At the beginning of the "Overtime" segment of Friday evening's
Real Time, a viewer asked one of Bill Maher's guests, whistleblower Frances
Haugen "why did Congress fail to hold social media companies accountable
for their role in the January 6 attack on the Capitol?" Haugen, the
data engineer who exposed Facebook documents in 2021, blamed Facebook for its
slow response in turning on safety measures on 1/6/21, noted she testified
extensively before the Committee. She stated also
I believe none of that was included- the final write-up
report, like it wasn't one of the attributable things. I think part of it was
cut. The January 5 committee felt it needed to educate the public on a very
broad set of issues and that I think they had to pick and choose on, like, how
many things are we going to walk people down that road.
The proper answer is "Liz Cheney." However, while
Haugen's reply was mildly disappointing, Bill Maher's response was really bad.
The host responded
Which was smart. That committee was smart. I mean, it didn't
do anything. No, I've seen interviews with the Republicans and nothing changes
anybody's mind about anything. But you can't blame the committee. They put on a
show and it was a good show. That was a smart decision- I'm sorry but they had a lot of fish to fry
and that one, O.K.
A good show or, when the media was less interested in
performance, what would have been called a "cover-up." The National Commission to Investigate the January 6 Attack on the United States Capitol Complex was directed to "investigate the facts, circumstances, and causes relating to the domestic terrorist attack on the Capitol" to include "activities of intelligence agencies, law enforcement agencies, and the Armed Forces, including with respect to intelligence collection, analysis and dissemination and information sharing" within the government. The committee, as led by the de jure chairperson and de facto chairperson, wanted no part of examining these "branches and other instrumentalities of government."
In a PBS report shortly before release of the final report
of the committee, correspondent Laura Barron-Lopez seemingly made the
case for a September 11- style commission to study the Capitol attack. Having
held no person or agency ultimately responsible for the nation being unprepared
for the attack on the World Trade Center, that committee itself has been
overrated ever since.
Barron-Lopez spoke to two individuals familiar with the
nation's intelligence apparatus. Former Secret Service agent Evy Pompouras
remarked "you should see this information was passed to this person at
this rank, and what did that person do with that information? You do really
need to see names and ranks."
Former FBI agent Tracy Walder explained
I think, in the final report, what I would really like to
see is accountability. I think that's
the bottom line, whether it's the Secret Service or the FBI or local police,
for not taking some of these threats seriously. And they need- either need to
have new training in place, in terms of how to understand some of these
threats, or we need to look at creating a federal domestic terrorism statute.
There may have been merely a breakdown in communications, as
the 9/11 commission found in the period preceding 9/11/01. However, January 6 committee member Adam
Schiff noted "The Secret Service had advance information more than 10 days
beforehand regarding the Proud Boys' planning for January 6. We know now, of
course, that the Proud Boys and others did lead the assault on our Capitol
building."
Donell Harvin, who oversaw the Fusion Security Intelligence
Center for the District of Columbia on 1/6/21 and testified thrice before the
committee, noted
The committee report surmises that going forward, “the best
defense against [the danger to the Capitol] will not come from law enforcement,
but from an informed and active citizenry.” This is poetic at best, misleading
at worst. The thoughts and actions of those who want to incite or commit
violence can’t be controlled, especially when they use the First Amendment as a
shield. The “best defense” against that danger is a physical defense posture
informed by the intelligence and directed by competent leaders.
Actually, misleading and reprehensible at worst. Harvin concludes
Two years after a deadly assault on our democracy, we are no
closer to correcting the system processes and cultures that turned an obscure
and mundane day on the electoral calendar into a massive failure of government
o be immortalized in the history books.
Liz Cheney is a conservative Republican and institutionalist
with a fierce, justified hatred of Donald J. Trump. She did not want the
committee to dilute its single-minded focus on the 45th President with an
inquiry into the failure of the defense apparatus or of law enforcement, and de
jure Chairman Bennie Thompson, no bold progressive he, gladly obliged. Analysis of financing of the attempted coup was left on the cutting room while Republicans Mike Pence and Bill Barr (the latter a Maher favorite) were favorably treated by the committee. It is its legacy to have exposed the danger posed by one
insurrectionist President- and nothing else. Bill Maher and other people of wealth
and influence, especially those with friends in high places, must be pleased
and satisfied.
There must be a nationwide shortage of Kamala Harris flavored Kool-Aid because this guy is hoarding and drinking it all.
Warren stops short of backing Harris for VP in 2024
So many of us have pointed out the problems with Elizabeth Warren for years. Her response here is indefensible. https://t.co/hynQ9K1kGo
— @david_darmofal@mstdn.social (@david_darmofal) January 27, 2023
WGBH in Boston on January 27 reported that upon being asked, Senator Warren stated that President Joe Biden should run for re-election. However
Her response to a follow-up question of whether Harris
should be his running mate was less concrete.
“I really want to defer to what makes Biden comfortable on
his team,” she said. “I’ve known Kamala for a long time. I like Kamala. I knew
her back when she was an attorney general and I was still teaching and we
worked on the housing crisis together, so we go way back. But they need — they
have to be a team, and my sense is they are — I don’t mean that by suggesting I
think there are any problems. I think they are.”
Whatever Warren's reasoning, that was not only a defensible answer, it was the only answer that would make any sense. Speaking in the Florida capital of Tallahassee on January 22 to honor the 50th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, the Vice President had remarked (at 2:28 of the video below)
So we are here together because we collectively believe and
know America is a promise. America is a
promise. It is a promise of freedom and
liberty — not for some, but for all.
A promise we made in the Declaration of Independence that we
are each endowed with the right to liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
Be clear. These
rights were not bestowed upon us. They
belong to us as Americans.
Harris is correct that the rights of liberty and the pursuit of happiness- however they exist at varying times and in varying contexts- were not bestowed upon us but belong to us specifically as Americans. In most nations they do not exist or do so only in limited measure.
Nevertheless, Harris' statement was an unforced error and politically tone-deaf. It enabled the right wing to jump on her for leaving out a portion of the phrase "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." Of course, opposition to abortion rights is not grounded in a pro-life sensibility but in a preference for forced-birth. Nevertheless, conservatives label themselves "pro-life" or "for life" and the media gladly obliges them this myth.
