Showing posts with label NPR. Show all posts
Showing posts with label NPR. Show all posts
Friday, April 9, 2021
Be Aware, Missourians---Republicans In Jeff City Are Also Working on Vote Suppression Here
From NPR today: The same day last month that Georgia's legislature passed a controversial new voting bill, Missouri's Republican-led House approved one of its own. It would impose strict photo ID and other requirements on voting.
Both bills are part of a wave of measures proposed across the country after the 2020 elections, and reflect a deep partisan divide over who has access to the polls and how. The divide is not new, but the sides have become increasingly entrenched.
Understand, folks. The Republicans and their ideas and work is so very unpopular with the rest of us out here in America that they have found the only way they can get or stay in government offie is to HAVE FEWER AMERICANS VOTE. They are actively working, now in 47 states, to disenfranchise fellow working, tax paying American citizens, voters. This cannot stand. We mustn't allow this. Call your government representatives. Tell them to support HR1 in the House and S1 in the Senate. We must stop all attempts at vote suppression.
Monday, February 1, 2021
News About the Trumpster Just Keeps Getting Better
It was bad enough he was ever, ever in government office, let alone the highest office in the land but now that he's out---THANK GOD AND GOODNESS--the news just does seem to keep getting better and better about this old orange buffoon.
Of course, we'll be starting an impeachment, his 2nd, God love him, on February 9, little over a week from now--JUST AFTER THE CHIEFS WIN THE SUPER BOWL--and of course, his, Trump's 5 lawyers all quit on him about one week before this trial is to start because they wouldn't testify falsely in court that he won the election.
The state of New York is still, still going after him about his taxes, God love 'em, and in 2 different cases, I believe. Also, he had to turn over yet more tax documents it was ruled by and in a court last week.
And now this.
Scotland Parliment to Vote on 'Unexplained Wealth Order' Against Trump This Week
An "unexplained wealth order", you ask?
The Scotish Parliment is about to jump in on the fun of dumping on Trump.- Scotland's government could investigate Donald Trump's Scottish assets
- MSPs are set to vote on whether to pursue an Unexplained Wealth Order
- Wednesday's debate is being brought to the chamber by Patrick Harvie
- The vote to seek an Unexplained Wealth Order (UWO) would not be binding.
- However, it would increase pressure on Sturgeon to act in accordance with Hollyrood.
- Most notably, they would probe where the £35.7 million Trump used to purchase the Turnberry resort came from.
Ain't it great?
Have a terrific day, campers.
Final, side note. A reader---yes, apparently I had a reader!--commented that he thought I'd stop unloading on Trump now that he's out of office.
Not a chance in Hell.
As long as he or I am alive, I will be dissing on this greedy, selfish, self-centered, reckless, dangerous, ignorant old fool that tried so hard to wreck our nation.
But thanks for asking.
Additional link:
Yet more wonderfulness, too.
The Real Reason Republicans Are Against Biden's COVID Relief Proposal
Yes, the Republicans say things about being concerned about the budget and that's why they're proposing a smaller and honestly weaker COVID relief plan but Robert Reich gets this correct.
The Real Reason the GOP Don’t Want Biden’s Plan? They Fear It Will Work
Biden’s success would put into sharp relief Trump and Republicans' utter failures on COVID and jobs
A bit from the article:
Ten Senate Republican have proposed a COVID relief bill of about $600 billion. That’s less than a third of Biden’s plan. They promise "bipartisan support" if he agrees.Their proposal isn’t a compromise. It would be a total surrender. It trims direct payments and unemployment aid that Americans desperately need. Biden should reject it out of hand.
Republicans say America can’t afford Biden’s plan. “We just passed a program with over $900 billion in it,” groused Senator Mitt Romney.
Rubbish. We can’t afford not to. Millions of people are hurting.
Besides, with the economy in the doldrums it’s no time to worry about too much spending. The best way to reduce the debt as a share of the economy is to get the economy growing again.
Beyond COVID relief, Biden has other proposals waiting in the wings, such as repairing aging infrastructure and building a new energy-efficient one. These would make the economy grow even faster over the long term—further reducing the debt’s share.
