Compare & Contrast

Can you say "Mini Me"?

"Bitch Set Me Up"

Morning Joe - Ron Johnson goes full Marion Berry

Fading Away

MSNBC - Morning Joe

Tickets on StubHub were available at about $1 for the throngs descending on the golf course in hordes of 2, and sometimes upwards of 3. It was a mad house.

The standard GOP play is in process - the erasure of a bad presidency. They're stuffing it all down the Memory Hole.

One major development is the (apparent) fact that somebody has gotten to Trump and convinced him not to announce for 2024 until after the midterms this fall. And that may have been as simple as the RNC telling him straight out that once he announces, they'll have to stop paying his legal bills.

Not that they've been all that good at following the rules on such things. 

Suddenly they're sticklers?

One other interesting tidbit: Trump may be getting hip to the changes going on. He may be more aware that his endorsement is becoming a kiss of death in a growing number of races, and while one of these things may have nothing to do with the other, this thing in Missouri looks a lot like he's hedging his bets to a ridiculous point. It could also be just a matter of Trump trying to be cute and clever - which makes him look even less serious about anything other than his own standing, but then again - when did that start to matter?

Anyway, in the Missouri GOP Senate primary, there are 3 guys named Eric running, at least 2 of which are Über-MAGA freaks, so Trump decided to issue his endorsement by saying he supports "Eric".

Meanwhile, DumFux News hasn't had Trump on their air in over 3 months.

Ari Melber - MSNBC

Alrighty Then

I think it's more than possible that Mr Putin's Russia might be on its last legs.

As the USSR was grinding to its end, the Russians kept trying harder and harder to show the world they were superior in every way, so they went to extraordinary lengths to put up a front that eventually collapsed and disappeared like a mud fence in a heavy rain.

To wit - CNN:

It was the Soviet response to the space shuttle, designed to take the Cold War into space. But after just one flight, it was mothballed. Now, the ruins of what was called the Buran program are left to rust in the steppe of Kazakhstan.

Two shuttles and a rocket lie in disused hangars, not far from the launchpad of that first flight, at the Baikonur Cosmodrome.

Now it looks like Putin is playing a little more of his shitty little extortionist game, disguising the move as, "We can do all this without you guys, and do it so much better, and maybe if you stop buggin' us about Ukraine, we'll let you bask in the glory of Russian technological prowess..." 

...and somebody please put a bullet thru that little prick's head so we can all get on with living together on a decent peaceful planet for a fucking change.

Sorry - sorry - don't kill him - just put him in a room by himself and feed him nothing but raspberries and Metamucil til he shits himself to death.

Nope - nope - sorry again - maybe just think of something that makes him less likely to fuck up the whole world. Can we do that?

Anyway, here's Vlad pretending that waving his tiny dick will scare the world into doing what he wants

WaPo: (pay wall)

Russia says it’ll withdraw from International Space Station after 2024

The announcement comes less than two weeks after Russia and the U.S. announced new cooperative space launches

Russia on Tuesday announced it will withdraw from the International Space Station (ISS) project after 2024, signaling an end of an era in one of the last remaining areas of cooperation between Russia and the United States.

Russia’s newly appointed head of space agency Roscosmos announced the decision in a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday, saying that the agency will instead focus on building its own orbital station.

“We will fulfill all our obligations to our partners, but the decision to leave this station after 2024 has been made,” the space agency chief Yuri Borisov said.

Russian officials have discussed leaving the project since at least 2021, citing aging equipment and growing safety risks. The countries involved in the ISS agreed to use the station until 2024 and NASA plans to use the station until 2030.

But the ongoing rift between Moscow and Washington over the Russian invasion of Ukraine and a barrage of economic restrictions seem to have accelerated the pullout. Last month, the previous head of Roscosmos, Dmitry Rogozin, said that talks about Russian involvement after 2024 are possible only if the U.S. sanctions against the Russian space industry and other sectors of economy are lifted.

Shortly after the Russian troops entered Ukraine in February, President Biden imposed new sanctions against Russia that were intended to “degrade” the country’s space program.

“We estimate that we’ll cut off more than half of Russia’s high-tech imports. That will strike a blow to their ability to continue to modernize their military. It’ll degrade their aerospace industry, including their space program,” Biden said at the time.

In response to sanctions, Rogozin, known for his retorts and a years-long snide Twitter feud with SpaceX’s Elon Musk, threatened that Russia would allow the station to crash into Earth.

“There [is a] the possibility of a 500-ton structure falling on India and China. Do you want to threaten them with such a prospect? The ISS does not fly over Russia, therefore all the risks are yours. Are you ready for them?” Rogozin said then.

The two sections of the station run by NASA and Roscosmos are interdependent, and it is unclear whether the ISS can be sustained with one side quitting the project. Russia is responsible for the space station’s critical propulsion control systems, which keep the ISS in the correct orbit as the Earth’s gravity slowly pulls it toward the atmosphere. The U.S. segment is responsible for the power supply.

Roscosmos under Rogozin also stirred controversy when it posted photos of its three cosmonauts holding the flags of two self-proclaimed republics in eastern Ukraine, where Russia launched its invasion. The post marked the capture of Lysychansk, the last city in what pro-Russian separatists call the Luhansk People’s Republic to fall to Russian forces, and was captioned “a liberation day to celebrate both on Earth and in space.”

The stunt with the flags and Russia’s apparent attempts to use the project as a bargaining chip in efforts to alleviate sanctions have been condemned by NASA.

“NASA strongly rebukes [Russia] using the International Space Station for political purposes to support its war against Ukraine, which is fundamentally inconsistent with the station’s primary function among the 15 international participating countries to advance science and develop technology for peaceful purposes,” the agency said in early July.

