Democrats censure Sinema

Keep pissing her off, and go after Manchin too.

The sooner they push one of them across the aisle, the sooner we no longer have to hear from Schumer.

https://tinyurl.com/zxk3zvm4

The Guardian reports on the work of prosecutors in New York who are digging into Donald Trump’s alleged bank, insurance and tax fraud. The essence of the fraud is massively overstating the value of his real property. The civil side of the case involves massive financial liability while the criminal side of the investigations could lead to jail.

I’ve seen hundreds of snowstorms in my life, but never one like today’s. Not a single snowflake, nary a flurry, yet hour after hour the landscape outside my windows turned whiter and whiter.

Invisible fall, visible deposit. I blame the president.

Source: ZeroHedge.

You could have predicted that Democrats’ projection of a “Big Lie” onto Donald Trump regarding the 2020 election would eventually become a “Big Lie” they told for themselves. It was predictable because merely accusing others of being liars normalizes the behavior of lying.

“It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.”

Or not. The possibility of self-awareness — the end of tragedy — remains.

https://thehill.com/homenews/house/590717-boebert-asked-jewish-visitors-to-capitol-if-they-were-doing-reconnaissance

Claiming it is a joke is as bad as saying what was said. This is more insensitive than posting “gun celebration” pictures of her family shortly after a school shooting.

Constitutional conservatives seem to forget about Art. 1, Sec. 4 of the Constitution.

“The Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any time by Law make or alter such Regulations, except as to the Place of Chusing Senators.” (emphasis added)

Congress has dominion over federal elections. Anyone saying that the election laws proposed by the Democrats in Congress constitutes “federal overreach” is, in a single word. WRONG.

Justice Scalia in a 2013 opinion wrote, ““The power of Congress over the ‘Times, Places and Manner’ of congressional elections ‘is paramount, and may be exercised at any time, and to any extent which it deems expedient; and so far as it is exercised, and no farther, the regulations effected supersede those of the State which are inconsistent therewith.’”

“The legal scholar Pamela S. Karlan put it this way in a 2006 report on the Voting Rights Act: “The Supreme Court’s recent decisions under the elections clause have confirmed the longstanding interpretation of the clause as a grant of essentially plenary authority.” In other words, Congress has absolute, unbending power to regulate federal elections as it sees fit.” – from Jamelle Bouie opinion piece in today’s NYT.

And the 15th Amendment …” ratified in 1870, expanded and reaffirmed the power of Congress to regulate federal elections, stating that, “The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude” and that “The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.””

So how does one square the idea of overreach with what the Constitution says? I’m talking to our moderator and EVERY single GOP member of Congress and the right wing talking heads.

http://digitaledition.pilotonline.com/infinity/article_share.aspx?guid=cddece5b-c962-48f0-ab81-e683d8b17de0

(Apologies to W. Shakespeare)
Both parties can legally accept massive donations after their candidate is elected. Future campaigns or inaugural expenses are the explanations, but it sure sounds like bribery to me.

Therein lies a major problem for our political system: it costs so much to run for office that major donors can and do dIctate our laws and policies. If money is speech, then the microphone is only on for serious money. Business as usual should not be the norm in my opinion. Donations only to those candidates you can legally vote for.

My wife came home from her daily grocery outing this morning and uttered a bewilderment as she leaned on her shoulder in the frame of the back door to the house before bundling into the kitchen. She said that to complete her shopping list she had to visit four different grocers. At one the produce shelves were empty, at another the meat shelves were empty, and so on. Not sparse, but empty.

Being the retired hunter in our household, I pretended nonchalance. I could still kill a moose barehanded, if I had to, after all. “Someone should tell Joe Biden,” I quipped.

Stumble Town, by the way, is the actual colloquial name of the old South Norfolk neighborhood where my Goddess of Gathering grew up. You could say the community was poor or backward in some ways (if you wanted to be unkind to good people) but even in Stumble Town 50 years ago an empty grocery shelf would have shocked everyone. There would have been gossip, maybe even a conspiracy theory or two.

My wife and I have sure seen hard times in our life together, but we have never seen any slack in the abundance around us. Until now.

It makes you wonder.

Source: PJ Media.

The story concerns a Rasmussen poll. The poll results interest me because I imagine the participants who expressed totalitarian views would object to being called totalitarians.

https://tinyurl.com/224jzx6m