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PELOSI DEMS3

SEE FOUR

12 21 no especial reason but new they are coming for you anti-gubmint BS paranoia

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11 24 an dr earl b

...Don’t breathe the noxious gas that there is a Republican mandate right now. Battleground States flipped. It happens. Here in Wisconsin, Kamala Harris actually got more votes than Joe Biden did on 2020. We worked our asses off up here and simply got beat in large part by the massive rightwing propaganda machine that I warned about above. Wisconsin is 90 percent white and under conventional wisdom should be a bright-red state. It’s not, because we have leaders and ideas that resonate with everybody. In fact … the best thing we can hope for is that Republicans read this election as a mandate, because as you know most of their odious plans will sting their voters at least as much as everybody else. Let them get out over their skies as far as possible, and then watch them crash.

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Project 2025, right-wing media, and Trump zero in on dismantling the Inflation Reduction Act

Special ProgramsClimate & Energy

Written by Ilana Berger

Published 08/29/24 mma

While the Trump campaign has sought to distance itself from the widely unpopular project, both the former president and his running mate JD Vance have extensive ties to it. And although Project 2025 architect Paul Dans resigned from his position at The Heritage Foundation in July, the Trump campaign’s rhetoric on the Inflation Reduction Act appears to align with that of Project 2025, as laid out in an over 900-page policy book called Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise.

Project 2025 chapter author Bernard McNamee and Trump have both suggested that renewable energy doesn’t work.}: During an exclusive interview with Fox host Jesse Watters, Trump said, “The whole world is going woke, their world is going woke. The Green New Scam, we’re spending all our money on things that don’t work.” In Mandate, McNamee calls renewable energy unreliable, backing his statement with an endnote that includes no citation and falsely claims that “the challenges to the grid are coming mainly from subsidized renewable resources.” Meanwhile, most power outages are triggered by severe weather. |

Renewable energy is particularly resilient because it is modular, and can adapt more easily even if one component of a system is damaged. McNamee also argues that “electric reliability is decreasing in many parts of the country,” citing “the blackouts and shortages in California (August 2020, summer 2022) and Texas (February 2021, summer 2022)” in an endnote. In reality, widespread blackouts and shortages did not occur in California or Texas in 2022, and a multitude of factors caused the blackouts in 2020 and 2021. Fox News, *Fox & Friends*, [7/22/24; Project 2025, Mandate for Leadership, 2023; Climate Central, 4/24/24; Media Matters, 2/19/21; Utility Dive, 11/22/22; ABC News, 9/9/22; Natural Resources Defense Council, 9/12/22, 3/3/21]

Like the architects of Project 2025, Trump has publicly opposed equity-related initiatives throughout the federal government, which would seemingly include billions in IRA funding dedicated to helping underserved communities. McNamee writes: “The next Administration should stop using energy policy to advance politicized social agendas. Programs that sound innocuous, such as ‘energy justice,’ Justice40, and DEI, can be transformed to promote politicized agendas.” }:Trump has also attacked equity-focused programs, writing on Truth Social in 2023 after Biden signed an executive order focused on advancing racial equity, “It is time to eradicate Joe Biden's sinister ‘equity’ Executive Order that has led to the woke takeover of the U.S. Government!” These statements lay bare the threats to initiatives and programs like the $3 billion Environmental and Climate Justice Grant program, a product of the IRA that aims to reduce the impacts of climate change and pollution in low-income communities. Project 2025, *Mandate for Leadership*, [2023; Newsweek 3/2/23; United States Environmental Protection Agency, accessed 8/16/24]|

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an 8 24

In an effort to fire up far-right white evangelical voters and Christian nationalists, former President Donald Trump has repeatedly attacked Democrats as anti-religion — often using the word "godless." And Caroline Sunshine, deputy communications director for Trump's 2024 presidential campaign, commented, "I think the left is godless" during an appearance on Fox News in July.

But in fact, President Joe Biden and former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-California) have had a lot to say about their Catholicism. Former President Barack Obama isn't shy about discussing his Mainline Protestant background, and Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-Georgia) is an ordained Protestant minister.

In an article published on August 20, Religion News' Jack Jenkins examines the role that religion is playing in the 2024 Democratic National Convention in Chicago. Speakers at the convention, Jenkins notes, haven't been shy about referencing "religion, scripture and faith."

:{READ MORE:Meet the prominent Republicans who are backing Harris at DNC

"The faith-fueled messaging may have surprised some conservatives," Jenkins observes, "but it's hardly news to anyone who kept a close eye on liberals over the past decade or so. The Democratic Party, although home to a growing and sizable subset of religiously unaffiliated voters, remains majority religious and majority Christian, according to the Public Religion Research Institute."

Jenkins adds, "More to the point: Although people of faith have long been at home among its ranks, religious rhetoric at Democratic Party conventions has garnered more headlines in recent years, with the 2016 gathering featuring a primetime address from a prominent pastor and the 2020 event including an entire section dedicated to faith."

