Wreck Everything

Trump seems determined to destroy the federal government on his way out:

As President Donald Trump’s tenure in the oval office winds down, his administration is apparently looking to leave a lasting effect on federal civil service employment. The administration is seeking to remove legal protections for 88 percent of the federal workforce and ultimately make it much easier for career employees to be fired, several news outlets reported this week. At least one congressional Democrat said the move appears calculated to undermine the incoming Biden administration.

The effort to destabilize tens of thousands of federal jobs stems from an executive order signed by the president late last month. The Office of Management and Budget is reportedly moving swiftly to ensure that it’s implemented before Trump leaves office on Jan. 20.

Under the order, political appointees in the White House sent every federal agency a list of positions that should be reclassified as “Schedule F” roles, meaning the employees could be terminated for a number of reasons including poor performance or failing to carry out the administration’s stated priorities. The deadline for the reclassification is Jan. 19, one day prior to inauguration.

There's a lot of speculation that Trump will try to fire everyone and fill the positions with his own loyalists. I wouldn't put it past him just to fire everyone on January 19.

I don't understand why this isn't in court already -- it's a direct violation of federal law, namely the Pendleton Act of 1883, which was passed specifically to avoid that Trump is trying to do.

We'll see if anyone tries to stop him.

Via Joe.My.God.

Today's Must-Read: But Don't Call It "Terrorism"

From Digby, this is something that Trump deserves to be branded with -- these are his supporters, who he has encouraged and parised as "patriots":

What would you say if you saw this in another country?

There is new and disturbing information in the alleged militia plot against the governor of Michigan.

The 14 men charged had far more violent plans than just a kidnapping, according to federal and state authorities.

New filings claim there was a Plan B the militiamen had drawn up, that involved a takeover of the Michigan capitol building by 200 combatants who would stage a week-long series of televised executions of public officials.

Actually, we've seen this before, on live television from the Middle East.

Read the whole thing, and hope that the Biden administration comes down hard on these "patriots" and others like them. (Can we repoen Alcatraz? Or maybe some coral atoll in the Pacific that's about to go under water.)

Thanks, Trump

I went to the Field Museum yesterday -- my last chance for at least two weeks: they're closing again until December 5, maybe longer, depending, in accordance with new guidelines from the state and city because of the new spike in COVID-19 cases. My cousin e-mailed me that the Art Institute is also closed (I had inquired about the "Monet in Chicago" exhibition); the Shedd Aqarium is closed; the Adler Planetarium has been closed, not being set up to encourage social distancing; the Nature Museum, ditto. Also, all Park District facilities, including the conservatories and field houses, are closed.

Lincoln Park Zoo is open, but closes for the day at 3 pm. two hours early.

And COVID-19 deaths have hit 250.000 and show no sign of tapering off. And now the forecast is for 2,000 deaths a day.

Just think how different it would be if we'd had a president who actually did something about the pandemic instead of denying that it existed. And now, of course, instead of trying to ameliorate the second wave, he's trying to steal the election.

Tofay's Must-Read: The End-Game(s)

Digby has a very interesting post that relies heavily on a piece by Fred Hiatt in the Washington Post (behind a paywall) describing three possible scenarios that explain Trump's behavior in the wake of his election loss:

The Washington Post’s Fred Hiatt summarizes the various theories about what Trump is actually doing with his inane refusal to concede the election despite the fact that he clearly lost. In anyone else you would be talking about doing some kind of intervention and getting him some professional help, but this is Trump and he acts irrationally every day and his supporters love it so he remains in power, doing what he does[.]

The three scearios Hiatt outlines all make sense, given that it's Trump's reality we're dealing with, but underlying this is something more important, which Digby notes in her final comment:

From the moment Mitch McConnell stole the Supreme Court seat from Barack Obama in 2016, it was clear that the Republicans had finally completely gone rogue. They made it clear before Trump was even nominated that they no longer cared about hypocrisy and were going to retain power by any means necessary. Trump made that easier by taking all the slings and arrows from the rest of the country and allowing them to pretend that they were secretly embarrassed by him but couldn’t really do anything because their voters are a bunch of rubes and you can’t tell them anything.

