anti-GUBMINT 2 FEDS

621

SEE THREE4 23

MERRI OK

see freeDUMB grift

see vaxx

see big lie

see federal overreach

see control concept //LEED TYRANT

see agenda 21 (anti-commie //)

see they are coming for you/your kids

see IRS

see secede

see mar-a-lago raid

html endit1

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aha: erosion of trust60's viet nam lies pentagon papers, secret plan to end war, nixon lies ---> apollo landing hoax, Area 51 ...koch propaganda libtard Fox --> soc med/ OANN, Newsmax is a blog with video?!

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CPI

“I’m not doing anything I’m ashamed of,” Charles Koch himself told Forbes last month. “You’ve gotta change the hearts and minds of the people to understand what really makes society fairer and what’s going to change their lives. And it’s not more of this government control.”

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mma 4 23

LAURA INGRAHAM (GUEST): The dual sense of justice, that there's one style of justice if you're connected to liberals and there's another type of justice -- which is injustice -- if you don't agree with the in-crowd. Whether it's on immigration, or China, or, you know, all the wars, or, you know, government spending, you're a deplorable. They use the word "deplorable" for a reason.

Michelle Obama said, "It's the first time I'm proud to be an American" for a reason. They believed it. They believe that everyone in this audience, every one of you sitting here tonight, they -- if they could,I really believe they would shut you down, whether put you in a camp, or put you -- send you away somewhere so you're never heard from again.

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https://www.mediamatters.org/tucker-carlson/what-tucker-carlson-left-out-his-defense-accused-pentagon-leaker-jack-teixeira

no lnx vid

fox News’ Tucker Carlson defended accused Pentagon leaker Jack Teixeira, a member of the Air National Guard arrested Thursday “in connection with the leak of dozens of highly classified documents containing an array of national security secrets” largely related to the Russian war in Ukraine, by inventing honorable motives for his alleged actions without any supporting evidence.

In a monologue on April 13, Carlson left viewers with the clear impression that Teixeira took a principled stand to inform the public about U.S. involvement in defending Ukraine against Russia’s invasion. Carlson has been a vocal critic of U.S. involvement in the conflict, and a supporter of Russian President Vladimir Putin more broadly.

Video

From the April 13, 2023, edition of Fox News' Tucker Carlson Tonight

In fact, the available evidence suggests that Teixeira was driven by a desire to impress a small group of friends in an online Discord chat group called “Thug Shaker Central.” Teixeira was known in the group as “OG” and presented himself as “the ultimate arbiter of secrecy,” who “allowed his companions to read truths that ‘normal citizens’ could not,” according to The Washington Post.

For all OG’s disdain for the federal government, the member said there was no indication that he was acting in what he thought was the public interest by exposing official secrets. The classified documents were intended only to benefit his online family, the member said.

“I would definitely not call him a whistleblower. I would not call OG a whistleblower in the slightest,” he said, resisting comparisons to Edward Snowden, who shared classified documents about government surveillance with journalists.

The New York Times further reported that “outrage about wrongdoing or government policies does not appear to have been a factor” in the leaks.

“The secret documents in the news now, Airman Teixeira’s friends said, were never meant to leave their small corner of the internet,” the Times wrote in a separate story. That piece further corroborates that claim with a direct quote from Teixeira, who reportedly said, as the authorities were closing in, “I never wanted it to get like this.”

Carlson didn’t take this context into account in his characterization of Teixeira’s motivations.

Instead, he argued that U.S. involvement in that conflict was “a crime,” and accused Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin of lying in recent congressional testimony. But, Carlson continued, “the only man who has been taken into custody — or likely ever will be — is a 21-year-old Massachusetts Air National Guardsman who leaked the slides that showed that Lloyd Austin was lying.”

“He revealed the crimes, therefore he’s the criminal,” he continued. “That’s how Washington works. Telling the truth is the only real sin.”

:{:{}:

After playing a clip of CNN analysts discussing the issue, Carlson added, “So, this 21-year-old Air National Guardsman from Massachusetts is not a whistleblower, CNN explains, with the help of the many intelligence agency figures it has now hired as analysts.”

It’s fine to criticize cable news’ practice of hiring former intelligence officials and former government flacks more broadly, CNN very much included. Carlson’s sleight-of-hand here obscures an inconvenient fact for him: It’s not just CNN hacks who say Teixeira isn’t a whistleblower — his own online “tightknit family” says the exact same thing.

“You have no right to know what your government is doing in your name with your tax dollars and with the future of your children and grandchildren,” Carlson said later, further implying that Teixeira’s motives were to inform the public rather than to gain clout with his friends.

The Post also reported that in a video at a shooting range Teixeira “yells a series of racial and antisemitic slurs into the camera, then fires several rounds at a target.” Carlson addressed the video to suggest that Teixeira is being targeted for his personal views, claiming the media is treating “him like Osama bin Laden, maybe even worse actually, because unlike al-Qaeda, apparently this kid is a racist.”

Over the course of his monologue, Carlson never came right out and said explicitly that Teixeira was definitely driven to expose Pentagon lies or obfuscation, but the argument is undeniable: He’s implicitly claiming the media is working with the government to persecute a whistleblower, which is simply not the case according to all available public information.

Carlson also ignored one of the aspects of the leak that doesn’t fit neatly into his manufactured narrative about an anti-war whistleblower risking their freedom to inform the public. A leaked document from Teixeira’s cache shows that Hungary’s authoritarian prime minister Viktor Orbán listed the United States as one of his government’s top three adversaries. Carlson is a major booster of Orbán, who in turn is seeking closer relations with China. That one of Carlson’s most admired heads of state is allying with a country he frequently demonizes poses a problem for the simplistic storylines he puts forward, and it isn’t surprising that the Orbán revelation didn’t find its way into his show.

The entire segment also followed a familiar Carlson playbook, namely that the federal government is sending militarized police forces to target conservatives, as the Post’s Philip Bump noted. Carlson has repeatedly pushed that line, and made his defense of Teixeira in the same rhetorical register.

Bump also cited his colleague Jim LaPorta, who resurfaced Carlson’s remarks condemning whistleblower Reality Winner in 2017. Winner’s disclosures to media outlet The Intercept cut against Carlson’s attempts to diminish Russian attempted interference in the 2016 election.

It’s worth underscoring a few last points. There may very well be information in these leaks that truly is in the public interest. The national security state is a sprawling, unaccountable behemoth that enriches contractors and uses classification to control information, including information that implicates the U.S. government in fraud, waste, and abuse. It’s also true that leakers and whistleblowers go to the media with all sorts of complicated, divergent, contradictory motives, none of which necessarily undermine the value of the information they provide.

The issue here is that, from all available evidence, Teixeira did not want this information to be widely accessible to the public. Carlson is simply backfilling motivations that are not there to fit his own narrative bashing the media and the Biden administration, which he argues are acting in lockstep to keep the public in the dark.

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https://www.alternet.org/2022/06/tucker-carlson

gubmint anti-dep

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https://www.alternet.org/menacing-wickedness-marjorie-taylor-greene/

no lnx twt

:{:{on June 22nd, 2021, then-freshman United States Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Georgia) filed House Resolution 3960 to abolish the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, alleging that the agency was in cahoots with President Joe Biden to strip American citizens of their right to bear arms.}:

"The ATF's ongoing, unconstutional [sic] attacks on the Second Amendment must end," Greene's office stated of the Brian A. Terry Memorial Eliminate the ATF Act, which went nowhere because Democrats controlled both chambers of Congress. The typo still appears on Greene's website.

Like most right-wing lawmakers, Greene is steadfastly opposed to any form of sensible gun control, even as thousands of Americans are killed by bullets every year. But Monday's mass shooting at the private Christian Covenant School in Nashville, Tennessee that claimed the lives of at least six people marked an escalation in Greene's rhetoric and actions aimed at thwarting efforts to save lives.}:

READ MORE: Marjorie Taylor Greene garners few sympathizers after claiming she was 'attacked' in a restaurant

:{:{At around the same time that Greene baselessly blamed Biden for the slaughter, Greene and other members of their state's Capitol Hill delegation were obstructing a routine ATF inspection of a weapons retailer in Smyrna, Georgia.}:

Footage of the confrontation was posted to Twitter along with a screenshot of Greene boastfully writing that the ATF abandoned its assignment "after we questioned their motives."

In the video, Greene flexed her power.

"We're members of Congress," she said, adding that "I serve on the Oversight Committee."}:

READ MORE: Watch: Jamie Raskin shreds Marjorie Taylor Greene at hearing for sympathizing with insurrectionists

:{:{Greene also complained to the ATF officer that the "government has been weaponized," that "people feel like their gun rights are threatened," and that "gun dealers feel like their businesses are threatened."}:

Given the day's events, social media users tore into Greene with exasperated disgust.}:

Jayme Ruimveld: "Is this today? Is she running her mouth about guns while children have been murdered by guns at their preschool? Not a shred of decency. Not an ounce of respect or concern for the grieving families. Absolutely soulless."

Kat: "And they're worried about gun vendors, feeling threatened!"

Judy Miron: "There are 7 more people dead, 3 of them children today in Nashville.. and she complains about ATF inspections!! Time to get rid of her. Vote her out!!"

Michelle: "Marge is nothing but a heartless hateful little troll."

Leon: "Meanwhile children died today at a Christian School, but hey as long as your precious 2nd Amendment that was written for Flintlock rifles is protected right."

Cathy Coleman: "There is something very wrong with MTG and the Republican members of Congress who hover around her & follow her lead. Something beyond dirty politics or unbridled ambition - there is a menacing wickedness and cruelty about them all."

ZoëbethC-MeidasMighty: "Just as another shooter shows up in Tennessee to kill elementary school kids. They got their priorities straight. I bet after lunch it's more bills to ban Drag Shows on a federal level."

Marcus Flowers: "As America grieves over yet another school shooting, this time in Nashville, Marjorie Taylor Greene is trying to prevent the ATF from doing their job. Common Sense Gun Legislation is necessary. We must do something to protect our children."

Seth Abramson: "Marjorie Taylor Greene is all about 'good guys with guns' until a violent insurrectionist smashes the window of the Speaker's Lobby inside a closed-to-the-public United States Capitol so a military veteran can leap into the breach and kidnap or kill a sitting member of Congress."

Watch the encounter below or at this link.

READ MORE: 'Performative disgrace': Marjorie Taylor Greene ridiculed for defending Ashli Babbitt while misspelling her name

FROM YOUR SITE ARTICLES

'Liar, liar': Joe Biden amuses crowd with quip about Marjorie Taylor Greene ›

Marjorie Taylor Greene says the Navy will be 'force fed' bugs and Krabby Patties ›

Veteran rips into Marjorie Taylor Greene and Lauren Boebert over Jan. 6 jail visit ›

RELATED ARTICLES AROUND THE WEB

Marjorie Taylor Greene's jail visit pulls GOP closer to Jan. 6 rioters ... ›

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene rises from GOP fringe to front | AP News ›

House Republican leaders condemn GOP candidate who made ... ›

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https://www.mediamatters.org/one-america-news-network/oan-promotes-texas-secession-movement

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https://www.alternet.org/menacing-wickedness-marjorie-taylor-greene/

no lnx twt

READ MORE: Marjorie Taylor Greene garners few sympathizers after claiming she was 'attacked' in a restaurant

Footage of the confrontation was posted to Twitter along with a screenshot of Greene boastfully writing that the ATF abandoned its assignment "after we questioned their motives."

In the video, Greene flexed her power.

"We're members of Congress," she said, adding that "I serve on the Oversight Committee."}:

READ MORE: Watch: Jamie Raskin shreds Marjorie Taylor Greene at hearing for sympathizing with insurrectionists

Given the day's events, social media users tore into Greene with exasperated disgust.}:

Kat: "And they're worried about gun vendors, feeling threatened!"

Judy Miron: "There are 7 more people dead, 3 of them children today in Nashville.. and she complains about ATF inspections!! Time to get rid of her. Vote her out!!"

Michelle: "Marge is nothing but a heartless hateful little troll."

Leon: "Meanwhile children died today at a Christian School, but hey as long as your precious 2nd Amendment that was written for Flintlock rifles is protected right."

Watch the encounter below or at this link.

READ MORE: 'Performative disgrace': Marjorie Taylor Greene ridiculed for defending Ashli Babbitt while misspelling her name

FROM YOUR SITE ARTICLES

'Liar, liar': Joe Biden amuses crowd with quip about Marjorie Taylor Greene ›

Marjorie Taylor Greene says the Navy will be 'force fed' bugs and Krabby Patties ›

Veteran rips into Marjorie Taylor Greene and Lauren Boebert over Jan. 6 jail visit ›

RELATED ARTICLES AROUND THE WEB

Marjorie Taylor Greene's jail visit pulls GOP closer to Jan. 6 rioters ... ›

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene rises from GOP fringe to front | AP News ›

House Republican leaders condemn GOP candidate who made ... ›

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no lnx vid

Fox News freaks out over energy efficiency standards for washing machines

Special PROGRAMS

CLIMATE & ENERGY

WRITTEN BY ILANA BERGER

PUBLISHED 03/16/23

Washing machines have become the latest target of Fox News’ campaign to stoke outrage over efforts to reduce carbon emissions from household appliances by casting newer, more energy-efficient products as dysfunctional, expensive, and intrusive “scams.”

In February, the Department of Energy proposed stricter standards for household washing machines, refrigerators, and freezers to reduce carbon emissions and make these appliances more energy efficient. On March 13, the Washington Free Beacon and later Fox News started a parade of misleading claims about the effectiveness and cost of what several sources say will actually make doing laundry cheaper for many Americans.

Consumer experts and the U.S. Energy Department suggest energy-efficient washing machines would actually make doing laundry easier and cheaper

Firstly, it’s important to note that consumers will still be able to choose between top-loaders and front-loading machines. According to the Appliance Standards Awareness Project, the new standards will actually phase out machines that use older technology called agitators and replace them with ones that use impellers, or wash plates. Consumer Reports says that impellers use less water and more motion to get clothes clean and cut down on time in the dryer, which could save consumers money in the long run. Consumer Reports also found that top-loaders that use impellers have a higher average “washing performance” score than those that use agitators. Even Whirlpool, which spoke out against the new standards, claims on its website that impellers and agitators are “roughly equal” in “cleaning performance, energy efficiency, capacity, innovation and convenience.”

The Department of Energy estimates that the proposed standards could cost manufacturers about $690 million to make the necessary updates. However, the changes would also save U.S. consumers up to $14.5 billion over 30 years, helping reduce utility costs for renters who are typically lower-income, and the new standards are estimated to cut more than 53 million metric tons of carbon emissions over that same time.

Fox personalities misleadingly attack energy-efficient washing machines

Despite the evidence, anchors, hosts, and guests on Fox News and Fox Business have taken the word of an industry trade association, the Association of Home Appliance Manufacturers, and repeatedly claimed that the Department of Energy’s new efficiency standards will somehow make Americans “dirtier and stinkier.” They also parroted the industry claim that the standards would make doing laundry more expensive by increasing the cost of detergent or preventing consumers from buying cheaper, older, less efficient models. Some Fox figures even denied the reality of climate change to argue that energy efficiency should not be a priority in the first place:

Fox News Radio host Jimmy Failla said the Biden administration is banning “super-sized water” in washing machines, calling it a “scam” that will leave clothes “dirtier.” “This is the scam here, OK, because your clothes are going to be dirtier. And they’ve said this already. It's going to require possibly a second wash. … Think about this, remember when they banned super-sized fries so all the fat people like me just bought two larges? That’s what this is. They're banning super-sized water. So now you get to wash them twice.” [Fox News, Jesse Watters Primetime, 3/15/23]

Fox & Friends hosts doubled down on the idea that the new standards would leave clothes dirtier. Co-host Steve Doocy reported, “Critics say President Biden's new energy plan would make each washing cycle take longer, make detergent more expensive, and leave clothes dirtier because they use less water.” Co-host Ainsley Earhardt told viewers to “get those dirty clothes clean while you can, cause soon they're all gonna be dirty.” [Fox News, Fox & Friends, 3/15/23]

Video

CitationFrom the March 15, 2023, edition of Fox News' Fox & Friends

Fox Business correspondent Jeff Flock questioned why his washing machine isn’t energy efficient enough, even though the government is not forcing anyone to get rid of their washing machines. “I already have what they call a high-efficiency washing machine. But the Biden administration thinks maybe it's not efficient enough. They want you to use less water and less detergent.” [Fox Business, Mornings with Maria, 3/15/23]

James Coleman, a senior fellow at Koch-funded climate denial front group the American Enterprise Institute,fearmongered that “the standards would, on-net, harm consumers.” “Like many efficiency standards, the government claims that although these standards will raise the cost of appliances, they are justified because they will reduce consumer spending on energy and water even more. Of course, if that were true, consumers would likely buy more efficient appliances anyway, given that studies show consumers consider energy and water costs.” [FoxNews.com, 3/14/23]

Hannity host Sean Hannity called reducing carbon emissions from washers and dryers “idiotic.” “Leave my washing machine alone. But more importantly, leave my gas stove alone. … I mean, this is madness. China is the world's biggest polluter. They're not being held accountable. All these other countries are not being held accountable. And they're looking for U.S. taxpayers to pay for their cleaner air. Why would we bear that responsibility? This is so idiotic, but yet they present this as legitimate policy.” [Fox News, Hannity, 3/14/23]

Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) on The Bottom Line said the Biden administration wants to have people “carrying our clothes back out back and doing an old wringer washing machine.” “My goodness, you know it is not enough to control you from daylight to dark. Now they want to control your oven. I'm not giving up my gas stove. … And to take your washing machine and try to make it to the point that it is going to be less efficient.” Co-host Sean Duffy added, “They’ve ruined our toilets, they’ve ruined our dishwashers. Listen, nothing works in the home. Enough with these liberals, get them out of here.” [Fox Business, The Bottom Line, 3/14/23]

Video From the March 14, 2023, edition of Fox Business' The Bottom Line

Fox Business’ The Big Money Show co-hosts Brian Brenberg and Taylor Riggs said energy-efficient washing machines are ineffective. “I can tell you what is exactly going to happen here, OK?” Brenberg said. “You going to just wash your clothes twice, which means you’re going to use more water than you do right now and more soap than you do right now.” Riggs further claimed that saving water and energy will not have an impact on the climate crisis: “China and India are the world's largest polluters, go after them. The U.N. climate report says anything we do is worth nothing if we don't get them on board. Stop coming after small things like washing machines.” [Fox Business, The Big Money Show, 3/14/23]

Comedian Tom Shillue on America’s Newsroomsaid “no one ends up noticing the benefit” from more energy-efficient washing machines. “They always claim this is going to save the consumer, you should be happy. Well if that’s true, manufacturers would do it on their own and we would be happy to pay more for a machine to see that happen. But we don’t believe that’s what happens.” [Fox News, America’s Newsroom, 3/14/23]

Varney & Co. host Stuart Varney included washing machines in a list of things that people supposedly “can’t have” anymore. “It is nonstop. Lightbulbs, can't have them. You can’t have toilets which flush a lot of water, so now you flush twice of course. What else have we got? Gas stoves, let’s not forget, washing machines, they’ve got to tell you what to do all of the time.” [Fox Business, Varney & Co., 3/14/23]

Fox anchor Maria Bartiromo discussed the new regulation with investor Michael Lee, who called the climate crisis a “lie” because “over the last 100 years, deaths due to climate-related accidents and disasters is down 98%, yet somehow it's an existential threat.” “It is beyond insane, the things that they've done and hearing that you've got to change your washing machine because it might use a little less water for this cycle or for that cycle, it's more of the same insanity that's ruining our country right in front of our eyes.” [Fox Business, Mornings with Maria, 3/14/23]

Failla called the regulations a “scam” the Biden administration is “forcing it on us.” “Nobody is on board with this. Everything this government does is some type of heavy-handed coercion or in this case what they would be calling a mandate. … These clothes aren't going to be cleaner, so you’re going to wind up washing them twice is my guess and probably using more water in the process.” Fox host Steve Doocy suggested the administration only put the regulations in place to placate environmentalists after greenlighting the Willow Project: “You’ve got to figure that his environmentalist base loves this kind of stuff, but at the same time he’s apparently greenlighted the Willow project which is going to open billions of gallons — billions of barrels of oil up north. So they’re furious.” [Fox News, Fox & Friends, 3/14/23]

Video

CitationFrom the March 14, 2023, edition of Fox News' Fox & Friends

Outnumbered co-host Harris Faulkner insisted that more efficient appliances would actually use more energy.“If in fact you're doing it longer, right, and you’re not getting the clothes as clean, if in fact you're cooking on that electric appliance now and also not cooking as quickly because the flame is on and the other element takes time to heat up, you’re already — aren't you breaking regulations for usage? … This is so counter to all the regulations that they’ve put in place, it makes no sense. It is like they are punching each other in the face, only they're hitting us.” [Fox News, Outnumbered, 3/14/23]

Outnumbered guest and former NFL player Jake Bequette said the “green agenda” is making everything worse. “Before long, you’ll have to say your preferred pronouns to get your dishwasher to work. I mean this is ridiculous, like nothing works anymore. I just want the high-pressure shower heads to come back. They don't make them like they used to. I mean, this is all part of the green agenda.” [Fox News, Outnumbered, 3/14/23]

Hannity tweeted, “WON’T WASH: Biden Proposes Washing Machine Regulations, Makes Doing Laundry More Expensive.” [Twitter, 3/14/23]

The attacks on washing machines are just part of right-wing media’s drumbeat against any consumer policy framed as climate-friendly

These attacks are just the latest instance of conservative media fearmongering over various household appliances, goods, and cherished companions — including gas stoves, coffee, gaming consoles, cars, and even pets — being supposedly regulated to fight climate change.