As transcribed above, the Vice-President's first and the third paragraphs were good while the second should have been promptly flagged as seriously problematic. With her periodic gaffes and mediocre record before becoming Vice President, an obvious question is "why, Kamala?" or as Elizabeth Warren may be- and should be- thinking "why Kamala?"
As virtually everyone across the nation and- if center/left cable news media has had anything to do with it- across the world knows by now
Five former Memphis police officers were indicted Thursday
on murder charges in the death of Tyre Nichols, whose beating after a traffic
stop was captured on video that “sickened” a top Tennessee law enforcement
official.
Police had said that Nichols was supposedly stopped for
reckless driving, but Memphis Police Chief C.J. Davis said early Friday morning
an investigation and review of available camera footage had found "no
proof" of that.
The officers involved — Tadarrius Bean, Demetrius Haley,
Emmitt Martin III, Desmond Mills Jr. and Justin Smith — were fired after, Davis
said, they violated department policies during the Jan. 7 stop that led to
Nichols' death.
All five former officers were charged with second-degree
murder, two counts of official misconduct, two counts of aggravated kidnapping,
one count of official oppression and one count of aggravated assault,
prosecutors announced.
But it shouldn't stop there, George.
Police departments, and our country generally, need more Harry Dunns. https://t.co/b7QgRyXiBL
All those disposed toward prayer should pray for the comfort of the family and the victim's loved ones, though the individuals calling for "prayers" after murders and tragedies typically are individuals who wouldn't pray if their lives depended on it.
It appears Harry Dunn is calling for guilty verdicts for the five officers, now ex-officers, charged with murdering Tyre Nichols. However, justice should be the highest priority and there have been few details thus far revealed, let alone a trial (or plea) or a guilty verdict. If Dunn is suggesting that we can assume that the Memphis Police Department and Shelby County prosecutors have it right and there has been no overcharging, there is at least one lesson we haven't learned from the black lives movement of two-and-a-half years ago. A need for vengeance should apply in some capital cases, though I'm sure that's not what Dunn/Conway are referring to, especially being this is not a first degree murder case.
Certainly, police brutality can never be acceptable and it is safe to assume from what little we know that considerable brutality was applied by police to the victim. This, and this sort of thing, also should not be acceptable:
A barber who had just became a father for the second time was
shot dead while cutting hair last weekend, according to police in Tennessee.
Darwin Hill, 29, was on a house call in southeast Memphis
when he was shot at about 1:30 a.m. on Saturday, January 21.
Detectives said Hill and a woman had been hit when a gunman
fired into the home. The woman, who has not been named, was critically wounded,
according to CBS affiliate WREG.
The Gun Violence Archive, which collects information about
shootings all over the country, states that 17 people have been shot dead in
Memphis since January 1. There have been 53 fatal shootings in Tennessee since
the start of the year.
Seventeen fatal shootings occurred in the first 26 days of the year in Memphis. In that city alone, seventeen people now are dead who should not be. The circumstances of each were unique However, a killing such as that of Darwin Hill- minding his own business and struck down while working in a house pierced by a bullet- is especially tragic. As the attention of the nation and to a lesser extent, the world, turns toward the evidently horrific killing of Tyre Nichols, we should remember, mourn, and address the victimization endured, and largely tolerated, every day of innocent Americans.
Dana Bash interviewed Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin on
Sunday's edition of CNN'sState of the Union. Conceding "the White House
response to this nothingburger has been slow-footed and dull," Charlie Pierce remarks
Into this manufactured melee have come some of the
president's fellow Democrats. From the AP:
Biden should be “embarrassed by the situation,” said
Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin, the second-ranking Democrat in the Senate, adding that
the president had ceded the moral high ground on an issue that has already
entangled former President Donald Trump. Special counsels appointed by Attorney
General Merrick Garland are investigating both cases. “Well, of course. Let’s
be honest about it. When that information is found, it diminishes the stature
of any person who is in possession of it because it’s not supposed to happen.
... The elected official bears ultimate responsibility,” Durbin said.
"Ceded the moral high ground" implies that El Caudillo
del Mar-A-Lago now occupies a piece of that "moral high ground." The
former president* hasn't been within an area code of any "moral high
ground" since he took his first breath of air. Lord, why did you make
Democrats so dim?
Truth be told, the Senator never stated (full transcript of
segment below) that President Biden has "ceded the moral high
ground." Bash asked him asked him whether the President "has kind of
lost the high ground" and Durbin responded
Well, of course. Let's be honest about it. When that
information is found, it diminishes the stature of any person who is in
possession of it, because it's not supposed to happen. Whether it was the fault
of a staffer or attorney, it makes no difference. The elected official bears
ultimate responsibility. And we have to worry, since this new group that has
taken over control of the House of Representatives has promised us endless
investigations, confrontations, impeachments and chaos, what is going to
happen.
Still, Durbin did generally agree with the thrust of Bash's
question and maintained "it diminishes the stature of any person who is in
possession of it." Durbin did get around to contrasting the responses of Donald
Trump and of Joe Biden to discovery of documents, noting
what happened and followed from it is significantly
different. Donald Trump defied those who knew the documents were in place and
ultimately led to, involuntarily, a court order and a search of his Mar-a-Lago
hotel resort to find out how many documents were there.
Contrast that with Joe Biden. Embarrassed by the situation,
as he should have been, he invited the government agencies in to carefully look
through all the boxes he had accumulated. It's a much different approach.
That's not good enough. American voters aren't going to be
impressed with Joe Biden cooperating with a Department of Justice and an FBI it no
longer holds up in such high respect (in part due to Trumpy attacks). It's a mere legal matter- except insofar as
there was a motive for the former President to obstruct an investigation in
contrast to the cooperation thus far demonstrated by the current President and
former Vice President Pence, who has now reported the existence of documents in
his Indianapolis home.