There’s no chance that public spending will “crowd out” private investment. If you hadn’t noticed, borrowing is especially cheap right now. Money is sloshing around the world in search of borrowers.
It’s hard to take Republican concerns about debt seriously when just four years ago they had zero qualms about enacting one of the largest tax cuts in history, largely for big corporations and the super-wealthy.
If they really don’t want to add to the debt, they have another alternative: A tax on super-wealthy Americans...
The total wealth of America’s 660 billionaires has grown by a staggering $1.1 trillion since the start of the pandemic, a 40 percent increase. They alone could finance almost all of Biden’s COVID relief package and still be as rich as they were before the pandemic. So why not a temporary emergency COVID wealth tax?
Let’s be honest. The real reason Republicans don’t want Biden’s plan is they fear it will work.
This would be the Republican’s worst nightmare: All the anti-government claptrap they’ve been selling since Ronald Reagan will be revealed as nonsense.
Government isn’t the problem and never was. Bad government is the problem, and Americans have just had four years of it. Biden’s success would put into sharp relief Trump and Republicans’ utter failures on COVID and jobs.
If Biden gets his plans through, he and the Democrats would reap the political rewards in 2022 and beyond.Democrats might even capture the presidency and Congress for a generation. After FDR rescued America, the Republican Party went dark for two decades.
Further proof new President Joe Biden's plans and ideas are good and positive?
Bolstering Reconciliation Case, Study Shows $15 Wage Would Boost Federal Budget By $65 Billion
Added to this, Joe Biden has only been President just shy of 2 weeks and his popularity is soaring, by any comparison, whether to the previous orange President or nearly any other.
Biden's Popularity Is Surging
This is how Americans feel on our most pressing issue of the day, too.
Joe Biden won by such a large margin in this election and he's so popular presently, Republicans are moving in 28 different states now, again, to make it even harder for Americans---you and I--to vote.
The fewer people vote, the more likely they, Republicans, can get into government office and stay there. Wrap your head around that.
So don't think for a moment anyone in the Republican Party is concerned just now about keeping the national debt lower. Oh, no. They're concerned for the their own political party and for their own power, nation and people be damned, as we keep seeing from them over time, repeatedly.
Additional links to further Republican Party ugliness:
Meanwhile, we can do this.
I say again, why anyone, anyone from the middle or lower classes considers themselves a Republican and votes that way is beyond me. WAY beyond me.
Additional links:
Trump Tax Cuts Helped Billionaires Pay Less Taxes
Trump's 2017 Tax Cuts Helped Super-rich Pay Lower Rate
Trump Tax Cuts Have Failed To Deliver On GOP's Promises
Friday, December 11, 2020
The Damage Donald Is Now Doing to Our Democracy--and the Very Needed Backlash
I keep saying this and it's so true. I just can't believe where we are. I can hardly believe how low, how badly this Republican Party President Trump is dragging our nation.
“In elections going forward, not trying to steal the election will be seen as RINO behavior.”
The Republican Party Is Now a Seditious Organization
These authoritarian yahoos believe that the Supreme Court will ride to their rescue and disenfranchise millions of people whom they don't believe should be allowed to vote anyway
These next two are out of Chicago. The first, the Sun-Times, the second, the Tribune, with thanks to both of them, for sure.
A critical mass of the party has adopted Trump’s disordered personality for its own.
The attorneys general of Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin and Georgia asked the Supreme Court to reject a lawsuit from Texas seeking to overturn President-elect Joe Biden’s victories.
Everyone needs to understand this next point.
I think the St. Louis Post-Dispatch got this right, no overstatement.
There are two sane, responsible Republicans, anyway, speaking up and out on the subject of this President trying to overturn our election. Here's the first.
Sen. Mitt Romney of Utah said it would be "madness" for Republicans to protest the Electoral College vote set to certify President-elect Joe Biden's win.
Here's the second.
Other states are thankfully fighting the 17 states' attempt to overturn our election.
I could hardly believe this.
