meijer currently represents me (though due to redistricting I’m not in his district for the upcoming election) and he’s honestly been *fine*. I’d prefer a Democrat, but we could have so much worse that I’d rather not play with fire here.

        • Rayne says:

          Let me guess you’re in MI-02 in the southeast corner of what used to be MI-03, cattycorner from Grand Rapids. That’s a scary area with that nutbag Constitutional sheriff Dar Leaf in Barry County. I’ve warned my adult children to stay the hell away from that ; this monkeying around with donations would have made things exponentially worse before redistricting.

        • pH unbalanced says:

          Close, but not quite that bad cause I’m north of GR.

          And yeah, people don’t understand how deep the crazy runs out here — and once it gets into power it’s hard to get it out. I grew up in Texas in what is now Louie Gohmert’s district, and the vibe is very similar.

        • Rayne says:

          LOL one of my family members lives not far from you, then, over in Montcalm County. Sorry to say they’re bugfuck MAGA; I keep my distance.

          And yeah, they have NO idea even after the conspiracy to kidnap and murder Whitmer — conspirators met in Grand Rapids, one was from GR, at least two more were from area north of GR. They weren’t all from the usual Michigan Militia haunts.

        • kellyg says:

          Agree with everything Rayne and PH Unbalanced have said about the MI-03 race. Redistricting puts my current home in MI-03 and let me tell you my neighbors do not like Meijer. And quite frankly, the more sane GOP out here will vote R no matter what because of Scholten being pro-choice. The county I’m currently in seems just stupid enough to elect the christo-fascist, election denying, TFG cultists that are primarying every county commissioner. This is NOT the time for the Democrats to fuck around with trying to get someone *they* think is unpalatable on the ticket to run against their person. It’s way too risky.

        • Ginevra diBenci says:

          I know the area too, and a once-good friend of my dad’s still lives there. He’s so MAGA he would go Travis Bickle on Meijer given the chance. He found lots of like minds when he moved up from Charlotte NC.

    • PieIsDamnGood says:

      The arrogance of the DCCC to throw money behind MAGA candidates. Do they think republican primary voters will give a shit about democratic ads? Do they have nothing better to do with their time and money?

      • Peterr says:

        The thing is, Claire McCaskill pulled that off in 2012. From Politico:

        It was August 7, 2012, and I was standing in my hotel room in Kansas City about to shotgun a beer for the first time in my life. I had just made the biggest gamble of my political career—a $1.7 million gamble—and it had paid off. Running for reelection to the U.S. Senate as a Democrat from Missouri, I had successfully manipulated the Republican primary so that in the general election I would face the candidate I was most likely to beat. And this is how I had promised my daughters we would celebrate.

        But first let me go back to the beginning. . . .

        What made it work for her was that she didn’t simply put a bunch of ads up, but did a lot of careful polling to understand the GOP electorate in Missouri in 2012, and carefully wove an advertising narrative that let her nudge the GOP candidate most unelectable in a statewide election into the lead in the GOP primary. Claire’s ads warning the GOP not to nominate Akin was a lot like Br’er Rabbit saying “Don’t throw me in that there briar patch!” to the GOP, and so they promptly elected Akin as their nominee. When Akin won the primary and put his foot in it with his “legitimate rape” comment, she knocked him around and the moderates (or what passed for moderate at the time) sent her to DC as our senator.

        I watched this play out in real time, and it was amazing to behold. Read the Politico piece for the details.

        Fast forward to 2022 . . . Something tells me that the DCCC hasn’t done nearly that kind of homework, hasn’t tailored their approach nearly that well, and hasn’t identified the weaknesses in the GOP targets well enough to make the strategy work.

        • bmaz says:

          I try to pay attention to national players, but Claire has always been on the radar screen because of Peterr, who was her constituent.

        • holdingsteady says:

          Good to know.
          we have Lisa Murkowski here, who is perhaps the equivalent of Claire, i.e. ‘moderate’. she’s the best we can do at the moment apparently. I go back and forth being grateful to her and wanting to call her names.

          This year we have a constitutional convention on the ballot, very very scary against our guarantees of privacy.

        • Rayne says:

          I will bet dollars to donuts McCaskill wouldn’t pull that “biggest gamble” in Missouri today even if she had a mess of polling. The political environment is just too volatile and completely different from what she was up against.

        • Peterr says:

          Agreed.

          Which is my point. She read the situation then, very carefully, and acted as fit that moment. This is a very different moment, and she would be the first to agree that this wouldn’t work in this year’s Senate race.

          For one thing, it is hard to identify which of the candidates would be the Akin of 2022, as they are all Akin in their own way.

          ETA: Which is the main point I was trying to address. The DCCC looks at what Claire did in 2012, and seems to say “If Claire could do in then, we can do it now. In a whole bunch of districts and states.” Which is exactly wrong.

          But Claire’s success then has blinded the DCCC now.

        • wetzel says:

          Sure it ‘would not work’, but I don’t think that’s the point, really. Aside from the grotesque, irresponsible nature of allowing fascists even one step closer to power, even if there were a good likelihood of such a plan succeeding in any given election, it is a corrosive and dangerous strategy because of the effect on the GOP electorate. Firstly, every GOP voter who goes to the polls and votes for the losing fascist will have their attitudes shifted rightward. At first it’s a shock, like saying ‘fuck’ in a commercial on HULU for attention, but then it’s just normal. The people become conditioned to it. All those Akin voters in Missouri became accustomed to voting for a lunatic, and their attitudes change because cognitive dissonance shifts attitudes to match behaviors. In 2012 the wingnuts of the GOP were simply ‘beyond the pale’. Now those attitudes are within the ‘latitude of acceptance’.

        • Peterr says:

          Jack Danforth has two things he needs to repent of: Clarence Thomas and Josh Hawley.

          Now he’s backing a GOP candidate (John Wood) who is running as an independent, preaching the need for Missouri to have a middle of the road centrist as its next senator. My fear is that this will siphon off enough GOP voters who can’t stand the thought of voting for Eric Greitens (or whichever rightwinger the GOP puts up) and dump them to Woods rather than the Democratic candidate, and the GOP ends up winning the race with something like 40% of the vote.

          Then he can add another name to his repentance list.

        • Molly Pitcher says:

          She has said as much on MSNBC in the last few weeks. She has said she thinks it is nuts for people to be trying the same gambit now.

    • Rayne says:

      Update: Looks like Speaker Pelosi has been pressed by news media about Dems’ throwing money at GOP MAGA candidates in districts like MI-03.


      Oh jeebus, this is just utterly clueless. It’s not about contrast between Dems and GOP traditional or GOP MAGAts in MI-03; Meijer is no Justin Amash.

      Meijer’s family is as well known in MI-03 and Grand Rapids as the DeVos, Van Andel, and Prince families, and he probably has their support. This was one race where the Dems should have expected a very tough slog no matter who the GOP opponent was, and if the MAGAt wins the primary, it’s going to be fucking ugly and require even more Dem money burnt on this pyre.