Since the Biden difficulties emerged, there has been no
discussion and virtually no speculation about the reasons either possessed classified documents in insecure locations. That is the major distinction
between Biden and Trump. No one suspects that Joe Biden squirreled away
documents to barter with the Saudis, the Russians, or the North Koreans. But
Donald Trump may have done so. No one suspects that Joe Biden is possessing
them so that if he is indicted, he has collateral in negotiations with the
Justice Department, state or city authorities. But Donald Trump may have done
so.
Nonetheless, now the American people think that the only
difference between Biden and Trump is that Biden played nice with the federal
government. They believe this because Durbin and other Democrats have
encouraged them to believe that. Democrats refuse to suggest nefarious motives
on the part of Donald Trump, which virtually every Democrat and most
independents believe characterize the former President.
And another thing- please stop with this
"embarrassed" thing. In a fair and just world, this would account for
something. Americans would appreciate their leaders recognizing their
wrongdoing and feeling guilty about it. However, not only do people realize this
is not a fair and just world, most voters of the left or the right, whatever their reasons, no longer believe this even of the USA. Not only does
an admission of embarrassment come off as weak, it is a virtual admission of guilt.
We have here a classic example of Democrats believing the
press is their friend. Dana Bash plays a video clip of Durbin labeling the
hoarding of documents at Mar-a-Lago "an outrage, a literal outrage,"
asks if Biden's behavior "was also an outrage," and the Senate's
second leading Democrat replies "and its heart, the issue is the same.
Those documents should not have been in the personal possession of either Joe
Biden or Donald Trump." If media
personalities suggest Joe Biden=Donald Trump, the question should be turned
back on them.
The response of the two men been dramatically different, but
the track record and motives very likely
are, also. Some Democrats such as Dick
Durbin much prefer to play defense rather than offense, to admit guilt, error,
or embarrassment rather than focusing on their opponents. It's a defeatist
media strategy and losing one.
And, Senator, I just should say sorry in advance if I have
to interrupt you to go to that press conference. But we will go back.
And, while we are waiting, I want to turn to the new
classified documents that the FBI found at the president's house in Delaware.
It was a 13-hour search. That happened on Friday. It's just the latest
revelation of the president having classified items that he shouldn't have.
You have been in Congress for 40 years. You have handled
classified material for a lot of those years, probably most of them. How
concerned are you about this?
DURBIN: Well, I'm concerned.
There's a standard that we follow when it comes to members
of Congress and classified information. The door to my office is closed. The
person who presents the document to me takes it out of a locked briefcase,
hands it to me and watches as I read it, when I finish reading it, and he takes
it back and puts it in the briefcase and leaves the scene.
I mean, that's how carefully we review these documents. To
think that any of them ended up in boxes in storage one place or the other is
just unacceptable.
But, having said that, let me make this point clear. Joe
Biden has said from the start: We are going to be totally transparent about
this. Let the chips fall where they may. I'm going to open my home voluntarily
to a search, not the first search, I'm sure, of his offices and home.
He has shown total cooperation in this effort. That is a
sharp contrast to President Trump.
BASH: Well, I want to -- speaking of former President Trump,
I want to play something that you said last year about the classified documents
found at his Mar-a-Lago resort.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DURBIN: It's an outrage. It's a literal outrage. For the
president to take this important information down to his home in Florida, and
then store it in a closet with traffic, people back and forth in his resort and
golf course, is an outrage.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BASH: Is it also an outrage for the current president to
have what appears to be multiple classified documents in multiple locations?
DURBIN: At its heart, the issue is the same. Those documents
should not have been in the personal possession of either Joe Biden or Donald
Trump.
But what happened and followed from it is significantly
different. Donald Trump defied those who knew the documents were in place and
ultimately led to, involuntarily, a court order and a search of his Mar-a-Lago
hotel resort to find out how many documents were there.
Contrast that with Joe Biden. Embarrassed by the situation,
as he should have been, he invited the government agencies in to carefully look
through all the boxes he had accumulated. It's a much different approach.
It is outrageous that either occurred. But the reaction by
the former president and the current president could not be in sharper
contrast.
BASH: They are. They're very different, no question about
that.
Having said that, you are a politician. You have been around
for a while, and you understand how these things play out. Do you fear that,
because of that, the current president has kind of lost the high ground on this
notion of classified information being where it shouldn't be?
DURBIN: Well, of course. Let's be honest about it.
When that information is found, it diminishes the stature of
any person who is in possession of it, because it's not supposed to happen.
Whether it was the fault of a staffer or attorney, it makes no difference.
The elected official bears ultimate responsibility. And we
have to worry, since this new group that has taken over control of the House of
Representatives has promised us endless investigations, confrontations,
impeachments and chaos, what is going to happen.
[09:15:00]
I only have one word for those who are dubious as to whether
that will happen, and the word is Benghazi. How long did we spend going through
Benghazi hearings in the Republican-controlled House in the past? Now imagine
the MAGA Republicans and what they're setting out to do. I'm sure that they are
going to have investigations to our heart's delight.
BASH: I want to turn to the debt ceiling, sir.
The White House insists they are not going to negotiate with
Republicans who are demanding spending cuts in exchange for raising the debt
limit, so America doesn't default on its debt. Do you think the president
should negotiate?
DURBIN: No, absolutely not.
Let's get to the bottom line here. Those who are posing for
holy pictures as budget balances, the MAGA Republicans, should note one important
fact. Almost 25 percent of all of the national debt accumulated over the
history of the United States, 230 years, was accumulated during the four years
of Donald Trump.
So, the notion that there is some partisan holy position
that they're taking and that they're going to fight this battle of the matter
of principle, when they enacted tax cuts for the wealthiest people of America
during the Trump administration, they added dramatically to the national debt
which we are now facing.
Having done that, they need to face the responsibility of
paying for it. That is what the debt limit is about. And if we play games with
this, if we delay this, if we have short-term extensions of the national debt,
we run the very risk of a recession in this economy, millions of Americans out
of work and interest rates going even higher, denying people an opportunity to
buy a home or a car. And this economy will be stalled.
We shouldn't play games with the national debt.
BASH: When Joe Biden was vice president, I'm sure you
remember, back in 2011, he was the lead negotiator on negotiations for spending
cuts in exchange for raising the debt ceiling.