In January, right-wing media essentially tried to convince consumers that the Biden administration was going to come into their homes and rip their gas stoves out of the walls in the name of public health and climate change (in addition to trying to discredit a plethora of studies highlighting the health risks of indoor air pollution). It is only a matter of time before right-wing media finds some new manufactured narrative to whine about. These stories are not about improving the quality of life for Americans — they are purely politically motivated attacks to lambast Biden’s “green agenda.”

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Pagination

Current page1

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IN THIS ARTICLE

Climate deniers

Right-wing media figures become gas stove devotees after health concerns arise

01/12/23 2:55 PM EST

Fox News’ Jesse Watters suggest climate policies will “bring society back to the Stone Age”

02/02/22 3:22 PM EST

As a climate-fueled heat wave stresses California's electric grid, right-wing media are disingenuously attacking electric vehicles

09/02/22 11:50 AM EDT

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https://www.desmog.com/2023/02/21/oreskes-conway-the-big-myth-free-market-capitalism-climate-change-mont-pelerin-society/

science historians Naomi Oreskes and Erik M. Conway, authors of the classic 2010 book Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Global Warming, have released a new book placing that doubt machine into a longer arc of U.S. business and political history.

The Big Myth: How American Business Taught Us to Loathe Government and Love the Free Market explores an even more ambitious history dating from the dawn of the 20th century to the present day.

The book documents how today’s prevailing anti-regulatory and anti-government postures that deride Big Government and cheer for Big Business did not arise simply from grassroots demands. Instead, they arose from well-funded industry campaigns creating what Oreskes and Conway have called a manufactured consensus “quasi-religious belief” in deregulated markets and an accompanying diehard opposition to governmental solutions to public policy problems.

Fighting Public Utilities, Child Labor Laws

One of the first campaigns in that spirit occurred within the electricity utility industry via an organization which eventually became known as the Edison Electric Institute.

What is now colloquially calledEEI, was launched in 1885 as the National Electric Light Association, or NELA. At the time, it “represented more than five hundred of the largest privately owned electrical utilities, accounting for more than 90 percent of U.S. kilowatt output,” according to the book.

In the 1920s, according to Oreskes and Conway, “electricity industry leaders organized one of the largest propaganda campaigns in the history of the United States.” The campaign aimed to persuade the public thatmunicipal-owned electricity was a bad thing, advocating instead for investor-owned utilities. In the end, though, it resulted in higher rates for homeowners and small businesses and bigger profits for company owners and their bankrollers.

The initially unpopular campaign framed its activities under the guise of freedom and market efficiency. NELA’s influence operation — involving rewriting K-12 and university textbooks, courting and funding industry-friendly professors, utilizing astroturf campaigns, deploying sophisticated lobbying techniques to facilitate regulatory and legislative capture, and other deceptive practices — resembles much of the fossil fuel industry’s political pressure that DeSmog has covered and uncovered week-in and week-out for over a decade and a half.

At the time, it was the first of its kind industrial-scale full-court press, and it provided a roadmap for other corporate hegemons in subsequent decades. And NELA’s goal went far beyond merely winning a PR campaign, Oreskes and Conway conclude; it had much deeper ideological underpinnings.

“[U]nlike conventional PR, the aim was not simply to create a positive impression of a particular business or even of the whole industry,” they write. “Rather, the goal—expressed outright in numerous documents—was to change the way Americans thought about private property, capitalism, and regulation” altogether.

Core to NELA’s campaign, Oreskes and Conway wrote, was the idea “that free-market capitalism was the embodiment of freedom, writ large, and that any restriction on the freedom of any business would put us on a slippery slope to tyranny.”

Private ownership of the electricity industry was, up until then, relatively rare in the United States and even more so throughout the industrializing world. But as of 2017, 72 percentof U.S. electricity customers got their power from investor-owned utilities. NELA’s campaign, in other words, changed history as we know it.

Today, its successor EEI and its member companies continue to wage deceptive PR campaigns to fight renewable energy and bolster the continued consumption of fossil fuels.

The NELA campaign’s legacy, however, goes far beyond its sector alone, according to Oreskes and Conway. “Perhaps most importantly, NELA pioneered a strategy of insisting that these claims were true, regardless of the facts,” they wrote.

Broadening their view beyond the fossil fuel industry, Oreskes and Conway also detail how the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) propelled similar efforts across other industries during the same era. Like EEI, fast-forwarding to the present-day, NAM has served as a key node of climate denialism.

But in its earliest days,NAM maintained a different sinister focus, according to The Big Myth: advocating against child labor laws amid what the authors described as a “pandemic” of workplace deaths both among young workers and the adult workforce.The sheer volume of such deaths served as one of the first major wakeup calls in the need for a more active regulatory state, the book maps out.

In making its case for child labor and against regulations protecting children, NAM espoused “that the federal government had no business interfering in business” and called such a notion “socialistic in its origin, philosophy and associations.”

Libertarian Fringe to (Neo)Liberal Mainstream

While both NELA and NAM laid the groundwork for a paradigm that’s alive and well today, their ideas were not adopted globally until the formation of theMont Pelerin Society,a group created in 1947 that like EEI and NAM has received close scrutiny from DeSmog for years. Oreskes and Conway devote a whole chapter of The Big Myth to Mont Pelerin.

Like NELA and NAM, Mont Pelerin’s roots lay in anti-regulatory and business-funded ideology. But unlike them, Mont Pelerin came out of academia and via professors committed to the now globally pervasive neoliberal ideology they created. Mont Pelerin inspired similar groups that are, like it, still active today, such as the Koch Industries-funded Institute for Humane Studies at George Mason University and the University of Chicago’s free market-oriented Economics Department.

Oreskes and Conway point to a legion of like-minded groups arising by the 1970s, riding the momentum of an academic community devoted to neoliberal ideology, and reacting to the gains made in environmental protection and other areas. Formation of these groups accelerated after the metaphorical call-to-arms made in a memo written to theU.S. Chamber of Commerce by the then-tobacco industry attorney and soon-to-be Supreme Court Justice Lewis Powell.

Known today as the Powell Memo, the 1972 letter called for Big Business to undergo “careful long-range planning and implementation, in consistency of action over an indefinite period of years, in the scale of financing available only through joint effort, and in the political power available only through united action and national organizations.”

The Powell Memo, Oreskes and Conway concluded, spearheaded free market fundamentalist groups such as the Cato Institute, Koch Family Foundations, Scaife Family Foundations, Olin Foundation, Heritage Foundation, and the Federalist Society, among others. All of these entities, and the groups they fund or work alongside in coalitions, remain powerful forces within U.S. and global politics.

The Big Myth further highlights how those think tanks and companies also played akey role in defeating the 2009 and 2010 congressional push, led by then-President Barack Obama, to pass a federal, market-oriented climate bill known as the American Clean Energy and Security Act. Critics would charge that the policy approach taken in the bill, emblematically, embodies the very “market fundamentalist” ethos reigning over U.S. politics for the past 100-plus years.

During the congressional debate over a bill that would haveenshrined the policy lever of cap-and-trade, the Koch-funded Tea Party network also ascended[vid]

previous congressional pushes in the 2000s for what was ultimately a business-friendly climate policy, had enjoyed bipartisan support. But The Big Myth explains how as the Tea Party network took flight, Republican Party support for the climate bill — and broader climate action — eroded to a near-zero level. It has mostly remained there since.

At the same time, the reality of climate change had and has continued to become all the more clear. That reality though, Oreskes and Conway wrote, clashes with the religion of market fundamentalism.

“[H]ad the market fundamentalists spent so much time defending the magic of the market-place that they simply couldn’t accept market failure on a global scale?” the authors asked of the legion of climate-change deniers who helped to kill the bill. “To accept the enormity of what climate change portended for civilization was to accept that capitalism, as practiced, was undermining the very prosperity it was supposed to deliver. And not just in some distant future, but now.”

Although this “quasi-religious belief” in the power of the market holds the greatest sway with conservatives, Oreskes and Conway argue that belief in the “magic of the marketplace” has become an intoxicating ideology withinliberal circles too, including within climate policy debates.

“Even in supposedly liberal enclaves like Cambridge, Massachusetts,” where Oreskes teaches at Harvard, “many people think climate change will be best addressed by technological innovation in the marketplace,” the co-authors surmise, perhaps in alluding to the prototypical industry-friendly policies pushed by former Obama Administration U.S. Secretary of Energy Ernest Moniz — a professor at the nearby Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

“The rise of right-wing think tanks helped spread the pro-market, antigovernment gospel across the country and insert what had been decidedly niche views into the mainstream,” the authors explained of the ideology’s spread. Other scholars have referred to this as the “force field” effect, moving the gravitational pull of what’s possible within U.S. politics further and further toward right-wing, corporate-created policy solutions.

The ideological roots of anti-democracy, anti-environmental, and anti-regulatory campaigning explored in The Big Myth also serve as the heart and soul of the book Climate Cover-Up: The Crusade to Deny Global Warming, written by DeSmog co-founders James Hoggan and Richard Littlemore.

If you have learned from DeSmog’s reporting shedding light on the climate change denial machine, you’ll love The Big Myth, an excerpt from which follows below. The book is a must-read for all students of the sordid history of public relations and governmental capture.

Go grab a copy and check out some recent interviews on the book, as well, for further background. A video of Professor Oreskes discussing the book can also be seen below.

Excerpt from The Big Myth

In the 1990s, as capitalism was being declared triumphant in many quarters, scientists had proved that man-made climate change was under way.1 Climate change was textbook market failure. It arose from everyday economic activity— using fossil fuels—but was about to impose a huge external cost, inundating major coastal cities around the globe, making hurricanes and cyclones even more deadly than they already were, and dislocating tens or even hundreds of millions of people. It was also textbook environmental injustice, as poor people would almost certainly bear the brunt of a problem created by the rich.

But it also had a textbook answer: putting a price on carbon. Economists called this solution a “Pigouvian tax”—after the Cambridge economist Arthur Pigou, who in the early twentieth century had helped develop the concept of negative externalities. (Pigou also suggested it would be reasonable for governments to subsidize activities that had “positive externalities,” such as education.) The idea of pricing social and environmental costs of carbon was hardly radical; Pigou was firmly mainstream, a respected scholar at Cambridge University, a leading figure in what came to be known as the Cambridge school of economics.2 The obvious benefit of the Pigouvian approach was that it remedied the market failure directly by embedding information—in this case scientific information—into the price of fossil fuels. Then consumers could decide for themselves whether or not to buy more expensive fossil fuels, and producers of alternatives could compete on a level playing field.

The Clinton administration proposed to address climate change through a Pigouvian tax, the so-called “BTU” tax (referring to the heat content of fuels as measured in British Thermal Units).3 But it was opposed—indeed, ridiculed—by a broad coalition of conservatives, including, the Chamber of Commerce, the American Petroleum Institute, and virtually every right-wing think tank in America.4

The notorious Global Climate Coalition, a network of fossil fuel producers and users that in the 1990s successfully prevented the U.S. Congress from ratifying the Kyoto protocol to the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change, was originally established as a committee of the National Association of Manufacturers. Even though the idea of putting a price on carbon was a mainstream economic approach to market failure, Republicans framed it as just another example of Democrats’ penchant to “tax and spend.” The Wall Street Journal mocked it as Al Gore’s “favorite tax.”5

In his 1979 paper on nonmarket failure, economist Charles Wolf had slipped into his conclusion the idea that one cause of nonmarket failure was “premature but politically effective demands for government action.”6 In the 1990s, many Republicans picked up on this theme, arguing that it was premature to act on climate change. Even at the time, that was wrong: scientists already had a consensus that man-made climate change was under way and likely to be very costly.7 To act in the 1990s would have been appropriate. It would have been timely. But Clinton was unable to generate congressional support for action; Republican opposition made it clear that any proposal to put a price on carbon would be dead on arrival. In 1999, when Vice President Al Gore ran for president on a platform prioritizing climate change, journalist Gregg Easterbrook (brother of Judge Frank Easterbrook) embarrassed him on the campaign trail with a false story that his mentor—climate champion Roger Revelle—had experienced a deathbed conversion and died thinking climate change was not a serious problem.8 (He had not.)

As the 1990s became the 2000s—and scientists declared the evidence “unequivocal”—market fundamentalist did not adjust their views. To the contrary, their opposition hardened.9

In 2006, Lord Nicholas Stern, former chief economist of the World Bank, concluded on behalf of the UK government that, yes, fixing climate change would be expensive—perhaps as much as 1 percent of global GDP per annum—but not fixing it would cost much more: at least 5 percent and perhaps as much as 20 percent.10 Here was a solid argument from a man who could scarcely be accused of being any kind of -ist other than an economist. In response, conservatives dug in deeper. Senator Ted Cruz promoted the canard that global warming had stopped; Senator James Inhofe called it a liberal conspiracy to bring down capitalism.11 No matter what solutions were proposed—market-friendly or not—the right wing found reasons to oppose them. The science wasn’t settled (they claimed). It would be too expensive to fix. We could just adapt. It was all a hoax. Often these claims were couched in libertarian terms, as when in 2011 former House Speaker Newt Gingrich deemed the push to address climate change “the newest excuse to take control of lives.”12

The singular exception to climate denial in Republican Party leadership was Senator John McCain. He and conservative Democrat Joe Lieberman introduced Climate Stewardship acts in 2003, 2005, and 2007 to address the carbon dioxide emissionsthat drive climate change by creating an emissions trading system—a proven mechanism, albeit more complicated than a Pigouvian tax. But when given the chance to use it to address climate change, Republicans refused.13 The 2003 bill failed on mostly party lines, with a few Democrats and nearly all Republicans in opposition. But it was a closer call than many expected, and soon Congress faced intense lobbying pressure against climate legislation, particularly from NAM and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. The 2005 version came to a vote and failed 60–38, with only a handful of Republicans voting yea.14 Two years after that, McCain could not even persuade Republican leaders to bring a climate bill to the Senate floor.15

In 2009, Congress tried once more, with the American Clean Energy and Security Act (better known as Waxman-Markey,for its primary sponsors, Massachusetts representative Ed Markey and California representative Henry Waxman). For the fourth time in a decade, Congress had the opportunity to address climate change using a market mechanism, and for the fourth time rejected it. The bill barely passed the Democratic-led House; nearly all Republicans voted against, as did Democrats from fossil-fuel-producing states (and a few Democrats who found the bill too weak). The Senate never brought it to a vote. Democrats concluded they could not overcome the “wall of opposition” they faced from their Republican colleagues, opposition fortified by fierce lobbying.16 One analysis concluded that, in the eighteen months between January 2009 and June 2010, electric utilities, oil and gas companies, trade associations, and think tanks spent at least $500 million against climate change legislation.17 Another study tracing anti-climate lobbying back to 2003 places the figure at closer to $1 billion.18

The fossil fuel industry’s economic interests in preventing climate action have always been obvious; less understood is how it has camouflaged those interests. No one ever said, “I am denying climate change to protect corporate profits.” They said they were protecting jobs, protecting the economy, and protecting free markets from government “encroachment.” They said they were fighting for capitalism and freedom.

But historically, capitalism has never been just one thing: Adam Smith’s eighteenth-century vision of a democratic, distributed marketplace populated by small bankers and businessmen was a far cry from the industrial capitalism that developed in early nineteenth-century England and Germany—with its cruel “Satanic mills”—or the monopolies and managerial capitalism that came to dominate America in the late nineteenth century, much less the globally financed capitalism that emerged at the end of the twentieth century. China has liberalized its markets while continuing to oppress and even murder its ethnic and religious minorities. There are many capitalisms. American market fundamentalists fight for a form of capitalism that is both brutal and ignorant: that brushes aside market failure, anticompetitive practices, and external costs, in part by denying the facts of science, the facts of history, and the necessary role of government in making capitalism work.19

The question is not whether government should set limits that prevent individual autonomy from producing collective harm, the question is where we draw the lines. That is not an economic question, it is a political one. Market fundamentalists have managed to distract from the political aspects of these decisions and frame them as questions of “economic freedom.” Thus, a reasonable response to climate change is rejected as unreasonable “government encroachment.”

All this may make one wonder: was this ever reallyabout capitalism? Or freedom? Or was it all just one long, semi-continuous, shape-shifting defense of the prerogatives of big business? Of freedom for capital and capitalists? Or had the market fundamentalists spent so much time defending the magic of the market- place that they simply couldn’t accept market failure on a global scale? To accept the enormity of what climate change portended for civilization was to accept that capitalism, as practiced, was undermining the very prosperity it was supposed to deliver. And not just in some distant future, butnow.

ref bib...

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1 23 an

Conservative pundit Sean Hannity claimed without evidence on Thursday that President Joe Biden and his son Hunter have "hired" Special Weapons and Tactics units to hunt down and destroy their political detractors.

:{:{First, Hannity and his guest alleged that the Bidens conducted nefarious business with China. They agreed that there were secret recordings of the two men kanoodling with foreign nationals, and determined that the Bidens acted illegally based on what was left "unsaid" in the supposed clandestine phone calls. LACK OF EVIDENCE IS EVIDENCE}:

Next, Hannity stated in a fake Russian accent that Libya may have "real compromising materials" about Hunter.He then transitioned into the Biden-SWAT conspiracy theory.

"The amount of money, the sheer amount of money, and a number of countries, andJoe's outright lie about never having discussed this with Hunterare now coming to light. Now there's going to be pushback because they have nowhired, you know, SWAT teams and are creating a war room to slander and smear and attack every single solitary person that either reports it or is investigating it," Hannity said.

He also accused Biden and Democrats of weaponizing investigations, which is what House Republicans are doing through their congressional committees.

"That's, you know, that's Democratic politics 101. That's who they are. That's what they do. So we have to know this, understand this fully," Hannity continued. "And, you know, I think it's pretty obvious what's going on."

Listen below viaMedia Matters for America or at this link.

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anti gubmint hype fear:

see BBB--> IRA ~ 118th; 30% tax on all?!

an 1 23

it's only been two weeks since Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) was elected House Speaker and already, CNN is taking swift action to correct inaccurate claims he's shared.

On Tuesday, January 24, CNN's Don Lemon aired a brief clip of the top-ranking Republican lawmaker's remarks about the debt ceiling.