Sure, it's Donald Trump but THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES? Thought to be going to Russia?? To avoid prosecution?? Yet this is where we are. Insane.
Then there is the effect this is all having on Der Fuhrer.
Fortunately, with all the Republican Party insanity, there is this, reality.
So now, Republicans, we ask you, would you get your little temper tantrum over with and join back with the rest of hard-working, sensible, grounded in reality America, stop this nonsense and recognize, respect our vote, our votes, our election and Democracy? Please? We have work to do.
Saturday, December 5, 2020
Trump Endangers the Nation -- Some More
This broke today. Unreal.
Pentagon blocks visits to military spy agencies by Biden transition team
As I said. Unreal. Someone at the Pentagon is putting this man Trump and his phony election claims ahead of the nation and our security. This is, again, dangerous. Reckless. It's not like we haven't seen recklessness from this President before now, we certainly have but this is very late in his presidency to have this going on.
Meanwhile, with no leadership from this President, the White House or his administration, this is going on presently.
Certainly still no leadership on or about this pandemic.
And he's still attacking our votes, our election and Democracy.
Fortunately, there is a little bit of positivity.
Now, mind you, it's only 25 members of the GOP. In their research, they found that, yes, 25 of them agree Biden won, 222 of them said it was unclear, the cowards, and 2 actually said Trump won, in spite of all the evidence otherwise. And this late after the election and vote, too. More insanity.
He's still losing his attempt at a war.
We have to take our wins where we get them.
It's time. We need to #throwthebumout
More:
From the UK:
From Scotland:
Sunday, November 29, 2020
Kansas City COViD Roundup
Here you go, Kansas City! A COVID roundup. First up, Torey Southwick advises us!
Negro Leagues Baseball Museum temporarily closes after staff test positive for COVID-19
Meanwhile, this, nationally.
16 States Log Record-High Average COVID-19 Cases Since Thanksgiving
Insane.
Here's a statewide assessment.
The region.
And then, hope.
Be careful out there, folks. Stay safe. Mask up, for sure.
Saturday, November 14, 2020
The Election, the Pandemic, This President & Where We Are Now
So Donald Trump still hasn't and still won't recognize our election and votes and that he lost. He still hasn't and won't concede to President-elect Biden. This all leaves us, as a nation, here:
The Rocky Transition Of Power Between Biden And Trump May Affect National Security
'It's Dangerous To Delay' Transition, Democratic White House Veteran Podesta Says
Even Republicans in Congress recognize what needs to be done here, now.
Trump certainly needs to face and accept reality.
Legal Avenues Closing As Trump Lawsuits Meet With Defeat Or Dead Ends
His own, our own agencies are saying, telling him there was no election theft.
Then there's this.
Heads roll as Trump launches post-election purge
President Trump is stepping up his war on the federal government after losing the 2020 election, sending heads rolling across key agencies with a late push to get personnel and policies in place before he leaves the White House.The president’s dismissal of Defense Secretary Mark Esper and other top Pentagon officials put Washington on notice and potentially paved the way for the withdrawal of U.S. troops from the nation’s longest-running war in Afghanistan.
Rumors are swirling around whether CIA Director Gina Haspel might be next, as the president’s allies accuse her of obstructing efforts to declassify top secret materials they say would expose wrongdoing in the Russia investigation.
A shake-up is underway at the Department of Homeland Security’s cyber division, where top officials have disputed Trump’s baseless claims that Democrats fraudulently stole the election from him.
The president has installed loyalists at agencies responsible for overseeing the government’s environmental and energy regulations, and there is speculation that he could clean house at the FBI or Health and Human Services...
What on Earth is he doing? Does he even know? And why is he doing this? What are his goals? Does he have any? It's yet more of this unprecedented President and presidency.
Again, doesn't it seem as though Putin helped put him in this place, this position, to help tear us down, tear us apart? Doesn't that seem plausible? Because nothing else makes sense.
And this. This is potentially frightening and may portend what we're left with when the Orange Man is gone.
Far-right groups plan DC rallies for Trump as tensions grow
The mix of demonstrators gathering in downtown Washington, D.C., where they’ll be met with counterprotesters, is sparking fears that the events could turn violent.
