Buying and buying America until you own it AIPAC & Citizens United Billionaire’s Row
“This was an act of desperation from a pro-war lobby that is at odds with the majority of Americans, including American Jews.”
Source: Progressives on AIPAC Beating Bowman: How to “Buy an Election”
Source: The Attack on American Democracy — In the Name of Israel
Judge Aileen Cannon appointed by Trump, who has already favored Trump gets to make this decision? She doesn’t even have to recuse herself. Wow, Australia should be grateful for the Separation of Powers.
Judge Aileen Cannon, Who Showed Trump Favor, Gets …
On Thursday, prosecutors on special counsel Jack Smith’s team responded by asking US District Judge Aileen Cannon to not postpone the trial beyond the December date they recommended.
Source: Judge urged not postpone Trump’s trial over documents
Progressives win a majority in the Supreme Court.
What’s happening today in Manhattan’s criminal court is important. Holding a former president accountable to the rule of law is essential.
But what’s happening today in Wisconsin may prove as, if not more, important to the future of American democracy. It will either strengthen or weaken the levers of self-government in a state where those levers could make all the difference.
This is America Democracy’s global role model
Santos’ eight-point victory over Democrat Robert Zimmerman—someone who actually graduated from college and is Jewish—may partially be attributed to how he misrepresented his background. But winning a Congressional race also takes money, and one of the lingering questions is where Santos got his. Financial disclosure forms reveal that by 2022, Santos loaned his new congressional campaign and political action committee at least $600,000. (His disclosure forms from his first Congressional bid in 2020 said he earned just $55,000 per year.)
His 2022 financial disclosure forms showed more than $1 million in income coming from a company he started called the Devolder Organization LLC. But that math doesn’t add up: the Washington Post reported that as of July 2022, Devolder’s revenue was less than $50,000, according to data modeling from the financial data company Dun & Bradstreet.
It’s difficult to decipher what exactly Santos’ actual biography is; sometime between December 25 and December 27, he deleted the entire “about” section from his campaign website. But Santos did clear the air about something. When the 118th Congress begins on January 3, his dubious history will not be a problem. “I will be sworn in,” he assured WABC. “I will take office.”
Source: The George Santos Apology Tour for Lying Doesn’t Explain the Biggest Mystery of All – Mother Jones
American Democracy and Citizens United
Federal election law sets strict limits on how much you can contribute, as an individual, to your candidate of choice. That limit now stands at $2,900 per election.
Contribute more than that and you’ll be breaking the law. And you could face some hefty penalties, nearly $22,000 or even more depending on the specifics of your oversized contribution.
Wait. How can ordinary Americans face substantial penalties for contributing too much to their favorite candidates when we regularly see headlines about the multiple millions America’s wealthiest are legally investing in our elections?
Trump’s Brainiac gets a slap on the wrist
Steve Bannon, a prominent figure on the American right who served as a senior strategist for former President Donald Trump, has been sentenced by a judge to four months in prison for refusing to cooperate with lawmakers investigating last year’s US Capitol attack by a pro-Trump mob.
His lawyers have said they will appeal his conviction.
US District Judge Carl Nichols during a sentencing hearing also ordered the former adviser to pay a fine of $US6,500 ($10,298).
Trump’s former mastermind Steve Bannon has been sentenced to four months jail on two charges of contempt of Congress
Source: Former Trump mastermind Steve Bannon jailed for contempt
American democracy is in peril, teetering between democracy and authoritarianism and under siege by Donald Trump, the Republican Party and the larger white right. To call them “conservative” is an insult to language.
Source: Donald Trump has learned how to manipulate white rage — that’s very dangerous | Salon.com
Trump lost the election, but he had his revenge, leaving us the worst Supreme Court since the Civil War. The irony of Trump’s success in creating a Court ready to approve the agenda of the far right is that the Republicans can now dump him in favor of a less polarizing but equally reactionary leader, say Ron DeSantis, and take advantage of a generational shift in power that can thwart progressive change for decades.
Like the United States Senate and the Electoral College, the Supreme Court presents a major barrier to achieving democracy in the United States. For over 200 years the Court has blocked efforts to abolish slavery and its ongoing legacy, achieve equal rights for women, defend and expand the democratic vote, regulate the distribution of increasingly dangerous weapons, and protect the planet from the dangerous impacts of climate change. Against this record, the assertion by Chief Justice Roberts that the role of a Supreme Court justice is akin to a baseball umpire calling balls and strikes is laughable.