But you think -- you're saying you think it's different
because of what happened during the Trump years?
DURBIN: I think it's different, not just because of the
Trump years being the origin of much of this debt, but by the new House of
Representatives, 15 ballots, Dana. You were there. You saw it, or at least
witnessed it on television, 15 ballots to choose the speaker.
And he gave the authority to each member of the House to
initiate a vote of no confidence on a daily basis. I mean, this is a House of
Representatives which is under control of the MAGA Republicans at this point.
And I'm fearful that very few constructive things will emerge.
BASH: Before I let you go. I have to ask about the Supreme
Court. You are, of course, Senate Judiciary chairman.
You saw what happened at the court. They announced this week
that they were unable to determine who leaked the draft decision overturning
Roe vs. Wade last year. Clerks had -- and employees had to sign a sworn
affidavit saying that they didn't leak the draft opinion.
The justices -- neither the justices nor their spouses
actually had to sign affidavits. So, do you believe that that was a mistake?
Should they have to do so to figure out where the leak comes -- came from?
DURBIN: Listen, the universe of people who are suspects in
this leak of an opinion of the Supreme Court is really a small universe.
It includes the justices and their families, if they had
access to this opinion, which I assume some of them did. They should have gone
into the -- at least a position of assertions by each one of the justices as to
what they did or did not do when it came to these opinions.
But I find it hard to imagine, with the small group of
people who had access to this opinion, they couldn't come up with more
information.
BASH: Are you going to try, in your capacity as Judiciary
chair?
DURBIN: No, I don't think this is an area where we can go in
with any kind of force and make for a changed result at this point.
BASH: OK. OK.
Senate Judiciary Chairman Dick Durbin, thank you so much,
and, I should say, the Senate whip. Thank you so much for joining me this
morning. Appreciate it.
This was not Bill Maher's finest two minutes. But it may have been Bill Barr's finest hour.
When Bill Barr was Attorney General, he usually didn’t come out and directly lie. He would slant the truth, selectively quote documents, and mislead through statements that were technically accurate but highly misleading.
It may have been the finest hour of the former Attorney General because he proved a skillful prevaricator throughout but most notably when talking of the Mueller report. Andrew Weissman, who worked under Special Counsel, Mueller, puts on those bones meat which Mariotti was unable to do with the 64 characters of a tweet. He explains
Here’s the now-familiar backstory: After Barr on March 24,
2019, released a summary of the Mueller report on President Donald Trump’s 2016
campaign and Russia’s interference in that election, special counsel Robert S.
Mueller III sent him a letter complaining that the summary failed to “fully
capture the context, nature, and substance” of his report and its conclusions.
When the report itself came out the next month, it became clear that Barr’s
summary had indeed been misleading in some significant ways. And eventually a
federal judge — a Republican-appointed one, no less — issued a scathing review
of the matter that called Barr’s “candor” and “credibility” into question.
Barr has given media interviews since the end of the Trump
administration. But unlike his appearances on Fox News, Barr’s discussion with
Bill Maher on HBO this weekend paired him with a potentially more critical
host.
In what was otherwise a relatively chummy interview, Maher
did briefly press Barr on the subject of the summary, saying the way he
“mischaracterized” the Mueller report was “shady.”
Barr defended his handling of the matter. But in doing so,
he rolled out some of the most misleading aspects of his summary all over
again.
“I felt that I had to say something to give the bottom line
of what [Mueller] had decided,” Barr said. “Number one, I said that he had
found there was no collusion.”
This isn’t strictly accurate now, just as it wasn’t strictly
accurate back when Barr first said it. In fact, as we came to find out, Mueller
said explicitly in his report that he wasn’t examining the nonlegal concept of
collusion.
“Collusion is not a specific offense or theory of liability
found in the United States Code, nor is it a term of art in federal criminal
law,” the Mueller report reads. “For those reasons, the Office’s focus in
analyzing questions of joint criminal liability was on conspiracy as defined in
federal law.”
Barr’s use of the “no collusion” phrasing was suspect not
just because the report didn’t directly address it, but because it matched
Trump’s own mantra and defined the amorphous term in a way Trump surely
approved of. And it’s arguably even more jarring today, given that a later
bipartisan Senate report, released in August 2020, detailed perhaps the most
significant example to date of a high-ranking Trump campaign aide working with
someone it described as a “Russian intelligence officer.”
As the federal judge noted in his opinion, issued a few
months before that revelation:
Attorney General Barr’s summary failed to indicate that Special
Counsel Mueller “identified multiple contacts — ‘links,’ in the words of the
Appointment Order — between Trump [c]ampaign officials and individuals with
ties to the Russian government” … and that Special Counsel Mueller only
concluded that the investigation did not establish that “these contacts
involved or resulted in coordination or a conspiracy with the Trump [c]ampaign
and Russia” … because coordination — the term that appears in the Appointment
Order — “does not have a settled definition in federal criminal law.”
In his interview this weekend, Barr proceeded to defend his
summary of the second portion of Mueller’s report, having to do with whether
Trump obstructed justice during the investigation.
Mueller “states, colon, that he does not find there was
obstruction, but he is not exonerating the president. Okay? I used his exact
language,” Barr said. “Then I said he punted but I’m making the decision, and I
say, based on the report, there was no obstruction. And the discussion about
how there was no obstruction was not me characterizing Mueller, but me stating
my conclusion. So those are the facts.”
Again, the issue here isn’t so much inaccuracy as spin.
Perhaps the main problem with Barr’s initial summary and his
news conference on the day the Mueller report was released is that he elided
the reason Mueller didn’t accuse Trump of obstruction. Barr’s implication was
clearly that Mueller had examined the evidence and could not come to a
conclusion. But Mueller’s report was explicit that he believed it wasn’t his
place to accuse Trump of a crime, regardless of the evidence — because of
long-standing Justice Department policy against charging a sitting president.
Barr did not mention this. And in fact, when asked at the news conference
whether Mueller punted because of that policy, Barr talked around the question.