On the second night of the 2024 DNC, presidential nominee Kamala Harris' husband Doug Emhoff discussed their interfaith marriage. Emhoff describes himself as "proudly Jewish," while Harris is a Baptist.

Emhoff told the crowd, "Kamala has connected me more deeply to my faith, even though it's not the same as hers. She comes to synagogue with me for High Holidays, and I go to church with her for Easter. I get to enjoy her mom's chile relleno recipe every Christmas, and she makes a mean brisket for Passover. It brings me right back to my grandmother's apartment in Brooklyn — you know, the one with the plastic-covered couches."

READ MORE:'I'm not going to quit': Swing state GOP official who endorsed Harris now faces expulsion

Jenkins notes that religion has been "easy to find on the DNC's main stage."

"Rep. James Clyburn of South Carolina, a member of the AME tradition, referenced 2 Corinthians 4:8-9 in his speech, noting, 'We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair,'" Jenkins observes. "Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear, who attends a Disciples of Christ church, spoke of the golden rule and the parable of the good Samaritan while discussing the need for abortion access."

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AN 1 24 BUT REBOOT

Editor's note: *On the day after Trump's suprising victory over Hillary Clinton, we've resurfaced Robert Reich's killer essay explaining why the working class doesn't vote for Democrats anymore.

Why did the white working class abandon the Democrats?

The conventional answer is Republicans skillfully played the race card.

In the wake of the Civil Rights Act, segregationists like Alabama Governor George C. Wallace led southern whites out of the Democratic Party.

Later, Republicans charged Democrats with coddling black “welfare queens,“ being soft on black crime (“Willie Horton”), and trying to give jobs to less-qualified blacks over more-qualified whites (the battle over affirmative action).

The bigotry now spewing forth from Donald Trump and several of his Republican rivals is an extension of this old race card, now applied to Mexicans and Muslims – with much the same effect on the white working class voters, who don’t trust Democrats to be as “tough.”

All true, but this isn't the whole story. Democrats also abandoned the white working class.

Democrats have occupied the White House for sixteen of the last 24 years, and in that time scored some important victories for working families – the Affordable Care Act, an expanded Earned Income Tax Credit, and the Family and Medical Leave Act, for example.

But they’ve done nothing to change the vicious cycle of wealth and power that has rigged the economy for the benefit of those at the top, and undermined the working class. In some respects, Democrats have been complicit in it.

Both Bill Clinton and Barack Obama ardently pushed for free trade agreements, for example, without providing the millions of blue-collar workers who thereby lost their jobs any means of getting new ones that paid at least as well.

They also stood by as corporations hammered trade unions, the backbone of the white working class. Clinton and Obama failed to reform labor laws to impose meaningful penalties on companies that violated them, or enable workers to form unions with a simple up-or-down votes.

I was there. In 1992, Bill Clinton promised such reform but once elected didn’t want to spend political capital on it. In 2008, Barack Obama made the same promise (remember the Employee Free Choice Act?) but never acted on it.

Partly as a result, union membership sank from 22 percent of all workers when Bill Clinton was elected president to fewer than 12 percent today, and the working class lost bargaining leverage to get a share of the economy’s gains.

In addition, the Obama administration protected Wall Street from the consequences of the Street’s gambling addiction through a giant taxpayer-funded bailout, but let millions of underwater homeowners drown.

Both Clinton and Obama also allowed antitrust enforcement to ossify – with the result that large corporations have grown farlarger, and major industries more concentrated.

Finally, they turned their backs on campaign finance reform. In 2008, Obama was the first presidential nominee since Richard Nixon to reject public financing in his primary and general-election campaigns. And he never followed up on his reelection campaign promise to pursue a constitutional amendment overturning “Citizens United v. FEC,” the 2010 Supreme Court opinion opening the floodgates to big money in politics.

What happens when you combine freer trade, shrinking unions, Wall Street bailouts, growing corporate market power, and the abandonment of campaign finance reform?

You shift political and economic power to the wealthy, and you shaft the working class.

Why haven’t Democrats sought to reverse this power shift? True, they faced increasingly hostile Republican congresses. But they controlled both houses of Congress in the first two years of both Clinton’s and Obama’s administrations.

In part, it’s because Democrats bought the snake oil of the “suburban swing voter” – so-called “soccer moms” in the 1990s and affluent politically-independent professionals in the 2000s – who supposedly determine electoral outcomes.

Meanwhile, as early as the 1980s they began drinking from the same campaign funding trough as the Republicans – big corporations, Wall Street, and the very wealthy.

“Business has to deal with us whether they like it or not, because we’re the majority,” crowed Democratic representative Tony Coelho, head of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee in the 1980s when Democrats assumed they’d continue to run the House for years.

Coelho’s Democrats soon achieved a rough parity with Republicans in contributions from corporate and Wall Street campaign coffers, but the deal proved a Faustian bargain as Democrats become financially dependent on big corporations and the Street.

Nothing in politics is ever final. Democrats could still win back the white working class – putting together a huge coalition of the working class and poor, of whites, blacks, and Latinos, of everyone who has been shafted by the shift in wealth and power to the top.