The main rally — known by various unofficial names such as the Million MAGA March, Stop the Steal DC and March for Trump — appears focused on showing an outpouring of support for President Trump as he refuses to concede the race to President-elect Joe Biden, citing unsubstantiated claims of widespread voter fraud.
Organizers and right-wing media figures, along with the White House officials, have predicted a massive turnout, though similar events during Trump’s presidency have fizzled out.
Fox News host Sean Hannity, White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany and Trump have all promoted the rally.
Fox supported it. Because of course.
Fighting the Pandemic Can’t Wait for Inauguration Day
According to ABC News last evening, we hit 193,000 new cases of COVID here in the US yesterday. We'd been warned there could be as many as 100,000 per day some months ago. Now we're nearly double that, obviously. More frightening, it's estimated 2,000 Americans per day are going to start dying from this. And it's not even Winter yet.Meanwhile, this President is still going for self-supporting rallies.
Trump says he may ‘stop by’ MAGA rally in DC on Saturday
So irresponsible. As ever.
So we're in limbo. Nationally, we're in an in-between state that no President has ever put us before. And in the midst of the worst, most deadly, killing international pandemic in the last more than 100 years.
So we wait.
And we wait.
Waiting for Trump to concede the election.
Waiting for him to do something, anything, lead on this pandemic.
And more.
We wait.
Thanks, Mr. President. Thanks, again.
And thanks, Republicans. Your boy just keeps getting worse and worse.
Do the right thing, Mr. President. Concede. For the first time in your life, do the right thing. Do the responsible, adult, mature, intelligent thing.
Please.
Monday, November 9, 2020
Lots of Big News This Morning
Yes, lots of breaking news today. Lots of good, it seems and yes, some bad. First the good. If not even great.
Pfizer says virus vaccine 90% effective
Fantastic great news. Very hopeful for us all.
And that got us this.
With that great news on a possible vaccine, the markets went nuts. All time highs. Excellent. (Thank goodness it didn't come out last Monday, huh?).
And then the bad news. This just broke in the last hour.
I swear these people don't learn. Incredible. With any other administration, this would be unbelievable. And I don't know what's more ironic, that he's a doctor or that he apparently contracted this COVID from a White House election party, given the now known results. Wow.
Then there's this. It's not bad enough he won't recognize our vote, our votes and our election. It's not bad enough he won't man up, be an adult, a responsible adult---for the first time in his long life--no.
No, that's not enough or bad enough. Now he also, along with all that, says he wants to have "recount rallies" across the nation. Terrific. Not only deny our election and the results but have yet more pandemic superspreading events, just when we're hitting every higher highs in COVID cases. Sure, why not, right? Why should this man or his administration make sense NOW?
Unfortunately, there's yet more bad news from this President and his White House today, however.
This administration hasn't been enough of a revolving door, the President had to add yet more to it. Worse than firing him in these, the last 72 days of this administration, he had to also do it as the coward he is.
This horrible and sad news hit yesterday.
To maybe try to lift us back up and give us a bit of encouragement today from the Republicans, there's this.
I saw where son in law Jared Kushner had advised Trump to accept the election. Now this.
This, however, is starting to make me mad.
federal funding and access to a plethora of government information for President-elect Joe Biden’s transition team, which is already at work.
But the official is not opening the door just yet — citing an ambiguity about the election results advanced by the Trump administration.
A spokesperson for the General Services Administration says Emily Murphy, the GSA administrator, hasn't signed off on the transition yet because she's waiting for an “ascertainment” about who officially won the 2020 presidential election, which President Donald Trump is contesting without evidence.
But the official is not opening the door just yet — citing an ambiguity about the election results advanced by the Trump administration.
A spokesperson for the General Services Administration says Emily Murphy, the GSA administrator, hasn't signed off on the transition yet because she's waiting for an “ascertainment” about who officially won the 2020 presidential election, which President Donald Trump is contesting without evidence.
it's one thing for the Trumpster to deny reality. It's a whole 'nother thing for even one of them to start blocking this transition.
