babylonsister

babylonsister's Journal

July 1, 2022

Jon Stewart: Supreme Court is 'the Fox News of justice'

Jon Stewart: Supreme Court is ‘the Fox News of justice’
by Natalie Prieb - 07/01/22 12:17 PM ET

Comedian Jon Stewart blasted the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade on his podcast Thursday, arguing that the ruling was based in ideology rather than constitutional reasoning.

“In my mind, the idea that this was based in any kind of reasoned debate or philosophical education — the Supreme Court is now the Fox News of justice in my mind,” Stewart said on an episode of “The Problem with Jon Stewart.”

“It is a cynical pursuit in the same way that Fox News would come out with ‘we’re fair and balanced’ under the patina of what would be a high-status pursuit to the betterment of society, journalism. They are a cynical political arm,” the comedian argued.

snip//

“When you look at the ridiculous kabuki theater now of justice confirmation, where they can just go out there and just f—— lie, like if this were about debate, then they would’ve understood what perjury meant,” the former “Daily Show” host argued.

“But they are now the Fox News of justice. I mean, there is no consistency. States can’t regulate guns, but they can regulate [uteruses], you know?”

more...

https://thehill.com/blogs/in-the-know/3543836-jon-stewart-supreme-court-is-the-fox-news-of-justice/

July 1, 2022

Oregon School's Ridiculous Battle Over 'Handmaid's Tale' Ends With Book Ban

Oregon School’s Ridiculous Battle Over ‘Handmaid’s Tale’ Ends With Book Ban
RESTRICTED ACCESS
The graphic novel version of Margaret Atwood's novel became embroiled in controversy after one parent complained about its sexual imagery.
Brooke Leigh Howard
Reporter
Updated Jun. 30, 2022 5:48PM ET / Published Jun. 30, 2022 5:34PM ET
JIM WATSON

A graphic novel adaptation of Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale was permanently pulled from an Oregon high school’s library thanks to the district’s superintendent and his deputy who forced its removal after a committee couldn’t decide what to do about the book.

“We removed the graphic novel because…we found numerous images of nudity, sexual assault, and violence throughout the graphic novel,” Medford School District spokesperson Natalie Hurd told the Mail Tribune.

Superintendent Bret Champion and Superintendent Deputy Jeanne Graziol made the final call to remove two copies of the graphic novel from North Medford High School, Mail Tribune reported.

According to Oregon Public Broadcasting, the removal came after just one parent complained about sexual images in the book.

more...

https://www.thedailybeast.com/oregon-schools-ridiculous-battle-over-handmaids-tale-ends-with-book-ban?ref=home?ref=home

June 29, 2022

Psychopath in Chief

The American Prospect

Psychopath in Chief
Today’s ‘smoking gun’ testimony: Trump was fine with smoking guns as long as they weren’t aimed at him.
by Harold Meyerson
June 28, 2022

snip//

But Trump didn’t merely encourage violence on January 6th. He wanted to lead it, and he was violent himself. Following his speech on the Ellipse, he got into the presidential limo and insisted he be taken to the Capitol, to join with the rioters and we don’t know what else. Try somehow to keep the electoral votes from being tallied? Whatever his plan, he objected furiously when Robert Engel, the head of his Secret Service detail, told him that he couldn’t go to Capitol Hill; it simply wasn’t safe.

Trump’s response, as Tony Ornato, Trump’s deputy chief of staff for his personal security, told Hutchinson with Engel beside him, was to point out that he was “the fucking president,” seize the steering wheel to turn the limo toward the Capitol, and when Engel reached over to remove his hand from the wheel, to choke Engel to make him stop. Engel prevailed—fortunately, if you’re one of those who believes in democracy, the rule of law, and that sort of thing.

Such spasms of rage, apparently, were nothing new in the Oval Office. When Trump saw Attorney General Bill Barr’s interview with the Associated Press on December 1, 2020, in which Barr said the Justice Department had found no evidence of vote rigging or voter fraud that called into question Joe Biden’s victory, he hurled his lunch across the presidential dining room, smashing his dishes and covering the walls with ketchup. (Hutchinson helped clean up the mess.) On other occasions, she testified, he also broke dishes and yanked his tablecloth off his dining room table, scattering his meals to the four walls.