This would give Democrats the political clout to restructure the economy – rather than merely enact palliatives that papered over the increasing concentration of wealth and power in America.

But to do this Democrats would have to stop obsessing over upper-income suburban swing voters, and end their financial dependence on big corporations, Wall Street, and the wealthy.

Will they? That’s one of the biggest political unknowns in 2016 and beyond.

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see gold scam ~ sr cit

11 23 rww

...Hawking gold has been a financial mainstay of right-wing media outlets and online personalities for years. For religious-right pundits like Wallnau, promoting gold as a hedge against financial and societal collapse can dovetail with broader apocalyptic messaging.

A few months ago, The Washington Post wrote about the extensive marketing on right-wing media of gold coins as a retirement investment, often with outrageous markups. Reporter Hanna Kozlowska, one of the authors of the Post report, followed up with an August story for MSNBC, noting that their research found that older people who watch conservative media are “bombarded” with ads for gold:

We’ve spoken to customers who are disabled, homebound or living only on Social Security, their lives upended by losing their only nest eggs. And although complaints and allegations of fraud against these companies have been public for years, right-wing media outlets have continued to benefit by accepting their advertising.

The kind of fearmongering pitch Wallnau’s email included is a common sales tactic, according to Kozlowska. “To lure customers, the companies often use fear-based and politically tinged messaging in their advertising and on sales calls,” she wrote for MSNBC, citing an example of an ad sent to a Newsmax list claiming, “Nancy Pelosi has been on a secret mission to KILL the US Dollar.”

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Florida GOP State Senator has proposed a bill that would officially abolish the state's Democratic Party, NBC reports.

Sen. Blaise Ingoglia filed "The Ultimate Cancel Act," which according to the Tallahassee Democrat, "never mentions the word Democrat or Democratic, but would decertify any political party that ever included a plank to support slavery in its platform, something the Democratic Party did between 1844 - 1864."

Furthermore, according to NBC, the bill "would require Florida officials to notify all registered voters who belong to any canceled parties that their parties no longer exist. It would also change their voter registrations to 'no party affiliation' and 'provide procedures' for those voters to update their affiliations to 'an active political party.'"

READ MORE: Democratic activists dispute claims that Florida is now 'officially a Republican stronghold': report

NBC reports:

Ingoglia suggested in a news release that his bill was designed to get back at Democrats and 'leftist activists' who he said had 'been trying to 'cancel' people and companies for things they have said or done in the past,' including 'the removal of statues and memorials, and the renaming of buildings.'

Florida's Democratic Party responded to the proposed measure in a statement saying, "Presenting a bill that would disenfranchise 5 million voters is both unconstitutional and unserious. Under Ron DeSantis, Senator Ingoglia is using his office to push bills that are nothing more than publicity stunts instead of focusing on the issues that matter most to Floridians."

Although deemed "unserious" by the Florida Democrats, many Twitter users are unamused by the proposed legislation.

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an 11 22

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi is now sharing the moment she first learned her husband Paul had been viciously attacked inside their San Francisco home, bludgeoned with a hammer by an extremist who has touted right-wing conspiracy theories.

“I was sleeping. in Washington, D.C.. I had just gotten in the night before from San Francisco and the, um,” she says, pausing in apparent emotional pain, swallowing hard and seemingly near tears as she remembers the event.

“I hear the doorbell ring and think it’s five something – I look up I see it’s five,” meaning 5 AM, she tells CNN’s Anderson Cooper in an interview that airs Monday evening.

READ MORE: Watch: Marjorie Taylor Greene Says Paul Pelosi Is to Blame for His Near-Fatal Assault as He Arrives Home From Hospital

“They must be [at] the wrong apartment,” she explains was her first thought. “No, it rings again and then bang, bang, bang, bang bang on the door,” she says pounding her fist.

“So I run to the door, and I’m very scared, and I see the Capitol Police and they said we have to come in to talk to you and I’m thinking my children, my grandchildren. I never thought it would be Paul because you know, he wouldn’t be out and about,” she said, explaining her train of thought.

“And so like, um,” she says, again appearing to choke up. “They came in at that time – we didn’t even know where he was, what his condition was,” she said. “We just knew there was an assault on him in our home..”

READ MORE: ‘Suicide Mission’: Pelosi Attacker Named ‘Prominent State and Federal Politicians’ He Wanted to Target

The interview is bringing back feelings of anger and upset from many who were furious how Republicans mocked the Speaker and her husband, both 82-years old, after what prosecutors described as a “near-fatal” attack.

“The violent attack on Paul Pelosihas raised fresh concerns over threats of political violence driven by partisan animosity and increasingly hostile political rhetoric – and highlighted the potential vulnerability of lawmakers and their families in the current political climate,” CNN adds.

Outrage at the right was rekindled.

“This is what Kari Lake and Don Jr mocked and laughed at. This is what Donald Trump and Ted Cruz cast doubt on. To borrow a line: have they no decency?” responded MSNBC’s Mehdi Hasan.