They know now that they can get away with anything if they find the right points of leverage. It’s wide open now. The beltway establishment embodied by Hiatt is finally starting to come to grips with that. Let’s see if it sticks.

I've been pointing out for a while that this is what the GOP has been working toward since Reagan and their unholy alliance with the "Christian" right. Trump, with his ability as a rabble-rouser and complete lack of any concerns other than his own comfort, finally made it possible (with the connivance of the media, whether deliberate or just lazy).

Read the whole thing. It's worth it.

The Next Step

Toward Donald Trump, President for Life. After all, he's already claimed victory in the election; how better to make sure that it happens?

As ongoing vote tabulation in several key battleground states continues to slowly narrow President Donald Trump’s path to reelection, the New York Times reported late Wednesday that the Justice Department has told federal prosecutors that U.S. law permits armed federal agents to enter ballot-counting locations to investigate alleged “fraud,” heightening fears of possible intimidation efforts by the Trump administration. . . .

The Times noted that the Justice Department’s email, authored by Principal Associate Deputy Attorney General Richard Donoghue, “created the specter of the federal government intimidating local election officials or otherwise intervening in vote tallying amid calls by President Trump to end the tabulating in states where he was trailing in the presidential race.”

While U.S. law bars the stationing of armed officials “at any place where a general or special election is held,” Donoghue claimed in his email that the statute “does not prevent armed federal law enforcement persons from responding to, investigat[ing], or prevent[ing] federal crimes at closed polling places or at other locations where votes are being counted.”

What better way to insure the vote goes your way -- I mean, is fair and accurate?

And you can bet real money that they will find fraud, if they have to invent it themselves.

I think, if I were the governor of any of these states, I would have these federal agents met by armed state troopers.

Trump's War on America Continues (Updated)

But received a setback this week:

Federal police are now under a court order not to arrest or assault journalists and legal observers for doing their jobs, after a federal judge issued a temporary restraining order Thursday that the government said it would appeal.

“An open government has been a hallmark of our democracy since our nation’s founding,” U.S. District Judge Michael Simon wrote Thursday, citing precedent from the Ninth Circuit case Leigh v. Salazar. “When wrongdoing is underway, officials have great incentive to blindfold the watchful eyes of the fourth estate. The free press is the guardian of the public’s interests and the independent judiciary is the guardian of the free press.”

To that hallmark, he added: “This lawsuit tests whether these principles are merely hollow words.”

The government is claiming that "the chaotic atmosphere of Portland’s protests is too “volatile and dangerous” for federal police to differentiate between journalists and protesters accused of breaking the law." Somehow, that argument rings hollow:

Attorney Matthew Borden told Judge Simon at Thursday’s hearing that federal police had mounted “incredible and despicable attacks” against journalists and legal observers. “A 70-year-old man marked ‘press’ from head to toe. Multiple attacks on a 17-year-old girl who stood far from the front. They shot Jungho Kim right in the press pass [with less lethal munitions] and Lewis Rolland a dozen times in the back when he was standing under a streetlight so police could see the big block letters saying he was press.

“These are not accidents,” Borden continued. “These are not inadvertent shots. These are trained marksmen and these are the actions of a tyrant. They do not have a place in Portland, Oregon and they do not have a place under the First Amendment. If you do not have the press reporting on events first-hand, then you only have the version put forth by the government. And that’s what you have under a totalitarian state.”

A number of commentators are characterizing this as an attack on the free press. Well, yes -- but it's also a direct attack on the First Amendment and the Constitution as a whole.

This is Trump all the way: he doesn't like democracy. He likes strongmen and dictators -- look who among world leaders he considers admirable: Putin, Erdogan, Duterte, Kim Jong-Un, Jair Bolsdonaro. He wants to be just like them.