And as expected and thought.
Finally, today, folks, there's this. Keep in mind this big bit of great news.
Think happy thoughts, campers.
And have a great day and week.
And remember! 72 days!! (to inauguration!)
Additional links:
Friday, November 6, 2020
Kansas City Needs a Philanthropist Savior Just Now
I've been thinking of this for the last week since I heard this report.
Pandemic prompts Nelson-Atkins Museum layoffs
From the article.
The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art plans to lay off 36 employees because of fallout from the Covid-19 pandemic.
The museum announced the layoffs in a Wednesday news release. It also said it planned to cut its budget by 25% to about $26 million, KCUR reports.
“Today’s decision comes after analyzing, trying to fundraise,” CEO and Director Julián Zugazagoitia told KCUR, “and also seeing that this pandemic is going to be lasting for many, many months to come.”
So that, last week, led to this, now.
In 2005, Keith Davis brought the Hallmark Photographic Collection to the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art and founded the museum's photography department. Now, he's leaving after another curator lost her job.Last month, the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art announced it was cutting its budget by 25 percent and laying off 36 staffers to cope with financial challenges due to the coronavirus pandemic.
"It does cut across all (of) the museum," said CEO and director Julián Zugazagoitia at the time, and suggested that "recalibrating and restructuring" was ahead.
National arts writer Tyler Green reported on Wednesday that the departures include two of three curators in the museum's photography department. These curators oversaw the internationally recognized Hallmark Photographic Collection with works from 1839 to the present.
According to Green, an author, critic and host of The Modern Art Notes Podcast, senior curator Keith Davis resigned in protest of the termination of curator Jane L. Aspinwall.
So this is where it made me think that we need one of our local, very wealthy philanthropist families, or someone, anyone, to come up with--who knows how much? a million?--or whatever and make yet another donation to the Nelson-Atkins so they can stay afloat. Not only stay afloat but keep it's national standing and it's fantastic exhibits all going.
Blochs? Kempers? Halls? Someone? Anyone? Maybe get together and make a donation together? Please?
Because we'll beg.
Honestly we will.
Tuesday, October 20, 2020
2 Weeks to Election--and the Unprecedented President, Collapsing Unprecedentedly
Yes, ladies and gentlemen, only 14 more days to the big November election and it really does look like yet more of the Trumpworld is dying or collapsing. Just look at all the breaking proof.
Now, even the former head of the Republican National Committee came out for Biden and against Donald J Trump.
You can't get much more unprecedented than that.
USA Today broke their own tradition of not endorsing a candidate.
In 2016, we broke tradition in urging you not to vote for Trump. Now we're making our first presidential endorsement. We hope it's our last.
This is how things are going in swing state Florida, too.
People don't line up in record numbers to vote, period, let alone during the worst, most killing, deadly international pandemic in the last more than 100 years because they think things are going swimmingly the way they are, folks. All of these voting records not just broken but shattered are a very good indication for us, I think.
Then this just happened in Pennsylvania.
On the Hunter Biden "story", there is this.
Even Trump's own Fox network passed on the Hunter Biden untruth of a story.
And then there's this.
Over 50 former intelligence officials said emails alleged to have been found on a laptop belonging to Hunter Biden show signs of a Russian disinformation operation: “If we are right, this is Russia trying to influence how Americans vote in this election, and we believe strongly that Americans need to be aware of this."
Followed by this, from Trump himself.
With all this, he's either just crude or--what?--stupid? or simply losing it. Honestly.
More crudeness and stupidity here. Desperation plays a factor, I think.
He was caught, publicly, in a lie.
For that matter, he was caught in lies, yet more lies.
Apparently, all the facts aren't lost on the Trump staffers in and of his campaign.
And now, with these mere 2 weeks to go, it looks as though he and his reelection campaign are short on funds. Oh. Darn.
How Trump plowed through $1 billion, losing cash advantage
It looks for all the world like this very unprecedented President and Presidency is going to have a very unprecedented collapse, Mr. and Mrs. America.
Make it so.
86 45
BYEDON
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