(This was the other main part of Barr’s summary the judge deemed to be
misleading.)
On Maher’s show, Barr again oversimplified. He pitched the
report as Mueller saying he didn’t “find there was obstruction.” In fact,
Mueller laid out five instances in which he suggested Trump’s conduct appeared
to satisfy the criteria for an obstruction charge. Mueller at one point did say
that “this report does not conclude that the President committed a crime” — but
in the context of an extended discussion about why he felt he wasn’t even
allowed to make such a conclusion.
Instead, Barr focused on the fact that the final
no-obstruction call was his own, which is indeed how it was presented at the
time. But the problem was always about how he described Mueller’s views and
findings and how they fed into Barr’s own.
Four years later — and even after creating some distance
between himself and Trump — Barr seems to still fail to “fully capture the
context, nature, and substance” of the report.
Trump campaign officials in 2016 engaged in extensive contacts with Russia and/or WikiLeaks, did not report them to law enforcement, then lied about to investigators about the contacts. Despite its failings, the Mueller report never denied there was collusion and laid out an extremely strong case that what non-lawyers call "collusion" was present. Bill Barr remains a deeply dishonest and clever individual while Bill Maher had a very bad evening.
Lawyer and radio and television broadcaster Michael Smerconish, once a Republican and now an enthusiastic Independent, weighed in on his weekly CNN show Saturday on a controversial LGBTQIA matter. The transcript:
SMERCONISH: An NHL defenseman under fire because he's uncomfortable with those who play for the other team. But did he deserve to be benched? Ivan Provorov is a 26-year-old Russian national who plays for the Philadelphia Flyers. Last Tuesday was pride night for a home game, and when the flyers took the ice for their pre-game skate before facing the Anaheim Ducks, players were wearing LGBTQ pride night warm up jerseys and using sticks wrapped in rainbow tape.
But Provorov stayed in the locker room. He cited his Russian Orthodox faith. I've talked here about the Russian Orthodox Church, which is part of the larger communion of Eastern Orthodox Christianity, its Patriarch Kirill has a close association and friendship with Vladimir Putin.
The church maintains that homosexuality is a sin and will not bless same sex unions. In fact, Patriarch Kirill has used homosexuality as a justification for the Russian invasion of Ukraine. After the game, Provorov was asked about his decision.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
IVAN PROVOROV, DEFENSEMAN, PHILADELPHIA FLYERS: I respect everybody and I respect everybody's choices. My choice is to stay true to myself and my religion. That's all I'm going to say.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SMERCONISH: Many are saying the Provorov should have been benched for that night's game and are calling for his punishment. Philadelphia Inquirer Columnist Marcus Hayes had this blunt reaction. He said, "So let's not complicate the issue. Provorov refused to warm up Tuesday night against Anaheim because he does not support the right of LGBTQ people to even exist. He cites his devotion to the Russian Orthodox Church. In his eyes, their life is a sin.
I read again Hayes' column because it's hard to believe that a legitimate, even somewhat respected, columnist for a more-respected news outlet would state without proof that an individual "does not support the right of LGBTQ people to even exist." Remarkably, the columnist did inaccurately and dishonestly charge Provorov with opposing the existence of LGBTQ individuals. Had the Flyer been asked, he probably would have explained, simply or otherwise, that all human beings are God's creatures and nothing more needs to be said. Smerconish continued to quote Hayes:
About that, Patriarch Kirill, the church's leader in Russia and reportedly a former KGB agent, in in May justified Russia's invasion of Ukraine because Ukraine allows Gay Pride parades. And if Russia and other homophobic states do not oppress LGBTQ persons, then human civilization will end there.
This is homophobia at its most extreme. And if you subscribe to this belief, you're a homophobe. A little rainbow tape on Provorov's hockey stick wasn't going to send them to hell. So yes, if the Flyers were staunch in their advocacy, Provorov should have been benched."
Provorov never suggested that any of this has anything to do with anyone going to hell. Smerconish commented
To give you a sense of the widespread public fallout on this issue, some have even hurled nasty comments at the Instagram page of the adorable golden retriever belonging to Provorov's girlfriend. She felt compelled to post, this is a dog's page, please stop sending me hateful messages.
As is often the case, the facts are straightforward here, but the issue is a little bit complicated. It has echoes in several recent cases that have reached the United States Supreme Court. You'll remember that in December, the Court heard the case of a devout Christian website designer from Colorado who didn't want to make a website for a same sex wedding, notwithstanding that she had not even been asked to do so.
Which was similar in many respects to another Colorado case, the baker who didn't want to bake the wedding cake for the same sex couple, who the Court ruled in favor of by a seven to two margin. The website designer is challenging a Colorado public accommodation law that prohibits most businesses from discriminating against LGBTQ customers. She argues that requiring her to create websites for same sex couples that would violate her freedom of speech.
And it seemed from the argument and the reaction to the argument that the six three conservative court is poised to support the wedding designer. On one hand, you had liberal Justice Sonia Sotomayor saying, hey, allowing the designer to refuse would be, quote, the first time in the court's history that it would rule a commercial business open to the public, serving the public, that it could refuse to serve a customer based on race, sex, religion, or sexual orientation.
But Chief Justice Roberts countered. He said, to force the designer to build the website for the same sex couple, that would be compelling her to speak. And he then asked, quote, "In what other case have we upheld compelling speech. In other words, not simply restricting speech but actually compelling an individual to engage in speech contrary to their beliefs?"
We don't know the outcome yet of the website case. My hunch is that the court is going to distinguish between service and speech. In other words, the baker, the website developer, the florist will be treated like artists who speak through their work. And therefore, are allowed to refuse business or service.
[09:30:03]
The guy who delivers the tables and chairs to the wedding, not so much. My own view is that if you're a baker of wedding cakes, it's your responsibility, it's your obligation to bake a cake for all wedding couples. The same with the wedding Web site designer or the pharmacist, for that matter, who has qualms about distributing birth control.
You signed up for the gig. You cannot now stand behind your religion as a shield when you discriminate. Instead, maybe you need a career change.