We'll see if this order holds -- Trump's minions will appeal, and Moscow Mitch has been concentrating on stacking the courts rather than actually legislating. One can only hope that there will be something to salvage come January.

Via Joe.My.God.

Update:

Digby has a post on the plans to deploy brown shirts to other major cities, with reports of what's been happening most recently in Portland. Trump's comments are revealing.

Today's Must-Read: Nice Democracy You've Got There (Update)

or had. It's no exaggeration to say that Trump and the Republicans are aiming toward a fascist state. There's a lot of commentary that this is Trump showing he's a strong leader to energize his base because he's worried about the election. That's probably part of it, but the larger picture is that this is the next step in the Republican agenda: permanent rule, by whatever means necessary.

This story's been all over the place, but Digby has a good overview:

Trump has been saying over and over again since George Floyd was murdered, “if cities won’t deal with protesters, I will.” Bill Barr declared war on “Antifa” and blamed it for the violence and looting in the early days of the protests.

Guess what? They meant it.

The post is mostly a series of tweets, with videos, showing what's going on in Portland, OR. It's not pretty. And it's a blatant violation of Constitutional rights:

“Congress shall make no law … abridging the freedom of speech … or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

That's the beginning of an opinion piece by Ruth Marcus at WaPo. It's behind a paywall, but Digby quotes it extensively.

There will be lawsuits, but given that the Supreme Court has already upheld a poll tax and blown a "religious freedom" hole in anti-discrimination laws. Just think of the fun Kavanaugh et al. will have with the right to assemble.

Update: Here's a follow-up story via Joe.My.God.:

The US Attorney for the Oregon District today requested an investigation into the masked, camouflaged federal authorities without identification badges who are arresting protesters in Portland. The request is aimed specifically at DHS personnel who have been captured on various videos arresting protesters and putting them in unmarked SUVs.

DHS is the last agency to be investigating -- well, the DHS. This goes back to AG Barr and Trump. This is the authoritarian secret police in action, courtesy of Barr.

And if you thought it was just Portland -- well, no:

Nonetheless, the administration has made it clear it intends to take these tactics nationwide. When asked about the arrests in Portland, Acting Deputy Secretary of Homeland Security Ken Cuccinelli told NPR that “this is a posture we intend to continue not just in Portland but in any of the facilities that we're responsible for around the country.”

That's from this article by Heather Cox Richardson. (With thanks to commenter coram nobis.)

And a coda:

You think not?

Today's Must-Read: Are We Great Yet?

I fan across this article by Robin Wright late yesterday. It's rather sobering. Wright starts off with a history of the Statue of Liberty -- not what you may have learned in school. Farther along, this struck me:

On the eve of America’s anniversary—our two hundred and forty-fourth—much of the world believes that the country is racist, battered and bruised. “Europe has long been suspicious—even jealous—of the way America has been able to pursue national wealth and power despite its deep social inequities,” Robin Niblett, the director of the Royal Institute of International Affairs, also known as Chatham House, in London, told me. “When you take the Acela and pass through the poorest areas of Baltimore, you can’t believe you’re looking at part of the United States. There’s always been this sense of an underlying flaw in the U.S. system that it was getting away with—that somehow America was keeping just one step ahead of the grim reaper.”

The flaw, he said, is reflected in the American obsession with the stock market as the barometer of national health—economically, politically, socially. The reaction to Floyd’s murder exposed the deep injustices in the American economic model, as well as in the police and judicial systems, Niblett said. Europeans, he added, are no longer so envious.

The Trump Administration’s ineptitude in handling the covid-19 crisis, as well as the President’s disdain for longstanding allies and international treaties, have compounded the damage to America’s image. A second poll, released last week by the European Council on Foreign Relations, reported that public perceptions of the United States are increasingly negative in virtually all of the European nations surveyed. In France, the country that backed the American Revolution and later donated the Statue of Liberty, forty-six per cent of the people polled said that their opinion of the U.S. has “worsened a lot.” The proportion of respondents who still view America as a key ally is “vanishingly small”—as low as six per cent in Italy.