In the clip, McCarthy could be heard saying, "Listen, when Trump was president and Nancy Pelosi was speaker, they became a debt ceiling agreement. And it was a cap agreement for two years to cap the spending and make those decisions."

Lemon turned the segment over toCNN Daniel Dalewho broke down the claims and pushed back against McCarthy's arguments.

"John McCarthy is wrong in two ways here. First of all, House Republicans didn't actually repeal anything they did vote to repeal. They passed a bill to repeal more than 70 billion in new IRS funding," Dale explained. "But that bill is not going to get through the Senate or President Biden. So they have not changed the law. Second of all, this frequent Republican talking point you hear about how Democrats are hiring 87,000 new IRS agents is just not true. It's an exaggeration.

He went on to discuss President Joe Biden's legislation to combat inflation.

"The inflation reduction act that Biden signed into law last year includes 80 billion in additional funding for the IRS that will very possibly allow the IRS to hire tens of thousands of additional employees," he said. "But not even close to all these employees, Don, will be agents. The people who conduct audits and investigations sometimes frighten people. Non-agents make up the vast majority of the IRS workforce."

He continued, "And many of the newly hired employees we know will be in things like customer service and operations in it. And experts tell us that many of the new hires will be making up for attrition filling posts left by tens of thousands of retirements departures, not taking newly created jobs."

Dale added, "So the image McCarthy and other Republicans are trying to conjure, Don, of this army of 87,000 new agents coming to get you is not based on the facts."

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an 1 23 maya

Amid the Republican battle over the next speaker of the House, Mother Jones Senior Editor Michael Mechanic shed light on another priority of the party — which is the possible enactment of theFamily and Small Business Taxpayer Protection Act.

In his reporting, Mechanic asserted that the potential bill is a misnomer, because rather than protecting taxpayers — as the name implies — it would instead protect “tax cheaters” by rolling back IRS funding from the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA).

Americans for Tax Fairness founder Frank Clemente said in a recent press release, “The richest 1 percent avoid paying $160 billion a year that they owe in taxes due to inadequate tax enforcement. Republicans are voting to let them keep on cheating the rest of us.”

Mechanic reflected on his 2021 reporting around a similar IRS arrangement back in 2011. The agency’s budget was cut by over $2 billion at the time which resulted in a significant drop in non-filer investigations and an astronomical increase in outstanding tax debt by 2019.

In 2020, it was confirmed that almost 800,000 wealthy non-filers owed a hefty $46 billion collectively, and many of the cases were eventually dismissed without any accountability from the agency.

This is what the $80 billion allotted by the IRA was supposed to rectify. As of October 2022, the Congressional Research Service reported that over a span of 10 years, the funding would update the agency’s outdated systems and technologies, bolster operations support (such as rent, facility, security costs), expand and enhance taxpayer services (prefiling assistance and education), and “monitor and enforce taxes on digital assets such as cryptocurrency."

Then, GOP hardliners and allies of former President Donald Trump attempted to hijack that narrative across social media by claiming that the IRA would instead use the money to hire “87,000 new agents” who would track down “ordinary taxpayers."

Moreover, members of the party who are spewing that lie are not letting up on their desire to repeal 90 percent of the funding, which Americans for Tax Fairness said in its press release would take away plans to improve taxpayer services (for refunds, customer calls, etc.), fund US Tax Court to resolve cases between taxpayers and the agency, and also provide the IRS with enough resources to launch an easy and free, government e-filing system.

Mechanic noted that the GOP’s gesture of proposing anti-tax bills that benefit no one but the 1 percent is nothing new, and Tax Policy Center Senior Fellow Steve Rosenthal presumed that the issue of IRS funding will be “ongoing” in both Senate and House sessions for the foreseeable future.

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girl athletes recall rt xian natl are fine with big gubmint to go after enemy or threat

https://www.alternet.org/2022/10/florida-history-of-mentrual-periods/

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coulter bails but bannon clings 1776 BS

https://www.mediamatters.org/steve-bannon/steve**-bannon-says-fbi-seizing-top-secret-documents-mar-lago-what-we-fought-revolution

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2 field offices attacked assault weapons?

https://www.alternet.org/2022/08/florida-republican-house-candidate-blasted/

shoot FBI on sight

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https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/tucker-carlson-suggests-government-wants-put-chemicals-milk-turn-kids-trans

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https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/fox-news-pushed-falsehood-inflation-reduction-act-hires-87000-new-irs-employees-more-200 times

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aha recall conservatives hard-wired to be sensitive to threat/fear, amplified by soc media bubble, boost by troll caucus [all built on libtard/ koch fdn]

8 22

https://www.alternet.org/2022/08/gop-rumors-irs/

An official from the U.S. Treasury Department confirmed Friday that, contrary to the unrelenting barrage of lies repeated by GOP operatives for over a week, the Internal Revenue Service is not going to hire 87,000 new agents to harass working people at their homes.

Not a single Republican in the House or Senate voted for the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) that was passed through the filibuster-proof budget reconciliation process last week and signed into law by President Joe Biden on Tuesday, choosing instead to condemn the package's relatively modest but popular tax reforms.

Despite analysts' predictions that the 98.2% of U.S. households with annual incomes of $400,000 or less will receive the same tax bill or a slight cut as a result of the IRA, [plus study for free file] far-right lawmakers have sown disinformation about how the law's provision of roughly $80 billion in new IRS funding over 10 years—money intended to help the agency crack down on rich tax cheats—poses a threat to every American.

:{:{Last week, Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.) went so far as to claim that Democrats are "using the power of the federal government for armed robbery!" Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) has made similar allegation:(style="background-color:#ff9900ff"):}:s.}:

It's not just fringe members of the GOP who are spreading such falsehoods. One day before Boebert's tirade, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (Calif.), the highest-ranking Republican in the lower chamber, tweeted, "Democrats in Washington plan to hire an army of 87,000 IRS agents so they can audit more Americans like you."

On Wednesday, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis—currently a top contender, along with former President Donald Trump, to be the Republican Party's 2024 nominee for the White House—called hiring 87,000 IRS agents "a middle finger to the American public," making clear that he would prefer more "might at the border."

Where does this oft-repeated number of IRS agents come from?

"The 87,000 figure does exist, buried within a May 2021 Treasury Department report when the Biden administration was pushing a bigger spending bill with the same $80 billion IRS funding," Reuters noted Friday. "The report estimated the money could fund 86,852 full-time hires through 2031."

But the actual net increase in staff would be much lower, as the IRS expects more than 50,000 aging Baby Boomer employees to retire over the next half-decade.

In addition to an unspecified number of new revenue agents—there were 8,321 in fiscal year 2021—the agency is looking to hire tens of thousands of new information technology specialists and customer service personnel who can create a user experience more akin to online banking, Natasha Sarin, Treasury counselor for tax policy and administration, told Reuters.

There are 2,100 special agents in the IRS Criminal Investigation branch who are authorized to carry firearms, but right-wing assertions that all 87,000 new hires would be auditors, criminal enforcement agents, or armed are "deeply dangerous nonsense—and false," said Sarin.

"The speed and voracity with which [Republicans] are coming at this is really a testament to how important these resources are going to be—because there are many wealthy tax evaders that stand to lose a lot," Sarin continued.

The GOP's intentionally misleading attacks come after a decade of budget cuts approved by congressional Republicans left the IRS with 16,000 fewer employees in 2021 than it had in 2010.

As ProPublica has documented, the IRS now audits low-income taxpayers at the same rate as the top 1%, but that is a direct result of years of austerity, which have undermined the agency's ability to audit the rich.

The IRA's boost in IRS funding aims to rectify this injustice and to begin closing an estimated $600 billion annual "tax gap"—the difference between taxes paid and owed—by strengthening enforcement against the complex avoidance strategies used by the wealthy, especially those with murky sources of income.

New information technology hires will develop "tools to identify more high-end audit targets," Reuters reported. "To target wealthy taxpayers and handle sophisticated audits, Sarin said the IRS needs mid-career individuals with accounting and often tax law experience."

The Congressional Budget Office estimates that the increase in IRS funding will raise $204 billion in additional revenue over 10 years, while the Treasury projects that the real revenue impact will likely be $400 billion over a decade—a substantial portion of the IRA's climate and healthcare spending.

Earlier this week, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen instructed IRS Commissioner Charles Rettig—a scandal-plagued Trump appointee who spent decades battling the agency—to submit an $80 billion spending and hiring plan within six months. Yellen previously directed the agency not to use any new resources to increase audits of people making less than $400,000 per year.

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aha/hmmn paranoid style earth2 has just taken over gop trumpista qanon and/or boebert mirror rubber/glue mock BLM defund police (never really a thing) and/or just kneejerk gubmint (recall // deep state intel) but FBI storied literally; they are running out of allies/institution woke corps, DoD etc; just fundraising clicks?

an 8 22

...Others have attempted to defend the former president. Rep. Mike Turner (R-Ohio) said, “You can say nuclear weapons, but there are things that are highly, highly classified, there are things that are not extremely classified."

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) is now selling merchandise on her website in support of a call to "defund the FBI" while Rep. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.) tweeted, "I will support a complete dismantling and elimination of the democrat brown shirts known as the FBI."

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aha note gubmint so demonized by gop and libtards/kochs that any accusation instantly believed by trumpistas? esp when pedo commie dems in control

an 8 22

no lnx twt

Donald Trump peddles conspiracy theory about FBI 'planting' evidence

Igor Derysh and Salon August 10, 2022

President Donald Trump and his lawyers pushed a conspiracy theory that FBI agents may have "planted" incriminating evidence while executing a search warrant at his Mar-a-Lago residence.

FBI agents on Monday executed a warrant at Trump's Palm Beach home, meaning that a judge found enough probable cause to approve the search. Agents investigating presidential documents that Trump took with him to Mar-a-Lago, including classified materials, removed 12 boxes of items from Mar-a-Lago after Trump turned over 15 boxes of materials to the National Archives earlier this year, according to the Washington Post.Trump attorney Christina Bobb told the outlet that the search warrant indicated that the FBI is investigating possible violations of the Presidential Records Act and laws related to the handling of classified material. Trump has thus far refused to release his copy of the search warrant even though it could provide transparency on what agents were searching for.

Bobb said that she was not allowed to observe the search, as is common during such FBI operations. But Trump and his lawyers have seized on that fact to push a conspiracy theory that the FBI may have "planted" something without providing any evidence to support their claims.

"The FBI and others from the Federal Government would not let anyone, including my lawyers, be anywhere near the areas that were rummaged and otherwise looked at during the raid on Mar-a-Lago," Trump said on his Twitter knockoff Truth Social. "Everyone was asked to leave the premises, they wanted to be left alone, without any witnesses to see what they were doing[CCTV?] , taking or, hopefully not, 'planting.' Why did they STRONGLY insist on having nobody watching them, everybody out? Obama and Clinton were never 'raided,' despite big disputes!"

Bobb, a former TV host at the right-wing outlet OAN who joined Trump's legal team, made a similar claim on Monday, citing only the fact that she was not allowed to observe the search.

"There is no security that something wasn't planted," Bobb said in an interview, adding, "I'm not saying that's what they did."

"At this point, I don't necessarily think that they would even go to the extent of trying to plant information, I think they just make stuff up and come up with whatever they wantand that's the way that they will have to proceed in order to actually try to indict the president because they don't have anything," she said.

Fellow Trump attorney Alina Habba told Fox News that she was also "concerned that they may have planted something. You know, at this point, who knows? I don't trust the government and that's a very frightening thing as an American."

Trump's right-wing allies have parroted this evidence-free claim to their followers.

Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., cited his distrust of the government to suggest that the FBI "may put something" in the boxes they removed from Mar-a-Lago to "entrap" Trump.

"I think there is an extremely high probability that the FBI planted 'evidence' against President Trump," tweeted Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga. "Otherwise WHY would they NOT allow his attorneys or anyone watch them while they conducted their unprecedented raid? They know the consequences of an empty handed power move."

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, R-Ga., and Trump ally Charlie Kirk, the founder of Turning Point USA, both discussed their belief that the FBI may have "planted evidence" on Kirk's show Monday.

Trump's defenders on Fox News have also echoed the claim.

"They could have easily negotiated the return of documents like that without guns and warrants. What the FBI is probably doing is planting evidence," Fox News host Jesse Watters said without any evidence. "We also have a hunch they doctored evidence to get the warrant."

Fox & Friends host Ainsley Earhardt suggested that FBI agents may have dumped "backpacks" full of incriminating evidence at Mar-a-Lago.

:{:{}:

"His lawyer said they brought in backpacks, what was in those backpacks?" Earhardt said. "Did they bring those in to fill them up or did they have something in there?"

Agents raided Mar-a-Lago because they believed Trump did not turn over all classified information he had taken to his home, according to The Wall Street Journal. Trump's lawyers had been in discussions with federal officials about the records for months. Trump attorneys in June showed investigators a basement room where boxes of materials were being stored. The Justice Department directed Trump's team to secure the room, prompting them to add a padlock to the door. It's unclear what triggered Monday's raid.

Legal experts pushed back on the claims. Former federal prosecutor Elie Honig called the idea that FBI agents "may" have planted evidence "ridiculous."

"How would anybody even know at this point?" he questioned. "If you're going to fabricate some accusation, at least wait until you might plausibly have a basis for it."

Former federal prosecutor Richard Signorelli condemned Trump's attorneys for pushing the claim.

"These are baseless lies but unfortunately will be believed by deranged, ignorant MAGA cult members," he tweeted.

Defense attorney Ken White noted that forbidding anyone from observing their searches is standard practice.

"Law enforcement does not let anyone, including lawyers, observe what they're doing during searches," he wrote. "They typically remove everyone from the searched area. This has always been the case. This is the latest 'it's an outrage when the typical happens to me.'"

Former federal prosecutor Michael Stern suggested that TrumpWorld is trotting out the claim because the FBI may have found damaging evidence at his home.

"I have written hundreds of search warrants. Lawyers and people whose homes are being search[ed] are routinely not present during the search," he wrote. "That Trump is now talking about 'planted' evidence means he knows there is something damning they found."

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Following the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) search of former President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate, Republican lawmakers are reportedly looking to shift the focus from the relentless Trump-centric news cycle.

According to HuffPost, Republicans are responding to the search on Trump's property by criticizing an unrelated topic: The Internal Revenue Service (IRS). Per the news outlet, Republican lawmakers are "desperate to change the subject to something else ― anything else" and are now focused on "pushing an extremely weird and false talking point: Tens of thousands of tax collectors are coming for you."

On Monday, August 8, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) shared his reaction via Twitter as he pivoted to concerns about the IRS. “The FBI raiding Donald Trump is unprecedented,” he tweeted. “The Biden Admin has fully weaponized DOJ & FBI to target their political enemies. And with 87K new IRS agents, they’re coming for YOU too.”

Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wisc.) also tweeted his complaints about the United States justice system as he shared his disapproval of the IRS. “One more example of our two-tiered system of justice,” tweeted Johnson. “Who do you think they’ll weaponize the 87,000 IRS agents against? The answer is obvious. Their political enemies.”

On Tuesday, Rep. Kat Cammack (R-Fla.) tweeted to criticize Democrats' passing of new legislation to provide funding for more than 80,000 agents.

“Senate Democrats just passed their insane tax-and-spend package, which includes funding for more than 87,000 new IRS agents — more than State, DoD, and CBP combined,” Cammack tweeted. “This nonsense +wild weaponization of the FBI + Democrats’ inflation, crime, border crises = @HouseGOP landslide.”

Rep. Jim Banks (R-Ind.) also warned American citizens about the IRS and Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.) echoed a similar sentiment. "If the FBI can raid the home of a former US President, imagine what 87,000 more IRS agents will do to you,” tweeted Banks.

“The same Democrats cheering on the FBI raiding President Trump’s house are trying to give the IRS 87,000 new agents and an additional $80 billion,” tweeted Boebert. “And we’re supposed to believe they won’t alsoweaponize the IRS?”

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) also expressed frustration as news about the FBI's search continued to circulate online.

“The @FBI raid on President Trump was approved by Director Wray, who also claimed that the illegal FISA warrants used to spy on Trump were constitutional,” said Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), who voted in favor of confirming FBI Director Christopher Wray. “Today’s raid is outrageous and unjust, but predictable.”

“Using government power to persecute political opponents is something we have seen many times from 3rd world Marxist dictatorships. But never before in America,” tweeted Rubio.

Rep. Diana Harshbarger (R-Tenn.) also argued that the FBI's actions were an example of "inconsistent and partisan" action. “The inconsistent and partisan application of the law by the FBI has gone too far,” argued Harshbarger. “The Democrats, for too long, have used our government agencies from the FBI to the IRS to target their political opponents.”

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aha: recall heartland rev engr if AGW is real, req gobal action thus not real

aha2 note that action esp climate /enviro by ANY branch, even the agency in charge of it is being called overreach = tyranny/loss of FFFRrrreeeeeedumb!

london protests 7 22 break glass in emergency so they did

wow omg ingraham? 1100 dead

an 7 22

with thousands dying from extreme global heat in recent days, and as President Joe Biden announced new executive actions to address the climate crisis, right-wing media figures and climate deniers are downplaying the heat wave and the threat from human-caused climate change.

In Europe, extreme “red” heat warnings were issued in the United Kingdom for the first time, and Wales recorded its highest-ever temperature. Railroad lines, major highways, and airport runways in the U.K. buckled under the extreme heat. Multiple regions of Germany also set all-time highs, as did at least part of Denmark. Over 2,000people have died in Spain and Portugal due to the extreme heat, which has fueled wildfires there and in parts of France. These record-setting events are not contained to Europe. Parts of the U.S. and Central Asia are suffering from extreme heat as well.

Even though the extreme heat event in Europe is truly exceptional, and its connections to the climate crisis are unquestionable, multiple right-wing media figures used the extreme heat event to downplay and criticize any possible action to address the climate crisis.

Right-wing media also attacked Biden for considering declaring a climate emergency during this deadly heat wave. Instead Biden unveiled much more modest steps to address climate impacts, such as putting $2.3 billion toward community resilience and infrastructure and bolstering offshore wind development. The Federalist falsely declared that “Biden has no right to declare a ‘national climate emergency,’' though The Washington Post explained that such a move would “tap a variety of long-standing emergency authorities under the National Emergencies Act and other laws.” LifeSiteNews fearmongered thatthe emergency powers would result in “climate lockdowns.” And other right-wing media suggested that there is no crisis at all.