But NASA has gone to great lengths to keep the cooperation afloat and has attempted to keep the war from affecting the ISS partnership, pledging earlier this year that the joint work would continue.

“Russian cosmonauts and American astronauts are all very professional,” NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said on June 15 during a joint news conference with his European Space Agency counterpart.

“Despite the tragedies that are occurring in Ukraine by President Putin, the fact is that the international partnership is solid when it comes to the civilian space program.”

For a while, that effort seemed to have been paying off. It was only July 15 that NASA and Roscosmos announced they’d reached an agreement to launch one another’s space travelers to the station, with Americans riding aboard Russian rockets and Russian cosmonauts traveling aboard SpaceX vehicles. The SpaceX launch was announced for sometime after Sept. 29.

In late March, a U.S. astronaut and two Russian cosmonauts safely landed in Kazakhstan after leaving the space station aboard the same capsule.

The ISS, the size of a football field, was launched in 1998 and has since been a staple of post-Cold War international cooperation involving Moscow that survived for decades as the relationship between the U.S. and Russia soured. Its demise will likely spawn new stations in the coming decade as NASA actively involves private space companies and has given seed funding to at least four concept stations.

Axiom Space is also developing a private station of its own and has plans to launch the first segment by 2024.

But it’s not clear when those stations would become operational. And some fear there will be a gap between when they are ready and when the ISS is decommissioned, leaving the United States without a place to go in Earth orbit.

Meanwhile, China has begun assembly its space station, and launched a second laboratory module on Sunday.

Russia has set sights on launching its own project, but Roscosmos has for years struggled financially, and the cash inflow has been hindered after the U.S. shifted from using Soyuz rockets to lift their astronauts to the station and turned to SpaceX for these services.

In his Tuesday announcement, Borisov admitted that the Russian space industry is struggling as it also needs to replace many foreign technologies that are no longer available due to sanctions.

“I see my main task, together with my colleagues, is not to lower, but to raise the bar, and, first of all, to provide the Russian economy with the necessary space services,” Borisov said. “This is navigation, communication [services], data transmission, meteorological, geodetic information, and so on.”

Russian state media previously reported that Rocket and Space Corporation Energia is preparing a draft design of the station, dubbed Russian Orbital Service Station, that should be completed in the third quarter of 2023.

NASA officials on Tuesday said, however, that they had not been notified of Russia’s intentions and that they are planning to use the station until 2030 at least, when commercial space stations are expected to come online to replace the aging ISS.

NASA and the European Space Agency did not respond to requests for comment Tuesday. But speaking at a conference about the research and development done on the station, Robyn Gatens, NASA’s director of the ISS, said that NASA did not want to see the partnership come to an end. “We want to continue together as a partnership to operate the space station,” she said. “I think the Russians, just like us, are thinking ahead to what’s next for them. And as we’re planning for a transition after 2030 to commercially owned and operated space stations in low Earth orbit … they’re thinking about a transition as well.”

She added that NASA had not “received any official word” from Russia, but that “we’ll be talking more about their plan moving forward.”

If Russia were to pull out of the station, it would be a complicated process logistically and diplomatically. The agreement that governs the space station says that while partners may withdraw at any time, they must give “at least one year’s prior written notice.”

And while Russia’s statement said it would withdraw after 2024, it was unclear exactly when that might happen.

NASA has repeatedly stressed that its astronauts and Russian cosmonauts aboard the station continue to work side-by-side, as they have for years. And despite the turmoil on the ground, they have shown real signs of friendship. Earlier this year when cosmonaut Anton Shkaplerov handed over command of the station to NASA’s Thomas Marshburn, he said that while, “people have problems on Earth … on orbit we are one crew.” Speaking in English, he called the space station “a symbol of friendship and cooperation and like a symbol of the future of exploration in space.”

He thanked “my space brothers and sisters” and praised Marshburn, saying he would be a “professional commander of ISS.

But it hasn’t always gone smoothly in space. In November, Nelson criticized Russia for conducting a missile test against a satellite that created an estimated 1,500 pieces of space debris, some of which intersected the space station’s orbit. Then came the flag incident earlier this month. Nelson issued another rebuke, calling displaying the flag “fundamentally inconsistent with the station’s primary function.”

Today's Reddit

A laughingstock

 

Fooling Nobodies

Josh Hawley is having a rough go of it.

Kansas City Star:

Fist pumper to fleeing coward:

Jan. 6 video shows Missouri who Josh Hawley really is

Josh Hawley is a laughingstock.

During Thursday night’s televised hearings of the House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, coup attempt at the U.S. Capitol, Rep. Elaine Luria played video of Missouri’s junior senator that will surely follow him the rest of his life.

In the clip, Hawley sprints across a hallway as he and his fellow senators are evacuated after insurrectionists had breached the Capitol building. When it went across the screen, the audience in the room with the committee erupted in laughter.

Of course, Twitter immediately dogpiled. Hawley’s name was the No. 1 trending topic in politics that evening as users shared the hashtag #HawlinAss along with GIFs of a galloping Forrest Gump.

“From now on, if political reporters ask Josh Hawley if he’s planning to run, he’s going to have to ask them to clarify,” quipped one. 

A signature Hawley issue is masculinity — as in, how little of it American men seem to have these days. It’s a frequent topic in his speeches and on his podcast, where “the left-wing attack on manhood” is a dire threat to our society. Regnery Publishing is set to release his book “Manhood: The Masculine Virtues America Needs” next year. Twitter didn’t see much bravado as he ran from the mob on Luria’s video.