As I was reading this I kept hearing echoes of Trump's slogan, "Make America Great Again". It occurred to me that greatness is not a quality one assumes for oneself -- it is a quality that is recognized by others. In that context, Trump and his enablers have taken what was once America's greatness and flushed it down the toilet. It will take a massive, sustained effort to regain that -- if we can.

Read the whole thing. Wright also notes the role of capitalism in the current state of affairs, which is itself an eye-opener.

Via Digby.

Wow. Just, Wow. . . .

This story broke yesterday (actually, probably Friday, but I saw it late yesterday):

American intelligence officials have concluded that a Russian military intelligence unit secretly offered bounties to Taliban-linked militants for killing coalition forces in Afghanistan — including targeting American troops — amid the peace talks to end the long-running war there, according to officials briefed on the matter. . . .

The intelligence finding was briefed to President Trump, and the White House’s National Security Council discussed the problem at an interagency meeting in late March, the officials said. Officials developed a menu of potential options — starting with making a diplomatic complaint to Moscow and a demand that it stop, along with an escalating series of sanctions and other possible responses, but the White House has yet to authorize any step, the officials said.

(Via Towleroad, where you can year Rachel Maddow's commentary.)

The reaction has not been positive. A small sample:

NOTE TO AMERICA'S TROOPS:

Donald only protects troops who are made of metal or stone -- and fought for the other side. #TraitorTrump https://t.co/Z58SrAbtcC

— Mrs. Betty Bowers (@BettyBowers) June 27, 2020

A white supremacist, a sex offender, and a traitor walk into a bar. The bartender says "What'll it be, President Trump?"#TraitorTrump

— Middle Age Riot (@middleageriot) June 27, 2020

There's lots more at the link.

It's indicative of the way Trump's mind works that he accused Obama of treason for "spying" on the Trump campaign. (L'Etat, c' est moi) There is some speculation that this was a combination of projection and deflection, since he reportedly knew about the Russian bounties at the time.

I think with any other president, this would be unbelievable. But it is believable. Here's an interesting take on that issue:

Whether Trump has actually committed treason is arguable. Treason is defined as:

Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort.

U.S. Constitution, Article III, Section 3.

Although there's been no format declaration of war against Russia, Putin's certainly not a friend of the U.S. And the Taliban is an enemy.

The White House, of course, is denying that Trump knew anything about it:

White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany said in a statement Saturday that the President and Vice President Mike Pence were not briefed “on the alleged Russian bounty intelligence.” McEnany said her statement “does not speak to the merit of the alleged intelligence but to the inaccuracy of the New York Times story,” which said Trump had been briefed.

We're back at the believeability thing. Who are you going to believe, a serial liar or the New York Times?

At this point, it's almost a toss-up, but NYT still has more credibility than Trump.

Today's Must-Read: The Lunatic in Chief

From Digby, this article on our acting "president" and his destruction of the government:

During his three and a half years in office, President Trump has succeeded in damaging every institution of politics and government, from the Department of Justice to the federal courts to the Foreign Service and the State Department to the intelligence community, public health agencies and beyond. But until fairly recently he had more or less left the U.S. military alone.

The George Floyd/Black Lives Matter demonstration have really brought his dictatorial impulses to the fore. This bit is telling:

This episode illustrates one of the ongoing destructive dynamics of the Trump administration. The president makes mad demands and, in order to keep him from doing his worst, people around him appease him with flattery or come up with slightly less bad options and then scurry to carry them out. In the process, so many of them destroy their credibility and their reputations. Even if they succeed in short-circuiting the very worst of Trump’s impulses, their willingness to appease him always produces bad outcomes anyway.

It's a lose-lose situation for anyone involved -- and for the rest of us as well.

The man -- and I use the term loosely -- is insane.