“All of the conservatives who have been laughing at the their trauma should watch this one min clip and imagine if it was your family,” suggested The Daily Beast’s Matt Wilstein.

“The composure Nancy Pelosi shows in the face of such hate-filled violence is remarkable. Which makes it all the more despicable that Republicans tried to laugh off this act of domestic terrorism,” said Democratic pollster Matt McDermott.

Historian Rebecca Fachner also pointed to Pelosi’s composure.

“Watching her struggle to keep her composure is wrenching,” she observed.

“Every Republican (or anyone, really) who has made jokes about this are not fit to serve in any capacity whatsoever,” said political opinion columnist Teri Carter.

Watch below or at this link.

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matt g

https://www.mediamatters.org/fake-news/right-wing-ecosystem-created-paul-pelosi-conspiracy-theory

mma 1122 no twt

it  took roughly 48 hours for the right-wing media ecosystem to turn a story about a man who committed political violence after becoming consumed by right-wing conspiracy theories about the depravity of the left into another right-wing conspiracy theory about the depravity of the left.

On Friday morning, a man broke into the San Francisco home of Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. He was reportedly carrying zip ties and duct tape and, according to law enforcement, was looking for the woman who is second in line to the presidency. She was not present, but the man did find and severely beat her 82-year-old husband, Paul, with a hammer, sending him to the hospital for emergency surgery.

The assailant, who was arrested and identified by police as David DePape, had an extensive Internet footprint that suggests a standard case of online right-wing radicalization. DePape’s writings show his adherence to a wide range of conspiracy theories that are often propped up or adopted in their entirety by prominent right-wing media figures and Republican officials. President Joe Biden on Friday night condemned the impact the Republican Party’s “vitriol” has on those who may be mentally unbalanced.

But in the days since the attack, people who get their news from right-wing sources have instead been told an absurd and baseless conspiracy theory. In this telling, there was no home invasion; instead DePape is actually Paul Pelosi’s leftist gay lover, and the police,Democrats, and the press are covering up that the assault was really a lovers’ spat. The tale was quickly adopted by influential right-wing figures – including Twitter owner Elon Musk – and, if past is prologue, will be accepted by a sizable percentage of the GOP base.

The Pelosi conspiracy theory took hold so quickly thanks to the parallel media ecosystem the right constructed over decades. That ecosystem features numerous outlets that generate conspiracy theories for partisan and financial gain; food-chain mechanisms that swiftly distribute them to millions of people; an existing right-wing audience trained to demand such fantasies; minimal internal guardrails within the right-wing press to provide more credible information; and strong external barriers against contrary information from mainstream news sources. 

How the right built a Paul Pelosi conspiracy theory

The right’s conspiracy theorists went to work soon after news of Paul Pelosi’s assault broke. They create dubious but politically beneficial narratives by taking existing facts – particularly ones that emerge early in the life of a story, when initial reports are often wrong – mixing in falsehoods, and using wild logical jumps to put the result in a different context.

First, an investigative journalist at a local TV affiliate reported on Friday that the assailant was wearing only his underwear when police arrived. But the journalist retracted that reporting the same day, and no other outlet confirmed it.

Second, the dispatcher who received a 911 call from Paul Pelosi said that he had identified the intruder as a “friend.” But Pelosi, according to law enforcement, was making that call surreptitiously from the bathroom and speaking “in code” to the dispatcher in an attempt to avoid his suspicion.

Third, some alleged that there were no signs of forced entry at the Pelosi home, suggesting that Paul Pelosi had willingly let DePape inside. In fact, police say he forced entry through the rear door, and aerial photos and video show shattered glass around that entryway (in fact, other internet sleuths claim that the glass pattern is suspicious).

Fourth, Politico reported on Friday based on San Francisco Police Chief William Scott’s press conference that the first police officers responding on the scene “were let inside by an unknown person. They discovered DePape and Pelosi struggling for a hammer.” This generated speculation that a third individual had been present. But Scott did not actually say that, and the SFPD subsequently confirmed only two people, DePape and Paul Pelosi, were at the home when police arrived.

The right’s conspiracy theorists took those four pieces of evidence, mixed in Paul Pelosi’s May DUI charge, and concocted the narrative that he had been the victim of a drunken gay lovers’ spat that was subsequently covered up.

By Sunday, versions of this speculation were rampant on the right. Commentators who present themselves as credible offered a version in which they were simply asking questions because the press supposedly refused to do so.

[twt]

those who lack such airs simply claimed, as Dinesh D’Douza did, that “this guy, the assailant, is either a sexual partner or a male prostitute, and this is a sexual rendezvous that went sideways.”

[twt]

eventually, the story reached Musk, a troll beloved on the right with a penchant for conspiracy theories. And on Sunday morning, he blasted it out to his 112 million Twitter followers.