But funny as the visual was, there is absolutely nothing amusing about Jan. 6, 2021. A bipartisan Senate report concluded seven people died as a result of the attack. Two more Metropolitan Police officers took their own lives shortly after. About 150 members of law enforcement were injured, and it’s impossible to know how many others caught up in the horrific event will carry scars for life, of body and mind.

We said that day Hawley has blood on his hands for his role in perpetuating the lies that drove thousands of people to violence. That remains true.

Beyond the physical toll, though, is the damage Jan. 6 continues to inflict on our democracy and our shared sense of truth. The House committee is systematically demonstrating how too many Republicans in Donald Trump’s orbit allowed him to incite the riot, which he had promised in advance “will be wild,” and were then unable to get him to call his fans off until unimaginable damage had already been done.

SHAMELESS SENATOR STOLE COPYRIGHTED PHOTOGRAPH

Hawley has become one of the defining figures of that day. A famous photo captured by Francis Chung shows him raising a fist in solidarity with the crowds that would soon be breaking through doors, looting offices and assaulting law enforcement. Luria quoted a Capitol Police officer who was there and told the committee that Hawley’s gesture “riled up the crowd, and it bothered her greatly because he was doing it in a safe space protected by the officers and the barriers.”

And later that day, when the Senate reconvened after the halls of the Capitol had been cleared and secured, Hawley took to the floor to be the first voice calling to throw out millions of Americans’ votes cast fairly and legally for the rightful winner in a presidential election. And never forget: He was joined in his campaign to discard ballots by Kansas Sen. Roger Marshall. 

Chung’s photo of Hawley and his salute has become iconic. Taking a page from the Trump playbook, Hawley has embraced the famous image, flagrantly violating copyright laws by slapping it on T-shirts and camouflage beer koozies, and selling them on his political campaign’s fundraising website. Politico, owner of the image, sent a cease-and-desist demanding the merchandise be removed from sale. Of course, Hawley refused — a defiance shameful and shameless in equal measure.

Shame, clearly, is not a motivating factor for any number of Republicans still caught up in Trumpworld. Hawley has never apologized for attempting to reinstall a man who everyone around him knew had lost the election, as witness testimony continues to confirm. Surely the Yale and Stanford grad isn’t gullible enough to believe the craven lies about tampering with voting machines and dead people casting ballots that ooze through social media.

We realize Hawley’s conscience won’t make him suddenly do the right thing and tell the Jan. 6 committee what he knew and when he knew it. But as GOP Rep. Liz Cheney said Thursday while announcing more public hearings to come: “Doors have opened, new subpoenas have been issued, and the dam has begun to break. … We have considerably more to do.” The committee has delivered on its promises so far.

Since Trump left office, many insiders have revealed in interviews and tell-alls that his administration really was as unethical and chaotic as its worst detractors claimed all along. (Gee, thanks guys, but why couldn’t you have come clean back before the damage was done?) History will not look kindly upon the dead-enders who continued to defend Trump long after it became apparent his conduct was indefensible. When Cheney is saying even more birds are singing, believe her.

Sen. Josh Hawley might not fear a little mockery of his hasty flight from Capitol marauders. But he might be justified if he’s afraid of what emails or text messages some previously-loyal staffer might be considering turning over to the House committee. Stay tuned to the hearings.

Today's Stoopid Fuckin' Republican

There is only one organ in a woman’s body “that is not there to serve a purpose for her and that is her womb.”

“I’m not going to apologize for saying that,” Tschida told MTN. “I think that’s exactly what it’s there for. It welcomes in a new life and that’s what it’s there to do, to nurture and sustain that life.”

So, if her womb is there to serve as an incubator for new life, but it's not there to serve any other purpose for a woman, then who's purpose are you insisting it's there to serve?

Gosh - lemme see - maybe that purpose is all about a man taking sole province over a woman's reproductive decisions. That's it, isn't it, you arrogant dominionist assholes?

Seriously now, guys - fuck off and leave people alone.

WaPo: (pay wall)

GOP lawmaker: Womb has ‘no specific purpose’ to a woman’s ‘life or well-being’

As millions of Americans protest restrictions that preclude abortions, even when the life of a woman is at risk, Montana state Rep. Brad Tschida (R) is arguing that a woman’s womb “serves no specific purpose to her life or well-being.”

Tschida, a former Montana House majority leader who is running for the state Senate, wrote an email this week to more than 100 legislators citing a podcast featuring a woman who is an antiabortion advocate, according to the Daily Montanan.

“The womb is the only organ in a woman’s body that serves no specific purpose to her life or well-being,” Tschida wrote on Monday, according to MTN News, the first to report the news. “It is truly a sanctuary.”

The false claim goes against long-accepted science surrounding the pear-shaped organ and how it helps in women’s reproductive health and function. The uterus plays a critical role not just in the growth and development of a fetus during pregnancy but also menstruation and fertility. Conditions and diseases of the uterus can cause painful symptoms that require medical treatment, according to the Cleveland Clinic.

Tschida’s remarks were met by backlash from Democrats who accused the lawmaker of holding “antiquated, and frankly offensive beliefs.” Among those critics was state Rep. Willis Curdy (D), Tschida’s state Senate opponent, who decried the comments as “absolutely ludicrous and flat-out creepy.”

“He is literally telling women what is and isn’t theirs and what they can and cannot do with their bodies,” Curdy tweeted.

But Tschida, who did not immediately respond to a request for comment early Friday, doubled down on his remarks to local media, and pointed to a comment from the antiabortion activist in the podcast episode he had referenced: There is only one organ in a woman’s body “that is not there to serve a purpose for her and that is her womb.”