Right-wing media denied the existence of the climate emergency

Fox News host Dan Bongino questioned whether the planet is getting warmer and whether humanity played a role in it, asking: “What kind of a dunce believes that? Come on. Is it [the planet] getting warmer? The answer is maybe. … The question isn’t is it getting warmer; the question is what’s human beings' role in it.” Fox News, *Hannity*, [7/19/22]

Judicial Watch president Tom Fitton wrote on Twitter: “There is obviously no ‘climate emergency'.” Twitter, [7/19/22]

Fox host Tucker Carlson devoted a monologue to undermining the existence of climate change, reducing climate predictions to: “It’s gonna be hot and then it’s gonna rain hard.” “No one really believes in global warming,” he continued, “and that’s why all of the liberals in the United States live on the coasts – because they don’t believe it… The entire theory is absurd and they know it. … The whole thing is a joke.” Fox News, *Tucker Carlson Tonight*, [7/20/22]

On Fox, conservative British political commentator Douglas Murray dismissed the urgency of the climate crisis, saying, “Whenever there is not an absolutely vital recent emergency, we can always fall back on – oh and the climate emergency.” Fox News, *Fox & Friends*, [7/20/22]

Fox anchor Dana Perino asked: “What has changed with the science that would lead a president to need to declare an emergency?” Fox News, *America’s Newsroom*[, 7/20/22]

Fox host Todd Piro said that climate impacts, particularly the ones affecting the most vulnerable communities, did not meet his criteria for an emergency: “While we all love clean air and clean water — I, in fact, use both … this is not an emergency that we need to focus on today. We got a lot of other problems in the world.” Fox News, *Outnumbered*, [7/20/22]

Fox host Sean Hannity responded to new actions by the Biden administration to address climate change by dismissing the role of human influence over global warming saying, “I think these might be acts of nature, and God, and way out of the realm of something that human beings can prevent.” Fox News, *Hannity*, [7/20/22]

Conservatives also downplayed the deadly extreme heat

Climate change denying author Bjorn Lomborg dismissed the dangerous extreme heat event, writing on Twitter: “Standard climate scare.” Twitter, [7/17/22]

Climate denier Steven Milloy on Twitter dismissed a Washington Post article linking the Europe heat wave to climate change, writing: “Hot in some places. Cool in others. Just weather. Not climate.” Twitter, [7/19/22]

Fox & Friends co-host Brian Kilmeade dismissed the dangers extreme heat poses to human health, saying: “Don’t panic. It is summer. If it was December and this was happening, then I would say, this is a little weird. But it's just a little bit hotter than usual.” Fox News, *Fox & Friends*, [7/20/22]

Daily Wire founder Ben Shapiro said on his radio show that the heat wave and wildfires were being reported so fervently because “you always know that it’s the slow season newswise when you start getting weather reports from Europe. … The thing that they will never tell you, the media, is that more people die of cold every year than die of heat every year, but the cold narrative doesn’t tend to play into the climate change narrative that they wish to progmulate.” The Daily Wire, *The Ben Shapiro Show*,[7/19/22]

Fox host Jesse Watters dismissed the extreme heat event as regular seasonal weather, saying: “Joe Biden has seen more seasons than a lot of us. He knows that it gets cold in January and hot in July.” Fox News, *Jesse Watters Primetime*, [7/20/22

Watters followed this up with an interview during which an on-screen graphic read: “Dems worried about weather, not real problems.” Fox News, *Jesse Watters Primetime*, [7/20/22]

Fox host Greg Gutfeld said: “We are in a full-blown heat wave hysteria.” He said that while he does believe “it’s getting warmer,” climate advocates should “think about the opportunity cost of all the zealotry. You know? Panic didn’t work.” Fox News, *The Five*, [7/20/22]

Right-wing media also attacked the Biden administration for considering a climate emergency declaration

Conspiracy theorist Alex Jones claimed on his Infowars show that a climate emergency would be orchestrated by a “scientific global dictatorship whose aim is 90% world depopulation,” and that it would lead to a “dystopia”: “You’re gonna live in a 200-square-foot coffin apartment, you’re gonna be given forced inoculations five, six times a year, you’re gonna be sterilized, you’re gonna be killed.” Infowars, *The Alex Jones Show*,[7/20/22]

The Wall Street Journal editorial board called a possible emergency declaration “a serious abuse of power.” The Wall Street Journal, [7/19/22]

Kilmeade called Biden’s executive orders tone-deaf and “agenda-driven,” insisting that they “will do nothing but hurt the price of oil and gas.” Fox News, *Fox & Friends*,[7/19/22]

Hannity quoted climate denier Joe Bastardi, saying on his radio show that Democrats’ response to climate change is the“systemic dismantling of the American way of life.It’s not a rational response to a climate crisis.” Premiere Radio Networks, *The Sean Hannity Show*, [7/19/22]

Hosts of Fox’s Outnumbered claimed a possible climate emergency declaration from Biden “could cause a global depression,” is “suicide,” and is “going to kill the economy.” Fox News, *Outnumbered*, [7/19/22]

related: Tucker Carlson tells idiotic lie that “no one really believes in global warming”

07/20/22

Fox contributor calls for more coal plants as a solution to extreme heat

07/20/22

National TV networks mention climate change in 32% of segments on global extreme heat

07/19/22

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mma 7 22

Just a week after the Supreme Court effectively gutted the Environmental Protection Agency’s ability to regulate greenhouse gases in the United States, Fox’s leading prime-time hack Tucker Carlson hosted fringe right-wing Dutch commentator Eva Vlaardingerbroek, to spread transparent lies about the Dutch government implementing climate policy designed to reign in emissions of nitrogen oxide and ammonia from the agricultural sector by 2030.

According to Dutch government data, about “70 percent of the country’s surface area exceeds critical limits for nitrogen.” In Europe, nitrogen pollution has caused billions of euros in economic damages and has cascaded through environmental trophic levels, leading to the destruction of drinking water sources, soil health, and biodiversity. In the Netherlands, scientists have also reported decreased plant and species diversity in dunes, bogs, and heathlands.

Despite clear scientific evidence to the contrary, Carlson introduced the July 7 segment by insinuating a longtime right-wing narrative – climate change and its environmental protection policy solutions are nothing more than a sinister ruse by global elitists designed to “whip you into a panic” in order to demand obedience and increase political power. Referencing protests on July 5, during which Dutch police fired on farmers protesting plans to cut nitrogen emissions, Carlson warned his audience the United States could face similar turmoil if “we let them do it.” He later cautioned: “This is what climate activism actually looks like: men in uniform shooting at 16-year-olds.”

Video] citationFrom the July 7, 2022, edition of Fox News' Tucker Carlson Tonight

While Carlson claimed the emissions reductions would have the “effect of destroying agriculture in the Netherlands,” he failed to mention the Dutch government has earmarked billions of euros to help farmers transition through a voluntary program that offers various strategies to increase sustainability in farming, with only the “very last option” involving the “complete ‘buyout’ of the farmers involved.” Instead, Carlson employed a jingoistic red herring criticizing China’s and India’s use of fossil fuels that failed to account for developed countries’ disproportionate roles in climate change.

Carlson then brought on Vlaardingerbroek to baselessly claim that the Dutch government is “stealing our farmers’ land … under the guise of the made-up nitrogen crisis.” This is a clear lie fueled by years of denial of the climate’s impact on future economies. (A 2022 report from the World Economic Forum estimated that climate inaction would cost $178 trillion over the next 50 years.) Vlaardingerbroek then returned to her nativist tendencies to claim the emissions reduction is designed to push farmers off their land to “house new immigrants,” subtly encouraging anti-immigrant sentiments.

The pair then pivoted to a recent favorite narrative of Carlson, suggesting that climate activism and President Joe Biden’s policies around the war in Ukraine are pushing us toward food shortages and a global famine. Carlson further suggested that the resulting American climate policies would increase food prices. Vlaardingerbroek enthusiastically agreed, saying Dutch citizens understand “no farmers, no food.” Yet, Carlson and Vlaardingerbroek ignored scientific evidence that demonstrates the opposite as true: Climate change has already impacted our food and drinking supply. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s 2019 Special Report on Climate Change and Land projects an increase of up to 183 million additional people at risk of hunger due to climate change impacts.

The urgency to implement climate mitigation strategies comes not from power-hungry global elitists craving control, but from climate scientists who have warned for decades that unless immediate action is taken, irreversible environmental consequences will impact every aspect of daily lives -- including American and Dutch.

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mma 6 22

sTEVE DOOCY(CO-HOST): Battle for the American Mind, Uprooting a Century of Miseducation, a brand new book that hits the shelves today. In it, Pete Hegseth and David Goodwin discuss how American education has been destroyed and what we can do to restore it. Here's an excerpt. "Make no mistake about it the historical singularity that was America's founding was a result of classical Christian education. Full stop. Our founders did not stumble their way to brilliance of 1776. They were forged in the foundry of the education of their time." And Pete and David join us live right now. And they've got the number one book in the world. Who's who?

PETE HEGSETH (AUTHOR, FOX AND FRIENDS WEEKEND CO-HOST): Pete. David.

DOOCY: Thank you very much. David, it's very nice to meet you. We were talking to Pete about this yesterday. This is part of a master plan that a lot of people don't have any idea has been going on for decades.

DAVID GOODWIN (AUTHOR): Right.

DOOCY: Regarding education in the country.

GOODWIN: Yes. Well, you know, that's when I was doing the research, some of the research through the original book, which The New Republic in the early part of the 20th century. I thought I would find a lot about labor unions and a lot about minimum wage, a lot about, you know, the things that we know that the progressives were talking about at the time. But education was in every issue. And I was wondering, why.

DOOCY: Right. And Pete who would –who drew up this master plan?

HEGSETH: Well, there were a lot of – there wasn't one master architect, John Dewey's the father of the progressive educational system.

DOOCY: But they were like-minded.

HEGSETH: Very like-minded. Almost all atheists. Almost all socialists. Eventually, almost all Marxists.And they had a plan to capture the minds of our youngest kids. And we're not talking about the lunacy of higher education. This is K through 12. They knew the affections of young people. Elementary school students would shape the way they view America, their faith, for the rest of their life. And so they set it out on a course. They didn't know exactly where it would lead, Steve. All of these architects of progressives, but they knew where it wouldn't lead: Not toward Biblical wisdom, not toward appreciation for our founding documents.And people say to David I all the time, How do I not know this history?

DOOCY: Right.

HEGSETH: 100-year history. You know why? Because the progressives write the history. They write the textbooks.

DOOCY: Right.

HEGSETH: So, David and I had to dig underneath everything that's hidden to find out the real story of how they captured K through 12.

DOOCY: You know, and David, we've known for a long time that America's colleges, for the most part. are way to the left, very progressive. But I don't think a lot of people realized until the last decade or so when they started looking in America'stextbooks,how far to the left aome are trying to drag K through 12.

GOODWIN: Well, they've had the advantage. When you have the college system, you control the instruments of education all the way down to the kindergarten. Right. Because you train the teachers, you train the administrators, you train the curriculum providers. You're the ones doing the accreditation, the college – at the college level. All of that flows right from the, you know, kind of nodes of control that the progressives had.

DOOCY: And, you know Pete, so many parents got a good look at what their kids were doing during COVID-19. Your first chapter is our COVID 1619 moment.

HEGSETH: It's exactly right. You're at home looking at your kid's curriculum through your laptop, and suddenly there's a new founding date on their screen, 1619 or they're talking about gender pronouns for seven or eight-year-olds.[note no eg] So we start with the problem, and the first step to any recovery is understanding the depth of your problem. And we outline that. But the best part of the book, in our opinion is those five chapters at the end that are about the solution. AndDavid runs the Association of Classical Christian Schools.

DOOCY: Right.

HEGSETH: Classical Christian Dot Org. There are hundreds of wonderful brick-and-mortar schools across the country that are the exact opposite of what our government schools provide right now. There are online options, there arehomeschoolcurriculum options. The insurgency to take our classroom back has begun, and that's the preferred form of ideological warfare of the weak against the small. You do not have to default to progressive public schools, because otherwise, you're going to war with an educational complex that has 40 hours a week to capture your kid's mind. And that's why we call it a battle. It really is for parents and grandparents.

---

ORIGIN?: KOCH, FOX, NORQUIST?

https://www.alternet.org/2022/03/koch/

no lnx

Koch keeps doing business in Russia as top journalist says family fortune came from Hitler: report

David Badash and The New Civil Rights Movement March 14, 2022

Award-winning journalist Jane Mayer, who literally wrote the book on the Koch Brothers and Koch Industries, pointed to a report published Monday stating, “Koch Industries continues doing business in Russia.” Despite major U.S. corporations shutting down operations after Putin’s illegal war on Ukraine, major U.S.-based multinational corporations, from Apple to Disney to McDonald’s, have responded by pulling out of Vladimir Putin’s Russia.

Mayer’s 2016 book “Dark Money” focuses on Charles Koch and (the now late) David Koch, the powerful conservative billionaire Koch Brothers.

Monday morning is his widely-read newsletter Popular Information Judd Legum reported Koch Industries doesn’t seem to be joining the American movement to isolate Putin and Russia – even after his forces have slaughtered thousands of innocent civilians in Ukraine.

“Guardian Industries,” writes Legum, “is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Koch Industries, acquired in 2017. Guardian, a manufacturer of industrial glass and other products, is based in Auburn Hills, Michigan but has production facilities around the world.”

Guardian has two glass production plants that operate in Russia. One facility is in Ryazan, Russia, about 120 miles southeast of Moscow. The company added “a new jumbo laminated glass production line” to that facility in August 2021. Another facility is located in Rostov, Russia, near the border with Ukraine. The Rostov plant, which began operations about a decade ago, cost $220 million to build and produces “Guardian’s high-performance, energy-efficient ClimaGuard(R) (residential) and SunGuard(R) (commercial) glass products for construction of homes, offices, retail, health-care and other facilities.” It is capable of producing “900 tons of glass per day.”

Mayer, an investigative journalist who is a staff writer for The New Yorker, also wrote an article about the Koch Brothers, in 2010: “The billionaire brothers who are waging a war against Obama.”

Mayer’s piece suggests the Koch Brothers had funded and fueled the Tea Party almost since its inception.

A Republican campaign consultant who has done research on behalf of Charles and David Koch said of the Tea Party, “The Koch brothers gave the money that founded it. It’s like they put the seeds in the ground. Then the rainstorm comes, and the frogs come out of the mud—and they’re our candidates!”

And it paid off.

:{:{}:

“The anti-government fervor infusing the 2010 elections represents a political triumph for the Kochs. By giving money to ‘educate,’ fund, and organize Tea Party protesters, they have helped turn their private agenda into a mass movement.”

So where did the Koch money originally come from?

Mayer on Monday reminded America:

For those who would like more information, here’s The New York Times on Mayer’s 2016 book:

The father of the billionaires Charles G. and David H. Koch helped construct a major oil refinery in Nazi Germany that was personally approved by Adolf Hitler, according to a new history of the Kochs and other wealthy families.

Mayer’s “book is largely focused on the Koch family, stretching back to its involvement in the far-right John Birch Society and the political and business activities of the father, Fred C. Koch, who found some of his earliest business success overseas in the years leading up to World War II. One venture was a partnership with the American Nazi sympathizer William Rhodes Davis, who, according to Ms. Mayer, hired Mr. Koch to help build the third-largest oil refinery in the Third Reich, a critical industrial cog in Hitler’s war machine.”

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omfg

https://www.mediamatters.org/coronavirus-covid-19/oan-falsely-reports-upwards-25-million-people-have-been-killed-covid-19

pEARSON SHARP (CORRESPONDENT): Our government is trying to kill us. It's not the first time it's happened, and it probably won't be the last. Of course, that's just a conspiracy, though, isn't it? Our government would never do anything to harm us. Just like the CIA didn't spend 20 years secretly conducting hundreds of illegal mind control experiments on American citizens, without their knowledge, under theMK-ULTRA plan.

The CIA used colleges, universities, prisons, and got the help of doctors and hospitals and even pharmaceutical companies to carry out these illegal tests on thousands of patients who didn't know they were being experimented on. Sound familiar? It's all real. Look it up. It happened -- a proven case where our government illegally experimented on us. And you think that was the only time?

We could wonder about what else they're doing, but it's really not much of a mystery. Just look at the experimental vaccines they forced on hundreds of millions of unwitting Americans. The forced vaccination program has been the largest human experiment in the history of the world, and so far the consequences have been appalling.

Conservative estimates from the VAERS programs show upwards of 2.5 million people have been killed by the vaccines, and that's just here in America. Another 100 million have suffered injuries ranging from persistent headaches, to paralysis, to amputation of all four limbs. In fact, there are so many injuries that the federal programs set up to help treat patients who suffered from injuries are totally overwhelmed. Even Politico, of all places, admitted programs like the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program doesn't have enough staff to handle the thousands of people flooding through their doors, all of them suffering from injuries after getting the experimental injections. These numbers are way up from previous years.

…

At this point, it's more of a conspiracy to believe the vaccines work than to believe they're causing us harm. But that's just what the government wants you to think, and they're doing their level best to cover up any evidence that exposes how dangerous these injections really are. It turns out the CDC has been quietly going through and deleting official records on the U.S. government's VAERS website, which is used by health professionals, doctors, and insurance companies to track injuries and deaths from vaccines. According to data analysts, the Center for Disease Control has been erasing reports of deaths or injuries caused by the COVID vaccines and has already deleted about 10,000 reports so far.

This isn't the first time this has happened, either, with reports that the CDC went through and deleted up to 6,000 deaths from the database last year, but only for reports on the COVID vaccines. It's already been confirmed that both the FDA and Pfizer knew before the vaccines were released that they were dangerous and ineffective, and yet they decided to release them anyway. Now we're seeing the gruesome consequences of that decision.

No one can guess how many more innocent lives will be lost because of these toxic injections. But as we said in the beginning, this isn't the first time our government has illegally experimented on us. And although we don't know what their true purpose is, we do know one thing. Our government doesn't care how many of us it has to kill to achieve its goals.

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https://www.nationalreview.com/2016/05/climate-change-attorneys-general/

no lnx

POLITICS & POLICY

The Climate-Change Gang

By SCOTT PRUITT

& LUTHER STRANGE

May 17, 2016

The Obama administration lawlessly rewards its supporters and punishes its enemies.

The United States was born out of a revolution against, in the words of the Declaration of Independence, an “arbitrary government” that put men on trial “for pretended offences”and “abolish[ed] the Free System of English laws.” Brave men and women stood up to that oppressive government, and this, the greatest democracy of them all, one that is governed by the rule of law and not by men, is the product.

Some of our states have forgotten this founding principle and are acting less like Jefferson and Adams and more like George III. A group of Democratic attorneys general has announced it intends to criminally investigate oil and gas companies that have disputed the science behind man-made global warming. Backed bygreen-energy interests and environmentalist lobbying groups, the coalition has promised to use intrusive investigations, costly litigation, and criminal prosecutions to silence critics of its climate-change agenda. Pretended offenses, indeed.

We won’t be joining this coalition, and we hope that those attorneys general who have joined will disavow it. Healthy debate is the lifeblood of American democracy, and global warming has inspired one of the major policy debates of our time. That debate is far from settled. Scientists continue to disagree about the degree and extent of global warming and its connection to the actions of mankind. That debate should be encouraged — in classrooms, public forums, and the halls of Congress.It should not be silenced with threats of prosecution. Dissent is not a crime.

RELATED: Obama’s Latest Executive Action: Spend Hundreds of Billions to Not Help the Environment]

Sadly, this isn’t the first time we’ve seen this tactic of advancing the climate-change agenda by any means necessary. President Obama’s Clean Power Plan is a particularly noteworthy example. This EPA regulation, one of the most ambitious ever proposed, will shutter coal-fired power plants, significantly increase the price of electricity for American consumers, and enact by executive fiat the very same cap-and-trade system for carbon emissions that Congress has rejected.

The Clean Power Plan was promulgated without any consultation with Congress.No bills were debated, no votes were taken, and the representatives of the American people had no opportunity to object or offer their own suggestions. The checks and balances built into our system of government were simply ignored as inconvenient impediments to the president’s agenda.

The Clean Power Plan was promulgated without any consultation with Congress. No bills were debated, no votes were taken.

But in our states, we believe in and govern with respect for the rule of law, rather than by ambition to use the power of our governments to stifle political opponents. That is why we are part of a very different kind of coalition, a coalition of 29 states seeking to vindicate the rule of law by challenging the legality of the Clean Power Plan in our courts. The 29 states and state attorneys general who are part of this effort respect our proper role, which is neither to pick winners and losers in the energy sectornor to silence those with whom we disagree. Rather, our job is to hold the EPA accountableto the laws that created it and to fulfill our statutory duties to ensure that consumers in our states have access to reliable, affordable energy. We will continue to pursue those goals and to present our arguments in the courts and in the public square, treating our opponents with the respect they deserve.

RELATED: Obama’s ‘Clean Power Plan’ Punishes Workers, Consumers, and States That Voted for Romney]

It’s unfortunate that this respect is not always returned. In their press conference, the group of state attorneys general called themselves an “unprecedented coalition.” On this point, they are correct. Rarely in our nation’s history has the police power of the state been so eagerly used to intimidate citizens [corporations?] into silence.

But even more troubling are internal e-mails and other documents that indicate that this coercion was orchestrated not by the attorneys general themselves, but by green-energy advocacy groups using these officials as puppets to further their extreme agendas. This should frighten us all. Outside groups should not be able to use the power of the government as a sword to go after their political opponents.