      If you don’t live in the Midwest, Meijer supermarket is a $20B privately-owned corporation with 70K employees founded in and headquartered in Grand Rapids. Pete Meijer, current House rep for MI-03 in which Grand Rapids is located, is a member of that family and heir/scion of the founders. He’s one of the 10 GOP House members who voted to impeach Trump and this is who Dems oppose in the GOP primary, instead of giving other Dem candidates the cash.

      • P J Evans says:

        Pelosi is going to get retired in the next three years. SF isn’t that liberal any more – too many techbros, and she’s a bit out of touch.

        • Rayne says:

          The local and state Dem Party need to get on this, RTFN, not in a couple years. Whoever is their preferred success needs to build name cred and a posse to help them campaign. Just so stupid the amount of money in that area hasn’t already made this happen.

        • Peterr says:

          The techbros don’t live in SF. The actual residents of SF are indeed liberal, and are not at all happy about how the techbros have changed the dynamics of their city. Indeed, the techbros have pissed off a lot of the SF residents, and if they try to say “vote for X,” then X’s candidacy will be screwed.

      • AgainBrain says:

        Beyond astoundingly ill-conceived, sends ALL the wrong messages, and gives media something to latch onto instead of the #PACTAct debacle they should be focusing on where Toomey and Cruz are just outright lying about the contents of the bill, to try and justify the little spite-driven fist bump of glee.

    • J R in WV says:

      What do I know; I’m just a WV hillbilly retired to a hillside in a tiny WV hollow…

      But I agree that the MSM is way off in their election assumptions. Women are really pissed, and men who care about their relations with women are also pissed. We contribute to individual candidates who appear able to flip a district in every election cycle. Obviously our actual votes don’t matter to the national results, because WV is now a blood red state.

      When I was a youngster (1950s and ’60s) and visited in the neighborhood, there were always 2 or 3 portraits on a prominent wall in the houses. Jesus, JFK, and FDR! While there were always a few elected Republicans in the lege, it was controlled by Democrats, and unions, specifically the United Mine Workers of America had enormous power. The UMWA actually built a chain of small new hospitals, Appalachan Regional Hospitals in the coal fields of WV and Kentucky.

      All that is gone now.

      But I firmly believe that when the Russo-Fascists messed with health care they way they have, they signed off on their election taking over the House and Senate this election cycle. I have to maintain my optimism if I am to be able to go on with my life!

  2. punaise says:

    Brava, Olivia Julianna. Total ownage.

    Re the midterms, Josh Marshall has had his cautious finger on the pulse of this. (sorry: paywalled):

    Various … midterm metrics continue to move slowly but perceptibly in Democrats’ direction. As we’ve discussed at various points over the last few weeks, the House especially is still very much an uphill battle for Democrats. But this trend makes me think Democrats holding the House in November is definitely possible and getting more likely. Not remotely a lost cause.

    At least according to this one poll, the weight of the January 6th hearings is pushing voters to see the midterms more as a choice between Republicans and Democrats than a referendum on the President or the state of the country generally.

    But across dozens of polls and probably tens of thousands of voters we can be fairly confident that this is a real movement rather than statistical noise.

    One can hope, one can act (post cards, $…) .

  3. Traveller says:

    Well, I have started posting around my own series:

    Joe Biden, Just a Great President…or Our Greatest President? (a series: Number 1 of 100)
    (and beneath I’ll have a Youtube, or Embedded Tweet…with whatever accomplishment I wish to promote)

    Part of our problem is to overcome some natural embarrassment in so openly declaring ourselves….but we must, and must make the case for a Democratic sweep in November. (yes, I have some problems with Mr Biden, {for one I wish he were more charismatic…but he genuinely is what he is}, among other quibbles).

    Still, it is time to put aside our differences and stake out a case….

    • grennan says:

      I love what you’re doing but IMO it would be more effective without hyperbole (‘greatest president’)…it reduces credibility and screams ‘biased’ to folks who want to believe.

  4. S.Chepaitis says:

    Speaking of PA, my congressperson Glen Thompson, just got lambasted for attending his son’s same-sex wedding only hours after he voted to deny the codification of same-sex marriage into law. I think that meets all of John Stewarts criteria – hypocrisy, lying, cowardice and cruelty.

    https://www.pennlive.com/politics/2022/07/pa-gop-congressman-attends-gay-sons-wedding-days-after-vote-against-same-sex-marriage-protection.html

    He also voted to decertify PA’s vote for Biden in 2020, of course.

    • Rayne says:

      The old PA-15 was held half the time by Dems. Constituents and his opponent really need to press on Thompson’s refusal to support same-sex marriage because the right to privacy underpinning same-sex marriage also underpins right to contraception, to abortion, and to mixed race marriage.

      • S.Chepaitis says:

        A close friend and colleague ran against him in 2018. She is one of the most intelligent and articulate people I know. She didn’t have a chance because out here in Pennsyltucky they’ll vote for a groundhog as long as the initial is r.

        It’s not the old 15th anymore. It was drastically altered after the suit in 2018 and even more so in 2021. I won’t even be in this district anymore, but the new one is no improvement.

    • Leoghann says:

      Dick Cheney’s support of his daughter Mary’s sexuality is entirely attributable to Mary herself, and her mother, Lynne. The Cheney daughters both inherited their father’s “back down for no one” genes, but they’re even stronger in Mary. If Glen Thompson’s son is willing and able to confront his father’s cowardly hypocrisy, there might be a change.

  5. backfire says:

    PA-11 resident here. Love to unseat Lloyd Smucker but this district still solidly Red. Lancaster county is more dem than it used to be but a sizeable chunk of the district is (rural) York county and that not. Shapiro +10 over Mastriano also good news, don’t see Mastriano winning.

    • Rayne says:

      The point isn’t how red the district is; it’s forcing the incumbent to work for their seat, to campaign which requires spending money. Any money the GOP must spend on a race is money they can’t send to a swing race on the same ticket or elsewhere.

      Forcing the incumbent to campaign also creates opportunity: will they say or do something egregiously stupid which exposes flaws constituents may not like?

      No seat in this country should be ceded simply because the GOP has always held district, and especially not when the top of the tick trends the other way.

      • Peterr says:

        The point isn’t how red the district is; it’s forcing the incumbent to work for their seat, to campaign which requires spending money. Any money the GOP must spend on a race is money they can’t send to a swing race on the same ticket or elsewhere.

        This.

        And this is also why letting a GOP candidate run unopposed is an even worse electoral strategy. Sure, in races that are in deep Red areas (and we’ve got plenty of races like that in MO), that Dem is very likely to get whipped. But forcing the GOP to defend that deep red seat means they can’t coast here and spend elsewhere.

      • grennan says:

        Other reasons not to let any of them, at any level, run unopposed:

        a) may bring some more transparency to the process
        b) boosts the morale of lonely D-voters
        c) any reduction in arrogance, no matter how microscopic, that incumbents with no opponents accrue, is good
        d) may encourage/force local media, if such exist, to cover the race
        e) reminds people that we don’t have a one-party system

  6. bg says:

    Thank you, Rayne. I read about Olivia yesterday and thanks to your link made a donation. Now over $1.4M. Go GenZ! I hope that fist bump goes viral. How about that rain in KY? When will they have enough? Fuck MM and all his henchmen. I have hope.