“I’m not going to apologize for saying that,” Tschida told MTN. “I think that’s exactly what it’s there for. It welcomes in a new life and that’s what it’s there to do, to nurture and sustain that life.”

The Republican’s comments come as the country continues to navigate through the first weeks of a post-Roe landscape — a stretch dominated by protests, lawsuits, court rulings and a man’s arrest in the case of a 10-year-old rape victim in Ohio who traveled to Indiana for an abortion. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton (R) announced Thursday that he was suing the Biden administration over federal rules that require abortions be provided in medical emergencies to save the life of the mother, even in states with near-total bans. The lawsuit follows new guidance from the Department of Health and Human Services that asserted federal law requiring emergency medical treatment supersedes any state restrictions on abortion in cases where the pregnant patient’s life or health is at risk.

While abortion remains legal for now in Montana due to protections in the state constitution, Gov. Greg Gianforte (R) has said previously that he would call a special legislative session on abortion if Roe was overturned. As Gianforte joined other Republicans on June 24 in celebrating what he called “a historic win for life, families, and science,” the governor tweeted that he was “in discussions with legislative leaders on next steps as we work to protect life in Montana.” Any legislative change to end the abortion protections would require a voter-approved amendment.

Tschida, who has represented Missoula in the state House since 2015, is running for a state Senate seat in a district that Democrats narrowly won in the previous two elections. The seat has been held by Democratic state Sen. Diane Sands, an outspoken advocate for women’s reproductive rights who recently spoke at a White House roundtable discussion on abortion access with Vice President Harris. Sands’s term ends next year.

In an email sent Monday to legislators, Tschida referenced an episode of a podcast featuring a professor who supported abortion rights debating with a woman who held antiabortion beliefs. Although Tschida told local media that he did not recall the name of the podcast, the Republican noted how the professor asked his antiabortion guest whether a woman should have to “sacrifice her organs because someone else told her to do so.” After thinking on the question, Tschida wrote, the woman expressed her opinion that “the womb is a place set aside for another person who arrives as a result of a choice of a man and a woman to procreate.”

“That single factor has struck me since I heard that commentary,” Tschida wrote.

The Republican told the Daily Montanan that the message he took away from the uterus exchange was comparable to a time he saw a doe fend off birds of prey from eating her dead fawn.

“We’ve got a mother that’s a wild animal that’s trying to protect her offspring who’s already dead, but we don’t have the same concern generally speaking for unborn in humanity,” he said. “I thought that was a pretty interesting parallel or dynamic.”

The Republican argued that voters cared about other issues more than abortion — such as inflation, the high cost of gas and election security — and that his views on women’s rights and their bodies would not be a factor in the November election.

“I’ve told people what I believe. I’ve told them how I would vote,” he said to the newspaper. “That’s up to the individuals.”

It's The Climate Change, Stoopid

Newsweek:

Marjorie Taylor Greene has asked why thousands of cattle perished during an extreme heatwave in Kansas just weeks after saying that climate change would be good for food production.

"Why did thousands of cattle all die in a heat wave?" the Republican congresswoman from Georgia wrote on Twitter on June 29. "Usually just the old, sick, or weak die in stressful conditions, not the whole herd. Food security is national security."

Horrific footage showing the cow corpses lying dead went viral online in the middle of June. As of June 16, approximately 2,000 cattle deaths had been reported to the Kansas Department of Health and Environment, with heat being cited as the cause. Large sections of Kansas are currently in the grip of a severe drought.

"This was a true weather event, it was isolated to a specific region in southwestern Kansas," A.J. Tarpoff, a cattle veterinarian with Kansas State University, told the Associated Press. "Yes, temperatures rose, but the more important reason why it was injurious was that we had a huge spike in humidity ... and at the same time wind speeds actually dropped substantially, which is rare for western Kansas."

The temperatures in certain areas of Kansas exceeded 100 degrees Fahrenheit, which when combined with low winds and high humidity, was too much for the cows to handle. "It was that sudden change that didn't allow the cattle to acclimate that caused the heat stress issues in them," Scarlett Hagins, a spokeswoman for the Kansas Livestock Association, told AP.

Extreme weather events are expected to become increasingly common as a result of climate change.

Michael Mann, director of the Earth System Science Center at Pennsylvania State University, and author of The New Climate War, told Newsweek climate change is going to threaten food security. "Climate change is already leading to more weather extremes—heat, drought, wildfire, floods, superstorms, and massive tornado outbreaks," he said. "Our own research suggests that, if anything, climate models are underestimating the impact climate change is having on these weather extremes and the potential for future increases with additional warming.

"This already is threatening food security, both in terms of the direct impacts of these extreme events e.g. withering heat waves and droughts that damage crops and threaten livestock, and the indirect effects [such as] disruption of supply chains and the food distribution system."

In an interview with Brian Glenn on the conservative Right Side Broadcasting Network on June 13, Greene said she thinks that increased levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere will do us more good than harm.

"The Earth is more green than it was years and years ago, and that's because of the Earth warming, it's because of carbon, because plants do need carbon. [Climate activists'] whole argument is not even scientific," she said.

"We've already warmed one degree Celsius and do you know what's happened since then? Let me tell you—we've had more food grown since then, which feeds people. We've been producing fossil fuels, [which] keeps people's houses warm in the winter. That saves people's lives. People die in the cold. This Earth warming, and carbon, is actually healthy for us. It helps us to feed people, it keeps people alive."