Read the whole thing.

Chipping Away, "Free Exercise" Version

Catholic Charities is at it again, and now the Trump/Barr "Justice" Department, Evangelical Division, has stepped in:

In the latest example of the Trump administration seeking to enable legal discrimination against LGBTQ people, the Justice Department is calling on the U.S. Supreme Court to allow religious-affiliated adoption agencies to refuse child placement into LGBTQ homes.

In a 35-page brief, U.S. Solicitor General Noel Francisco and other Justice Department attorneys maintain the City of Philadelphia has “impermissibly discriminated against religious exercise” under the First Amendment by requiring Catholic Social Services to abide by a contract requiring LGBTQ non-discrimination practices in child placement.

“Governmental action tainted by hostility to religion fails strict scrutiny almost by definition,” the brief says. “This court has never recognized even a legitimate governmental interest — much less a compelling one — that justifies hostility toward religion.”

The U.S. government isn’t a party to the case, known as Fulton v. City of Philadelphia, so the brief is completely voluntary. In justifying the brief before the Supreme Court, the filing makes the case the Justice Department has a compelling interest to intervene.

The City of Philadelphia is insisting that "Christians" abide by a contract. The horror!

The case came about after the City of Philadelphia learned in March 2018 that Catholic Social Services, which the city had hired to provide foster care services to children in child welfare, was refusing to license same-sex couples despite a contract prohibiting these agencies from engaging in anti-LGBTQ discrimination.

And the DOJ's brief looks to be 35 pages of bullshit:

Although the case involves Catholic Social Services refusing to abide by the terms of its contract, the Justice Department framing of the litigation makes it seem like the City of Philadelphia is an aggressor and unfairly targeting Catholic Social Services, asserting the municipality is allowing for exemptions in some cases, but not religious-affiliated adoption agencies.

“The City impermissibly targeted religious organizations for enforcement of its newly articulated policies,” the brief says. “Commissioner Figueroa testified that, in determining whether foster-care agencies were complying with the anti-discrimination requirements of their contracts, the city focused only on religious agencies, making just a single inquiry to a secular foster-care agency…City officials made no effort to determine whether other secular agencies perform home studies for everyone who requests them, or show preference for or against individuals who fall within particular groups.”

When this happened in Illinois, the state suspended funding to Catholic Charities adoption services and threatened to pull their license. Catholic Charities got out of the adoption business -- and a number of other agencies, including those run by the Lutheran Church -- took over their case load.

Via Joe.My.God.

Today's Must-Read: What a Pathetic Creature

This post, by Tom Sullivan at Hullabaloo, lays out what a total loss as a human being our "president" is:

The warnings have become clichés. There is no bottom. When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time. You can fool some of the people all of the time, etc. But as the country devolves into what the rest of world might describe as a hellhole, it is not clear what comes next after Monday. But it won’t be pretty.

Sullivan goes down the line and lays it out.

The trigger for this one is Trump having the police gas and fire flash-bangs and rubber bullets at peaceful, unarmed protesters in Lafayette Park, across from the White House, so that he could make a big show of walking across the street to St. John's church for a photo op -- and to prove he's a "real man" after hiding in a bunker the evening before.

In fact, scroll down today's posts at Hullabaloo -- it's pretty grim.

Liar du Jour

It's so hard to choose, but today it's Moscow Mitch with a major whopper. First, a swipe at Obama for criticizing President Quid-Pro-Quo:

Now, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has weighed in. And rather than focusing his comments on defending the current president, he took aim at the former one, stating that "President Obama should've kept his mouth shut."

"You know, generally, former presidents just don't do that," McConnell told President Trump's daughter-in-law, Lara Trump, during an interview streamed live by the Trump campaign Monday night. "I remember President George W. Bush and his father went right through eight years of Democratic administrations after they left office and kept their mouths shut because they didn't feel it was appropriate for former presidents to critique even the president of another party."