  7. dsl says:

    I’m Canadian and even I know that the cruelty is the point down there. How did this get missed by Jon Stewart, of all people?

    Do we need to also tell him that they are going after immigrants, women, the LGBTQ+ community, Jews, Muslims, (eventually) Catholics, Brown people, poor people, teachers, doctors, nurses, artists, entertainers, healthy people, young people, old people, children, people with differing opinions, people who read, people who use libraries, people who breathe, Canadians, Europeans, Asians, Mexicans, South Americans?

    • Rayne says:

      It’s yet another classic example of

      Leopards eat. They’re not picky.

      • ernesto1581 says:

        “Leop­ards break in­to the tem­ple and drink all the sac­ri­fi­cial ves­sels dry; it keeps hap­pen­ing; in the end, it can be cal­cu­lat­ed in ad­vance and is in­cor­po­rat­ed in­to the rit­ual.” F. Kafka

      • Duke says:

        Beg to differ. My granddaughter is a leopard and she is picky about what she eats. She identifies as a leopard. All her fave clothes are at least partial leopard print and puts on he cat-eared hair band. I used to refer to the little ones as Little Monkeys to which my granddaughter replies, “I am a cat. Leopard Cat!”

        She won’t eat bread if it has regular butter on it. She has to have Kerry Gold. She won’t eat any berries or apples unless she picks them from our yard. Occasionally, we get a coyote in the yard and she imitates a leopard growl/hiss flashing her teeth and managed to scare the coyote.

        • grennan says:

          Even here in WI, where colored margarine used to be illegal, and regular butter still costs less than $3 a pound, Kerry Gold has a lot of fans.

        • grennan says:

          Not sure our Costco goes *that* far, though that’s where our regular unsalted still goes for $9.50 for four lbs.

        • bmaz says:

          That is probably it here too. I am not necessarily the primary shopper, but when KerryGold is purchased, there is a lot of it. and, man, I love that stuff. It really is better.

        • Rayne says:

          Hope she grows out of this long before she becomes one of those menopausal cougars with a thing for animal print attire. LOL

        • Peterr says:

          Years ago, Mrs Dr Peterr and I were househunting, and came across a house that seemed to be everything we were looking for, except for one thing: the master bedroom had leopard print wallpaper, leopard print upholstery on two chairs, and a related carpet to go with it.

          We put in an offer, but knew that we’d have some work to do before we moved in. That sale fell through and we found a different house that we love, but there isn’t enough brain bleach to remove the leopard print master bedroom from my memory.

        • punaise says:

          Welp, here we I am at SFO, waiting for my flights to Brittany (France) aka the land of butter. Beurre salé, I’m on the way!

  8. Pete T says:

    Realize the focus here is the The House.

    But please send a little rain to Rep Val Demmings in her quest to unseat Sen Marco “Do Little” Rubio in FL.

    As Ryan has pointed out – to me directly ;-) – Latino voting is not a block but these South Florida Cubans are mighty R what with the Miami-Dade R Committee crawling with Proud Boys and all.

    Tampa is heavenly Latino, but I really do not know how they have leaned in the past. Demmings should do well in Orlando area and possibly Broward and Palm Beach, but she will need help in Miami-Dade and elsewhere.

    Pete

    • Rayne says:

      See my last Constructive Action post which focused on the Senate. Note Florida doesn’t have its primary until August 23. Donors sending money now need to realize it could be spent on a primary race against three other Dems until then.

      Demings has also raised more money than Rubio — $43M to $27M — yet still lags behind him in the polls. She MUST do more for Hispanic/Latinx outreach and in Spanish language across the entire state as well as multiple Hispanic/Latinx cultures, especially with Miami’s vulnerability to fascist Proud Boys.

    • ernesto1581 says:

      if I remember correctly, that whole Florida US rte 10 belt is fairly ripe for a democratic candidate — 40,000 fairly recent (within 10 years) puerto rican americans who seem not to be allied with the cuban powerhouse in miami.
      for some obscure reason, the biden campaign ignored this belt. demmings should not do the same.

    • christopher rocco says:

      Agreed. Been supporting Demmings consistently from CA through ACTBlue with monthly small donations. Same with Abrams and others.

  9. Badger Robert says:

    The Republicans have almost always lost seats in the House when their party controlled the Presidency. George W. Bush stands as the exception.
    Democrats have lost seats, but not always. And when have lost seats while they controlled the Presidency, it hasn’t always caused them to lose their majority.
    Much of the House apportionment change has been due to the southern districts going from Democratic to Republican, and that process is complete now.
    The website is Seats in Congress Gained/:Lost by the President’s Party in Mid-term Elections.
    I have the link, if it can be posted.
    Presidents Clinton and Obama won sweep elections and the Democrats had big majorities based on straight ticket voting. Biden did not win a sweep election and split ticket voting has already benefited R candidates for the House of Representatives.

    ADDER: https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/statistics/data/seats-congress-gainedlost-the-presidents-party-mid-term-elections
    Good work by this researcher.

    [Thanks, Badger. /~Rayne]

  10. Badger Robert says:

    OT: Maybe we could discuss why Mr. Meadows and other high ranking conspirators have to go to prison, even if they are partially co-operating with the committee and the DofJ.

    • Peterr says:

      Tell them that if they cooperate, they will gain access to a very exclusive all-amenities-paid-for gated community. Perhaps they’ll all jump to plead so they can move right in.

  11. P J Evans says:

    There are times when I wonder if someone on the DCCC is really working for the Rs, their backing/lack of backing is so weird.

    • Rayne says:

      Because it’s incumbents raising money to protect their incumbency, they don’t have the same perspective about races in which they are not personally invested. Their mission is just plain jacked up.

  12. SunZoomSpark says:

    Make it Rayne!

    1. Don’t get Sinema’d on the legislation formerly known as BBB. If she can’t be primary-ed until 2024 maybe a Recall campaign might shake her up
    2. Target marketing ProChoice Voters. Climate Voters, Tax the Rich Voters, Medicare/SSA recipients, Electric Car Shoppers. anti Sedition voters

    • bmaz says:

      Lol, a recall campaign against Sinema will never work, and if one was attempted, she would win it. Smart money is she will be primaried in 2024, but Ruben Gallego is the only one I would trust to beat her. Arizona politics is easy picking on the internet, but it very different here. Not to mention, am not sure she will actually run for reelection.

      • SunZoomSpark says:

        I do think she wants to cash in as soon as possible. That does not bode well for getting her support for the Inflation Reduction Act, because it may impact the Sinema enrichment actions she has bee working on.

      • Rayne says:

        Are recalls of U.S. Senators even possible in AZ? I could see recalls of state legislators but not House reps or senators.

      • grennan says:

        Can US senators be recalled? That question just sent me to Google, where all I typed was ‘can us sen” when it suggested

        can us senators be recalled (first)
        can us senators be impeached (second)
        can us senators be arrested (third)

        then some normal ones then
        can us senators be expelled

        querying for
        can us senators be recalled

        no. 2 suggestion is
        can us senators be recalled in arizona

        and fourth or fifth had Synema in the question

        The mainstream consensus seems to be they can’t be recalled, they can be expelled, they can be impeached by U.S. House and convicted by senate.