The Earth has indeed already heated up by 1 degree Celsius since the Industrial Revolution. However, the negative effects of this change can already be seen, particularly in the recent drought-triggered heatwave plaguing the western U.S.

Figures from the Environmental Protection Agency show how the U.S. heatwaves in the U.S. have become more regular, more prolonged and hotter since the 1960s.

Heatwaves in major cities across the United States are much more frequent than they were in the 1960s, rising from an average of two heatwaves per year to six per year in the 2010s. Heat-related deaths are rising worldwide, and crop growth is being hit.

While CO2 does help plants grow, drought will impact water resources that are also needed for agriculture.

The EPA says climate change will have a negative impact on food security, making it harder to grow crops, raise livestock and catch fish. It said in 2011, heatwaves caused about $1 billion in losses to agricultural producers.

Drought has the potential to reduce the amount of food available to grazing livestock. It could also increase the numbers of parasites and diseases, with warmer winters and earlier springtime allowing some pathogens to survive more easily.

There are 6.5 million cattle currently in Kansas, and the state has the third-largest cattle sector in the U.S. after Texas and Nebraska.

According to research published in the Lancet, cattle will experience heat stress at temperatures higher than 68 degrees Fahrenheit. Heat stress is caused by a combination of high temperatures, humidity, and wind speed, and results in negative impacts on both animal welfare and productivity: animals reduce their feed intake by between three and five percent with each extra degree of temperature increase, reducing milk and meat production. Heat stress will also reduce fertility and suppress the cow's immune system.

These effects, while awful from an animal welfare perspective, will also greatly impact the economic performance of the dairy and beef industry: according to the study, annual cattle deaths due to heat stress cost the U.S. $1.26 billion in the early 2000s. This is also a huge issue for food security, especially in lower income countries where cattle often constitute one of the main sources of food.

Usually, cattle farmers provide the cows with drinking water and spray them with sprinklers to help combat heat stress. However, it was early enough in the year that many of the cattle had not yet shed their winter coats.

This mass death was a freak incident, Brandon Depenbusch, operator of the Innovative Livestock Services feedlot in Great Bend, Kansas, told AP. "This is a one in 10-year, 20-year type event. This is not a normal event ... It is extremely abnormal, but it does happen."

Paging Dr Freud

Mary E Miller (GOP Rep from Illinois) is running against a fellow Republican because somebody in Springfield had the good sense to try to unfuck a hundred years of gerrymandering.

Here she is at a Trump rally yesterday (06-25-2022) telling the crowd that overturning Roe v Wade is a victory for "white life."

And yes, she fumbled a little. But she said what she said, and the crowd cheered it.

So no, Ms Miller doesn't have trouble with her words. Not really. What was in her mind came out through her mouth - just like normal people.

And it was no different than last time (01-10-2021).

"Hitler was right on one thing..."

When they tell you who they are

believe them

Stupid Politician Tricks

The Durango Herald: (southwestern Colorado)

Boebert seeks funding for Glenwood Springs bridge after voting against bill that would fund it

Congresswoman is asking for $33.1 million

U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert is seeking funding from an infrastructure bill that she voted against in March.

Boebert wants $33.1 million for the South Bridge in Glenwood Springs, according to a newsletter from her office. She also sent a letter to U.S. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg advocating construction of the Glenwood Springs bridge.

The city is requesting $33.1 million in Rural Surface Transportation grant money to complete the project, which would create a second point of access between Colorado State Highway 82 and the western side of the Roaring Fork River in the south Glenwood Springs area.

Boebert voted against President Joe Biden’s Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, calling the legislation “wasteful” and “garbage” on Twitter. Rural Surface Transportation grant funding began under former President Barack Obama’s Fixing America’s Surface Transportation Act in 2015.

In her letter to Buttigieg, Boebert said, “Glenwood Springs’ South Bridge Project aligns with the Rural Surface Transportation program’s goals to improve and expand the surface transportation infrastructure in rural areas to increase connectivity, improve the safety and reliability of the movement of people, generate regional economic growth, and improve the quality of life for residents of the Lower Colorado River Valley and the Roaring Fork Valley. This connection will also reduce traffic congestion, improve safety along State Highway 82, and will protect hundreds of lives in the event of a fast-moving fire.”

In an email to The Durango Herald, Boebert said the bill she introduced, America’s Infrastructure Modernization Act, is a “real solution” for funding infrastructure.

“I am for investing in rural Colorado, but Biden’s so-called infrastructure bill was not the right way to do it,” she said. “Less than 10% of (the) $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill went to roads and bridges. The bill provides tens of billions of dollars for Solyndra style slush funds, Green New Deal policies, electric busses (sic), and government welfare.”

The project has a local match commitment of $24 million, including a $20 million local cash match and a $4 million commitment from the Roaring Fork Transportation Authority. In her letter, Boebert stressed the importance of the bridge during emergency situations.

“With Rural Surface Transportation grant funds, Glenwood Springs will construct a new bridge connection that will provide a critical second emergency route/evacuation access between State Highway 82 and the western side of the Roaring Fork River in the City’s South Corridor,” Boebert wrote.

In March, Boebert also celebrated funding that she voted against from the same bill, with a newsletter distributed by her office afterward touting “nine Boebert wins for Colorado.” Boebert is also against the use of earmarks, which provide federal funding for local projects.

Today's GOP Sleaze Ball

Carl Paladino is as smarmy as they come.

He put this in an email about Michelle Obama:

“I’d like her to return to being a male and let loose in the outback of Zimbabwe, where she lives comfortably in a cave with Maxie, the gorilla.”