After Hillary Clinton shared an article about DePape’s promotion of conspiracy theories and commented that “violence is the result” of the right spreading such lies, Musk responded, “there is a tiny possibility there might be more to the story than meets the eye.” He provided a link to a site with the headline, “The Awful Truth: Paul Pelosi Was Drunk Again, And In a Dispute With a Male Prostitute Early Friday Morning."

[musk twt]

the website, the Santa Monica Observer, had previously alleged that Clinton died in 2016 and had been replaced by a body double for her presidential debate with Donald Trump.

At the same time, the right-wing media generated nonsensical explanations for why the assailant’s Internet footprint is forged and he’s actually a leftist. They cannot accept that the assailant believed right-wing conspiracy theories without taking on responsibility, so they’ve developed an alternate explanation instead.

Roughly 72 hours after news of the assault on Paul Pelosi had broken, the conspiracy theory had been promoted by a Republican member of Congress and by Donald Trump Jr., and “Pelosigaylover” was trending nationally on Twitter.

The conspiracy-minded ecosystem that fuels the right

The right-wing information ecosystem is built to create and propagate conspiracy theories like the latest drivel about the Pelosi attack.

On message boards and social media platforms, an army of right-wing would-be sleuths looking for political advantage or simple amusement are constantly on the hunt for raw materials that they can spin into these alternate narratives.

Hyperpartisan news sites with no journalistic standards – from local ones like the Santa Monica Observer to national players like Gateway Pundit – trawl those venues looking for stories that they can write up andmonetize.

The conspiracy theories move up the right-wing media food chain, with more and more prominent influencers and outlets picking up the story and running with it, until it becomes pervasive on the right.

Sprawling conspiracy theories like 2020 election denial, QAnon, Pizzagate, and Gamergate – all of which DePape had championed – worked their way through these networks.

The right-wing audience is uniquely vulnerable to these narratives.

The right-wing press spent decades spinning out these politically convenient narratives about the diabolical nature of their perceived enemies [NEWT! fox] until the audience came to demand them. Few on the right – and none with any real degree of influence – are interested in debunking the rampant lies once they get going. Instead, powerful figures at Fox News and elsewhere end up pushing the likes of QAnon talking points and scoffing at its extremism. And decades of right-wing attacks on the mainstream press have created a bubble in which the audience is unlikely to receive or credit contradictory information from those outlets.

The result is that we consistently see the conspiracy theories come to infest the ranks of the movement, from Vince Foster’s death to QAnon.

I expect the Paul Pelosi fantasy to follow the same route. Republican politicians and prominent Fox hosts will either stand by as the conspiracy theory builds credence on the right or even give a knowing wink and nod to its supporters. Some will probably promote it entirely, perhaps suggesting that these are simply questions that the media refuses to answer.

Credible news outlets will divert resources from covering the rising tide of right-wing political violence or the GOP’s disturbing policy aims if the party gains ground in the midterm elections to pointing out that the right is peddling nonsense about Pelosi.But thanks to the right-wing media bubble, their facts won’t make it to the people inclined to believe it. And so a sizable chunk of the GOP will come to believe an absurd lie.

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11 22 an raw

During a segment on his livestream show, Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk slammed news outlets and journalists who say the attack on Nancy Pelosi's husband this weekend is a sign that right-wing rhetoric is sparking real-world violence, saying "of course" Republicans should reject Democrats' attempts to link them to the attack.

"Why is the conservative movement to blame for gay schizophrenic nudists that are hemp jewelry maker breaking into someone's home -- or maybe not breaking into someone's home. Why are we to blame for that exactly," Kirk said. "And why is he still in jail? Why has he not been bailed out? And by the way, if someamazing patriot out there in San Francisco or the Bay Area wants to really be a midterm hero, someone should go and bail this guy out... bail him out, and then go ask him some questions."

Kirk's claim that Paul Pelosi's attacker, Dave DePape, is gay likely came from an article posted, then deleted, by Elon Musk that claimed without evidence that DePape had previously attended a gay nightclub before the attack.

Reports show that DePape had a long history of believing in and blogging about conspiracy theories. In recent years, his beliefs started to reflect themes that are echoed in right-wing conspiracy theorist circles.

Watch the video below or at this link.

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an 11 22 ah

From Arizona gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake to Donald Trump Jr., it isn’t hard to find far-right MAGA Republicans who are willing to joke about the violent assault on House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband, Paul Pelosi — who, on Friday, October 28, was attacked with a hammer by a man who broke into their San Francisco home. Countless Republicans have been unwilling to call them out, obviously fearing that doing so might offend former President Donald Trump. But one Republican who is speaking out is Doug Heye, former communications director for the Republican National Committee (RNC).

In an op-ed published by the Washington Post on Halloween Day, Heye argues that the “ugly tweets and jokes from some Republicans about the attack on Pelosi’s husband, Paul” have gone way too far. And this is coming from someone who was part of the “Fire Pelosi” campaign during the 2010 midterms, which found Republicans enjoying a major red wave and retaking the U.S. House of Representatives — a political event that then-President Barack Obama famously described as a “shellacking.”