We do not doubt the sincerity of the beliefs of our fellow attorneys general about climate change and the role human activity plays in it. [why/how could you? thy can and shd doubt yours?] But we call upon them to press those beliefs through debate [like in a courtroom?], not through governmental intimidation of those who disagree with them. Few things could be more un-American.

— Scott Pruitt is the attorney general of Oklahoma. Luther Strange is the attorney general of Alabama.

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aha not an accident it's women's rights roe v wade and griswold AND brown v bd for AA POC that are under attack by trump gubmint authoritarian xian nat'list STATES RIGHTS BS

AN 2 22

A debate between the Republicans running for Michigan attorney general confirmed warnings from reproductive rights advocates that Republicans aren’t going to stop with abortion bans—they’re coming for birth control next. In the last question of last Friday’s debate, all three men said they thought the 1965 Supreme Court decision striking down laws banning the sale of contraception had been wrongly decided, because states’ rights.

At least two of the three candidates did not know what Griswold v. Connecticut was about—which itself is kind of an issue in people campaigning to be Michigan’s top lawyer, since Griswold is a pretty damn famous case. (I literally learned about it in high school, and I am not a lawyer.) But all three agreed, once they learned what it was, that it was bad.

The Connecticut law struck down in Griswold allowed the prosecution of married couples for buying contraception. In Griswold, the Supreme Court said that the law violated the “right to marital privacy,” foreshadowing the privacy right that would be invoked in Roe v. Wade in 1973.

Here’s what the Michigan Republicans seeking to be the state’s top law enforcement officer had to say about the marital right to privacy around birth control decisions.

“Remind me,” Tom Leonard, the former speaker of the state House, said. After an explanation, he was ready to condemn the decision.

“Yeah, okay, I just, and I wanted clarification,” Leonard said. “This case, much like Roe v. Wade, I believe was wrongly decided, because it was an issue that trampled states’ rights and it was an issue that should have been left up to the states.”

State Rep. Ryan Berman literally pulled out his phone during that exchange.

”Yeah, you know what, I wasn’t familiar with Griswold v. Connecticut,but I’m an advanced legal researcher so I pulled it up real quick to look what it’s about,”he said. “And it says the court ruled that the Constitution did in fact protect the right of marital privacy against state restrictions on contraception. Again, I would have to look more into it and the reasoning behind it, but I’m all about states’ rights andlimiting federal judicial activism.”

Matthew DePerno, endorsed by Donald Trump for enthusiastically signing on to the Big Lie about the 2020 elections, had the same basic answer, minus the admission that he didn’t know what he was talking about.

”Listen, all these cases that deal—Griswold, Roe v. Wade, Dobbs— these are all state right issues.I think that’s what we’re gonna see with the US Supreme Court. They’re gonna come down on the side that these liberty issues—number one, the wide expanse that was given on Roe v. Wade and this litany—are unworkable. The Supreme Court has to deal with that, has to decide, mark my words, that the privacy issue currently is unworkable. It’s going to be a state right issue on all of these things—as it should be!”

DePerno wasn’t done. “We need to start defending state rights as attorney generals, across this country,” he said. “Too many people, even in our own party, too many people have lost the idea of what states’ rights means. They haven’t read the works of our Founding Fathers. They haven’t read The Federalist Papers. They continue to push the idea that we need to give rights away to the federal government. We don’t. We need to take state rights back. We need to stand in our borders. When the feds come and try to take our rights, we need to stand as citizens in Michigan and hold the line and protect states’ rights.”

So, yes. Republicans are 100% coming for the right to obtain birth control once the Trump Supreme Court strikes down Roe v. Wade, with that decision likely coming this June. Already some states are advancing personhood legislation, which would declare an embryo or fetus to be a legal person. Such laws criminalize abortion, but they also potentially ban forms of birth control like the pill, IUDs, and emergency contraception.

”All 3 Republicans running for Michigan Attorney General just stated that they oppose the ruling in Griswold v Connecticut which outlawed prosecuting married couples for using contraception,”Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel tweeted Friday evening. “You read that right. Terrifying.”

Lots of people who support abortion rights spent years responding lackadaisically to warnings that Republicans were stacking the Supreme Court to overturn Roe v. Wade and legalize abortion bans. Now we see how true those warnings were, as they come to fruition. It’s time to sit up and listen to the warnings that Republicans won’t stop there.

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222

Nasty, brutish and short” is the phrase that British philosopher Thomas Hobbes, in his 1658 book “Leviathan,” famously used to describe the lives of England’s working class. Hobbes, born in 1588, lived a long life and was 91 when he died in 1679, but many working-class Brits of Hobbes’ time didn’t make it to 50.

Centuries later, liberal economist and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman uses Hobbes’ “nasty, brutish and short” concept in his January 31 column — arguing that in 2022, Republican policies are designed to make American lives exactly that: nasty, brutish and short.

“As Thomas Hobbes could have told you, human beings can only flourish, can only avoid a state of nature in which lives are ‘nasty, brutish and short,’ if they participate in a ‘commonwealth’ — a society in which government takes on much of the responsibility for making life secure,” the 68-year-old Krugman explains. “Thus, we have law enforcement precisely so individuals don’t have to go around armed to protect themselves against other people’s violence.”

Krugman continues, “Public health policy, if you think about it, reflects the same principle. Individuals can and should take responsibility for their own health when they can, but the nature of infectious disease means that there is an essential role for collective action, whether it is public investment in clean water supplies or, yes, mask and vaccine mandates during a pandemic. And you don’t have to be a socialist to recognize the need for regulation to maintain the reliability of essential aspects of the economy like electricity supply and the monetary system." [twt]

the liberal economist/columnist lays out a variety of Republican policies that can make the lives of Americans “nasty, brutish and short” — from COVID-19 policies and anti-vaxxer insanity to a failure to support and maintain infrastructure.Krugman specifically mentions Texas Gov. Greg Abbott and Texas Republicans’ failure to properly “winterize” the Lone Star State’s “gas and electricity facilities” and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ efforts to “block just about every measure intended to limit the spread of the coronavirus.”

DeSantis “and his officials,” according to Krugman, “have stopped just short of being explicitly anti-vaccine, but they have catered to the anti-vax fringe.”

“I’m calling the modern American right antisocial — because its members reject any policy that relies on social cooperation, and they want us to return instead to Hobbes’ dystopian state of nature,” Krugman says of the Trumpified GOP of 2022. “We won’t try to keep guns out of the hands of potential mass murderers; instead, we’ll rely on teacher-vigilantes to gun them down once the shooting has already started. We won’t try to limit the spread of infectious diseases; instead, we’ll tell people to take drugs that are expensive, ineffective or both after they’ve already gotten sick.”

Krugman wraps up his column by stressing that the Republicans of 2022 fail to realize that government has its place.

“Government exists for a reason,” the economist/Times columnist writes. “But the right’s constant attacks on essential government functions will take a toll, making all of our lives nastier, more brutish and shorter.”

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aha? rooted i RR road to serfdom BS death panels

an 1 22

Watch: Tucker Carlson compares COVID-19 vaccine mandates to Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan experiments

Meaghan Ellis January 22, 2022

Fox News' Tucker Carlson recently compared COVID vaccine mandates to medical experiments that were conducted during the times of Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan.

The conservative primetime host made the controversial remarks on Friday, January 21 during his discussion with Dr. Robert Malone, an anti-vaccination virologist and immunologist known for spreading misinformation about the COVID-19 vaccine. Their discussion came just hours after a Texas federal judge struck down President Joe Biden's vaccine mandate.

While discussing the ruling, Carlson criticized the president's vaccine mandate and compared it to the Nazi experiments that were performed on captives held in concentration camps in Germany and the human procedures that were conducted during the period of Imperial Japan.

“After watching what the imperial Japanese army and the Nazis did in their medical experiments, I thought that American physicians agreed that compulsory medical care was unethical, it was immoral, and it could never be imposed on anyone. When did we forget that?”

Malone responded in agreement with Carlson saying, “Apparently, about a year ago was when we must have forgotten that… Thank you for bringing up the Nuremberg Trials, Tucker.”

Carlson's latest remarks align with a history of similar remarks made by Fox News hosts. Back in November, Fox Nation hostLara Logan compared the nation's top infectious disease expert, Dr. Anthony Fauci, to Josef Mengele, the Nazi “Angel of Death” who used human beings in Auschwitz for grotesque experiments. Shortly after Logan made the remarks, the network decided to sever ties with her.

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b/c the gubmint tyrant, we are all victims who shd resist by any means:

https://www.alternet.org/2021/12/conservative/

no lnx

The conservative urge to be a victim: Here’s why right-wing victimhood is spreading so fast

Sophia A. McClennen and SalonDecember 27, 2021

In late November a new variant of COVID-19 was detected by researchers in Botswana and South Africa. Within days, the omicron variant had reached California, marking the first documented case in the United States. By the end of December, omicron had not only become the dominant strain in the U.S, but it had also rapidly spread to push daily case counts well above the recent delta surge.

One of the greatest risks of omicron is the high degree of breakthrough infections, where vaccinated individuals still contract the virus. While the vaccinated, especially those who are boosted, tend to have much milder symptoms, if any at all, they still have the capacity to spread the virus. In only a few weeks, omicron has ripped through the country, stressing hospital capacity, canceling flights, disrupting holiday gatherings, and, most importantly, threatening lives. According to Johns Hopkins University data, between Dec. 1 and Christmas, over 39,000 Americans died of the virus

By all accounts, the principal reason why omicron is causing such havoc in the United States is our low rate of vaccination. The United States, at slightly over 61 percent full vaccination, is among the lowest of the developed world. Cuba has over 84 percent fully vaccinated. Even Brazil, under anti-vaxxer President Jair Bolsonaro has almost 67 percent fully vaccinated. Bolsonaro, like Trump, has been skeptical of the threats of COVID from the start. Yet, he took Trumpian irrationality to a whole new level, claiming a year ago that the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine "could turn people into crocodiles or bearded ladies" — and even his country is more vaccinated than the United States.

While there remains much to be learned about omicron and its consequences to public health, one thing is clear: The only reason why the nation is at such extreme public health risk is because the GOP weaponized the pandemic for political gain, convincing their supporters to distrust science and resist any policy, no matter how reasonable, if it came from a Democrat.

We've spent time analyzing the head-scratching right-wing ploy of sowing distrust in vaccines within the GOP constituency, a move which has literally killed off supporters and occasionally GOP leaders and pundits as well. But what we haven't done is recognize that the right-wing response to the pandemic is part of a larger political practice: Victimized Bully Syndrome.

Some of you will be familiar with DARVO, an acronym for deny, attack and reverse victim and offender. DARVO describes the behavior of psychological abusers when they are being held accountable for their behavior.Donald Trump and his supporters clearly exhibit DARVO habits. Rather than accept blame for anything they do, they turn around and accuse those blaming them of creating the problem. Victimized Bully Syndrome (VBS), as I'm describing it, though, is slightly different from DARVO. With DARVO the abusive behavior comes first and DARVO only emerges if the attacker is asked to take responsibility. But with VBS the cries of being victims come first and are used to justify the underlying bullying behaviors. The bully under VBS is always already acting in self-defense.

Take this example: In a recent interview with Fox News, Dr. Mehmet Oz, candidate for Senate in Pennsylvania suggested that Americans had been victimized by President Biden's "one-size-fits-all" COVID-19 "rules that limit our freedom." According to Oz, U.S. citizens "want government to get out of their way to stop scaring them into submission."

If we set aside the sheer stupidity of a doctor suggesting that we need "as many different approaches as possible" to the pandemic, the critical takeaway is Oz's claim that Biden's policy is designed to victimize the public by scaring them, taking away their freedoms, and destroying their dignity. According to this logic, refusing to wear a mask, get vaccinated, or support public health policy is a valid defense, rather than bullying behavior that puts everyone in peril.

And lest there be any doubt, the right isn't just refusing to be vaccinated and to follow public health guidelines; in the face of the pandemic they have chosen to respond with aggressive bullying: engaging in violent confrontations over masking policies, attacking teachers, threatening school board members, violently trolling scientists who speak to the media about COVID, and more. In fact, the violent far-right has exploded in the United States along with COVID-19.

Similar to the "sore winner syndrome" we saw emerge in the wake of former President Trump's election, VBS posits that those on the right are all the time being victimized by their government and that it makes perfect sense to respond aggressively.

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It is this exact same logic that was the backdrop to the January 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol and we can see the same logic in play in right-wing responses to the House investigation into the attack. Trump spokesperson Taylor Budowich claimed, "Democracy is under attack. However, not by the people who illegally entered the Capitol on January 6th, 2021, but instead by a committee whose members walk freely in its halls every day." That's right, according to Budowich the real threat to our democracy are those elected officials investigating what happened on January 6, not the actual people who attacked the Capitol. Those people were, according to this twisted logic, simply victims of election fraud.

It gets worse.

The victim card was at the heart of the Kyle Rittenhouse case as well. Rittenhouse claimed he shot three men, two fatally, with an AR-15-style semi-automatic rifle in self-defense. In his testimony, Rittenhouse stated the only reason he even went to Kenosha, Wisconsin on the night of the shootings was to provide first aid to people in need. Rittenhouse, then, was no average vigilante. Instead, he was an already victimized one, prepared to claim self-defense if he attacked anyone. In a post-verdict statement issued by the victims' parents, they nail the dangers of Rittenhouse's VBS. The verdict, according to them, "sends the unacceptable message that armed civilians can show up in any town, incite violence, and then use the danger they have created to justify shooting people in the street.

VBS, then, isn't only being used by the right to foster a public health catastrophe, it is literally being used to justify armed murder and armed insurrection. As long as we allow the right to continue to describe themselves as victims who have been harmed, injured, threatened and therefore need to act aggressively in self-defense, the closer we get to civil war. In fact, a recent Public Religion Research Institute poll showed that 30 percent of Republicans believe that "true American patriots" might need to resort to violence in order to save the country. Nearly 40% still think the election was stolen.

So as long as the victimized bully syndrome pandemic is transmitted across the right-wing community, it will continue to surpass any threats to our nation from any new variants to the COVID-19 pandemic. Until we address the real threats to our nation, we not only won't stop COVID-19; we will allow the true risks to our health and the health of our democracy to continue to spread.

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1 22 mma

https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/msnbc-angelo-carusone-describes-how-fox-news-picking-crazy-things-fever-swamps-and-pushing

ALICIA MENDEZ (HOST): Time, again, to raise the alarm about the danger of selling lies as journalism. We know the 1/6 committee has revealed texts from Fox News hosts sent to members of the Trump administration as the riot unfolded. But now Fox is apparently so powerful that it now has a sitting senator backtracking, and apologizing for calling the Capitol a terrorist attack. Joining us now to discuss, the president of Media Matters, Angelo Carusone. Angelo, thank you so much for being with us. Listen, this is your bread and butter. This is what you do day in, day out. So when I saw this, I needed to know what you thought about why this unfolded the way it did, what it tells us about Fox News, and what it tells us about the state of the Republican Party.

ANGELO CARUSONE (PRESIDENT OF MEDIA MATTERS FOR AMERICA): Well, there's a lot there. And I would just say there's one thing that's really important here, it's that one of Ted Cruz's penances wasn't just that he had to backtrack. During that same segment, he also endorsed and started to carry water for Tucker Carlson and Fox News’ conspiracy theory that the attack on January 6 was actually a FBI-orchestrated false flag operation. That happened in that exact interview as well, and that was Ted Cruz's way of trying to demonstrate that – to get Tucker and the audience to believe them.

And the reason I start with that example is because it illustrates a few things: One, that it is really here that Fox is really at the nexus of power. Because they weren’t just able to get him to apologize and to backtrack, but actually to start carrying water for Fox News' narrative. And that's where the power really comes from. And if I would describe it, I would say it's unrivaled agenda-setting power at this point. And that was always their purpose. Remember, they were born – I think the way you described it at the beginning was spot-on. They’re not a news operation, they were born as a political operation. That was the entire theory behind Fox News. Sure, they make a bunch of money on the side, but that isn't the goal. The goal really is political power, and the Ted Cruz thing is just an example of it.

MENDEZ: The reason I was so struck by this, and you know, is we always come back to this question of who is a trusted messenger, who could actually be the person to say the election was fair and true and we have to believe this vote count and we have to move on, and what happened on January 6 was an attack on American democracy and here's the path forward. When you see someone who attempts to do that even for a fleeting second, then taken down so quickly, it diminishes hope that there is even a possibility that there can be that messenger. Because the other side is clearly so powerful.

CARUSONE: Yes, it does. It actually does diminish that hope, because we actually need Fox's – I mean, just imagine COVID and the way that the country responded to a public health crisis, not a political question, but a public health crisis, if Fox News didn't begin by calling COVID a hoax. Then promotes – for two months promoting a fantasy treatment of hydroxychloroquine, and then the remaining summer downplaying the threat of the virus, and then now, of course, their antagonism toward vaccinations. It would be a different response, right? I mean, and that just illustrates to your point how depressing it can be sometimes. And that doesn't mean we're stuck with it. I think part of it is, and I think broadly themedia and the public has been slow to react, because, you know, we value free speech and they exploit that. They exploit one of the American values, is that we care about freedom of expression and free ideas. They exploit that, and that means they exploit that to get away with accountability.

And so many have said, well, they get to have their opinions, they get to have their take, but what the result of that is, is that we ignore their destructive influence. And then as a result of that, then the accountability and consequences needed to diminish and dilute what that destructive potential really is. I mean, they have hosted people who don’t – members of Congress that don’t support Joe Biden as president more than 947 times. Ted Cruz is an anomaly on Fox News, not the norm, when it comes to who they host and who they promote. And if you think about that in the context of his political aspirations -- and he's not the only one, he can't run for president if Fox News ices him out. It's a dealbreaker, forget about it. There's no chance.And that then portends the future and it gets to, I think, an important part of this discussion, which is that we're going to have to recognize the threat and then start to take more serious concerted efforts to hold them accountable and force some change.

MENDEZ: Angelo, I only have about 30 seconds left, but I want to loop back to something you said in that first answer, which is that what struck you wasn't just the fact that Ted Cruz came on and apologized, but then he was forced to carry water for this conspiracy theory. What does it tell you that a year out, they are feeling the need to complicate and heighten the lies that they have already put out there?

CARUSONE: Yeah. This is exactly how they're going to retain their power. And it says a lot about what this means for the future. Because I said they were unrivaled. And the reason they are unrivaled is because Limbaugh is not around anymore and the rest of the right-wing media is really fragmented. The way that Fox has responded is by picking up crazy things from the fever swamps, things that wouldn't have made Fox News five years ago, and now they're actively now promoting them on the channel. The FBI false flag thing is one of these examples. And so what does that mean? More stuff coming from what otherwise would have been the fringes that never would have seen the light of day. And so the fact that they're going to turn people like Ted Cruz into validators and messengers for it is quite bad.

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21 21 an 1/6 was practice

Barton Gellman, a staff writer for The Atlantic, has an excellent track record when it comes to predicting the ways in which former President Donald Trump and his allies would assault U.S. democracy. Before the United States’ 2020 presidential election, Gellman predicted that Trump would attempt a coup d’état if he lost to now-President Joe Biden —which is exactly what happened. And Gellman is now warning that Trumpistas will be better equipped to pull off a coup in the 2024 election; the journalist discussed that warning during a December 7 appearance on Rachel Maddow’s MSNBC show.

Maddow and Gellman’s appearance on Maddow’s show followed the December 6 publication of an article headlined “Trump’s Next Coup Has Already Begun” on The Atlantic’s website. That article is also available as a cover story in the January/February 2022 issue of The Atlantic’s print edition.

Describing Gellman’s reporting as “terrifying,” Maddow asked Gellman to discuss the possibility of Republicans “throwing out thousands, if not millions, of votes in the 2024 election.”

Gellman told Maddow, “I think it’s very real. I’m personally, just as a citizen, very worried about it. I think you have people who are bound and determined not to allow Republicans to lose another national election — and not to allow Trump to lose another election. And they are giving themselves permission to do it.”