 And then tried to excuse himself with this:

“I filled out the survey to send to a couple friends and forwarded it to them not realizing that I didn’t hit ‘forward,’ I hit ‘reply.' All men make mistakes."

Well, no shit, Skeezix, but guess what - it's still not OK to be an asshole, even if you keep it quiet. Maybe especially when you keep it quiet.

And then this:

Media Matters For America:

Carl Paladino: Hitler is “the kind of leader we need today. We need somebody inspirational.”

Republican congressional candidate Carl Paladino appeared on a radio program last year and claimed that New York needs someone like Adolf Hitler to lead it. In the newly unearthed remarks, Paladino said he'd recently heard someone talk about how Hitler had “aroused the crowds” -- and he commented that “that's the kind of leader we need today. We need somebody inspirational. We need somebody that is a doer, has been there and done it.”

Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY), the third-ranked Republican in the House, has endorsed Paladino’s campaign, calling him a “friend” and “conservative outsider who will be a tireless fighter.”

Paladino is a businessman and Republican politician who has appeared as a commentator on media outlets, including Fox News and Fox Business. He also briefly hosted a podcast. Paladino announced his congressional campaign for New York’s 23rd Congressional District last week after Republican Rep. Chris Jacobs dropped his reelection bid.

Paladino has a long history of making toxic and bigoted remarks. Media Matters reported earlier this week that he shared a post on Facebook portraying the recent mass shootings in Buffalo, New York, and Uvalde, Texas, as false flag attacks meant to help Democrats “revoke the 2nd amendment and take away guns.” The post also claimed “the Texas shooter was receiving hypnosis training” apparently under the direction of the CIA.

He initially responded to media attention to his post by lying that he didn’t personally share it and he doesn’t “even know how to post on Facebook.” Paladino later admitted that he posted it. Media outlets also reported that Paladino sent the post to his email list.

His commentary has also included saying his state needs someone like Adolf Hitler to lead it.

Paladino appeared on the February 13, 2021, edition of The r-House Radio Show, a weekly radio program that airs on WBEN in Buffalo, New York. (Update 6/10/22: The r-House Radio Show's podcast page for that episode has been taken down. An archive of it can be found here.) The program is hosted by real estate executive Peter Hunt.

During the show, Hunt asked Paladino how to “rouse the population” and get people thinking about change.

Paladino replied: “I was thinking the other day about somebody had mentioned on the radio Adolf Hitler and how he aroused the crowds. And he would get up there screaming these epithets and these people were just — they were hypnotized by him. That's, I guess, I guess that's the kind of leader we need today. We need somebody inspirational. We need somebody that is a doer, has been there and done it.”

This "New" Angle

Susan Collins was a "cheap date" for the Trump White House, a gullible rube for Mitch McConnell, a typical coin-operated crook for her lobbyist husband and his K Street pals, and a complete fucking idiot to the rest of us.

So how the fuck is it that not enough people are able to see all of this as a problem when it comes time to vote her sorry ass outa there?

Insider: (pay wall)

Trump officials privately mocked pro-choice Susan Collins for backing Brett Kavanaugh and called her a 'cheap date,' report says

Trump officials privately mocked pro-choice Sen. Susan Collins for being manipulated into backing then-Supreme Court Justice nominee Brett Kavanaugh, sources told Rolling Stone.

Although Kavanaugh said at the time that he considered Roe v Wade to be "settled law," he has since reportedly agreed to support a draft opinion overturning the landmark abortion ruling.

"The thinking from Trump and everybody else who worked to make this happen was that, as long as his nominees didn't say anything stupid and let the Susan Collins-es of the world think what they needed to think and hear what they needed to hear, then it would get done," a former Trump official speaking under the condition of anonymity told Rolling Stone.

Some Trump administration officials privately mocked the senior senator from Maine for her public support of Roe, crassly referring to her as a "cheap date," sources told the outlet.

In response to the "cheap date" comment, Collins' spokesperson Annie Clark told Rolling Stone: "That kind of sexist language is abhorrent."

Collins' team also denied the allegation that the senator was manipulated into voting for Kavanaugh.

"Senator Collins has voted to confirm six of the current nine Supreme Court Justices, as well as Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson. She considered the Kavanaugh nomination with a rigorous review process and an open mind. Any allegation to the contrary is false," her spokesperson said.

After Politico leaked the draft opinion that would overturn Roe v Wade, the moderate Maine Republican senator expressed surprise at Kavanaugh's stance.

"If this leaked draft opinion is the final decision and this reporting is accurate, it would be completely inconsistent with what Justice Gorsuch and Justice Kavanaugh said in their hearings and in our meetings in my office," Collins said in a statement at the time, per CNN.

According to the Rolling Stone report, Trump officials targeted certain senators to rally support for Kavanaugh. However, they believed that a pressure campaign against Collins would backfire, and the best approach was to leave Kavanaugh's stance on abortion law vague.

A former top Trump aide told Rolling Stone that the belief was that Collins would decide to vote "yes" on her own as long as she got the correct responses from Kavanaugh.

During mock hearings and prep sessions that the Trump administration held for Kavanaugh, the then-prospective justice would avoid revealing how he would vote if an opportunity to overturn Roe arose.

Instead, he would give "lengthy, detailed monologues on dissents, opinions, and precedents," Rolling Stone reported.

"It was instinct," a person familiar with the matter told Rolling Stone. "Everyone in the room knew that when a [Trump] nominee says something about 'precedent' [in regards to Roe], pro-lifers know what that really means. If someone else [such as Susan Collins] wanted to interpret that differently, that's their choice."