In W's case, it was because the only thing Obama did that deserved criticism was letting him and the other war criminals in his administration off the hook.

Strangely, the biggie is not in the CBS story. But, Twitter to the rescue (and I never thought I'd say that):

Sen. Mitch McConnell: "Clearly the Obama administration did not leave to this administration any kind of game plan for something like this." pic.twitter.com/ntbCocJogJ

— The Hill (@thehill) May 12, 2020

And the riposte:

Former Ebola Czar: - Ronald Klain
“We literally left them a 69-page Pandemic Playbook.... that they ignored.

And an office called the Pandemic Preparedness Office... that they abolished.

And a global monitoring system called PREDICT .. that they cut by 75%” pic.twitter.com/wAmEDcMuIJ

— Al Wayward (@Wayward888) May 12, 2020

But then, McConnell has gotten more and more brazen since Trump took office -- he's not even making excuses any more. Apparently he's convinced that one-party rule is firmly established.

Via Joe.My.God.

And It Was Such a Nice Democracy. . . .

Moscow Mitch,, most likely at the behest of his Kremlin paymaster, is trying to turn the U.S. into an even worse surveillance state than it already is:

Days after the Justice Department controversially dropped charges against Mike Flynn, Senate GOP Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) is set to expand a highly politicized Justice Department’s surveillance authority during a vote this week to renew the 2001 PATRIOT Act.

Under cover of redressing what President Donald Trump and his allies call the FBI’s “witch hunt” over collusion with the Kremlin, McConnell, via an amendment to the PATRIOT Act, will expressly permit the FBI to warrantlessly collect records on Americans’ web browsing and search histories. In a different amendment, McConnell also proposes giving the attorney general visibility into the “accuracy and completeness” of FBI surveillance submissions to the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) Court.

McConnell's amendments are directed against all of us -- except, of course, Trump and his henchmen.

Taken together, privacy advocates consider McConnell’s moves an alarming expansion of Attorney General Bill Barr’s powers under FISA, a four-decade-old process that already places the attorney general at the center of national-security surveillance. It also doesn’t escape their notice that McConnell is increasing Barr’s oversight of surveillance on political candidates while expanding surveillance authorities on every other American. One privacy activist called McConnell’s efforts “two of the most cynical attempts to undermine surveillance reform I've ever seen."

Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR) said that Barr, who has been deeply involved in investigations of interest to Trump, could authorize an investigation into a political rival, which could then unlock the internet-spying powers McConnell wants to grant the FBI.

“Under the McConnell amendment, Barr gets to look through the web browsing history of any American—including journalists, politicians, and political rivals—without a warrant, just by saying it is relevant to an investigation,” said Wyden, who has been trying to ban warrantless surveillance on such records.

If you think this is starting to sound like the Soviet Union in Stalin's heyday -- well, you're not far off. And to put Barr at the head of this effort makes it blatantly obvious that it's all a political maneuver to use the government's already too broad surveillance powers to shore up the Republican regime. (I'm not calling it the "Trump regime" because the GOP leadership will dump him as soon as he's no longer useful.) This is something they've been working toward since the days of Saint Ronnie, and Trump's fantasies of a "witch hunt" by the FBI are just the excuse they need.

It's worth reading the whole thing -- it's pretty alarming. The upside is that McConnell has to get this past Nancy Pelosi and the House, so it's not a done deal.

Via Joe.My.God.

The Lower Depths

Actually, it's more like a Jacobean revenge tragedy, with Trump out to get back at Obama for being everything he's not, and to hell with consequences:

President Donald Trump on Wednesday said his administration will urge the Supreme Court to overturn Obamacare, maintaining its all-out legal assault on the health care law amid a pandemic that will drive millions of more Americans to depend on its coverage.

The administration appears to be doubling down on its legal strategy, even after Attorney General William Barr this week warned top Trump officials about the political ramifications of undermining the health care safety net during the coronavirus emergency.