        • bmaz says:

          Yes, that strikes me as right. State level people here can be, but don’t think that applies to the national level people. I am really not sure she will even seek reelection. She used to be a seriously good retail politician when in the House, came to our door two or three times and was smart and charming. Also used to hold coffee klatches throughout the district. But everything changed when she got into the Senate, no availability at all now. In the meantime, until 2024, she is not going anywhere.

        • grennan says:

          But what’s interesting is that those search suggestions are based on quantity of searches performed for that query…so a lot of people seem to be wondering about their senators.

          And Sinema in particular, whose name I misspelled (the search queries did it correctly).

          Thankfully the GOP social media crowd still doesn’t understand as much as it thinks about the way searches work from the front end (classic example: Trump upset about few mentions within Google News for ‘Trump news’…results would have been way different searching there just for ‘Trump’).

    • Leoghann says:

      As has been pointed out, US Senators can only be removed by the impeachment process. Several Arizona people who know her well say that if she’s successfully primaried in 2024, she’ll run as an independent. Nearly all of her ads (yes, she’s already running them) have a very bipartisan flavor.

      As bmaz said, the only Dem candidate who’s gotten any buzz (in the form of press) so far is Rep. Ruben Gallegos. He’s good, but Marco Lopez has been gaining notice in the AZ party because of the primary race he’s been running for governor. Think Beto, but with mountains and heat.

      • grennan says:

        Not just the impeachment process…

        They can also be expelled from the Senate, either for whatever will get the votes or by the process outlined in the 14th amendment and post-civil war law about oath to U.S. and resurrection.

  13. Carole says:

    News of possible interest. Brandon Straka, founder of the #WalkAway movement, is claiming that the DOJ leaked the sealed documents in his J6 case to the “liberal media.”

    It actually sounds like the docs were accidentally released or something, but Straka apparently doesn’t want to waste an opportunity to own the libs.

    NBC link: https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/justice-department/-trump-influencer-upset-documents-detailing-substantial-cooperation-fb-rcna40576

    Sealed Docs: https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/22123090-straka-dkt-37-mot-to-seal-sentencing-pleadings-dmfirm_4042398461

    • Fran of the North says:

      Thanks for the heads up. Looks like his primary purpose is attempting to deflect attention from the fact that his cooperation might have provided evidence of wrongdoing by his ‘friends’.

      Methinks he protesteth too much.

      • Rayne says:

        Or he’s worried he’s going to be doxxed and swatted by his own team. Defenestration, of sorts.

    • TimB says:

      Jordan Fischer, reporter for WUSA9, says his media coalition filed a motion in court to have the materials unsealed, and it was granted. He’s @JordanOnRecord on twitter.

      Hope the twitter handle doesn’t violate the links policy, mods! Will stop if it is a violation.

      • Rayne says:

        Username isn’t a problem as we have no other “TimB.” Should another one arrive they’ll be asked to differentiate because you have first dibs on TimB.

        (And we’ve already understood the need for the other username. Carry on.)

    • Leoghann says:

      It seems clear to me that he’s trying to save his reputation, and maybe his quality of life, from his previous peer group, after having sung like a canary to the FBI for months.

  14. Lester Noyes says:

    My son proposes a jujitsu program – to make a flyer that goes something like (with flags in each corner, of course):

    VOTE REPUBLICAN! SAY NO TO…
    – Social Security (True Republicans have been against it since 1935)
    – Medicare = SOCIALISM!
    – Food and Drug Safety, Workplace Safety, Clean Air, Consumer Protection, Health & Welfare, Transportation Safety, Education Department, Civil Rights, etc. = TOO MUCH GOVERNMENT REGULATION!
    – Eliminate the I.R.S. = government robbery!

    Etc. Would something like this work? Too over-the-top? Or would the hard-of-thinking agree with it?

    • Rayne says:

      No. Your son needs to read George Lakoff’s work, particular his book, Don’t Think of an Elephant. As soon as “Vote Republican!” appears, that’s the message embedded in the target audience’s mind just as the Elephant is embedded once mentioned.

      Die-hard yellow dog Democrats are only going to vote for Democrats no matter the messaging. They need to be reminded and assisted to turn out. They don’t need messages which embed doubt.

      The swing audience which needs persuasion is very small, less than 10%, and the messages which appeal to them may vary widely. Leave this to professionals especially since some of this audience may not speak English as a first language.

      The hard core right-wing is unlikely to budge but if some become disenchanted, they need simple emotional appeals which validate their alternative choice and make them feel safe. Which is why Val Demings as one example in a red state may appeal to the law and order crowd.

    • P J Evans says:

      The first two items would certainly get their attention – the hard-of-thinking tend not to connect them with “big gummint”. They’re the people who think of them as “entitlements”, even though we pay into them – and if you want more than minimal Medicare coverage, you pay a monthly premium that comes out of your SS payment.

      • Peterr says:

        So (with Rayne’s comment in mind) flip things around.

        Like Social Security? VOTE DEM!
        (the GOP has been trying to kill it since it was introduced)

        Like Medicare? VOTE DEM!
        (the GOP doesn’t like it any more than they like Social Security

        Like clean water and clean air? VOTE DEM
        Like workers being able to keep their fingers and toes? VOTE DEM
        Like “everyone” to mean “everyone” and not just “everyone like me”? VOTE DEM

        The GOP can’t stand these things, even while they rush to take advantage of them. The only way for government to work is to elect people who *want* government to work. VOTE DEM

        • Peterr says:

          You’re welcome. Your son is free to use my off-the-top-of-my-head draft, amended for your particular area, as he creates that flyer.

          The next question is where to distribute it, and how to get that done.

          As my old math prof was fond of saying after giving the class the key to a rigorous proof but not completing the whole thing, “the rest is left as an exercise for the student.”

        • Tom says:

          Where to distribute the flyers? I would suggest anywhere young people go in the summer, such as patio restaurants, coffee shops, beer and liquor stores, and outdoor concerts for starters, with young volunteers doing the handing out.

        • Peterr says:

          Mostly agree, but if people flood their local area and hand them out in person at coffee shops, etc., the conversations will be very powerful.

          Sticking flyers under windshield wipers is an artifact of a previous era, but talking to people is not.

        • Rayne says:

          It’s the conversation part, Peterr, the human experience. That’s what made the MTV effort work in that link I shared. Paper isn’t experience; embedding content in a Pokemon GO game is, as is a live stream over Twitch or Discord. Find a way to engage the least likely to vote so that it becomes a social event.

          I’ve never understood why hair salons aren’t targeted because the audiences are captive and among the least reliable voters, but most socially influenced.

        • Peterr says:

          I’ve had campaign workers from 6 different candidates knocking on my door in the last two days. Every one of them had a piece of paper to hand me (or to leave behind if no one was home), so that I would remember who they were canvasing for.

          Conversation is great, but it really helps to have that tangible thing to leave with them at the end.

        • Rayne says:

          How old are you, Peterr? Don’t answer that. There’s a difference between target audiences and what works for them. Paper still works for you and your cohort.

        • Peterr says:

          Someone else would have to break the news to my congregation, as they would not be terribly happy to lose me.