“More and more in our politics, the loudest, angriest, most divisive voices get the most attention and money,” Heye observes. “Real solutions, and the politicians who put their heads down to do hard work, get short shrift. Collectively, we have to lower the temperature. People keep getting hurt. We’re very lucky no one has been killed — and I worry I need to emphasize ‘yet.’”

READ MORE: 'This is who they are': Critics blast Kari Lake for mocking Paul Pelosi after violent assault

Heye goes on to cite some examples of political violence that have plagued the United States, from the shooting of Rep. Gabby Giffords in 2011 to the shooting of Rep. Steve Scalise in 2017 to a plot to assassinate U.S. Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh earlier this year. Giffords (who is married to Sen. Mark Kelly) and Scalise suffered serious injuries but survived.

“Just as warming waters create the conditions for more frequent and destructive hurricanes, toxic rhetoric can manifest into actions,”Heye writes. “Our political emotions are running hotter than ever. We’ve been relatively lucky so far. Consider the attacks on Giffords and Scalise, the threats against Kavanaugh, the plot to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D), and the January 6 chants of ‘Hang Mike Pence’ and threats against Nancy Pelosi — had any of them gone further, our country would be even closer to unraveling.”

Heye continues, “Politics is a business of tough talk on tough issues. Some challenges, such as inflation, are at their worst state in generations. Some, such as the rapid speed of disinformation and hate, are newer. If we can’t tame the latter, our other problems will become small in comparison.”

READ MORE: 'What the hell is wrong with these people?': Conservative batters the GOP response to Pelosi beating

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https://www.alternet.org/2022/11/tucker-carlson/

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an 11 22

The suspect, David Wayne DePape, has been charged with a slew of state and local offenses, including attempted homicide and attempted kidnapping of a family member of an elected official.

DePape allegedly smashed a back window of Pelosi’s San Francisco home early Friday morning, woke up her sleeping husband and demanded to speak with “Nancy.” The Speaker was not at home.

DePape told investigators his plan was to hold “Nancy hostage and talk to her.” He came prepared with flex-cuffs, tape, rope and two hammers, according to police. He said he wanted to interrogate Nancy Pelosi, because she was the “leader of the pack” of the lying Democratic Party, according to the federal criminal complaint.

READ MORE: 'Break her kneecaps': Feds charge suspect who attacked Paul Pelosi as new details on his motivation are revealed

DePape said he planned to let Pelosi go if she told him “the truth,” but that if she “lied,” he was going to break “her kneecaps,” the complaint said. DePape said he was certain that Pelosi would not have told the “truth.” This was an astute inference on his part seeing as the “truth” he was looking for probably had something to do with a cabal of satanist pedophiles. Pelosi’s wounds, DePape stated, would put Congress on notice that there are “consequences for actions.”

That’s the classic logic of terrorism.

DePape’s plan is reminiscent of another plan to kidnap and interrogate Democratic leaders. It’s what the Wolverine Watchmen militia were accused of plotting to do with Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer, a Democrat. The men schemed and trained to kidnap her and “put her on a show trial” over covid regulations.

DePape’s online footprint shows a man in the tightening grip of radicalization. He registered a domain name in August and began posting feverishly about QAnon, Pizzagate and the pedophile cabal that runs the world. He was an election denier and a proponent of the Big Lie of 2020 voter fraud. He also indulged in Holocaust denial and other forms of antisemitism, anti-Black racism, rants against “groomers” and attacks on Ukrainian democracy. He also found time to defend the honor of rightwing scholar and icon Jordan Peterson.

READ MORE: ['What the hell is wrong with these people?': Conservative batters the GOP response to Pelosi beating

DePape embraced the Revolutionary War kitsch beloved of J6 insurgents. In an interview, he repeatedly likened himself to the American founding fathers. He claimed to be fighting tyranny without the option of surrender.

Some of the most notorious J6 insurgents specifically targeted Pelosi during the J6 siege.

Guy Reffitt said he wanted to drag Nancy Pelosi out of the building. He brought a semi-automatic handgun onto Capitol grounds. "I just want to see Pelosi's head hitting every fucking stair of the building,” Reffitt said. Reffit also brought flex-cuffs.

Oath Keeper Kelly Meggs, who is on trial for seditious conspiracy, said he wanted to see Pelosi’s head “rolling down the front steps” of the Capitol. Meggs and fellow Oath Keeper Kenneth Harrelson are accused of splitting off from the group to go “hunting” for Pelosi.

Insurgent Mark Mazza, who brought two loaded guns, told investigators that if he’d crossed paths with Pelosi "you'd be here for another reason."

Dawn Bancroft admitted on video that she and her friend broke into the Capitol and that they’d been “looking for Nancy to shoot her in the friggin' brain.”

We now know, in the suspect’s own words, that he was specifically targeting Speaker Pelosi for political violence. In the days following the attack, the political right has tried every bad faith deflection tactic imaginable, blaming DePape’s actions on drugs and mental illness. While DePape is likely mentally ill and may suffer from addiction, these factors are secondary at best.[ knowingly wind them up, then throw under bus]

This was a well-organized, premeditated attack.