Religious views must not be used as a shield to discriminate and that would be the case even if Jesus Christ had told a group of Jews or Gentiles "thou are to persecute sexual and racial minorities." He didn't, but even if we had, we should know well enough that it isn't acceptable in modern society. Now making a distinction both sensible and legally defensible, Smerconish adds
But I see the hockey player differently. Provorov was hired to play hockey which he's doing. I personally wish that he had skated with the Pride Night jersey and stick during the warm ups. But in not doing so, unlike the baker, unlike the Web site developer, he's not discriminating against anybody. He's not denying service.
I think we need to distinguish between discriminatory acts and discriminatory beliefs. Provorov is free to think what he wants and should not be compelled to wear a hockey jersey with a political viewpoint that he finds objectionable. Now, if he takes up baking or Web site design in his retirement that will be a different story.
This is indeed a strange time in history, one in which discriminatory acts and discriminatory beliefs are commonly conflated with one another. My only quarrel with this commentary is that Provorov was right not to have skated with the Pride Night Jersey. He not only acted in a manner consistent with his beliefs but also was willing to stand out from the crowd, not to conform with what all others were doing,
It is odd also that among many people on the left, a worker who doesn't have the same values toward a socio-political movement as does his employer must do as he/she is to told. He's not to question the bosses even if- perhaps especially if- he is being used as a prop. Virtue signaling is all the rage, and if the employee (albeit a well-paid one) dares to have a different opinion and not join the employer's political cause, he is condemned for being "patently homophobic and, frankly, rather ignorant." As Michael Smerconish recognizes, "Provorov is free to think what he wants." Or should be.
In the Real Time "Overtime" segment on January 20, Bill Maher was joined by author and blogger Andrew Sullivan, former Attorney General Bill Barr, and US Representative Nancy Mace, Republican from South Carolina. Mace made an interesting remark, at the 13:04 mark of the discussion but in fairness to her and the need for context, I began at 11:46 when the congresswoman remarked
You know, when Roe vs. Wade was overturned, we just turned our backs on women across the country and that's an issue. I was raped at the age of 16 and something I've been very passionate about. I'm pro-life but I also see that we got to find middle ground and with Americans about 89% of people are in the middle and we've got to protect women's rights and the right to life and there's a way to work together on many of these issues.
It's difficult to determine how Mace got the notion that nearly 9 of 10 Americans are "in the middle" on abortion rights. Soon after the Supreme Court overturned Roe, Forbes noted that an Ipsos poll in May 2021 found "66/% of Americans believe abortion should be permitted in at least some circumstances." Assuming the poll's accuracy, nearly 34% of individuals opposes abortion in all circumstances, and at least a few of that 66% no doubt supports a right to the procedure in any circumstance. Clearly, something over a third of Americans is nowhere near the middle on abortion. Mace continued
Cannabis is one other issue. I have a bill called the States Reform Act on that and uh, takes, takes that issue and makes it one way that's bipartisan that Republicans and Democrats can get on. Republicans have been on the wrong side of cannabis. We've been on the wrong side of Roe vs. Wade. We- on birth control and gay marriage and all these issues that are important. Environmental issues.
I can't argue with the congresswoman on the GOP being on the wrong side of Roe vs. Wade. However, when Maher asked her what she would support regarding abortion, Mace responded
Well, I think gestational limits should be part of that conversation. In Europe, if you're even allowed to have one, it's twelve to fifteen weeks on average. That would be where you would....
That simplifies and misrepresents the state of the law and the practical reality of abortion in Europe. In an opinion piece in The Washington Post in September, Leah Hoctor explained
Apart from the very few European nations that retain highly
restrictive laws on abortion — Andorra, Lichtenstein, Malta, Monaco and Poland
— no other European country “bans” abortion after 15 weeks of pregnancy.
Instead, almost all European countries allow abortion throughout pregnancy on a
range of grounds, including where there are risks to a patient’s physical or
mental health, and in situations involving severe or fatal fetal impairment.
Elective abortion is only one of the grounds on which
abortion is legal in most of Europe, and time limits for this differ per
country. When these time limits end, abortion almost always remains legal for a
much longer period on other grounds, such as broadly framed socioeconomic or
health grounds, or grounds of severe or fatal fetal impairment.
In support of calls for a 15-week ban on abortion — with
carve-outs merely for highly restrictive exceptions, extending only to
situations of physical risk to a patient’s life and pregnancy resulting from
rape or incest — U.S. lawmakers referred to six European countries in particular
(Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Norway and Spain) and falsely stated that
such a ban in the United States would be similar to policies in these nations.
Although these countries set a first-trimester time frame
for elective abortion, they all allow abortion thereafter on other grounds. For
example, laws in Denmark and Norway allow abortion for social, economic or
family reasons until fetal viability (the definition of which is not
specified). German law allows abortion on grounds of serious risk to health
throughout pregnancy, explicitly noting that this covers both physical and
mental health.
Moreover, unlike in the United States, many of these
countries include abortion under national health insurance policies, as do most
other Northern and Western European countries, meaning that patients do not
have to finance the costs of abortion care themselves.
Even more problematic is the underlying assertion that new
bans and restrictions on access to abortion dovetail with a European approach
to abortion. This is highly disingenuous.
The fact is that most European countries are moving to
expand access to abortion, not limit it. In the majority of countries, European
lawmakers have moved steadily forward for decades on the issue of access to
abortion. They have removed bans, increased abortion’s legality and taken steps
to ensure laws and policies on abortion are guided by public health evidence
and clinical best practices.
Honestly or not, Nancy Mace tries to portray herself as "in the middle" on several issues, a loyal Republican but not at odds with the 21st century, a potential darling of the mainstream media. She doesn't stimulate the erogenous zones of the Republican base but, if she continues to be dishonest about abortion, she may sometime emerge beyond the First Congressional District of South Carolina.
If there is any validity at all to these remarks, the operative term is partisan.