The creation of a democratic society requires that the extraordinary burdens on progressive political change imposed by a Court that follows its conservative political agenda be minimized if not completely overturned. Some change in the institution can be accomplished short of a constitutional amendment. Congress has the authority to eliminate lifetime tenure on the Court by enacting reasonable term limits for justices or by expanding the number of judges on the Court. These are issues that must be addressed by the movements for progressive change in the United States.
“Fifty-eight percent of respondents in the two-day poll – including one in four Republicans – said Trump’s “Make America Great Again” movement is threatening America’s democratic foundations.
Source: New Poll: Americans Believe MAGA Is A Threat To Democracy | Crooks and Liars
A want for a Christian ISIS State has always threatened America’s Democracy and it’s reared it’s head against the separation of powers and Secularism in the USA
Following the Supreme Court’s elimination of the federal right to abortion in June, conservatives have taken aim at other fundamental protections, such as same-sex marriage and access to contraception. But some on the right are resurfacing a different, long-simmering project: stigmatizing divorce, including, in some instances, attacking no-fault divorce laws.
No-fault divorce in the U.S. was first adopted in California in 1969, and New York was the last state in the country to pass a no-fault divorce law, which it did in 2010. Although state laws differ, in general no-fault divorce means that one party can successfully dissolve a marriage without needing to first prove wrongdoing by the other partner – including adultery, abuse, or desertion.
After Roe, conservatives set their sights on ending no-fault divorce laws | Media Matters for America
“Patriots were determined to “Kill Pence” and “Kill Pelosi” no matter what they wish they were called that fact remains they were Patriots of Treason. They were armed and weren’t simply exercising any right of protest. They were there at the behest and invitation of Trump to stop Biden from being officially rubber stamped as President. They were there to do what Pence refused to unceremoniously do for Trump. In short, to prevent the duly elected change of the Presidency. Theirs was an attempted unpatriotic coup!
There is a more accurate term than insurrectionists to describe the people who stormed the US Capitol building on 6 January, forever smearing the seat of the American republic with fear and fascism. Although their activities inspired terror and were planned in part by members of white supremacist groups, they object to being labeled as “terrorists” or “white supremacists”. Calling them “rioters” doesn’t quite capture the political motivations of the pro-authoritarian mob of Maga fanatics. Perhaps we should view them as historical re-enactors. After all, they were only recreating the effort to undermine democracy, freedom and the US constitution that has repeated itself for centuries. Yet, if you asked them, they would undoubtedly say they were “patriots”.
Source: ‘Patriots’ are undermining American democracy | Michael Harriot | The Guardian
We keep yelling “freedom of the press” but surely “the press” has like everything else changed over time and needs redefining and clarifying? Because Fox News certainly isn’t what the “press” was last century let alone the century before or even when the Constitution was written.
The UK made a judgment on Murdoch’s News of the World so much so Murdoch shut it down in order to keep his license and not be jailed. The British almost declared him “unfit” to run a media company. Surely Americans need to give consideration to events like that.
However, let’s face it they had no qualms in planning to assassinate or kidnap Julian Assange and sentence him to 175 years in jail for a single event. How many years did American Democracy dream of ways to kill Castro? The great experiment at home but Fascism in foreign affairs is Ok it seems. in the past 30 years they have allowed Murdoch to do them slowly. More harm done to their nation than Assange has ever done. Murdoch has assisted in supporting the extreme right, inciting and normalizing violence, riots, pandemic death, and continues to do so in plain sight under the protection of the 4th amendment. Nobody has died because of Julian Assange’s actions. He didn’t even commit the crime he’s accused of on American soil. You can be arrested in outer space if America chooses.
As my SiriusXM colleague Michelangelo Signorile points out, even “real news” guy Chris Wallace has jumped ship. To continue with Rudd’s metaphor, if our media and body politic are infected with a cancer it’s time to isolate it so it can’t further harm our democracy and, by extension, the democracies of the world.