        • rip says:

          Perhaps a small improvement?

          Intersperse each of the Like xxx, Vote DEM
          with
          Like zzz, Vote REP

          Obviously the zzz’s will be the many things that the REPs have been voting against.

        • grennan says:

          Singularly, great for shortrun bumper stickers, too

          Like to choose your own birth control method?
          Like to keep gallows out of ‘normal political discourse’?
          Like to let librarians choose books for their libraries?
          Like having health coverage?
          Like reality?
          Like breathing air?

    • harpie says:

      THANK YOU EVERYONE for all this inspiration!
      I would suggest watching the tweets of Rep. Bill Pascrell [D-NJ 09] for more ideas on messaging…he’s really good at that, as Rep. Eric Swalwell mentions here:

      https://twitter.com/RepSwalwell/status/1553204615751106561
      10:23 PM · Jul 29, 2022

      This is part of a series [unfortunately not threaded] from Pascrell:

      https://twitter.com/BillPascrell/status/1553146340762337282
      6:31 PM · Jul 29, 2022

      We just voted to ban war weapons off our streets and 99% of republicans voted no. 99%! [screenshot]

      I’m not up to thinking of a good, concise bumper-sticker Dem message from this, but look forward to suggestions from you all.

      [First comment in a while…
      still underwater with stuff, but trying to read/connect when I can. Hearts to all here!]

    • skua says:

      Looks like a good and unexpected first step by Congress.
      Hopefully it is the thin edge of the wedge going in.

      Will this result in the Senate filibuster being abandoned?

  16. Alan Charbonneau says:

    The polling seems to show the GOP has been hurt among independents as a result of the hearings. But I still think Roe will be the factor that could really energize the democrats and sway suburban republican women.

    https://morningconsult. com/2022/07/27/jan-6-hearings-independents-trump-gop-november-elections-survey/

    • bg says:

      Several years ago there was a ballot initiative to close down a 20-week/later term abortion clinic in Albuquerque. A lot of money flowed in to fight it, but we had a massive door-knocking campaign to defeat it. We did defeat it. I knocked on on door, the voter ID said the man was in his 80s. I asked if he was planning to vote, and he said he sure was. He told me, “I have a friend who has a baby right now that should never have been born.” The thing is that everyone will have an experience like his in the coming months, if they have not already. Someone they know who had an ectopic pregnancy, someone who had a miscarriage, or a later term in-utero death, things like this. They are not all that uncommon. Women will die from some of these things, and their friends, family, people who know people, all this will have an impact. This is health care. Families with children will lose mothers. Husbands will lose wives, parents will lose daughters. It is so fucked up. Fuck Scalia and the rest of them on their fucking high horses. It is immoral and hateful. People will not tolerate it. Knock on doors, turn out the vote. Door knocking is the most effective tool. Do it. Find a campaign and help turn out the vote, it matters, it will make a difference.

      • P J Evans says:

        Just about everyone knows someone who has had a pregnancy end badly – maybe it’s a friend of a friend, but it’s so not-rare that I can’t imagine none of these legislators, or judges, are ignorant of what can happen. even when I was a kid…neighbor had a baby born with severe spins bifida, that lived only a week or so. Friend of my brother’s, back in the mid-eighties, pregnant with twins, lost one in about the 7th or 8th month. Sis-in-law had a molar pregnancy, where it was never going to be a fetus, just a mass of tissue (and that comes with tests afterward, to make sure it didn’t get into her bloodstream). Miscarriages are so not-rare that they’re almost more normal than giving birth.

        • bg says:

          Yes, and the criminalization, the deaths, which will affect as they do now more poor and WOC, are going to be amplified. This is a terrible time to become pregnant with the built in perils. For Alito to make jokes is beyond offensive. Vote them all out.

      • Rayne says:

        From NIH Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development:

        How many people are affected by or at risk for pregnancy loss or miscarriage?

        The estimated rate of miscarriage is 15% to 20% in women who know they are pregnant,1 but as many as half of all fertilized eggs may spontaneously abort, often before the women realize they are pregnant.2 Women who have had previous miscarriages are at a higher risk for miscarriage.3 The risk of miscarriage also increases with maternal age beginning at age 30 and becoming greater after age 35.4
        _____
        American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists. (2002). ACOG practice bulletin. management of recurrent pregnancy loss. number 24, february 2001. (replaces technical bulletin number 212, september 1995). International Journal of Gynaecology and Obstetrics: The Official Organ of the International Federation of Gynaecology and Obstetrics, 78(2), 179-190. [top]
        Michels, T. C., & Tiu, A. Y. (2007). Second trimester pregnancy loss. American Family Physician, 76(9), 1341-1346. [top]
        Risch, H. A., Weiss, N. S., Clarke, E. A., & Miller, A. B. (1988). Risk factors for spontaneous abortion and its recurrence. American Journal of Epidemiology, 128(2), 420-430. [top]
        Nybo Andersen, A. M., Wohlfahrt, J., Christens, P., Olsen, J., & Melbye, M. (2000). Maternal age and fetal loss: Population based register linkage study. BMJ (Clinical Research Ed.), 320(7251), 1708-1712. [top]

        (I had to pull this from an archived page because this page was deleted from the NIH database early in the Trump administration. Remember all the alt-government Twitter accounts and their resistance to Trump by archiving what they could? This is a casualty under Trump and something someone was smart enough to save.)

  17. grennan says:

    Some musical inspiration:

    Midnight Oil’s Blue Sky Mine (“in the end the rain comes down”) is both anti-asbestos and anti-Murdoch:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E2Ru4_A8INU

    “Higher Ground”, performed around the world by Playing for Change, a truly amazing organization:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3hGSqqhhokE

    Playing for Change’s incredible production of “When the Levee Breaks” with John Paul Jones and many musicians around the world:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LH0-WXUFY2k

  18. ernesto1581 says:

    OT: even in death ivana remains a trump.inc asset:

    Publication ANJ–22: Cemeteries, Funerals & NJ Taxes, Rev. 5/17

    “Cemetery company” means any individual, corporation, partnership, association, or other public or private entity which owns, operates, controls, or manages land or places used or dedicated for use for burial of human remains or disposition of cremated human remains, including a crematory located on dedicated cemetery property.
    [snip]
    Exemptions
    The Act relieves cemetery companies from the payment of:
    • Real Property Taxes on lands dedicated to cemetery purposes;
    • Income Taxes;
    • Sales and Use Taxes;
    • Business Taxes; and
    • Inheritance Taxes.
    Cemetery property is exempt from sale for collection of judgments. Cemetery trust funds and trust
    income are exempt from tax and exempt from sale or seizure for collection of judgments against the cemetery company.

    • Rayne says:

      I thought at first it was the tax benefits but I suspect it’s really about property seizure as George Conway implied.

      Trump already has tax credits for farming because of goats he keeps at Bedminster. Ivana’s burial plot keeps the property from being seized — unless NYS rewrites the cemetery code.

      • earlofhuntingdon says:

        The burial location would also seem to keep Ivana alone – who will join her? – and under Donald’s thumb, seemingly in perpetuity. As you point out, this has nothing to do with honoring her and everything to do with keeping the TFG’s ego and assets intact.