DePape allegedly assembled a restraint kit, bought hammers, pinpointed his target’s address, and broke into the home under the cover of darkness. He knew exactly what he was doing.

The roots of this attack lie in toxic conspiracy theories that convince unstable people that their freedom is at risk and an insurrection that has gone largely unpunished.

As President Joe Biden said in Delaware, “[i]t’s one thing to condemn the violence but you can’t condemn the violence unless you condemn those people who continue to argue the election was not real, that it’s being stolen.”

READ MORE: 'Too soon?' Don Jr. mocks brutal hammer attack with 'Paul Pelosi Halloween costume' meme

underwear and hammer gay tryst? musk twit consp theory from wacko blog?

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[[mma

  1. ### While discussing hammer assault on Paul Pelosi, Chris Plante plays The Beatles' Maxwell's Silver Hammers, sings “made sure she was dead”

10/29/22

CHRIS PLANTE (HOST): The break-in was, according to a police sergeant in San Francisco, at 2:27 a.m. – 2:27 a.m. California time, of course. And there is video of the break-in. So that probably rules out being invited in then, and all that.

...

But there's video of the break-in at 2:27 a.m., according to a San Francisco police sergeant. Alright. We got that going for us. That's the – that's the thing. And it does look like Nancy has an alibi, but that doesn't mean – I know. I kid. I kid. I just kid. Womp, womp, womp. Bang, bang. Maxwell's silver hammer.

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  1. ### A Fox News report about Paul Pelosi’s attacker, briefly annotated

10/28/22

twt

An assailant violently attacked Nancy Pelosi’s husband, Paul, with a hammer at Pelosi’s San Francisco residence. The New York Times reported that, “The intruder was in search of Speaker Pelosi, according to a person briefed on the attack, and confronted Mr. Pelosi in the couple’s home shouting: ‘Where is Nancy, where is Nancy?’"

While covering the attack, Fox News’ John Roberts listed some of the conspiracy theories the alleged assailant reportedly posted online, including transphobic language, COVID vaccine misinformation, and beliefs that a “global elite” was conspiring to steal Americans’ money. Roberts didn't mention was that all of these things are regularly heard on Fox during the 8 pm hour.

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JESSE WATTERS (CO-HOST): What I want is that I want this allegedperpetrator to be treated the exact same way if he had treated -- if he had attacked anybody else. Because a lot of people get hit with hammers. A lot of people get attacked. And a lot of the times they're out on bail the next day and it's a simple assault charge. So I don't know why this guy is being treated differently. He's facing what? Attempted homicide? He's in prison right now? We've seen people assault people all the time randomly with all kinds of weapons. And we see them released the next day. So I don't know why this guy's getting all of a sudden special treatment or different treatment because the victim was so high profile.

Remember, if you call on a welfare check, the left wants to send a social worker. What if a social worker had come to this call? You would have had a dead husband and you would have had a dead social worker. That's why you have to have police.

  1. ### Fox News host calls for the immediate release of man arrested for “attempted homicide” of Paul Pelosi

10/28/22

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https://www.alternet.org/2022/10/pelosi-gop/

A new analysis is exposing the real timeline of staged attacks against House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) while explaining why it should not be a surprise that the lawmaker and her husband were the victims of a home invasion.

The report, collectively written by The Washington Post's Ashley Parker, Hannah Allam, and Marianna Sotomayor, sheds light on how far-right Republicans have been depicting the top-ranking Democratic lawmaker as a target for several years. In fact, some have even suggested that she be assassinated.

In the report, the writers highlighted how the alleged home invasion assailant, identified as 42-year-old David Depape, has a history of echoing conspiracy theories. They also suggested that the Republican Party's disturbing rhetoric may also be a contributing factor to the uptick in politically charged threats and violence.

READ MORE: 'Everybody was surprised': Nancy Pelosi reacts to Mar-a-Lago search

According to the Post, "For many Democrats, the attack on Nancy Pelosi’s husband represents the all-but-inevitable conclusion of Republicans’ increasingly violent and threatening rhetoric toward their political opponents — a phenomenon that escalated under former president Donald Trump, who prided himself on his inflammatory oratory and who was often reluctant to denounce white nationalists and others spewing hate speech."

Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-CA) also said, "Sadly this attack was inevitable. Political violence is on the rise. And instead of GOP leaders condemning it, they condone it with silence or, even worse, glorification.”

As an example, the writers referenced thehistory of controversial remarks made by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.). On multiple occasions, the conspiracy-driven lawmaker has encouraged threats against Pelosi.

"But the threats against Pelosi have often been particularly ferocious and date back more than a decade, when Republicans worked to make her one of the faces of former president Barack Obama’s health-care law," they wrote.

READ MORE: Watch: Fox News tries to blame President Biden for violent attack on Speaker Pelosi’s husband

"More recently, CNN reportedthat in 2018 and 2019, Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) — who was elected to Congress in 2020 and quickly became known for her conspiracy theory-laden views — repeatedly expressed support for executing prominent Democratic politicians, including Pelosi."