Abortion In Texas

Texas Public Radio:

Texas woman charged with murder for ‘self-induced abortion’

Police in Starr County on the Texas-Mexico border have arrested and charged a woman with murder for allegedly performing what they called a “self-induced abortion.”

The Starr County Sheriff's Office arrested 26-year-old Lizelle Herrera on Thursday.

The story was first reported by Valley Central. TPR confirmed Friday night that Herrera remains in the custody of the Starr County Sheriff’s Office with bond set at $500,000.

La Frontera Fund, a Rio Grande Valley-based abortion assistance fund, planned a protest for Saturday morning outside the Starr County Jail.

“This arrest is inhumane. We are demanding the immediate release of Lizelle Herrera.’ said Rockie Gonzalez, founder and board chair of Frontera Fund. “What is alleged is that she was in the hospital and had a miscarriage and divulged some information to hospital staff, who then reported her to the police.”

“This is a developing story and we don’t yet know all the details surrounding this tragic event, what we do know is that criminalizing pregnant people’s choices or pregnancy outcomes, which the state of Texas has done, takes away people’s autonomy over their own bodies, and leaves them with no safe options when they choose not to become a parent,” Gonzalez explained.

In September, Texas lawmakers passed Senate Bill 8, which bans the procedure as early as six weeks into a pregnancy — often before many people realize they're pregnant.

SB 8, the most restrictive ban on the procedure in the country, deputizes private citizens to sue anyone who performs an abortion or “aids and abets” a procedure.

“We want people to know that this type of legislation impacts low-income people of color communities the most when state legislators put restrictions on our reproductive rights,” Gonzales told TPR.

As legal challenges make their way through the courts, thousands of Texans have gone out of state to get abortions.

If I win the big jackpot in the lottery, I'll be providing transportation, food and lodging for any woman in Texas who needs to escape in order to get a safe and proper abortion. And eventually, I'm all but 100% certain we could make the effort self-sustaining with the money we'd win by countersuing those assholes.

Let's throw in a hypothetical:

• What if Ms Hererra had attempted this self-induced abortion, but the fetus survived, and the pregnancy was deemed to be fully viable?
• And let's say that the cops are dispatched to her house to arrest her for attempted murder, but she puts up an epic fight resisting.
• Are the cops authorized to use deadly force in order to compel Hererra's compliance?
• Would the cops then be liable on a charge for the wrongful death of the fetus?

Governor Trumpkin

"Conservatives" always walk in with a mouthful of "the supremacy of the individual", and "self-reliance" and "independent blah blah blah" - but when it's time to make real decisions on behalf of real people with real problems, they surely do love 'em some good ol' top-down authoritarian Daddy State bullshit.

Their specious nonsense about the absolute evils of collective action in the interest of doing what's best for the most has put them in a corner so tight, that when they find themselves in positions of power, they can't do anything that doesn't expose them as flagrant hypocrites.

exempli gratia:

Glenn Youngkin spent a lot of campaign time saying Ralph Northam had no right to mandate masks in schools (in the name of public safety), and then - on his first day in office - he issued an Executive Order mandating armed cops in schools (as a matter of public safety).

WaPo: (pay wall)

Opinion: Glenn Youngkin’s awful first moves are already sparking a rebellion

Glenn Youngkin pulled off a remarkably clever trick en route to becoming the first Republican governor of Virginia in almost a decade. He energized supporters of Donald Trump but kept those appeals under the radar, while running as a center-right businessman-turned-politician offered up in what has become his trademark “cheerful suburban dad” packaging.

But this balancing act is already facing its first big governing test. How Youngkin manages it will be highly illuminating with regard to how much space there is inside the GOP for a politics that isn’t relentlessly shaped around the preoccupations and pathologies of Trumpism.

In the coming days, one of Youngkin’s first big moves will likely face a sustained legal and political challenge. Youngkin just rolled out a new executive order that ends masking requirements in schools, instead stating that any parent can opt out without providing a reason.

But numerous Virginia school districts immediately announced that they will continue requiring masks in accordance with previous policy. Some said they will remain aligned with guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Opinion by James Downie: Youngkin cares more about sound bites than solutions

Youngkin talks Va. schools, critical race theory and vaccines in first state address

Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R) delivered his first address to the Joint General Assembly in Richmond at Virginia’s State Capitol on Jan. 17. (The Washington Post)

As of now, school districts in counties with a total of several million people in population have indicated they will likely continue the mask requirement in the face of Youngkin’s executive order. These include Fairfax, Henrico, Prince William, Arlington and Loudoun.

“We will fight it to the end,” Jason Kamras, the superintendent of Richmond Public Schools, told me.

What makes Youngkin’s move particularly ugly is that he’s hinting he’ll follow the path of fellow Republican governor Ron DeSantis of Florida. DeSantis threatened to withhold funding from school boards that kept mask requirements in defiance of his effort to bar them and sought to punish them in other ways.

Youngkin is making similarly menacing noises. He vows to “use every resource within the governor’s authority” to force school districts into compliance, while piously insisting it’s time to “listen to parents,” as if all parents monolithically want an end to mask requirements and only school boards want them.

But Youngkin’s effort to paint school districts as power-mad bureaucrats trampling on the rights of parents is running headlong into a counterargument: Though the legal issues here are complex, the school districts might have the law on their side, and Youngkin might be the one abusing his power.

Youngkin’s stance might be legally vulnerable

Here’s why: As some of the school districts continuing mask requirements argue, a state law passed by the General Assembly and signed by the former governor may well require them to implement mask requirements.

That law requires school boards to adhere “to the maximum extent practicable” to strategies protecting schoolkids from covid-19 that have been “provided” by the CDC. As it happens, the CDC does advise universal masking in schools and backs up this position by citing various studies showing that such policies are effective.