      • P J Evans says:

        Bedminster’s in NJ. And I’d seize everything except, say, an acre including the burial. It’s a private cemetery, that’s fine, but the rest is seizable..

      • earlofhuntingdon says:

        Brooke Harrington, a sociologist at Dartmouth, specializes in the tax maneuvers of the wealthy. Her quick take on how NJ law would treat this particular Trump maneuver:

        1. No minimum number of burials to qualify as a cemetery.
        2. Once a business qualifies as a “cemetery company,” it becomes exempt from payment of property, income and sales tax.

        The jury may still be out on what locations and/or acreage is covered and what, if any, other businesses a “cemetery company” might engage in. Trump would argue there are no limits. If so, the NJ legislature might clarify that and save the state years of litigation.

        Harrington wrote, Capital Without Borders: Wealth Managers and the One Percent (2016). Her work builds on that of sociologist pioneers like C. Wright Mills (The Power Elite) and G. William Domhoff, Who Rules America? The Corporate Rich, White Nationalist Republicans, and Inclusionary Democrats in the 2020s (2022, the 7th rev. of his 1967 book).

        https://twitter.com/EBHarrington/status/1553533320469905409
        https://twitter.com/EBHarrington/status/1553533324387295234

        • earlofhuntingdon says:

          The American Way of Death has long involved financial corruption. If the Trump’s are becoming involved in it, they are plowing fertile ground.

          Jessica Mitford’s seminal work: The American Way of Death (1963), and the American Way of Death Revisited (1998).

          See also, Pro Publica’s report on NY’s largest cemetery, Pinelawn on Long Island, which has been immensely profitable for its controlling owners. It’s over a hundred years old and less than a third of its unusually large acreage is occupied, so it’s likely to remain profitable for generations. Coincidentally, over a hundred of its acres is leased to a for-profit golf course.
          https://www.propublica.org/article/cemetery-long-island-pinelawn-lockes-pinelawn

    • Rugger9 says:

      I concur with the commentary about the crass angling for tax breaks and the shoddy nature of Ivana’s ‘burial’ but count me skeptical about whether Ivana’s really where her marker is. A cenotaph works just as well for tax breaks and other legal protections until someone with ground penetrating sonar checks to see if there is a body under the dirt. Why would I suspect something like this? Well, let’s see….

      1. Ivana had husbands after Individual-1, so any one of them would have a better claim to perform the burial as the active next of kin, all other things being equal. Perhaps the other hubbies were bought off, perhaps there is a will or legal document (the Scientologists are notorious for this kind of thing) that made Individual-1 the executor or specified the burial location.

      2. Ivana being there has to be appalling to the neighbors and FWIW is pretty creepy for anyone willing to shell out the membership fees for Bedminster and so I would expect it to be a net loss to the golf course bottom line. Seriously, only the Saudis would put a tournament in there with all of the bad taste tied to the grave location. However, the plans were even more grandiose according to C&L: https://crooksandliars.com/2022/08/garish-trump-also-planned-build-wedding .

      3. If someone wanted to take a look at Ivana to challenge the official cause of death, a court order to exhume would likely be harder to get since she’s on private property. It would be even harder if she wasn’t there (a la Evita). FWIW, it’s still an accidental death and remains so until real evidence emerges to prove otherwise.

      Given how much Individual-1 and his minions in TrumpOrg lie about everything, I would take any story like Ivana’s grave location with a boulder of salt until independently proven.

      • earlofhuntingdon says:

        I see from the pictures that, apart from a small, flat brass (plastic?) plague, there is nary a fence, post, or marker designating the area as burial ground. Makes mowing the rough easier, I suppose. Do the rules allow for a one club-length drop for landing on her, or is it still hit it where she lies?

      • Rugger9 says:

        One other note: for a recently dug grave, that’s a mighty low mound. As in… nonexistent.

        Typically is takes some time for the sod to settle in, given that a casket had just been placed into a hole dug out for the purpose.

  19. bg says:

    GenZ fundraiser nearly $1.85M now. I hope the Senate fist bump against Veteran Health Care gets good use in fall campaigns. The ongoing climate change disasters will continue apace as well. Sinema an ongoing problem.

  20. ernesto1581 says:

    *Jersey, not NYS.
    Maybe it’s a two-fer: double dip on RE taxes + exemption from judgements, sale or seizure.
    goats + burials, how excellent.

  21. Jared Shoemaker Jr says:

    Oh hey, just a resident of Pa-9 here. Not gonna be able to find much but despite my not living in Columbia County where I was very active in the local indivisible chapter, I keep in touch and will be doing text and message banking cause I’m really good at it

  22. posaune says:

    Rayne, just getting caught up! Just want to thank you for your wonderful posts this summer — you have really gotten me through this summer — don’t know what I would do without everyone here. It’s such a wonderful place and source of thinking and community. Thanks for all you do.

  23. J R in WV says:

    I started this thread, commented right off, had to close up the laptop to go to town / fresh corn / maters / string beans / pharma scripts, a 45 min drive plus the errands — but now I’m back.

    Lots of people I agree with completely. Unless something totally unexpected and freaky happens, I believe the health care explosion, the veterans’ health care slap in the face, the continuation of the Supreme arrogance of the court will result in a swing of voters away from the Russo-Republican theocratic patriarchal monsters and towards Democratic candidates.

    I’m amazed by the obvious and apparent attitude of the Theocrats that THEY are defending religious freedom, when in fact these “Justices” are attempting to impose their extreme, peculiar, and minority unChristian beliefs on the vast majority of American Christians who are Presbyterian, UCC, Methodist, Episcopal, American Baptist, UU, etc, etc.

    Not to mention the 10% or more of Americans who are not Christian of any flavor, who practice Native religions, Muslims, Jews, Hindus, Mormons, etc. Absurd to call their decision a support of religious freedom in any way whatsoever.

    They (The theocratic six) are violating every mention of God or religion in our founding documents, including the Constitution itself, which in Article VI states ” The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the Members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution; but no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States.”

    Then in the First Amendment, adopted as part of the original document IIRC, it says “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof …”

    This decision appears to me to impose a religious doctrine on everyone in this nation, to wit, that God inserts a soul into two cells at the first moment an egg and a sperm unite and that cell begins to multiply. This is biologically and scientifically absurd, as almost any OBGYN doctor will tell you.

    The “heartbeat” these theocratic dictators are so fond of talking about is no such thing… it is a tiny electrical pulse detected by sensitive and technical equipment, amplified and converted into sound waves, to make prospective mothers feel good about their pregnancy. No acoustic device can hear any sound generated by a fetus until there is an actual heart moving blood in a circulatory system, which is not extant at 6 weeks. This whole concept is a lie and a fraud!

    Rant over for now, but I will be back.

    OK, one more thing. back in the late 1950s when I was very young male person, my aunt was in the hospital, and all the grown-ups were worried about her. I was told it was something called an ectopic pregnancy, her egg had caught in her tube, and it was very dangerous for her. Most of that didn’t mean much to me at the time, but now it means that if Aunt had not received excellent medical care in the late 1950s in southern West Virginia, I would not now have my only surviving cousins on that side of my family, Aunt’s son and her grandson.