Barr, being a good "Christian", is worried about the "political ramifications"; the people who are going to lose health coverage if this is successful are simply collateral damage.

One hopes the Democrats will use this as a bludgeon -- at this point, since the chance of a decision before the election is vanishingly small, the important message is that "Trump wants to take away your health insurance during a pandemic".

It would be different if the GOP had an alternative to offer. They don't, no matter what they say. The ACA is on the list of social safety net programs that they want to get rid of, along with Social Security and probably Medicare and Medicaid. The magic word here is "privatize", which translates to "Our owners should be able to make lots of money off these programs."

Read the whole thing -- good background in case you've missed this story in all the sound and fury coming from the White House.

Via Joe.My.God.

Read It and Weep

Pew has done another survey. This one should give you pause:

Today, about half of Americans (49%) say the Bible should have at least “some” influence on U.S. laws, including nearly a quarter (23%) who say it should have “a great deal” of influence, according to a recent Pew Research Center survey. Among U.S. Christians, two-thirds (68%) want the Bible to influence U.S. laws at least some, and among white evangelical Protestants, this figure rises to about nine-in-ten (89%).

Here's the breakdown:

It gets worse:

All survey respondents who said the Bible should have at least “some” influence on U.S. laws were asked a follow-up question: When the Bible and the will of the people conflict, which should have more influence on U.S. laws?

The more common answer to this question is that the Bible should take priority over the will of the people. This view is expressed by more than a quarter of all Americans (28%). About one-in-five (19%) say the Bible should have at least some influence but that the will of the people should prevail.

Two religious groups stand out for being especially supportive of biblical influence in legislation, even if that means going against the will of the American people: Two-thirds of white evangelical Protestants (68%) say the Bible should take precedence over the people, and half of black Protestants say the same. Among Catholics (25%) and white Protestants who do not identify as born-again or evangelical (27%), only about a quarter share this perspective.

I've been saying for a while that evangelical Christians simply don't believe in democracy -- their whole religious philosophy is founded on authoritarianism.

However, all is not lost:

At the other end of the spectrum, there’s broad opposition to biblical influence on U.S. laws among religiously unaffiliated Americans, also known as religious “nones,” who identify as atheist, agnostic or “nothing in particular.” Roughly three-quarters in this group (78%) say the Bible should hold little to no sway, including 86% of self-described atheists who say the Bible should not influence U.S. legislation at all. Two-thirds of U.S. Jews, as well, think the Bible should have not much or should have no influence on laws.

One thing that tends to get glossed over, if mentioned at all, in reporting on the doings of the "religious" right, is that they're a minority. Unfortunately, over the past couple of generations, the Republicans have managed to put too many of them into positions of influence.

Time to clean house.

Via Dispatches from the Culture Wars.

Today's Must-Read: Quid Pro Quo

Yet another example of the axiom "There is no bottom". This is just the way Trump operates:

As we work to find out the scope and goals of the White House’s seizure of medical goods across the United States, a simpler pattern is coming into view: the White House seizes goods from public officials and hospitals across the country while doling them out as favors to political allies and favorites, often to great fanfare to boost the popularity of those allies. The Denver Post today editorialized about one of the most egregious examples. Last week, as we reported, a shipment of 500 ventilators to the state of Colorado was intercepted and rerouted by the federal government. Gov. Jared Polis (D) sent a letter pleading for the return of the equipment. Then yesterday President Trump went on Twitter to announce that he was awarding 100 ventilators to Colorado at the behest of Republican Senator Cory Gardner, one of the most endangered Republicans on the ballot this year. As the Post put it, “President Donald Trump is treating life-saving medical equipment as emoluments he can dole out as favors to loyalists. It’s the worst imaginable form of corruption — playing political games with lives.”

. . .

Were these a subset of the same ventilators? Like money, amidst the COVID-19 Crisis, all ventilators are fungible. It’s hard to know whether President Trump even knew in this case that his pandemic task force had swiped away five times as many ventilators just days before. Indeed, we still don’t whether this is all a central part of the White House’s crisis strategy – grabbing supplies from blue states to hand out to endangered Republicans or red state allies – or simply a layering of corruption over the general chaos.