Trump says an “establishment hack” was appointed to give Biden “white glove treatment,” while he is being “persecuted” by a “Trump-deranged person .. When I return to the WH, we will end the era of partisan witch hunts.” pic.twitter.com/qZzGwSOv70
If elected President again, Trump probably would go after a few Democrats, ones which he finds threatening or particularly annoying. But his prime motivation for conducting witch hunts, or completely baseless investigations, probably would not be partisan. He has told us as much:
Trump has a solution to the leak of the Supreme Court brief, which is not a crime. pic.twitter.com/Y0WQrKajRB
How about preventative detention for exercising freedom of the press? Take it away, Mr. ex-President!
Given the fact that the brief leak is not a crime, just an ethical violation if it was a lawyer, this statement is illegal, unconstitutional, and fascist. pic.twitter.com/xzN2T5jIf3
On a positive note, Mr. Trump is not Matt Gaetz, who suggests Democrats staged the document crisis to get a "younger crop of candidates engaged in the next presidential race." On a negative note, a President Donald Trump evidently would do whatever he could to get around that pesky First Amendment.
Republican Representative Rick Allen of Georgia defended his
position on raising the age when seniors can receive Social Security by saying
people want to work longer.
Advocacy group Social Security Works posted a video of Mr
Allen walking through the tunnels of the House of Representatives where he was
asked about why he wants to raise the age of retirement.
“You know, that’s interesting that you ask that question,”
he said. “People come up to me, they actually want to work longer.”
Currently, senior citizens collect Social Security and
Medicare at the age of 65. But some have proposed the idea of raising the age
to 67.
The person asking him the question asked if that proposal
was on the table at the moment.
“Well, you know, if people want to work longer, maybe you
need an incentive to do it,” Mr Allen said. “That’s the way to solve every one
of these problems, by the way, and actually grow wealth at the same time.”
Mr Allen sits on the powerful House Energy and Commerce
Committee, which deals with health care legislation. Mr Allen’s remarks come as
Republicans took control of the majority in the House of Representatives
earlier this month.
Responding to Allen's comments, at 1:39 of the video below,
The Young Turks' Ana Kasparian remarks
When they say they want to raise the retirement age, don't
be tricked into thinking that this isn't cutting Social security. It's just
raising the retirement age because Americans are living much longer- except
that's actually not true. The life expectancy of Americans has actually been
going down in recent years and life expectancy in the United States is
comparable to that of people living in Cuba.
To paraphrase a old saying, nobody died and made me a
fact checker. However, if I had to rate the accuracy of the latter
statement of Kasparian on a scale of 0 to 10 (with D. Trump at 0.5 and G.
Santos at 0.0), I'd give it an 8.
Life expectancy in the USA had been rising until it
declined in 2020. It declined further in 2021, and appears to have remained
the same in 2022. Presumably, that is
due to SARS-CoV-2. However, we can be sure neither that it will rebound after
the pandemic vanishes nor that there will not be repeated coronaviruses
into the indefinite future. Moreover, in 2021 "life expectancy at birth
began to rebound in most comparable countries while it continued to decline in
the U.S.," suggesting that a decline in life expectancy is not inevitable
after the peak of a major health crisis has passed.
Worse even than being "comparable," life
expectancy at time of birth in 2021 was 2.9 years lower in the USA than in
Cuba. That may be unsurprising because the single-payer health care system in
Cuba is superior provides significantly greater benefits than provided in the USA, with its largely
market-based system. Undoubtedly unsurprising is the lower age at death in the USA than in other, comparable developed nations.
The fallacy that Americans are living dramatically longer
lives than ever before is central to the effort to cut Social Security and
Medicare benefits. On January 12, House
of Representatives Speaker Kevin McCarthy, fresh off selling his soul and more
to be elected to the position, vowed "one thing I will tell you, as
Republicans, we will always protect Medicare and Social Security. We will
protect them for the next generation going forward. But we are going to
scrutinize every single dollar spent."
Hold on to your wallet.
It may be a nod and a wink, but when politicians threaten to protect
Social Security and Medicare, it means the programs are on their hit list. The theory is that the programs are on the
cusp of bankruptcy (they're not) so the
only way to "protect" them is to reduce benefits, raise the
eligibility age, lower the cost-of-living adjustments, or means-testing
benefits. The "scrutinize every single dollar spent" makes it obvious. (McCarthy is not talking about the defense budget or corporate giveaways.)
So when Republicans balk at raising the debt ceiling, it's
not only to try to bring the nation's economy to its knees. It's a continuation
of a decades-long effort to uproot the social safety net and if the elderly are
among its casualties, so be it.
Judd Legum makes a good point: One-sided portrayals can rival comic books in their simplicity but are often unreliable. If you can see his (16) tweet thread, you'll see that Legum notes (emphasis his) "the idea that today, MLK would advocate IGNORING racial and economic inequality is absurd."
We would do well to remember- heck, even merely to acknowledge, as the mainstream media strives to avoid- that King believed that racial and economic justice are interwoven. In the video below from eleven years ago, journalist John Nichols makes that point. Thus referring in 1961 to right-to-work laws, Reverend King stated
In our glorious fight for civil rights, we must guard
against being fooled by false slogans, such as ‘right to work.’ It is a law to
rob us of our civil rights and job rights.
Its purpose is to destroy labor unions and the freedom of
collective bargaining by which unions have improved wages and working
conditions of everyone…Wherever these laws have been passed, wages are lower,
job opportunities are fewer and there are no civil rights. We do not intend to
let them do this to us. We demand this fraud be stopped. Our weapon is our
vote.
In its 2017 decision in Janus whose majority opinion was written by Antonin Alito, the five GOP Justices ruled "states and public sector unions may no longer extract agency fees from non consenting employees." The number of states with right-to-work laws has grown from 20 to 27. Elizabeth Warren has thrice submitted bills to outlaw such laws, the latest last autumn and co-sponsored by several Democratic senators.
The failure of legislation to gain traction, combined with the Supreme Court decision, should underscore continuing opposition by Republicans to the rights of workers. And that the GOP remains hostile not only to Martin Luther King's vision of racial, but also of economic, rights.