Source: Is Fox News The Greatest Cancer on American Democracy? | The Smirking Chimp
The inequality, said two experts, “reaffirms the need to place generating robust wage growth for the vast majority and rebuilding worker power at the center of economic policymaking.”
Source: Yearly Wages of Most US Workers Grew Just 28% Since 1979 But ‘Skyrocketed’ for Top 0.1%
Where has America’s Democratic System taken it. To ultimate never-ending chaos. It’s a system much admired by Australia’s LNP because it allows for minority rule. Democracy can only exist when with elections comes the acceptance of loss. In America there isn’t currently an acknowledgement of loss but a disservice by the Republicans to the people and a total loss of trust in their political sysytem. There is only one Democratic Party in America.
He’ll use this as a fundraising tool and more fuel for his wingnut grievance brand of politics. At one point, Bannon upped the absurdity by screaming he was fighting for liberals and their rights of free speech. Bannon, like all of the MAGA culprits that were involved with the insurrection, cares nothing for the rule of law, instead of setting up a fascist regime set up to stifle all free speech in service of an egomaniacal man-baby.
Source: Steve Bannon Sends A Message To MAGA: Stand By | Crooks and Liars
There is a civil war brewing within the Republican Party in Nevada. According to The Las Vegas Sun, tensions began to rise when members of the Clark County Republican Party (CCRP) expressed concern about the state party’s director Michael McDonald who is accused of recruiting members of the far-right group The Proud Boys to run for public office. The move was reportedly an effort to increase the extremist presence in the state’s political party. On July 20, CCRP members held a meeting to select officers. However, that meeting was interrupted when individuals affiliated with The Proud Boys crashed it. The publication offered a clear depiction of how the scene erupted.
You’d think President Biden and the Democratic Party leadership would do everything in their power to stop Republicans from undermining democracy. So far this year, the GOP has passed roughly 30 laws in states across the country that will make voting harder, especially in Black and Latino communities. With Trump’s baseless claim that the 2020 election was stolen, Republicans are stoking white people’s fears that a growing non-white population will usurp their dominance.
Source: Why Aren’t Biden and the Democrats Going All Out for Democracy? | The Smirking Chimp
Republicans in Arizona are hoping to overturn their state’s presidential election result, creating a template that they can apply in Georgia, Wisconsin, and beyond. Meanwhile Sen. Mitch McConnell (to no one’s surprise) is making it clear that no Democratic policy objective is going to make it past his filibuster. Does a strategy of legislative obstruction and retroactive electioneering hold any promise for the party? Activist Lauren Windsor and former Senate staffer Eli Zupnick join Ryan Grim to discuss.
People around the world witnessing the fragility of American democracy “want to see whether our democracy is resilient, whether we can rise to the challenge here at home. That will be the foundation for our legitimacy in defending democracy around the world for years to come.” That resilience and legitimacy will depend in large part on whether Republicans or Democrats prevail on voting rights. Not since the years leading up to the Civil War has the clash between the nation’s two major parties so clearly defined the core challenge facing American democracy.
The Bigot Party | The Smirking Chimp
Thus, the country that for centuries had developed a system of government and justice became a victim to the whims of a psychopathic personality who in the short period of four years threatened to destroy had-earned advances towards a democratic and pluralistic society. It shows that unless we are serious in restoring the values fundamental to its existence, we will become one of those countries south of the border pejoratively called “banana republics.”
A Fragile Democracy | The Smirking Chimp
The waning of American Democracy and power in less than 3 years. The moral bankruptcy of a Nation in full relief (ODT)
The Trump administration has blocked a planned deposition from Gordon Sondland, the US ambassador to the European Union and a central figure in the Democrats’ impeachment inquiry, according to a statement by his lawyer.
Trump administration blocks testimony of central figure in impeachment inquiry
Washington: President Donald Trump called for paying bonuses to teachers who carry guns in the classroom, embracing a controversial proposal to curb school shootings hours after offering a full-throated endorsement of the National Rifle Association.
Trump told state and local officials gathered at the White House on Thursday to discuss school safety that “you can’t hire enough security guards” and teachers could carry concealed weapons and “nobody would know who they are.” He said that teachers would go through “rigorous training” and could get “a little bit of a bonus.”
via Trump suggests ‘bonus’ for gun-trained teachers, praises the NRA
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