The journalist went on to say, “They are characterizing the Democrats as tyrants, as thieves of an election who actually stole the presidency, as communists, as people whohate America— and they couldn’t discuss it with any more extremity than they’re doing. When you do that, you give yourself permission to take all kinds of steps in opposition. I mean, if you have an existential threat to the United States of America — which is what Republicans are saying about Biden — then what remedy would not be allowed to you?”

Maddow asked Gellman why the “openness to violence” among “Trump supporters” has been “growing worse,” and he responded, “I think there’s a strong ongoing message that is amplified thousands of times by the whole ecosystem on the right that is a propaganda ecosystem, and it is telling people that someone stole the election from them — that the Democrats are destroying the country, that more and more so-called evidence proves these things. And yeah, I think there’s this very large mass of Trump supporters who believe both that Biden is an illegitimate president who stole the office, and that violence is justified.”

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an 12 21

aha bek says koch network ~ vax to fwd goal of gubmint?! netflixunnat selection libtard rhet fuels all?!

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11 21 an

at Fox News, far-right opinion host Tucker Carlson has not only been a supporter of Hungarian strongman Viktor Orbán and promoted the racist, anti-Semitic Great Replacement theory — he has also been an apologist for the insurrectionists who violently assaulted the U.S. Capitol Building on January 6 in the hope of stopping Congress from certifying now-President Joe Biden's Electoral College victory over then-President Donald Trump. And Carlson's coverage of January 6 is so beyond the pale that two conservative journalists, according to National Public Radio, have left Fox News because of it.

Those conservatives, NPR's David Folkenflik reports, are Jonah Goldberg and Stephen Hayes. Goldberg is known his years as a National Review editor.And Hayes was with the now-defunct Weekly Standard, whose Bill Kristol started The Bulwark with fellow Never Trump conservative Charlie Sykes following the Standard's demise.

"Two long-time conservative Fox News commentators have resigned in protest of what they call a pattern of incendiary and fabricated claims by the network's opinion hosts in support of former President Donald Trump. In separate interviews with NPR, Stephen Hayes and Jonah Goldberg pointed to a breaking point earlier this month: network star Tucker Carlson's three-part series on the January 6 siege of the U.S. Capitol that relied on fabrications andconspiracy theories to exonerate the Trump supporters who participated in the attack."

Goldberg and Hayes, Folkenflik notes, became "mainstays" of Bret Baier's "Special Report" when Fox News hired them in 2009. And together, Goldberg and Hayes started the conservative website The Dispatch.

Goldberg, interviewed by NPR, said of "Patriot Purge," Carlson's three-part series, "It's basically saying that the Biden regime is coming after half the country, and this is the War on Terror 2.0. It traffics in all manner of innuendo and conspiracy theories that I think legitimately could lead to violence. That, for me and for Steve, was the last straw."

Speaking to NPR, Hayes was vehemently critical of Fox News for airing promotional videos for Carlson's "Patriot Purge" series.

"I thought it was irresponsible to put that out into the public airwaves," Hayes told NPR. "The trailer (for the series) basically gave people the impression that the U.S. government was coming after all patriots — half of the country, in the word of one of the protagonists in the piece. And that the federal government was going to be using the tools and tactics that it used to go after Al-Qaida. And that's not happening. That's not true."

Hayes continued, "It's a narrative that's contradicted by certainly the vast collection of legal documents charging those who participated in January 6, the broad reporting by a wide variety of news outlets on what happened on January 6 then and in the time since — andcontradicted in part by Fox News' own news site and the reporting that people on the news side have done."

READ:Trump lawyer who tried to overturn the 2020 election gets named to US Election Assistance Commission cleta

Goldberg also told NPR,"Being a Fox contributor is kind of a brass ring in conservative and right-wing circles, and I was well-compensated. I'm not looking to be a martyr or ask for pity or any of that kind of stuff. But it's a significant financial hit, for sure.And it's also cutting yourself off from a very large audience. We don't regret the decision, but we found it regrettable that we had to make the decision."

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aha yikes vaxx and big lie twin pillars of 2nd civil war:

an ah 1021

Bannon, former White House chief strategist under President Donald Trump and one of the most prominent agitators in the MAGA movement, is still refusing to testify before House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's select committee on the January 6 insurrection. He claims through his attorneys that he cannot do so because Trump still enjoyed executive privilege during his final weeks in office. But in an article published by the conservative website The Bulwark this week, historians Thomas Lecaque and J.L. Tomlins stress that even without testimony, there will be plentiful evidence of Bannon's anti-democracy agenda**.

Lecaque is a history professor at Grand View University in Des Moines, Iowa, while Tomlins teaches history at the University of North Texas. And the historians explain why Pelosi's select committee is so interested in talking to Bannon: the Trump ally "was involved in the 'Stop the Steal' efforts during the post-election period," and "remarks on his podcasts on January 5 suggest possible foreknowledge of the next day's disruptions."

On his January 5 podcast, Bannon told listeners, "You made this happen, and tomorrow, it's game day. So, strap in. Let's get ready. All hell is going to break loose tomorrow. It's all converging, and now, we're on the point of attack tomorrow."

Bannon, the historians note, was heavily involved in the Trump campaign's attempted coup and efforts to overturn the 2020 election results.

"Bannon's troubling activities did not stop after January 6," Lecaque and Tomlins write. "Far from it. He is still out in the streets, at rallies, on conference calls, and on his podcast trumpeting it to the heavens: The insurrection isn't over, it's only just begun."

The historians note that Bannon calls himself a "Leninist." That doesn't mean that he actually embraces communist or Marxist-Leninist beliefs; Bannon is on the far right, not the far left. Rather, when Bannon calls himself a "Leninist," that's his rhetorical way of saying that he wants to totally obliterate the old GOP establishment and purge the GOP of all non-MAGA conservatives. Soviet Union dictator Vladimir Lenin famously believed that it's necessary to destroy in order to build and create; similarly, Bannon wants to burn the remnants of the old pre-MAGA Republican Party to the ground.

"On his podcast, in his speeches, and in his interviews, Steve Bannon combines anti-democratic claims: the election was stolen, the insurrection was peaceful, we will build a centennial dynasty that cannot be shaken," Lecaque and Tomlins explain. "This fascistic message is not new: Bannon has had a clear mission for years, both before, during and after his time working with Trump. His vision is ultra-nationalist, deeply racist and aggressively linked to far-right Christian ideologies."

The historians continue, "Bannon has called himself a Leninist, specifically in his desire to destroy the state, and we should take him at his word. He was apparently one of the architects of the January 6 coup attempt, and he remains a continuing threat to our democracy. If the 2020 election and the January 6 insurrection are becoming the 'new lost cause' of the GOP, Bannon wants to organize its new fascist apparatus."

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omg npi

https://www.alternet.org/2021/10/extremist-christians/

paul r salon

progressive policies and positions are supposed to be rooted in reality and hard evidence. But that's not always the case when it comes to the culture wars that have such an enormous impact on our politics — especially not since the unexpected evangelical embrace of Donald Trump in 2016, culminating in the "pro-life" death cult of anti-vaccine, COVID-denying religious leaders. If this development perplexed many on the left, it was less surprising to a small group of researchers who have been studying the hardcore anti-democratic theology known as dominionism that lies behind the contemporary Christian right, and its far-reaching influence over the last several decades.

One leading figure within that small group, Rachel Tabachnick, was featured in a recent webinar hosted by the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice (archived on YouTube here /maxresdefault.jpg)), as part of its Religion and Repro Learning Series program, overseen by the Rev. Dr. Cari Jackson. Tabachnick's writing on dominionism can be found at Talk2Action and Political Research Associates, and she's been interviewed by Terry Gross on Fresh Air.

Her presentation sheds important light on at least three things: First of all, the vigilante element of the Texas anti-abortion law SB 8. Second, the largerpattern of disrupting or undermining governance, including the "constitutional sheriffs" movement, the installation of overtly partisan election officials and the red-state revolt against national COVID public health policies. While Donald Trump has exploited that pattern ruthlessly, he did not create it. And third, the seemingly baffling fact that an anti-democratic minority feels entitled to accuse its opponents — including democratically elected officials — of "tyranny."

Some dominionist ideas — such as the biblical penalty of death by stoning — are so extreme they can easily be dismissed as fringe, others have been foundational to the modern religious right, and still more have become increasingly influential in recent years. Those latter two categories are what we need to understand most, say both Tabachnick and Jackson.

"One of the things that struck me, as a relative newcomer," said Jackson, a former Congregationalist minister, "was that there was not sufficient understanding about the theological frames used by many individuals who are opposed to abortion." She continued, "I'm a strategist in a lot of ways, and one important strategy, I believe, must be to understand what the teachings and the theological frames are" on the other side. Which links directly to the question of what progressive activists need to do differently in this changed environment.

This failure to understand the nature of dominionism has hampered activists, not just in the realm of reproductive justice, but across an entire spectrum of political issues, both cultural and economic.Jackson discussed her own background, raised within a conservative Christian worldview.

"I was taught a very individualistic approach," she said, "taught that we shouldn't pay taxes, because doing so enabled people who were not working, and enables people whose lifestyle we don't agree with." There's nothing new about such views, but dominionism provides believers with an even stronger foundation for them.

Jackson describes her current understanding of religious faith as highly intersectional: "We believe that to understand the attacks on abortion also invites us — or even requires us — to look at attacks on voting, to look at attacks on immigrants, attacks on prison reform, attacks on equal pay and on and on," she said. "It's all of the same cloth: They are all attacks on humans flourishing. That's my language. The God of my understanding wants all of us to flourish in who we are."

the language of dominionism is strikingly different, to put it mildly. In her webinar, Tabachnick played a clip of one of the movement's leading figures, C. Peter Wagner, providing a definition:

Dominion has to do with control. Dominion has to do with rulership. Dominion has to do with authority and subduing. And it relates to society — in other words what is talked about, what the values are in heaven [that] need to be made manifest here on earth. Dominion means being the head and not the tail. Dominion means ruling as kings. It says in Revelation chapter 1:6 that "he has made us kings and priests," and check the rest of that verse, it says "for dominion." So we are kings for dominion.

Later she provided a definition from Frederick Clarkson, author of the 1997 book, "Eternal Hostility: The Struggle Between Theocracy and Democracy":

Dominionism is the theocratic idea that regardless of theological view, means, or timetable, Christians are called by God to exercise dominion over every aspect of society by taking control of political and cultural institutions.

Wagner, who died in 2016, is known as the founding father of the New Apostolic Reformation (NAR), one of the two main branches of dominionism, which grew out of the Pentecostal and charismatic traditions within evangelical Christianity. Dominionists in the other branch, known as "Christian reconstructionism," come out of conservative Calvinism, with a focus on bringing government and society under biblical law. They tend to be more circumspect, often obfuscating their true intentions and avoiding the word "theocracy" in favor of "theonomy," for example. But not Wagner, as can be seen in the title of his 2011 book, "Dominion!: Your Role in Bringing Heaven to Earth." The NAR talks constantly about taking dominion over the "seven mountains" of society: education, religion, family, business, government, arts and the media.

But it's the other branch, the Christian reconstructionists, who have excelled at strategic organizing and providing blueprints across different right-wing constituencies for almost 50 years. They are the ones Tabachnick focused most of her presentation on, specifically two key figures: Rousas John Rushdoony, the movement's master theologian, and his son-in-law Gary North, a prolific strategist, propagandist and networker who was once a staffer for Rep. Ron Paul, the libertarian hero.[ayn radical indiv ~ jesus charity]

Christian reconstructionism, Tabachnick explained, is "about bringing government in all areas of life under biblical law, a continuation of the Mosaic law in the Old Testament, with some exceptions." This dispensation would include, "according to Gary North, public execution of women who have abortions and those who advise them to have an abortion."

In a recent private presentation, Frederick Clarkson asked a rhetorical question: "People have long said that there should be Christian government, but if you had one, what would it look like? What would it do? Rushdoony was the first to create a systematic theology of what Christian governance should be like, based on the Ten Commandments, and all of the judicial applications he could find in the Old Testament — including about 35 capital offenses."

But the "Handmaid's Tale"-style extremism of dominionists' ultimate vision shouldn't really be our focus, Tabachnick told Salon. "Nobody cares about the theocratic, draconian future envisioned by reconstructionists because they don't believe it will happen," she said.

What's happening right now, however, is that this ideology has had tremendous impact on more immediate politics. "Christian reconstructionism is the merger of a distinct brand of Calvinism with Austrian School economics," Tabachnick said. "In other words, it's an interpretation of the Bible grounded in property rights." The results have been far-reaching:

For more than 40 years, its prolific writers have provided the foundations and strategic blueprints for the attacks on liberation theology and the social gospel, as well as many other streams of Christianity which do not share the Reconstructionists' belief in unfettered capitalism as ordained by God and its fierce anti-statism.

The larger religious right's attack on public education, the social safety net and most government functions are largely grounded in the writings, strategies and tactics formulated by reconstructionist writers. Reconstructionism is not the only (and certainly not the first) source of interposition and nullification in this country. However, much of what is currently being taught today about using interposition to undermine the legitimacy of government is sourced in reconstructionism.

This idea of "interposition" comes through what's known as the doctrine of the "lesser magistrate," which we'll return to below. But its significance — especially in the post-2020 Republican Party — has only recently become apparent. Reconstructionism's initial appeal was more immediately, as Tabachnick explained in the seminar:

What Rushdoony provided is a package that included attacking what these fundamentalists hated and feared most in society, often expressed in terms of "This is communist. This is socialist." But Rushdoony provided a way to sacralize these ideas, and at the same time not just tear down the old order, but provide a blueprint for the new order.

Everyone didn't have to agree on the blueprint, she said: "Rushdoony's ideas went out in bits and pieces. The Christian right leaders took what they wanted and discarded what they didn't."

"Christian reconstructionism, as articulated by Rushdoony, provided a standard by which everyone else had to measure themselves," Clarkson told Salon. "Not everyone on the Christian right agreed with Rushdoony and his fellow Reconstructionist thinkers on, for example, the contemporary application of capital crimes listed in the Old Testament. And followers were often at pains to distinguish themselves."

Clarkson cites the case of conservative Presbyterian theologian Francis Schaeffer, who disagreed with Rushdoony on the applicability of biblical law, but became a driving force behind the anti-abortion activist movement Operation Rescue. That "militant Schaefferism," Clarkson said, "led activists to think: What's next, beyond political protest and stopping abortion? This is where the conversation has been in the Christian right for decades."

The doctrine of the "lesser magistrate," mentioned above, first emerged into public discourse out of Operation Rescue. But it did so as part of a larger, more complicated story.

There's a long history of right-wing opposition to federal authority, particularly grounded in the 19th-century defense of slavery and continuing in the defense of Jim Crow segregation. In his famous "I Have a Dream" speech, the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. spoke specifically of the governor of Alabama "having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and nullification."

As detailed by Randall Balmer in "Bad Faith: Race and the Rise of the Religious Right," the religious right wasn't initially fueled by opposition to the Roe v. Wade decision in 1973, but by opposition to a lesser-known decision in 1971, Green v. Connally, which threatened the tax-exempt status of racially discriminatory institutions,most famously the evangelical stronghold Bob Jones University.

Anti-abortion activists have long sought not just to bury that past but to stand it on its head, somehow equating Roe v. Wade with the notorious Dred Scott decision of 1857 and claiming the moral heritage of abolitionism.

"Throughout these movements there is also an attempt to turn the tables on the claims of racism," Tabachnick said in her webinar. "This is one of the roles that anti-abortion activism as abolition plays. Also, there's a promotion of narratives that provide a different history and legal justifications for interposition, nullification and even secession. One of the things that Christian reconstructionism has added to this dialogue is the concept of the lower magistrate."

As Tabachnick explains it, the "lesser magistrate" is a heroic figure who "resists the tyranny of a higher authority" — defining "tyranny" in biblical terms, potentially including any number of popular or common-sense laws or policies. This notion first gained salience in the anti-abortion context in the 1980s and '90s, as Tabachnick went on to explain.

"Many violent anti-abortionists have justified their actions in reconstructionist teachings," she said. "One of these was Paul Hill, who studied under one of the major reconstructionist leaders and corresponded with others." Hill went on to murder Dr. John Britton, a physician who performed abortions, as well as Britton's personal bodyguard, in 1994. Hill was executed in 2003, but the reconstructionist movement sought to cast him out well before that.

"Gary North responded, after the murders had taken place, in a book called 'Lone Gunners for Jesus,'" Tabachnick said. His message to Hill was, "You're going to burn in hell, you've been excommunicated. This was because Paul Hill stepped outside the bounds of the guidelines set by the movement."

To explain this, she quoted a passage from another book by North that offered qualified support for Operation Rescue: "We need a statement that under no circumstances will Operation Rescue or any of its official representatives call for armed resistance to civil authority without public support from a lesser magistrate."

"On the basis of their belief of what the law or the word of God is, they are allowed — on the advice, on the interposition, of a lesser magistrate — to commit acts of violence," Tabachnick continued. North was seeking to control or curb anti-abortion terrorism, but without rejecting it in principle. Murdering abortion providers — or even murdering women seeking abortions — could be morally justified, with the blessing of a lesser magistrate.

This is relevant to SB 8 in Texas in at least two ways. That bill bans abortions after six weeks and is enforced not by state officials, but by deputizing private individuals to sue anyone who performs the procedure or "aids and abets" it. First of all, giving private individuals these vigilante-style rights seems a lot like making them into "lesser magistrates," however narrowly constrained.

Second, the Supreme Court's refusal to stay the law — which clearly violates the Constitution and existing precedent, as Justice Sonia Sotomayor argued in her dissent — can be seen as an example of the doctrine in action. In more normal circumstances, the court would have stayed the law pending consideration on the merits, even if a majority of justices intended to overturn precedent. That's how common law has worked for centuries.

But biblical law isn't common law, especially as reconstructionists understand it. Under the doctrine of the "lesser magistrate," Roe is not precedent but an instance of tyranny — and the justices have aduty to Godto resist it. Of course, not even Amy Coney Barrett or Clarence Thomas has said anything like that, but it's entirely consistent with their behavior — as well as with their silence, since openly making such an argument would clarify just how radicalized they have become.But adherents of the doctrine of the lesser magistrate must surely appreciate the drift in direction.

Nor is the doctrine limited to abortion cases, as already noted. Matthew Trewhella is a pastor who was a prominent leader of violence-prone wing of the anti-abortion movement in 1990s, and author of the 2013 book, "The Doctrine of the Lesser Magistrates," which greatly heightened its visibility.

"Trewhella is now all over radio and the internet," Tabachnick said in her webinar, "claiming to meet with state legislators and attorney generals at the moment, with the cause of fighting the 'tyranny of mask mandates' and vaccination for COVID. So you can see how this is a concept that is not just limited to abortion. It is a concept that can be used in resistance of government authority all over the country in all different kinds of ways — FEMA, EPA, Bureau of Land Management and so forth."

Trewhella isn't breaking new ground here. Clarkson's 1997 book "Eternal Hostility" describes him making similar arguments in a speech to an anti-tax group in Wisconsin. He was just one figure among many spreading the seeds of reconstructionist resistance to federal authority among militia members, "freemen" and anti-abortion activists at the time.

"This movement believes that rights come from God and not from any government," Tabachnick told Salon. "Therefore, any 'rights' that conflict with their interpretation of God's law are not actually rights. They are 'humanist' or a product of man's laws and not God's laws. This theme of 'human rights' versus inalienable rights from God has been at the center of the Christian Reconstructionist movement since its beginnings."

She pointed to "What's Wrong With Human Rights," an excerpt from a book of the same name by the Rev. T. Robert Ingram published in "The Theology of Christian Resistance," a collection edited by North. Ingram sweeps aside the Bill of Rights as "a statement of sovereign powers of states withheld from the federal authority of the Union," and turns instead to the Virginia Declaration of Rights, authored by George Mason in 1776.