    I am very close to my first cousin — the Republican party would make it impossible for him to have been born, would impose a death penalty on anyone who could have been born to a woman treated properly for ectopic pregnancy, or any other serious health problem related to pregnancy. The Theocrats might as well be throwing children into the Fires of Baal as sentencing mothers to die with an abnormal pregnancy~!!~

    Christian? I think not!!!

    Ok, NOW rant over!

    • OldTulsaDude says:

      These theocrats are a coalition of Christian Nationalists and Dominions who both agree with a pyramidal hierarchy structure with a white male atop.

  24. earlofhuntingdon says:

    Congratulations to the England women’s soccer team for its European Championship victory over Germany, 2-1 in overtime!

    • Ddub says:

      Ah no spoiler EoH?! my fave sport..
      Great victory for the Lionesses, who have looked superb under their new skipper.
      What a build for Copa23!!

    • Peterr says:

      Indeed! Great game between two great teams.

      Chloe Kelly’s reaction to her goal made me flash back to Brandi Chastain after her PK that gave the USWNT the World Cup title. But Chloe’s goal came with 9 more minutes left to go, and I was thinking “Chloe! Put your shirt back on and get back in the game. It’s not over yet!”

  26. grennan says:

    And Bill Russell, at 88. They will have to dip his casket to get through the door (just like the tall do in real life) because the pallbearers will be like an allstar team or two.

  27. Jenny says:

    Thank you Rayne.
    Conscious mature 19 year old Olivia Julianna.
    Unconscious immature 40 year old Matt Gaetz.

  28. morganism says:

    They are having the meeting on how to have the Article V constitutional convention on Sunday in Denver, ahead of the N Gov Ass meet.

    It’s never been just about states rights. The cons are playing the long game to get the Gov’s to call the Constitutional Convention…

    • Peterr says:

      You mean *this* Samuel Alito? From Dobbs, pp. 17-19, footnotes omitted:

      The “eminent common-law authorities (Blackstone, Coke, Hale, and the like),” Kahler v. Kansas, 589 U. S. ___, ___ (2020) (slip op., at 7), all describe abortion after quickening as criminal. Henry de Bracton’s 13th-century treatise explained that if a person has “struck a pregnant woman, or has given her poison, whereby he has caused abortion, if the foetus be already formed and animated, and particularly if it be animated, he commits homicide.” 2 De Legibus et Consuetudinibus Angliae 279 (T. Twiss ed. 1879); see also 1 Fleta, c. 23, reprinted in 72 Selden Soc. 60–61 (H. Richardson & G. Sayles eds. 1955) (13th-century treatise).25

      Sir Edward Coke’s 17th-century treatise likewise asserted that abortion of a quick child was “murder” if the “childe be born alive” and a “great misprision” if the “childe dieth in her body.” 3 Institutes of the Laws of England 50–51 (1644). (“Misprision” referred to “some heynous offence under the degree of felony.” Id., at 139.) Two treatises by Sir Matthew Hale likewise described abortion of a quick child who died in the womb as a “great crime” and a “great misprision.” Pleas of the Crown 53 (P. Glazebrook ed. 1972); 1 History of the Pleas of the Crown 433 (1736) (Hale). And writing near the time of the adoption of our Constitution, William Blackstone explained that abortion of a “quick” child was “by the ancient law homicide or manslaughter” (citing Bracton), and at least a very “heinous misdemeanor” (citing Coke). 1 Commentaries on the Laws of England 129–130 (7th ed. 1775) (Blackstone).

      English cases dating all the way back to the 13th century corroborate the treatises’ statements that abortion was a crime. See generally J. Dellapenna, Dispelling the Myths of Abortion History 126, and n. 16, 134–142, 188–194, and nn. 84–86 (2006) (Dellapenna); J. Keown, Abortion, Doctors and the Law 3–12 (1988) (Keown). In 1732, for example, Eleanor Beare was convicted of “destroying the Foetus in the Womb” of another woman and “thereby causing her to miscarry.”26 For that crime and another “misdemeanor,” Beare was sentenced to two days in the pillory and three years’ imprisonment.27

      Although a pre-quickening abortion was not itself considered homicide, it does not follow that abortion was permissible at common law—much less that abortion was a legal right. Cf. Glucksberg, 521 U. S., at 713 (removal of “common law’s harsh sanctions did not represent an acceptance of suicide”). Quite to the contrary, in the 1732 case mentioned above, the judge said of the charge of abortion (with no mention of quickening) that he had “never met with a case so barbarous and unnatural.”28 Similarly, an indictment from 1602, which did not distinguish between a pre-quickening and post-quickening abortion, described abortion as “pernicious” and “against the peace of our Lady the Queen, her crown and dignity.” Keown 7 (discussing R. v. Webb, Calendar of Assize Records, Surrey Indictments 512 (1980)).

      That the common law did not condone even pre-quickening abortions is confirmed by what one might call a proto-felony-murder rule. Hale and Blackstone explained a way in which a pre-quickening abortion could rise to the level of a homicide. Hale wrote that if a physician gave a woman “with child” a “potion” to cause an abortion, and the woman died, it was “murder” because the potion was given “unlawfully to destroy her child within her.” 1 Hale 429–430 (emphasis added). As Blackstone explained, to be “murder” a killing had to be done with “malice aforethought, . . . either express or implied.” 4 Blackstone 198 (emphasis deleted). In the case of an abortionist, Blackstone wrote, “the law will imply [malice]” for the same reason that it would imply malice if a person who intended to kill one person accidentally killed a different person:

      “[I]f one shoots at A and misses him, but kills B, this is murder; because of the previous felonious intent, which the law transfers from one to the other. The same is the case, where one lays poison for A; and B, against whom the prisoner had no malicious intent, takes it, and it kills him; this is likewise murder. So also, if one gives a woman with child a medicine to procure abortion, and it operates so violently as to kill the woman, this is murder in the person who gave it.” Id., at 200–201 (emphasis added; footnote omitted).29

      Notably, Blackstone, like Hale, did not state that this proto-felony-murder rule required that the woman be “with quick child”—only that she be “with child.” Id., at 201. And it is revealing that Hale and Blackstone treated abortionists differently from other physicians or surgeons who caused the death of a patient “without any intent of doing [the patient] any bodily hurt.” Hale 429; see 4 Blackstone 197. These other physicians—even if “unlicensed”—would not be “guilty of murder or manslaughter.” Hale 429. But a physician performing an abortion would, precisely because his aim was an “unlawful” one.

      The guy who wrote this sounds rather fond of quoting foreigners, if you ask me.

      • earlofhuntingdon says:

        Sammy had to go back a ways to find compatriots from witch burning eras, but used only the English speaking ones in Dobbs. I think his spiritual brother is Bernardo Gui.

        • Epicurus says:

          I think the spiritual brother he longs to be is Maffeo Barberini as I think Amy Barrett wishes to be the first woman pope.

        • grennan says:

          Or Sir Thomas More. Not as presented in “A Man for All Seasons” but in his loathsome self-assumed role of rooting out ‘heretics’ and going after translators and purveyors of Bibles in English, William Tyndall in particular. Object: burn ’em.