Remember when Trevor Noah roasts Chuck Todd: "Lots of big media name in the room tonight. Chuck Todd is here. Chuck, you here? How you doing? I'd ask a follow-up, but I know you don't know what those are." pic.twitter.com/PpCFACHaZQ
Tweeters and, it appears, comedians love to take shots at Chuck Todd for allegedly going easy on guests. From time to time, Nicole Wallace, Rachel Maddow, and Lawrence O'Donnell- the most popular personalities on MSNBC- ask a follow-up question, rather easy when your practice is to interview or chat with guests they agree with. On the same network, Brian Williams had quite a run- until he voluntarily retired- in prime time rarely, if ever, asking any question, let alone a follow-up question.
If Noah's charge were accurate, there certainly are notable exceptions. If there weren't, Republican Senator Ron Johnson wouldn't have melted like a snowflake 8 or 9 months later.
Chuck Todd to Ron Johnson: "We're trying to deal with issues and facts. You can go back on your partisan cable cocoon and talk about media bias all you want. I understand it's part of your identity." 💀☠️💀☠️ pic.twitter.com/uPZXCoWDMe
The relevant exchange from Meet the Press on January 16, 2003:
CHUCK TODD: Senator, senator, do you have a crime that you think Hunter
Biden committed because I've yet to see anybody explain. It is not a crime to
make money off of your last name.
SEN. RON JOHNSON: So, Chuck, you ought to read the Marco Polo report, where
they detail all kinds of potential crimes. You know, Senator Grassley has
certainly uncovered the --
CHUCK TODD :Oh, hold on, let me stop you there. Potential. This is --
senator, potential is innuendo.
SEN. RON JOHNSON: About, about, about, about, $30,000 --
CHUCK TODD: This is why you do investigations.
SEN. RON JOHNSON: I mean, Chuck, is it a crime to be soliciting and purchasing
prostitution in potentially European sex trafficking operations? Is that a
crime? Because Chuck Grassley and I laid out about $30,000 paid by Hunter Biden
to those types of individuals over December of 2018, 2019, about $30,000.
That's about the same time that President Biden offered to pay about $100,000
of Hunter Biden's bills. I mean, again, that's just some information. I don't
know exactly if it's a crime.
CHUCK TODD: Here's what I don't get. All right, Senator --
SEN. RON JOHNSON: It doesn't really look -- it sounds sleazy as you know what.
CHUCK TODD: I’ll -- I'll take you, I’ll take you at your word that
you're ethically bothered by Hunter Biden. I'm curious, though, you seem to
have a pattern --
SEN. RON JOHNSON: Are you not? Are you not?
CHUCK TODD: You seem to have a pattern. I'm a journalist. I have to deal
in facts.
SEN. RON JOHNSON: Are you not?
CHUCK TODD: I deal in facts. Senator, my question to you is, I'm always
worried, I have skepticism of both parties. I sit here with skepticism of a lot
of people's work --
SEN. RON JOHNSON: So do I.
CHUCK TODD: -- and I'm curious, are you, were you at all concerned? This
-- Senate Democrats want to investigate Jared Kushner's loan from the Qatari
government when he was working in the government negotiating many things in the
Middle East. Are you not as concerned about -- are you not concerned about
that? And I say that because it seems to me if you're concerned about what
Hunter Biden did, you should be equally outraged about what Jared Kushner did.
SEN. RON JOHNSON: I'm, I’m concerned about getting the truth. I don't target
individuals, target individuals. I target the truth.
CHUCK TODD: You don't? You’re targeting Hunter Biden multiple times on
this show, Senator.
SEN. RON JOHNSON: My concern -- my -- my --
CHUCK TODD: You're targeting an individual.
SEN. RON JOHNSON: Chuck, Chuck. My concern -- you know, Chuck. You know, part
of the problem, and this is pretty obvious to anybody watching this, is you
don't invite me on to interview me, you invite me on to argue with me. You
know, I'm just trying to lay out the facts that certainly Senator Grassley and
I uncovered. They were suppressed. They were censored. They interfered in the
2020 election. Conservatives understand that. Unfortunately, liberals in the
media don't. And that's part of the things that -- part of the reasons our
politics are inflamed is we do not have an unbiased media. We don't. It's
unfortunate. I'm all for free press.
CHUCK TODD: Well, Senator --
SEN. RON JOHNSON: It needs to be more unbiased.
CHUCK TODD: Senator, look, this is --
SEN. RON JOHNSON: There's misinformation on both sides --
CHUCK TODD: Look, go to partisan --
SEN. RON JOHNSON: -- but the censorship and suppression --
CHUCK TODD: Senator -- Senator -- look, we’re trying to do issues here
and facts.
SEN. RON JOHNSON: -- primarily occurs on the left.
CHUCK TODD: Partisan cable --
SEN. RON JOHNSON: It's frustrating.
CHUCK TODD: Look, you can go back on your partisan cable cocoon and talk
about media bias all you want. I understand it's part of your identity. Let me
move to what happened in Brazil. And I want to play something that Former Vice
President Mike Pence said about what happened in Brazil. "It is evident
that what happens in the United States has repercussions around the world. I
have no doubt that that tragic day in January of 2021 in this country played
some role in sowing the seeds of what's taking place in Brazil." Do you
agree with Mike Pence?
The questioning wasn't perfect. Before Todd concluded the topic with righteous indignation, he charged "you can go back on your partisan cable cocoon," a "part of your identity." Prior to that, he had remarked "if you're concerned about what Hunter Biden did, you should be equally outraged about what Jared Kushner did." When Johnson objected, Todd charged him with "targeting Hunter Biden multiple times on this show." The Senator interjected, and Todd repeated "you're targeting an individual."
Evidently this got under Johnson's skin, because the Senator complained "you don't invite me on to interview me, you invite me on to argue with me." Perhaps Johnson knew of Todd's reputation- partially deserved- of going easy on interviewees. Or maybe he has seen other shows on MSNBC, where the host rarely asks a difficult question of the guest and, if one guest disagrees with another, typically is loathe to seek a clarification (apologies here to Chris Hayes, a notable exception).
So this was among Chuck Todd's finest hours. It's what should be expected of the venerable Meet the Press. However, though Todd often falls short, so, too, does virtually every host on MSNBC. And on this occasion he did as far too few cable news hosts do.