Remember when wunderkind Jared Kushner said "These are our stockpiles"? No we know what he meant.

Read it. It's more than infuriating.

Via Digby, who adds:

I think this is the tip of the iceberg. There is going to have to be a full pandemic profiteering commissions after this is over. The question is whether or not the Democrats will be willing to “look in the rearview mirror.”

I'm not aT all confident of the Democrats' willingness to hold Trump's feet to the fire -- although they did impeach him. Of course, with Moscow Mitch in control of the Senate, another impeachment will go nowhere. But if we succeed in booting Trump and his criminal gang out of office in November. . . .

Blatant, Chapter Two

Following in the footsteps of Moscow Mitch, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-Dixie) has stopped even trying to appear fair and impartial:

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) on Saturday pledged to help impeachment "die quickly" in the Senate as it becomes increasingly likely that the House will vote to impeach President Trump, leading to a Senate trial.

"This thing will come to the Senate, and it will die quickly, and I will do everything I can to make it die quickly," he told CNN while at the Doha Forum in Qatar.

"I am trying to give a pretty clear signal I have made up my mind. I'm not trying to pretend to be a fair juror here," Graham added. "What I see coming, happening today is just a partisan nonsense."

Emphasis added.

And of course, which party made it "partisan"? (I'll take Republicans for $400, Alex.)

Via Joe.My.God.

The Trump regime has given up even pretending to work for anything but their own control of the country. Thanks, Uncle Vlad.

Digby has more background on Graham's transformation. Yes, once upon a time, about twenty years ago, he was all in favor of impeachment. This video is from November, 1998:

“I know many of them don’t want the president to be impeached, but I’ve got a duty far greater than just getting to the next election.” @LindseyGrahamSC pic.twitter.com/mBPmCGFCZ4

— Windsor Mann (@WindsorMann) December 14, 2019

Let me think -- who was president then?

How times have changed. something tells me Graham hasn't -- he's just gone public.

Blatant

They're not even bothering to pretend any more. Start with this:

Mitch McConnell: Everything I do during this, I’m coordinating with White House Counsel. There will be no difference between the President’s position and our position as to how to handle this pic.twitter.com/baFaTKWvUl

— Acyn Torabi (@Acyn) December 13, 2019

In other words, Trump will be dictating how the "trial" will be handled.

And it goes on from there:

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said Thursday that there was “no chance” that President Donald Trump would be removed from office in any impeachment trial and that it “wouldn’t surprise” him if some Democrats split from their party and voted in the president’s favor.

“The case is so darn weak coming from the House,” McConnell said in an interview with Sean Hannity on Fox News Thursday night, as the House Judiciary Committee continued to debate articles of impeachment. “We know how it's going to end. There's no chance the president's going to be removed from office.”

Digby sums it uP

The Senate will acquit the criminal. They are made men in the criminal organization known as the Republican Party. But whether a few go the other way, giving the Democrats a majority for conviction is another story. And yes, for all we know, there could be some defections from the Democrats. There almost always are., unfortunately.

Democratic defections? Say it isn't so. (Do I hear Joe Manchin's name?)

You Can't Make This Stuff Up

Words fail me:

[Frank] Luntz graced the soundstage of Ingraham Angle Monday night to declare that (not making this up) the baseball fans at Game 5 of the World Series should be "held accountable" for booing Donald Trump.

FRANK LUNTZ: The fact is, they should hold those fans accountable. Don't boo the president! You may disagree with him, you may say that he's not what you wanted, but you don't boo him, you show respect for him. And I'll tell you something, I think this event is going to have an impact...

LAURA INGRAHAM: It's huge! It's going to be a campaign commercial.

I guess Luntz thinks Kim Jong-Trump needs backup.

And a campaign commercial? For whom?