          Justice ACB probably doesn’t believe in ordaining women, so maybe Joan of Arc or one of the extreme female saints.

  30. Randy Baker says:

    To the starting point of this post, I would add that the corporate press [fortunately not MSNBC] have been diligently attacking Biden and the D’s ever since he pulled U.S. troops from Afghanistan. [All the smart guys knew, if US troops simply stayed another 20 years, everything would have turned out great]. To the great disadvantage of those of us with a strong aversion to fascism, which now is the central objective of the R’s, the Dems, the only anti-fascist national party, often are rendered incoherent by their leadership’s usually tepid efforts on behalf of people who don’t make a lot of money, people of color, women, LGBTQs, environmentalists etc. That problem arises largely from the fact the D’s donor class generally don’t want much done for these actual and potential D voters. This makes selling the D’s to otherwise reluctant voters rather difficult. Unfortunately, that’s what we need to sell, and so yes, don’t accede to corporate media, who strongly slant R anyhow, and main it rain! It has happened before, and it needs to happen again.

    • Rugger9 says:

      It’s been an issue of mine for a long time, our courtier press. When Toomey outright lied there were ‘provisions’ that were added to a bill that 25 GQP senators torpedoed for cloture after voting for it before the Face the Nation moderator didn’t make him enumerate what those ‘provisions’ were. TBF, Toomey didn’t vote for the original bill either but since no provision was changed, only a single sentence, Toomey would have had to lie some more.

      I had just sent off a note to Ro Khanna about the NM fire victims being asked to pay something like 25 percent of the damages from a fire started by USFS personnel botching a controlled burn. It apparently has to do with reimbursement rules within the responding agencies (which I would not be surprised were forced in by GQP types on deficit reduction grounds) but this is the kind of thing that the press would blame Biden for. The Ds could fix that problem to hold victims as harmless as possible from government screwups, which this year would be exceptionally good politics as well.

      As for the pullout from Afghanistan, that timeline was set by Individual-1 and FWIW if Biden had delayed or canceled it would likely have been more expensive in blood and treasure with a dollop of claims of treachery thrown in to motivate the locals. Afghanistan was a bad idea for nation building especially after Shrub let OBL go at Tora Bora to have a bogeyman. The courtier press loves war stories, and loves a horse race and so Biden will be made to suffer.

      • Rugger9 says:

        Buh bye, Al Zawahiri. Not many will mourn you since you killed Christians, Jews, Shia Muslims, non-believers, etc., etc. with some Sunnis thrown in for collateral damage. He was one enemy in Afghanistan we could identify. For many other groups it almost depended upon the day of the week to identify who were our allies or adversaries which is why Afghanistani nation building was a lost cause.

  32. Thomas says:

    The Republicans will lose the election in November 2022 VERY BADLY.

    Before Roe was overturned and before there were several mass shootings, and before the Republican Party was exposed as the traitorous violent criminal fraud of a political party that it is,
    Even before all that, they were going to lose the next election VERY BADLY.

    REPUBLICANS DID NOT get the kind of boost that they were expecting from redistricting.

    Republicans start off with a 2020 electorate that gave them a 7 million vote defeat, and they have lost 3 million more voters since then through DEATH, because Republicans have a 70-30 split among the most elderly voters.

    Republicans can’t make up those numbers among new younger voters, because Democrats have a 70-30 split in that demographic.

    That’s a ten million vote hill to climb before we even get to geographical population shifts combined with demographic changes, which, combined, are going make Republicans lose control of TEN STATES.

    If there are indictments of Senators for participating in Trump’s Russian money laundering into the Republican Party, then the Republicans will lose TEN Senate seats. But if that doesn’t come to light until after the election, then they will lose SIX Senate seats and we will have even more seats in 2024 after several of them are thrown in jail.

    The Republicans will lose 40 House seats in this election and they will really get wiped out in 2024, 2026, 2028, 2030 and 2032.

    The Republican Party will lose control of counties in this election. Probably about 100 of them, as people really start to take notice of just how many incompetent crackpots the Republican Party has in local elected offices.

    The Republican Party has had a strong dominance of county governments for decades.

    This election will begin to change that. In 2024, the Republicans will have their ears pinned back by catastrophic losses at the county level.

    We are at the beginning of the Seventh Party system, which will dominate politics for the next 40 years. 2022 is a realignment election.

    The Seventh Party system will be Center-Left, and it will enact checks on the corporate oligarchy, and then it will transform the oligarchy with constutional amendments. This era will revitalize capitalism at the grass roots level.

    The United States won the global ideological battle with the authoritarian USSR during the Sixth Party system, and it will win the global ideological battle against authoritarian China during the Seventh Party system.

    The United States will lead the entire world as it overthrows authoritarianism AND religious fundamentalism over the next one hundred years.

    The Seventh Party system is the harbinger of a New Age for humanity.

    This time is related to our future in the same relationship that the Enlightenment had to the 19th Century.

    The 20th Century was not just the culmination of all Liberal progress since the Enlightenment. It was the beginning of the Liberal Age that will endure for a thousand years.

    Fundamentalists have their belief in a divine narrative, and I have mine. Theirs is rooted in crackpot superstitions, and mine is rooted in science.

    There is nothing visionary or hopeful about the Republican Party defeat that will happen in the next few months. They will lose VERY BADLY.

    The polls are weighted to favor Republicans because pollsters believe that they were undercounted in 2016. I won’t go into why that is a false belief, but 2018 and 2020 refutes that belief and they still portray Republicans sliding down a cliff as a “tie.”

  33. earlofhuntingdon says:

    Imagine how badly the Saudis want to revivify the reputation of the Saudi crown prince, that they would offer Tiger Woods $800 million to join the LIV tour. MBS must have done something really bad, but, like most of today’s Robber Barons, thinks money will get him out of it.

    Greg Norman says the offer was $700-800 million, but Tiger turned them down. With all due respect to Australians, fuck Greg Norman.

      • Rayne says:

        If professional imprimatur was what the Saudis wanted from Woods for their new golf organization in spite of the possibility he may not play much longer, what did the Saudis get from Jared Kushner?

      • earlofhuntingdon says:

        I assume the Saudis wanted to normalize their revolutionary tour and to bask in the goodwill of Tiger’s millions of fans, given that his top-level playing days are over.

        As for Kushner, you know better than I do. I assume the $2 billion “invested” in his PE fund was, variously, payback for Trump administration policies he spearheaded, to keep his mouth shut about any negative info he has, to encourage other Goopers to follow his lead, and to keep tabs generally on the fascist GOP. But really, it looks similar to the outcomes American RBs seek when they fund hospitals, cancer clinics, operas, and art museums.

  34. earlofhuntingdon says:

    This headline seems wrong:

    “BP profits triple to 7 billion [pounds] as oil prices surge because of Ukraine war.”

    Profits tripled because BP and its sister oil companies used their oligopoly power and the Ukraine war to maintain unreasonably high prices. Never let a serious crisis go to waste. As with anti-abortion mobs and legislatures, they did it because they could.

    https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/aug/02/bp-profits-oil-prices-ukraine-war-energy-prices-cost-of-living-crisis

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