The first section of the Virginia Declaration, beginning "That all Men are by Nature equally free and independent, and have certain inherent Rights," is dismissed by Ingram for omitting any mention of God, as an "error of unbelief which falsifies all the rest that is said about human life." The second, beginning "That all power is vested in, and consequently derived from the People; that Magistrates are their Trustees and Servants, and at all Times amenable to them," he dismisses as well: "The meaning could not be more clear, nor more opposite Biblical thought. The ruling proposition of Scripture and Christian doctrine is that 'power belongeth unto God.'" In short, there are no human rights.

The connection to the doctrine of the lesser magistrate is clear: Power comes from God, not the people. Whatever the people want is irrelevant. Whatever laws they may pass are irrelevant, too, if they go against God. "Tyranny" is whatever the Christian reconstructionist decides he doesn't like.

Elsewhere, Ingram denigrates freedom of speech and the press:

Freedom of speech and freedom of press are, in fact, applied seriously only to giving government protection to instigators of riot and rebellion, as well as those who would undermine human order by more subtle attacks on morals and customs.

As for the right to dissent, he calls it "not a lawful claim to own or to do something, which is the true right," but "a turning upside down of right and wrong, calling good evil and evil good." Similarly, there is no scriptural right to "resist authority," only that granted by the false doctrine of "human rights."

Ingram's interpretation of the Civil War is that "Yankee radicals inflamed the Northern peoples to mount the Civil War in the name of a 'human right'to be free ... if they did not destroy the whole Southern Order, they did at least dismantle its vast and efficient plantation economy." The civil rights movement, unsurprisingly, is understood as a defiance of "Tradition, law, and custom, which preserved public peace and order in the bi-racial state of the union, both North and South," and became "the target of the right to resist in the 60's, the supposed human rights justifying the violent means."

Tabachnick didn't dig into this text in her webinar, but it serves to illustrate her central principle: "This attack on the very concept of 'human rights' can be found throughout today's religious right."

Jackson told Salon that the most important part of Tabachnick's presentation came "when she talked about humanism and the humanistic frame, from the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. Those who are within the dominionist camp see that as contrary to God. I read those same documents and I say, this is pointing us toward the direction that God wants for us. They look at it and see that as counter to God, because humanism from their perspective is something very contrary to God."

If we take such arguments seriously, then we understand why for dominionists there is nothing wrong with breaking any law at all, so long as "God wills it" and you have the blessing of a so-called lesser magistrate. This is the reconstructionist argument supporting a whole range of chaotic right-wing activity today, including baseless claims that the 2020 election was a fraud. After all, the fundamental reconstructionist argument is that all such democratic government is illegitimate.

"The goal of reconstructionism is to tear down the existing order and reconstruct a new society based on biblical law," Tabachnick said. "Even if we assume that this vision of a theocratic America will never come to fruition, it's important to recognize the movement's impact on the ideas, strategies and tactics of the larger religious right and its role in sacralizing the actions of other anti-statist fellow travelers.

"As I wrote almost a decade ago, the theocratic libertarianism of Christian reconstructionism has been surprisingly seductive to Tea Partiers and young libertarians— many of whom may not realize what is supposed to happen after the government is stripped of its regulatory powers."

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huh?

https://www.alternet.org/2021/10/scientists-explore-the-psychology-behind-qanon-support/

The "anti-establishment" ideology is a major contributor to the belief systems that catapulted former President Donald Trump to power and the formation of the QAnon movement, according to findings published by the American Journal of Political Science and The Forum.

Speaking to PsyPost, Adam M. Enders — an assistant political science professor at the University of Louisville and co-author of the study — discussed how they compiled the information.

"While we discuss primarily historical and theoretical literature arguing that anti-establishment viewpoints are hardly new, no one has been empirically tracking them over time," Enders explained. "Our study is a first cut at taking this ignored dimension of public opinion more seriously. We need to track anti-establishment orientations over time to better understand how they ebb and flow. We also need to track them across social and political contexts to see what role these ideas play in other countries with different political systems, economic systems, etc."

Enders also explained why the project piqued his interest.

"I was interested in this project because it increasingly seemed to me that polarization and political identities were increasingly bearing the brunt of the blame –– perhaps erroneously –– for socially undesirable beliefs and actions that were probably the product of other orientations, like conspiracy thinking and a tendency to view politics as a struggle between good and evil," said Enders.

Enders noted how Trump's influence has contributed to the widening gap between red and blue political supporters. "Especially with the ascendance of Donald Trump, we witnessed a blending of left-right political concerns (e.g., partisanship, liberal-conservative ideology) with antagonistic orientations toward the political establishment," Enders said. "I wanted to try and disentangle these dimensions of opinion in order to better understand both how they are related to each other and how they differentially promote the beliefs and behaviors that have so concerned social scientists in recent years."

University of Miami's Joseph E. Uscinski, who also served as a co-author,explained how the evolution of politics and societal issues have contributed to extremism and polarization in American.

"American politics seems to be different than in previous decades and we wanted to know why," Uscinski added. "Many people blame current political problems — conspiracy theories, fake news, political violence — on polarization. But, we were not convinced that our current problems are the fault of people becoming too ideological or too partisan."

Uscinski went on to note how dangerous cancel culture has become as polarization becomes more prominent among party lines. 'We believe that efforts to 'squish' all opinions, people, and groups onto a uni-dimensional space is unwise," Uscinski explained.

He added, "Many people's opinions aren't solely 'left' or 'right,' but rather a mix. Further, many people have antagonisms toward the political system writ large and this has been vastly understudied. It may not be the case that populism is new in the United States; it may instead be the case that in recent years, more politicians are willing to use populist anti-system rhetoric to build coalitions by activating a set of opinions that are already there waiting to be activated."

https://www.alternet.org/2021/10/sheriff-s-fellowship/

no lnx

One far-right, Trump-inspired think tank is adding more fuel to the extremism fire.

According to The Bulwark,The Claremont Institute is at the center of a new initiative called the "Sheriff's Fellowship." The disturbing new movement is described as an incentive to "weaponize 'patriotic law enforcement officers' to counter 'the perversion of the justice system by which the revolutionary left seeks to advance its totalitarian agenda.'"

In short, these types of sheriff groups classify more as "militias with badges, guns, and formal law enforcement powers. Or, if you like, secession-by-sheriff."

While the Sheriff's Fellowship is a new initiative for Claremont, the publication notes that other similar organizations like the Constitutional Sheriffs have existed for quite some time.

"Although the Oath Keepers, another anti-government extremist group that recruits from law enforcement, have garnered more media attention in recent years," the Anti-Defamation League said in their report, the Constitutional Sheriff movement "has arguably had more success infiltrating law enforcement, including at the executive level."

The central tenet of [the Constitutional Sheriffs and Peace Officers Association], borrowed from the anti-government extremist sovereign citizen movement, is that thecounty sheriff is the ultimate authority in the county, able to halt enforcement of any federal or state law or measure they deem unconstitutional.

Trump, members of his administration, and well-known law enforcement officials have echoed the values and beliefs highlighted by the Claremont Institute. In fact, during a previous interview, Former Attorney General Jeff Sessions (R) lauded the practices of "Anglo-American" law enforcement.

"Since our founding, the independently elected sheriff has been the people's protector, who keeps law enforcement close to and accountable to people through the elected process," said Sessions. "The office of sheriff is a critical part of the Anglo-American heritage of law enforcement. We must never erode this historic office."

Sheriff Mark Lamb, the sheriff of Pinal County, Ariz., is also seen as an upcoming member of the Republican Party. The law enforcement officer, who describes himself as "America's Sheriff," who "fashions himself as more of a vigilante resister, with a heavy dose of anti-government, sometimes militant rhetoric."

Lamb supported the "stop the steal" campaign in Arizona and has expressed sympathy for the Jan. 6 rioters. He has called vaccine mandates "garbage" and spoke at a recent anti-vaccine rally in Phoenix, where he told supporters, "We're going to find out what kind of patriots you are. We're going to find out who is willing to die for freedom." He also makes direct appeals to citizens, an effort that looks more dangerous after former President Donald Trump riled up supporters on Jan. 6.

For example, Lamb, an ardent defender of the Second Amendment, has spoken in support of the formation of private militias — "well within the Constitution," he told a group of supporters in March — and emphasized the power of sheriffs in Arizona, an open-carry state, to call local civilians into service to "suppress all affrays, insurrections and riots that comes to the attention of the sheriff." Last year, as Black Lives Matter protests swept across the country, he formed a local civilian "posse" to assist his office with law enforcement, even though there were no such protests in Pinal County.

Milwaukee's Sheriff David Clarke, a known vocal supporter of Trump, has also expressed extremist views. In the days leading up to the January 6 insurrection, Clarke even urged Capitol rioters not to comply with law enforcement.

"ALERT!!!," Clarke wrote on Facebook at the time. "If you attended the Trump rally in Washington DC last Wednesday and are contacted by the FBI or they come to your home, YOU DO NOT HAVE TO TALK TO THEM. DON'T LET THEM IN YOUR HOME EITHER. POLITELY TELL THEM TO LEAVE AND CLOSE THE DOOR."

"If you did not go into the US Capital (sic) you do not have to explain why you exercised your Constitutional right to assemble," Clarke wrote. "TRUST NO GOVERNMENT OFFICIAL right now."

---

ref

https://morningshots.thebulwark.com/p/militias-with-badges

chls sykes

yes, it could get worse.

The Claremont Institute — the home of John Eastman, author of the blueprint for overthrowing the presidential election — has a new initiative for undermining the rule of law.

And if you are not alarmed, you ought to be.

The Trumpian institute is launching a programto weaponize "patriotic law enforcement officers" to counter "the perversion of the justice system by which the revolutionary left seeks to advance its totalitarian agenda."

In announcing its new "Sheriff’s Fellowship" the institute tied together last year’s urban disorders, Covid-19 lockdowns, and “the electoral disaster of 2020,” and declared that “our nation's conservative movement needs a countervailing network of uncorrupted law enforcement officials.”

Specifically, Claremont envisions a cadre of sheriffs “not beholden to bureaucratic masters, and whose geographic boundaries, jurisdictional latitude, and - most important - direct connection and responsibility to citizens, places them on the frontlines of the defense of civilization.”

Think of it as militias with badges, guns, and formal law enforcement powers. Or, if you like, secession-by-sheriff.

Indeed, Claremont is late to the game. The so-called Constitutional Sheriffs have been a thing for quite a while now.

“Although the Oath Keepers, another anti-government extremist group that recruits from law enforcement, have garnered more media attention in recent years,” the Anti-Defamation League said in their report, the Constitutional Sheriff movement “has arguably had more success infiltrating law enforcement, including at the executive level.”

The central tenet of [the Constitutional Sheriffs and Peace Officers Association], borrowed from the anti-government extremist sovereign citizen movement, is that the county sheriff is the ultimate authority in the county, able to halt enforcement of any federal or state law or measure they deem unconstitutional.

This is no longer simply a fringe movement confined to a few rural counties.

Trump and members of his administration cultivated and encouraged the sheriffs’ movement, and openly embraced leading figures like Arizona’s Joe Arpaio. Former Attorney General Sessions famously praised what he called “the Anglo-Saxon heritage” of the office.

“Since our founding, the independently elected sheriff has been the people’s protector, who keeps law enforcement close to and accountable to people through the elected process,” Sessions said. “The office of sheriff is a critical part of the Anglo-American heritage of law enforcement. We must never erode this historic office.”

Milwaukee’s Sheriff David Clarke — who was named Constitutional Sheriff of the year in 2013 — became a prominent Trump surrogate and was, reportedly in line for a position in Trump’s Department of Homeland security.

More recently, Clarke urged January 6 participants to refuseto cooperate with law enforcement authorities.

"ALERT!!!," Clarke wrote. "If you attended the Trump rally in Washington DC last Wednesday and are contacted by the FBI or they come to your home, YOU DO NOT HAVE TO TALK TO THEM. DON'T LET THEM IN YOUR HOME EITHER. POLITELY TELL THEM TO LEAVE AND CLOSE THE DOOR."

"If you did not go into the US Capital (sic) you do not have to explain why you exercised your Constitutional right to assemble," Clarke wrote. "TRUST NO GOVERNMENT OFFICIAL right now." [twt pix]

clarke has since fallen into well-deserved obscurity, but the hot new face of the movement is Mark Lamb, the sheriff of Pinal County, Arizona.

In a new Politico profile, Lamb calls himself ‘America’s Sheriff,’ who “fashions himself as more of a vigilante resister, with a heavy dose of anti-government, sometimes militant rhetoric.”

Sheriff Lamb is the very model of the modern Trumpian law enforcement official. Politico reports:

Lamb supported the “stop the steal” campaign in Arizona and has expressed sympathy for the Jan. 6 rioters. He has called vaccine mandates “garbage” and spoke at a recent anti-vaccine rally in Phoenix, where he told supporters, “We’re going to find out what kind of patriots you are. We’re going to find out who is willing to die for freedom.” He also makes direct appeals to citizens, an effort that looks more dangerous after former President Donald Trump riled up supporters on Jan. 6. For example, Lamb, an ardent defender of the Second Amendment, has spoken in support of the formation of private militias — “well within the Constitution,” he told a group of supporters in March — and emphasized the power of sheriffs in Arizona, an open-carry state, to call local civilians into service to “suppress all affrays, insurrections and riots that comes to the attention of the sheriff.” Last year, as Black Lives Matter protests swept across the country, he formed a local civilian “posse” to assist his office with law enforcement, even though there were no such protests in Pinal County.

Now, fresh off its role in trying to overthrow the 2020 election, Claremont wants a piece of that action. Here is how a recent fund-raising letter for Claremont described the Trumpian think tank’s new program:

• The current revolution against the American regime, involving as it does both crime and political malfeasance, requires a coordinated response from patriotic law enforcement officers. Those whose "chain of dependency" is directly to the people of their region - officers not beholden to the centralized ( and often corrupt) bureaucracies of federal or state governments, nor the vicissitudes of easily pressured city officials.

• Sheriffs are appropriate for this response. Since their beginnings as "shire-reeves" ("county watchmen") centuries ago in England, sheriffs have been intimately connected with, and answerable to, the people of their "shires" and therefore the first layer of protection, and last line of defense, for the people's rights.

• Our project will equip sheriffs with strategic knowledge and end their isolation. Their efforts will be supported, enhanced, and multiplied through a reliable like-minded network of fellow sheriffs and others with complementary areas of expertise and potency.

(Here is a screen shot of the letter.)

If Claremont gets its way, there will be sheriffs like Joe Arpaio, David Clarke, and Mark Lamb all across the country.

You are not worried nearly enough about what that might mean.

---

see sov citizen me vs we; bodily integrity is last stand/refuge // virgin not penetrated totemic for safety of castle vs invaders?!

body is last thing i have control of, not my city, country b/c POC gt replacement, my econ future/membership in middle class precarious, factory jobs outsourced overseas to chicom and POC peasants.

aha: recall origins in Heartland reverse engineer: if AGW real, world gov't no capitalism

also fork 1 origin // sununu collectivist jackboots story 1 threatened

vax everywhere = neg?

gw denial eroded faith in sci for decades and made us vuln to vaxxer BS --> civil war?!

fox murdochs burn down the world for money and power (vax and AGW) ; koch gopanti-gubmint erode norms,

fox briefly forgot trump TV hacks and acted like a news org and reported FACT that trump lost AZ, immediate threat from oann newsmax reb mercer soc media play

no lnx

Black flag:Understanding the Trumpists' latest threatening symbol

Chauncey DeVega and Salon October 12, 2021

It's an old truism that the "real bad men" (and bad women) "move in silence and violence." That's certainly true for the most dangerous and most effective of Donald Trump's allies, henchmen, henchwomen, and other followers. But for Donald Trump himself, and most of his political cult, that rule does not apply....

https://www.alternet.org/2021/10/trumpists/

---

aha omg vax is everywhere basically = neg?!

radicalization, polarization --> civil war

perfect storm of gop / koch anti-gubmint BS erodes trust in inst/norms that trump fascists must erode/coopt

kochs did not want to shrink govt to drownd it just samll enough to dereg and small enough to buy/control it, trump delivered

tucker is mainstreaming gt replacement theory, bad trinity in on big lie and anti-vax

see black flag

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https://www.alternet.org/2021/10/merrick-garland-investigation/

no lnx

former Trump senior advisor Stephen Miller's legal group is demanding the U.S. Department of Justice Inspector General launch an investigation into Attorney General Merrick Garland's memo that directs the FBI to discuss threats against school board officials.

The Garland memo is exceptionally weak, stating: "I am directing the Federal Bureau of Investigation, working with each United States Attorney, to to convene meetings with federal state, local, Tribal, and territorial leaders" to "facilitate the discussion of strategies for addressing threats."

Nothing more.

After months of coaching and training of "grassroots" activists by right wing groups, including parents across the country, the nation has witnessed countless threats against school board officials and education professionals by parents whose anger is falsely ginned up by Fox news and other right wing media claims over critical race theory, masks, and vaccines.

Miller sees it differently, claiming his group is "demanding an investigation into AG Garland's memo unleashing federal law enforcement against parents fighting racism/CRT.Letter includes shocking info on origins of the memo."

Here is a copy of the letter America First Legal sent the DOJ Inspector General demanding an investigation into AG… https://t.co/T1aqGPokAW

— Stephen Miller (@Stephen Miller) 1634069778.0

Look at that language: "unleashing," "parents fighting racism," "shocking info" – all designed to create outrage.

(Also, parents who oppose CRT are not "fighting racism.")

As NCRM has previously reported, school board members and educators in at least nine states this year have been targeted with threats, death threats, and often racist death threats, including in Virginia, Arizona, Connecticut, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Louisiana, Wisconsin, Illinois, and Vermont, according to local news reports.

According to Miller, who was one of the architects of Donald Trump's child separation policy, parents engaging in these threats should not be subjected to legal investigation, but protection.

Miller's Senior Counselor Reed Rubinsteinclaims that "the nationwide protests by parents against public school policies and practices—regardingCritical Race Theory indoctrination; anti-religious and anti-family gender ideology; and/or forced online education and mask mandates—are entitled to the most robust federal constitutional protection."

Rubinstein claims that "the National Education Association, the American Federation of Teachers, and others, have combined to oppress, threaten, and intimidate parents to chill and prevent them from exercising the rights or privileges secured by the Constitution," offering no reason why they would do this, especially given they have not done it before.

He also claims, again, offering no proof, that in "early September, Biden Administration stakeholders held discussions regarding avenues for potential federal action against parents with a key Biden Domestic Policy Council official (Jane Doe #1) and White House staff (John Doe #1). Stakeholders also held discussions with senior department officials, including at least one political appointee in the department's Civil Rights Division (Jane Doe #2). Jane Doe #1, John Doe #1, and others in the White House separately expressed concern regarding the potential partisan political impact of parent mobilization and organization around school issues in the upcoming midterm elections."

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https://www.alternet.org/2021/08/south-carolina-school-board-covid/ nAZI CONC CAMPS

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trump Jr. mocked for tweet claiming troops refusing vaccine will get 're-education'

David Badash The New Civil Rights Movement

August 26, 2021

Donald Trump Jr. is being mocked after retweeting a post from the far right wing website The Daily Caller that claims troops refusing the Military's mandatory coronavirus vaccination program will go through "re...

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--==

//? any russion involvement?

https://www.alternet.org/2021/07/gop-2653812354/

Since the onset of the pandemic, Republicans have viewed the coronavirus through a relatively different lens than the rest of the country. As the months progressed, not only did their political views shape their belief systems about many aspects of science and the virus but also their opposition to the vaccine.

Although former President Donald Trump has adamantly demanded credit for the COVID vaccine, ironically Republicans have been the most apprehensive to get vaccinated despite blindly following the former president on many other key issues.

According to The New York Times, the Republican "wave of opposition to COVID vaccines" has accelerated in recent months due to the onslaught of **misinformationperpetuated by conservative, right-wing news outlets. In fact, some Republican lawmakers have even embraced conspiracy theories that have influenced their push-back against initiatives pitched in order to improve vaccination rates across various states.