If Trump exhibited all the restraint of a two-year-old with a particularly messy diaper, Hutchinson’s immediate boss, chief of staff Meadows, exhibited a sangfroid to predictions and actual outbursts of insurrectionary violence that would put a corpse to shame. Told by security officials of the coming violence, warned by the White House counsels of the disastrous consequences of Trump’s inviting it, and given a running account of the mayhem at the Capitol on January 6th, Meadows seldom even looked up from his cellphone, said Hutchinson, who was with him almost continuously during those days. And as the riot progressed, and most of the muck-a-mucks of Trumpworld called either Trump or Meadows to implore Trump to put a stop to the violence at the Capitol, she added, Meadows’s suggestion was that Trump should blame antifa for the attack, though as things grew steadily more hairy, he eventually counseled Trump to gently suggest his armed legion should leave.

When Hutchinson concluded her jaw-dropping account with the revelation that both Meadows and Rudy Giuliani had asked Trump for pardons, her interrogator, Rep. Liz Cheney, revealed some messages the committee had received from actual, potential, and reluctant witnesses (and refuseniks as well), none of whose identities were disclosed. These witnesses and non-witnesses relayed the threats they’d received if they testified and told the truth about Trump. The former president, they were told, was reading everyone’s testimony for signs of betrayal, whether real or incipient.

more...

https://prospect.org/politics/psychopath-in-chief/

June 29, 2022

Trump White House Lawyer Pat Cipollone Needs to Testify to the Jan. 6 Panel, Liz Cheney Says

https://www.thedailybeast.com/pat-cipollone-needs-to-testify-at-jan-6-hearings-after-cassidy-hutchinsons-hearings-liz-cheney-says?ref=home

Trump White House Lawyer Pat Cipollone Needs to Testify to the Jan. 6 Panel, Liz Cheney Says
CHAT WITH PAT
Dan Ladden-Hall
News Correspondent
Updated Jun. 29, 2022 9:26AM ET /
Published Jun. 29, 2022 9:17AM ET

Liz Cheney has called for top Trump White House legal counsel Pat Cipollone to testify before the Jan. 6 committee following explosive evidence given at Tuesday’s hearing. Cassidy Hutchinson, an aide to Trump Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, said Cipollone had been concerned about the president’s plans to join the mob at the attack on the Capitol. “Mr. Cipollone said something to the effect of, ‘Please make sure we don’t go up to the Capitol, Cassidy. Keep in touch with me,’” Hutchinson told the panel, recalling that Cipollone added: “We’re going to get charged with every crime imaginable if we make that movement happen.” On Wednesday morning, Cheney tweeted: “As we heard yesterday, WH counsel Pat Cippollone had significant concerns re. Trump’s Jan 6 activities. It’s time for Mr. Cippollone to testify on the record. Any concerns he has about the institutional interests of his prior office are outweighed by the need for his testimony.”

June 29, 2022

Army Drops Requirement for High School Diploma Amid Recruiting Crisis

Army Drops Requirement for High School Diploma Amid Recruiting Crisis
24 Jun 2022
Military.com | By Steve Beynon

The Army is tossing its mandate for potential recruits to have a high school diploma or GED certificate to enlist in the service, in one of the most dramatic moves yet in the escalating recruiting crisis hitting the entire Defense Department.

On Thursday, the service announced that individuals may enlist without those previously required education certifications if they ship to basic training this fiscal year, which ends Oct. 1.

Recruits must also be at least 18 years old and otherwise qualify for a job in the active-duty Army. They also must score at least a 50 on the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery, or ASVAB, an SAT-style quiz to measure a potential recruit's academic ability.

A 50 on the test is a relatively low score, with 31 being the minimum to qualify for service. Combat arms jobs such as infantrymen and cavalry scouts need only minimal scores to serve, while admin work such as a human resources specialist or public affairs require scores of 100 or higher.

more...

https://www.military.com/daily-news/2022/06/24/army-drops-requirement-high-school-diploma-amid-recruiting-crisis.html

June 29, 2022

James Fallows...

https://twitter.com/JamesFallows/status/1541843740452655108

Full thread here with lots of comments from people you know...

https://digbysblog.net/2022/06/28/cassidy-hutchinson-hero/

Cassidy Hutchinson, hero
Published by digby on June 28, 2022

June 29, 2022

Secret Service Agents Deny Claim of Violent Trump Freakout in Limo on Jan. 6: WaPo

https://www.thedailybeast.com/cassidy-hutchinsons-jan-6-testimony-on-trump-limo-assault-disputed-by-secret-service-agents?ref=home

Secret Service Agents Deny Claim of Violent Trump Freakout in Limo on Jan. 6: WaPo
RIOT RASHOMON
AJ McDougall
Breaking News Reporter
Published Jun. 28, 2022 10:55PM ET

The Secret Service appears to be pushing back on bombshell testimony that former President Donald Trump became violent during a presidential limo ride on Jan. 6, 2021. Former West Wing aide Cassidy Hutchinson told the select House panel she’d heard that after Trump was told he couldn’t go to the Capitol, he attempted to grab the steering wheel away from the driver and “lunged” at one of his security agents. But The Washington Post, among other outlets, is reporting that several agents who accompanied Trump that day don’t back that version of events up. Though the agents did not dispute that Trump was verbally aggressive, they deny that he ever assaulted anyone or grabbed at the wheel, the newspaper said, citing one current and one former law enforcement official.