Overheard

the deafening crash of a pin falling to the carpet made it impossible to hear what Republicans were saying as they reacted to the news that three white guys were convicted of murdering Ahmaud Arbery.

Today's GOP

John Neely Kennedy is the embodiment of a certain brand of Southern Gentility that has always been - and is continually demonstrated to be - as phony as a 20-dollar Rolex.

From Kennedy's Wiki page:

Kennedy was born in Centreville, Mississippi, and raised in Zachary, Louisiana. After graduating from Zachary High School as co-valedictorian in 1969, he entered Vanderbilt University, where his interdepartmental major was in political science, philosophy and economics. He graduated magna cum laude.

At Vanderbilt, Kennedy was elected president of his senior class and named to Phi Beta Kappa. He received a Juris Doctor in 1977 from the University of Virginia School of Law in Charlottesville, Virginia, where he was an executive editor of the Virginia Law Review and elected to the Order of the Coif. In 1979, he earned a Bachelor of Civil Law degree with first class honours from Magdalen College, Oxford, where he studied under Sir Rupert Cross and John H.C. Morris.

WaPo: (pay wall)

Opinion: Our Foghorn Leghorn Republican senator little resembles his former Democratic self, but in Louisiana we know the type

Many Americans took fresh notice of Louisiana’s sardonic junior U.S. senator, John Neely Kennedy, last week when the Republican lawmaker questioned the patriotism of President Biden’s nominee for comptroller of the currency.

“I don’t know whether to call you ‘professor’ or ‘comrade,’” Kennedy told Saule Omarova, a Cornell Law School professor, during her confirmation hearing before the Senate Banking Committee on which Kennedy serves.

When Kennedy asked if she had a resignation letter from the Communist youth group the Soviet-controlled Kazakhstan government forced her to join as a child, Omarova responded, “Senator, I’m not a Communist. I do not subscribe to that ideology. I could not choose where I was born.” Omarova told Kennedy the Communist regime persecuted her family, adding, “That’s who I am. I remember that history. I came to this country. I’m proud to be an American.”

Among those criticizing Kennedy for trying to smear Omarova was Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), who said his Louisiana colleague had violated “senatorial courtesy.” That includes, Brown added, “not doing character assassination.”

But Kennedy’s antics at the hearing should have surprised no one in the room. Since entering the Senate in 2017, he has specialized in outrageous comments on Fox News, on the Senate floor and in committee hearings.

An acerbic Biden critic, Kennedy is a fount of sharp-but-folksy one-liners. He punctuated his 2016 Senate campaign spots with, “I will not let you down. I’d rather drink weedkiller.” With his exaggerated Southern accent, he affects a mixture of Mr. Haney, the con artist of the 1960s CBS sitcom “Green Acres,” and the bombastic Looney Tunes rooster, Foghorn J. Leghorn.

The 70-year-old Kennedy is so committed to this persona that a columnist for the New Orleans Times-Picayune challenged readers in 2019 to guess the author of a series of eccentric statements: Foghorn Leghorn or Kennedy? It was a difficult quiz.

Whenever Kennedy appears on Fox News or launches an attention-getting stunt, those of us in Louisiana who know him well roll our eyes and reflect on the Kennedy we knew before his Senate election.

We recall the brainy graduate of Vanderbilt University, the University of Virginia Law School and Oxford University’s Magdalen College; the relatively progressive Democrat who ran for the U.S. Senate in 2004; the man who, despite his 2007 party switch, served capably as state treasurer from 2000 to 2017; the official who, although in the same Republican Party as then-Gov. Bobby Jindal, was a fierce critic of Jindal’s reckless fiscal policies.

Mostly, we wonder what happened to the reasonable, non-incendiary Kennedy we once knew.

In preparing this piece, I found a lengthy interview Kennedy did in October 2004 with the Shreveport Times. In pitching his Democratic Senate candidacy, he was articulate, restrained and progressive. He scorned the tax cuts for wealthy Americans that then-President George W. Bush had signed. He favored increasing the federal minimum wage.

He was no Bernie Sanders liberal, but he was the progressive Democrat in the race — so much so that some prominent Black leaders, including our congressional delegation’s most liberal member, Rep. William J. Jefferson of New Orleans, backed him.

But what stood out in that 2004 interview was the absence of the homey sayings, abusive zingers and character assassinations that have become Kennedy trademarks. He was nothing like the man you see these days insulting House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) — “It must suck to be that dumb” — or vilifying then-Interior secretary nominee Deb Haaland as “a neo-socialist, left-of-Lenin whack job.”

When people outside Louisiana ask me about Kennedy, I tell them he’s not the folksy bumpkin you see on TV, but a wealthy, well-educated attorney with an Oxford degree. Just like Pat Buttram, who portrayed Mr. Haney in “Green Acres,” Kennedy is acting. He’s a shape-shifting, attention-hungry politician who found a role — wily country boy — that brings him some fame.

Since the days of Huey Long, Louisiana has celebrated its brash, entertaining and clever politicians. But Kennedy’s latest media splash was not clever. It was entertaining only to those who enjoy cruelty and xenophobia. It was conduct that, until recently, might have earned Kennedy criticism from some members of his party. The pre-2017 Kennedy would have abhorred it.

What troubles me about Kennedy’s latest stunt is not just what it revealed about a politician doing what some unprincipled, opportunistic politicians have always done. What bothers me more is what it says about Louisiana politics, and today’s Republican Party, that Kennedy could expose himself as a xenophobic demagogue and pay no price for it.