"A wave of opposition to Covid vaccines has risen within the Republican Party, as conservative news outlets produce a steady diet of misinformation about vaccines and some G.O.P. lawmakers invite anti-vaccination conspiracy theorists to testify in statehouses and Congress. ["expert" woman magney key on skin]With very little resistance from party leaders, these Republican efforts have elevated falsehoods and doubts about vaccinations from the fringes of American life to the center of our political conversation."

For example, in the state of Tennessee, Republican lawmakers have managed to deter public health officials' efforts to get children vaccinated across the board. From the COVID vaccine to routine inoculations, the lawmakers' guidance prohibits health officials from sending reminders to students. Instead, lawmakers are wanting those reminders rerouted to parents.

On July 13, Tennessee's Public Health Department [head fired?!] spokesperson Sarah Tanksley explained how the department is making changes to incorporate lawmakers' new guidance, according to The Tennessean. She said, "the agency's online vaccine scheduling system also sends out automated reminder emails, but the agency is working to alter the system so reminders never go to minors and are instead rerouted to their parents."

Currently, Republican lawmakers are pushing back against the Biden administration's push to implement a door-to-door vaccination strategy in order to get low-income Americans vaccinated.

"Think about what those mechanisms could be used for," Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-N.C.) said condemning the Biden administration's proposed initiative as he baselessly added, "They could then go door-to-door to take your guns. They could go door-to-door to take your Bibles."

However, a small number of Republican lawmakers have pushed back against the widespread opposition to vaccines. "We don't control conservative media figures so far as I know — at least I don't," Sen. Mitt Romney(R-Utah) told the publication. "That being said, I think it's an enormous error for anyone to suggest that we shouldn't be taking vaccines."

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https://www.alternet.org/2021/07/terror-plot-election/

jon s salon

Two California men disgruntled by Donald Trump's election loss have been charged by the Justice Department for attempting to blow up the California Democratic Party's headquarters in Sacramento.

The development, revealed in a newly unsealed indictment on Thursday, centers on Trump supporters Ian Benjamin Rogers and Jarrod Copeland, both of whom believed their attack would spark a "movement" to enlist an army of followers to their cause. Having settled on a plan of attack last December, Rogers asked his partner:"Do you think something is wrong with me how I'm excited to attack the [D]emocrats?"

The plan developed over the ensuing weeks, prosecutors alleged.

On January 4, just two days before the Capitol riot, Copeland told Rogers that he was excited to "become outlaws for real" if the 2020 election was certified in President Biden's favor.

Following the riot, Rogers sent Copeland a flurry of texts. "REVOLUTION," he wrote. "I'm f---ing juiced!!!!!" he said, adding: "I'm bout to throw my gear on and drive around andpunish [sic] sombitces."

"Sad it's come to thisbut I'm not going down without a fight," Rogers later added. "These commies need to be told what's up."

Days following their exchange on January 11, Napa County Sheriff's deputies arrested Rogers. Authorities seized between45 and 50 firearms, including a number of assault rifles, machine guns, and three pipe bombs. Law enforcement also found approximately 15,000 rounds of ammunition.

At Rogers' personal place of business, law enforcement found copies of "The Anarchist Cookbook" and a "Homemade C-4 A Recipe for Survival," as well as "U.S. Army Improvised Munitions Handbook."

This week, the FBI also arrested Copeland, who attempted to scrub his text exchanges following his friend's arrest. Prosecutors noted that Copeland had joined the military back in 2013, but was twice arrested for desertion. Following his "other than honorable" discharge from service, Copeland joined the Three Percenters,a far-right, anti-government militia – several of whose members were indicted by grand jury last June for participating the Capitol riot.

"Copeland's membership in an anti-government militia, and his motivations for planning these attacks are relevant because they are not fleeting or the product of a single, but past, perceived affront," prosecutors said in court documents. "His sentiments are deeply felt and long-standing and reflect a [sic] believe that the government is illegitimate."

Last October, one of the suspects involved in a failed plot to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer was determined to be the second-in-command of Three Percenters' Wisconsin branch. A Three Percenter was also arrested three years earlier over a failed plot to detonate a car bomb attack on a bank in Oklahoma City. The plan was inspired by the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing.

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recall the vax was dev under trump, warp speed, he boasted about it (but took it in secret)

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https://www.alternet.org/2021/07/gop-2653811907/

"Death Wish" was a hit movie in 1974, starring Charles Bronson as a violent vigilante. Now it's the primary motivation for the Republican Party. As of this week, in 13 states you have a legal right not merely to have a death wish but to inflict it on others by refusing to get vaccinated against COVID. In 21 more states, bills have been introduced that would limit any requirements that individuals produce evidence that they have been vaccinated. In six of those states, the laws specify that schools, including public primary and secondary schools and public colleges, cannot require coronavirus vaccines, even while the same schools continue to require vaccinations against whooping cough, polio, measles and chicken pox.

"It seems to be kind of a mixed bag of all the things going on here — there's the limiting of requiring proof of vaccine, there's the limiting of requiring the vaccination itself, the prohibition of the mandates. So, there's a lot," Lori Tremmel Freeman, chief executive officer of the National Association of County and City Health Officials, told CNN.

These bills are being called "vaccine freedom laws," as in, you have a right to be free of the vaccines against COVID. What's not a mixed bag is the political leaning of the states. All the states where such laws are in effect are controlled by Republican governors and legislatures: Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Montana, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas and Utah.

You could call them the death wish states, or the Kevorkian states, after the infamous Dr. Jack Kevorkian, who was jailed for eight years after assisting a man to commit suicide who suffered from ALS, otherwise known as Lou Gehrig's disease. So if you want to enjoy your freedom to catch COVID and possibly die, those 13 states are the states for you. In six of them, you are guaranteed the freedom to subject your unvaccinated children to the virus as well.

At the same time the Republican Party is moving to protect your right to refuse the COVID vaccine, rates of infection are on the rise across the country. According to Johns Hopkins University, the new case rate is 10 percent higher in 46 states than it was last week. According to CNN, "In 31 states, new cases this past week are at least 50% higher than new cases the previous week."

Dr. Rochelle Walensky, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, told CNN that more than 99 percent of deaths from Covid in June were unvaccinated patients. CNN reports that "the vast majority of new Covid-19 cases, hospitalizations and deaths … are among unvaccinated people, doctors say."

The Delta variant of the virus is causing more infections among children and young adults than before. In Missouri, where just 39 percent of the population has been fully vaccinated, the situation is so bad that the CDC and FEMA have sent teams of specialists to the state to help stop the spread of the disease."We've been seeing a much younger population," Dr. Harold Jarvis, an emergency physician in Springfield, Missouri, told CNN. "We're seeing a lot of people in their 30s, 40s, early 50s. We're seeing some teenagers and some pediatric patients as well."

Missouri is one of the states that has passed a law forbidding the requirement of a COVID vaccine or evidence of vaccination such as a so-called vaccine passport.

In Mississippi, where the vaccination rate is only 33 percent, seven children are in intensive care with COVID disease and two are on ventilators, according to the state health officer, Thomas Dobbs. On Monday, Dobbs tweeted "Pretty much ALL cases in MS are Delta variant right now. Vast majority of cases/hospitalizations/deaths UNVACCINATED." By Wednesday, Dobbs was tweeting that the state had suffered a "Big jump," and reported 641 new cases and five deaths in one day, along with 36 new outbreaks of the virus in long-term care facilities such as nursing homes and rehabilitation centers.

Mississippi has three bills pending before the state legislature that would prohibit issuing a "vaccine passport" and prohibit businesses and state facilities from requiring proof of vaccination.. One bill has passed both houses of the legislature and is awaiting the governor's signature.

But it's in Tennessee that promotion of the Republican death wish has reached its nadir. On Monday, the state fired its top immunization official for her efforts to get teenagers vaccinated against the COVID virus. "This is about a partisan issue around covid vaccines and around people in power in Tennessee not believing in the importance in vaccinating the people, and so they terminated the person in charge of getting it done," Michelle Fiscus told the Washington Post. She was director of all immunization programs at the Tennessee Department of Health. "The government is sacrificing public health to be in the good graces of our legislators; it's a horrid dereliction of duty," she said on Monday. The Tennessean, the state's largest daily newspaper, reported on Tuesday that the state would stop promoting vaccinations for all teenagers, and would cease sending out reminders for teenagers who had received one vaccination to get their second dose.

That's more than a death wish. With 99 percent of all deaths from Covid among the unvaccinated, that is more like the organized and state-sanctioned killing of children.

I've been reading these stories all week and trying to figure out what's driving this madness. The evidence is out there for everyone to see. There can't be a state legislator or governor in this country who isn't aware that virtually all people who come down with COVID today, and 98 or 99 percent of those who die from the disease, are unvaccinated. They have to be aware of the fact, and it is a fact, that if you want to avoid being hospitalized with this disease and dying from it, a vaccination will not only help, it will absolutely prevent both outcomes.

They're not just standing up and speaking out against the COVID vaccines, they are passing laws with the express purpose of making it easier for people to refuse vaccinations. In some cases, these laws are specifically aimed at school-age children. It's one thing to put your adult neighbors and employees and fellow workers at risk. It's quite another to put not only your children, but allchildren at greater risk of getting sick with a virus that, with the spread of the Delta Variant, is showing signs of being deadly to children as well as adults.

The only answer I've been able to come up with is the obvious one. It's about politics, and not just any politics. These Republican death wish laws have one purpose: they are designed to make President Biden's push to get all Americans vaccinated fail. Republicans at the CPAC gathering last week in Dallas were laughing at references to Biden's goal of vaccinating 70 percent of the population by the Fourth of July. One speaker received an ovation when he told the crowd, "The government was hoping they could sucker 90% of the population into getting vaccinated. And it isn't happening."

"The government," of course, is no longer being run by the man the whole CPAC conference was designed to celebrate, former president Donald Trump. It's run by the man who beat him, Joe Biden, and the Republican Party seems determined to do as much damage to his vaccination program as they can, even if that means enacting laws that will surely cause more people to get sick from the virus and die.

Republicans have become the death wish party. Unsatisfied with passing laws to take away people's right to vote, they have moved on to passing laws that will, without a doubt, take away people's right to life.

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https://www.alternet.org/2021/07/gop-vaccines/

thom h

Dr. Jonathan Reiner, a CNN Medical Analyst, said last week, "A surprising amount of death will occur soon..." But why, when the deadly Delta variant is sweeping the world, are Republicans and their media warning people not to get vaccinated?

There's always a reason. People don't do things — particularly things involving a lot of effort and a need for consistency — without a reason. It just doesn't happen. No matter how bizarre, twisted or dysfunctional the reason may be, there's always a reason.

Dr. Anthony Fauci told Jake Tapper on CNN last Sunday, "I don't have a really good reason why this [unwillingness to get vaccinated] is happening."

But even if he can't think of a reason why Republicans would trash talk vaccination and people would believe them, it's definitely there.

Which is why it's important to ask a couple of simple questions that all point to the actual reason why Republicans and their media are discouraging people from getting vaccinated:

Why did Trump get vaccinated in secret after Joe Biden won the election and his January 6th coup attempt failed?

Why are Fox "News" personalities discouraging people from getting vaccinated while refusing to say if they and the people they work with have been protected by vaccination?

Why was one of the biggest applause lines at CPAC: "They were hoping — the government was hoping — that they could sort of sucker 90% of the population into getting vaccinated and it isn't happening!"

4. Why are Republican legislators in states around the country pushing laws that would "ban" private businesses from asking to see proof of vaccination status (they call it "banning vaccine passports")?

Why, when President Biden suggested sending volunteers door-to-door into low-vaccination communities to let people know how and where they could get vaccinated, did rightwing media go nuts about "government thugs" coming to your door to "force" vaccines on you?

Why are about half of all the Republicans in Congress refusing to say if they've gotten a vaccine or not? For that matter, why do the CPAC speakers who are trashing vaccines refuse to say if they're vaccinated or not?

7. Why would a Newsmax hosttrash-talk vaccines saying, "I feel like a vaccination in a weird way is just generally kind of going against nature"?

Why did Republican Governor Kristi Noem of South Dakota downplay the dangers of Covid last week by bragging that she never shut her state down(and Ron DeSantis did) when SD has 230 Covid deaths per 100,000 people while similar low-population states like Vermont and Oregon are at 41 and 66 deaths per 100,000 respectively?

I hope I'm proven wrong on this, but the only possible explanation I can see for all this activity that seems so well-coordinated and largely consistent is that they all think there's something in it for them. And what might that be?

Political power. And, of course, the eventual wealth that often comes with political power, particularly corrupt power. Retired Republicans make a *lot*of money.

Put simply, I believe these Republicans are trying to promote outbreaks of Covid in America to soften or damage Joe Biden's red-hot economy on the assumption that if the economy tanks then people will vote out Democrats and vote in Republicans in 2022 and 2024.

As Pat Buchanan wrote today: "Are the Democrats headed for their Little Bighorn, with President Joe Biden as Col. Custer? The wish, you suggest, is father to the thought."

They're not just willing to let tens or hundreds of thousands of Americans die just to win the next two elections, they're actively encouraging that outcome.

Deathis their electoral strategy.

Is there any other possible explanation?

They're not stupid (although they're banking on their audience being, at least, poorly informed) and most have college degrees (and Lauren Boebert finally got her GED). Even if a few of them fell down the Facebook or YouTube rabbit hole into anti-vaxxer territories, they still have no shortage of actual medical experts and staffers who know how to use Google available to them.

It's remotely possible they just hate and want to damage the US, and a few who are pushing vaccine "hesitancy" like Ron Johnson and John Kennedy recently celebrated the 4th of July in Moscow, but it's unlikely that they'd take the chance of coordinating with a foreign power to kill Americans (even if much of the foreign troll activity on social media is also trashing vaccines to American social media users).

A bizarre faux masculinity could be behind it, the way Trump tried to promote the idea that only wimps wear masks, but, seriously, do you really think these folks are taking fashion/appearance tips from an obese geriatric guy with a huge comb-over who wears absurd amounts of makeup, contacts, men's diapers and false teeth? And what's "masculine" about slowly dying by drowning in your own snot? Or becoming unable to get an erection, as happens to a significant number of men who get Covid?

It's certainly not fear of, or concern about, the vaccine itself; whether they'll admit it or not, virtually all of these Republicans and media stars telling people to be afraid of getting a shot have been secretly vaccinated themselves, just like Trump and his family were in January. As CNN Medical Analyst, Dr. Jonathan Reiner, said, "Over 100 members of Congress, all of them GOP members, refuse to tell their constituents whether they have been vaccinated. They've all been vaccinated, every single one of those characters have been vaccinated."

This also has nothing to do with "conservative" ideology. Vaccination has been a part of the American landscape since George Washington ordered his troops inoculated against smallpox during the Revolutionary war, and Republican President Dwight Eisenhower (and his VP, Richard Nixon) had schoolchildren across the nation get the polio vaccine in the 1950s (I was one of them who lined up in school to get it and remember it well).

As California governor, Ronald Reagan oversaw a public school system that required vaccination for admission and conservatives like Bill Kristol and George W. Bush are proudly vaccinated against Covid. Mitch McConnell, who had polio as a child, said, "As a victim of polio myself, I'm a big fan of vaccinations, and if I were a parent who had a child … being subject to getting any particular disease, I would come down on the side of vaccinations." This is not about fearing or not understanding vaccines.

They're certainly not being paid by "big Pharma" to trash vaccines, and you can bet your last dollar that the billionaires who pay for big Republican events are not only themselves vaccinated but have made sure the entire staff of their multiple mansions, from the cooks to the pool boys to the masseuses and the live-in chefs are all vaccinated.

So, what's left?

Politics, and the power and money that derive from it.

The reason why Donald Trump spent much of 2020 desperately encouraging people to keep shopping and working was because he knew that when an economy collapses in the 18 months before an election, the party in power always loses.

In his desperation to get the economy back in shape, Trump even issued an executive order**forcing mostly Black and Hispanic meat-packing and slaughterhouse employees back to work under threat of imprisonment.

But, sure enough, the economy tanked anyway and Democrats now control the White House, Senate and House of Representatives.

Thus, it appears that today's entire GOP strategy of encouraging "vaccine hesitancy" is to try to replicate that dynamic, to tank the economy, only this time in a way that works in favor of Republicans.

Encouraging Americans to die so they can win elections. That's how low today's GOP has sunk.

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721 noem brag on covid fail

https://www.alternet.org/2021/07/19-republicans/

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https://www.alternet.org/2021/06/qanon-2653524968/

Reporter Laura J. Nelson, in an article published by the Los Angeles Times on June 23, takes a look at Californians who have an unlikely combination of beliefs: they are into new age ideology, but are also QAnon supporters.

"A world that has long embraced love, light and acceptance is now making room for something else: QAnon," Nelson reports. "More commonly associated with right-wing groups, the conspiracy theory is spreading through yoga, meditation and other wellness circles. Friends and colleagues have watched with alarm as Instagram influencers and their New Age peers — yogis, energy healers, sound bathers, crystal practitioners, psychics, quantum magicians — embraced QAnon's conspiratorial worldview and sprayed it across social media."

QAnon is a far-right movement that promotes bizarre and outlandish conspiracy theories. According to QAnon, the United States' federal government has been taken over by an international cabal of pedophiles, child sex traffickers, Satanists and cannibals — and former President Donald Trump was put in the White House to fight the cabal. Well-known pro-QAnon extremists in the Republican Party include Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia and Rep. Lauren Boebert of Colorado.

The fact that QAnon has made inroads with far-right Christian fundamentalist evangelicals isn't surprising; the Christian right has long been prone to conspiracy theorists. But the new age community in California seems an unlikely place for QAnon to make inroads.

Nelson, however, reports, "The health, wellness and spirituality world has always been primed for that worldview, followers say. Though largely filled with well-meaning people seeking spiritual or physical comfort, the $1.5-trillion industry can also be a hotbed for conspiracies, magical thinking, dietary supplements with dubious scientific claims and distrust of institutional healthcare, including vaccines."

Julian Walker, a Mar Vista yogi who hosts a podcast called "Conspirituality," told the Times, "It's always been the water we were swimming in. Now, we're seeing what happens when the water rises."

The violent insurrectionists who attacked the U.S. Capitol Building on January 6 included supporters of QAnon as well as members of the Proud Boys, the Oath Keepers and other far-right Trump supporters. And some of those QAnon supporters, Nelson points out, embrace new age beliefs.

Nelson explains, "Several New Age spiritualists in Southern California interviewed by the Times said they knew a total of more than a dozen former friends and colleagues at the January 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol with ties to yoga, meditation, energy healing and dietary supplements hawked by multilevel marketing companies. Jake Angeli, whose face paint and horned headgear during the Capitol riot earned him the nickname'the QAnon Shaman,' carried a sign at earlier protests that read, 'Q Sent Me,' and successfully petitioned a federal judge on religious grounds to receive only organic food in jail. One of the best known of the rioters isAlan Hostetter, a ponytailed former police chief, yoga teacher and sound healer from Orange County who spoke at a QAnon conferenceand was indicted by federal officials this month."

Los Angeles-based yoga instructor Seane Corn, who co-founded the group Off the Mat, Into the World, has been warning others in the new age community that QAnon is dangerous.

"Corn was among the wellness leaders who shared a statement in September warning that QAnon's tactics resembled cult psychology and that the ideology would sow confusion, division and paranoia," Nelson reports. "Corn estimates she knows at least ten people who embraced 'hardcore QAnon,' including two people who participated in the attack on the Capitol — and is aware of more than 30 colleagues and peers who subscribe to some forms of the ideology, as well as a 'countless' number of yoga students. Corn said she has watched bots and real-life QAnon devotees try to harness her social media comment sections as a recruiting ground, using 'wellness language and nonviolent communication' in an attempt to lead her followers toward more conspiratorial thinking.

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