June 28, 2022

Flop sweat

https://digbysblog.net/2022/06/28/flop-sweat/

Flop sweat
Published by Tom Sullivan on June 28, 2022
We know exactly what they’ll be doing at Mar-a-Lago at 1 p.m.

January 6th: “Slowly I turned…step by step…inch by inch…” Almost as if justice is stalking.

snip//

Reporting backed up the rumors it would be former Mark Meadows aide Cassidy Hutchinson (CNN):

Cassidy Hutchinson, an aide to former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows and a witness to many critical events and conversations, is expected to testify publicly on Tuesday before the select committee investigating the January 6, 2021, US Capitol attack, according to two sources familiar with the matter.

Her planned appearance was first reported by Punchbowl News.

Hutchinson has already been interviewed by the committee behind closed doors and video clips from her deposition have been featured by the panel during earlier hearings. But her live testimony would mark a significant moment in the committee’s series of hearings as Hutchinson has long been considered one of its most consequential witnesses due to her proximity to former President Donald Trump’s then-White House chief of staff.

Prior taped testimony by Hutchinson implicated a set of Trump-adjacent advisers and members of Congress who asked for pardons after the Jan. 6 insurrection. Having her testify in person could prove even more explosive.

The urgency driving today’s snap hearing is unclear. Concerns about the witness’ name being leaked and for the witness’ security are likely, reports CNN:

The security concerns have also led to new precautions being taken inside the hearing room. Another source told CNN that some of the people who had regular front row seats for hearings were told they likely will not get them on Tuesday for security reasons.

snip//

As the investigative cordon closes around Trump, his communications with cultish followers could spark more violence.

Mob boss as a description of Donald Trump was not a euphemism, was it? An attack on the seat of government by a Trump mob is the very subject of the committee’s investigation.

June 28, 2022

What Cassidy Hutchinson Might Say

https://politicalwire.com/2022/06/28/what-cassidy-hutchinson-might-say/

What Cassidy Hutchinson Might Say
June 28, 2022 at 6:36 am EDT By Taegan Goddard

Cassidy Hutchinson, a top aide to Trump chief of staff Mark Meadows, will testify today before the January 6 Committee.

Playbook: “Hutchinson knows a lot. Before, on, and after Jan. 6, she had close proximity to both Meadows and then-President Donald Trump.”

Said Hutchinson: “Almost all, if not all, meetings Mr. Trump had, I had insight on.”

Punchbowl News: “Hutchinson also testified that she saw Meadows burn papers in his office after meeting with Rep. Scott Perry (R-PA) in the weeks before Jan. 6. Perry played a key role in the push to appoint Jeffrey Clark, a DOJ environmental lawyer, as acting attorney general in order to use the Justice Department to bolster Trump’s false election fraud claims.”

CNN: “Hutchinson told the January 6 committee that Trump had suggested to Meadows he approved of the ‘hang Mike Pence’ chants from rioters who stormed the U.S. Capitol.”

June 28, 2022

Eric Trump Felt Post-Election Violence Was 'Fair Game': Jan. 6 Filmmaker

https://www.thedailybeast.com/eric-trump-told-filmmaker-called-before-jan-6-panel-that-post-election-violence-was-fair-game-he-says

Eric Trump Felt Post-Election Violence Was ‘Fair Game’: Jan. 6 Filmmaker
GO TEAM!
AJ McDougall
Breaking News Reporter
Published Jun. 27, 2022 6:21PM ET

Donald Trump’s middle son was blithe about the potential violence that threatened to erupt across the U.S. in the wake of his father losing the 2020 presidential election, according to a British documentarian. Alex Holder, the filmmaker whose substantial access to the Trump family has been of great interest to the select House panel investigating the Capitol riot, said in an interview with The Independent published Monday that Eric Trump felt that violence would be justified. “When I asked Eric about the potential danger of sort of rhetoric and the sort of the belligerence, he felt that it was… fair game in that it… was sort of the equivalent on the other side of the political discourse,” Holder said, “or he felt that it was the right thing to do… because the election was stolen.” The documentarian’s forthcoming series on the Trumps, Unprecedented, is slated to premiere on Discovery+ this summer. Footage from the three-part project has been turned over to the Jan. 6 committee.

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