"Greene liked a Facebook comment that said 'a bullet to the head would be quicker' as a way of removing Pelosi as speaker, CNN found. And in a video of a speech Greene gave promoting a 2019 petition she’d launched to impeach Pelosi for 'crimes of treason,' Greene calls Pelosi 'a traitor to our country' and says the speaker could be executed for treason," with Greene sen stating in a video,"It’s a crime punishable by death — is what treason is. Nancy Pelosi is guilty of treason.”

Michael Jensen, with the START consortium for terrorism research at the University of Maryland, also expounded on some of the problems that could arise when some individuals are targeted.

"If somebody sets their sights on these individuals and then they decide to mobilize, there’s virtually nothing stopping them,” Jensen said, later adding, "There was an opportunity for the more moderate elements of the Republican Party to distance themselves from the more radical elements and marginalize them, and be the start of the end of this wave. The exact opposite happened. What we saw instead was a doubling down on moving extremism into the mainstream.”

READ MORE: Trump lawyer dhillon  writes conspiratorial post questioning Paul Pelosi hammer assault

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mma 10 22 paul pelosi

Conspiracy theories about transhumanism profess that elites are attempting to turn human beings into partial machines that frequently has explicitly anti-transgender ideas. Former Trump aide Steve Bannon has frequently pushed this theory and praised Infowars’ Alex Jones for doing the same. (Progressive transhumanists reject the version of the ideology expressed by Bannon and Jones.)

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oct 28 out#

EMILY COMPAGNO (FOX NEWS HOST): Not everyone in their homes is safe as Paul Pelosi's situation has now demonstrated, frighteningly, and Jackie, I wonder, you know, is it too late, is the climate of violence, politically motivated or otherwise, again we don't know in this particular situation, is it too far to go back? Have the elected officials not done a good enough job of not only condemning violence across the board, but also turning down the temperature rather than sort of increasing rhetoric all across the board that maybe has people sort of riled up and taking things into their own hands, those sort of unfettered criminals and otherwise?

JACKIE DEANGELIS (FOX BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT): I think that's a great question, and again, we're waiting to find out what the motivation was, but there are two things that we could have in our hands there. You know, a crime situation that just happened more randomly or with some motivation but wasn't really targeted at the Pelosis per se. That shines a light at what's happening not only in San Francisco but all these other cities.If we have a situation where this is politically motivated, you have to step back and say, why is our country so divided? President Biden, you got up to the podium and said you were going to bring us together, and that was one of the things you promised people. It's one of the reasons they voted for you and they backed away from Trump because they did think that he was divisive. So why is this happening and why are we so polarized? It's a huge question right now. [semi-fasc?]

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beast

Intruder Reportedly Yelled ‘Where’s Nancy?’ During Attack on Paul Pelosi

‘VIOLENTLY ASSAULTED’

The 42-year-old suspect, who reportedly shared conspiracy theories about COVID and the 2020 election online, “has always had an opinion,” his stepmom told The Daily Beast.

Justin Rohrlich

Emily Shugerman

Decca Muldowney

Dan Ladden-Hall

Updated Oct. 28, 2022

A 42-year-old man, who reportedly shared COVID conspiracy theories online and lived with a nude activist, was arrested Friday morning for allegedly breaking into House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s home in San Francisco andbludgeoning her husband with a hammer.

Paul Pelosi was hospitalized after being “violently assaulted,” the Speaker’s spokesman said in a statement, by an intruder who reportedly broke in through a rear entrance at about 2:27 a.m.

The assailant was identified by San Francisco Police Chief William Scott as David DePape. Scott said officers encountered DePape and Mr. Pelosi “both holding a hammer” when they arrived. “The suspect pulled the hammer away from Mr. Pelosi and violently assaulted him with it. Our officers immediately tackled the suspect, disarmed him, took him into custody, requested emergency backup, and rendered medical aid.”

The motivation for the attack is still under investigation, Scott said. However, CNN reported that the intruder shouted, “Where is Nancy, where is Nancy?” after entering the home, and tried to tie Mr. Pelosi up “until Nancy got home.”

The intruder reportedly broke into the Pelosi home through a rear entrance.

KGO TV via ABC via REUTERS

According to CNN, DePape had posted YouTube videos about 2020 election conspiracies and the House committee investigating the Capitol riot and shared conspiracy theories about the origins of COVID-19 in other social media posts.

Reached by phone at her home in British Columbia, DePape’s stepmother, Teresa DePape, told The Daily Beast, “David has always had an opinion.”

“I’m one of these people who thinks everybody has an opinion, and I was raised when sticks and stones would break your bones, but words will never hurt you,” she said. “But hammers are not words.”

She said the family had not yet spoken to DePape, who remains in police custody, and DePape’s father, Gene, was at work and unavailable to comment.

She said her stepson chose to stay in B.C. with Gene when Gene divorced DePape’s mother. His only sibling, a sister, moved away, she said.

DePape eventually moved to California, got married, and had kids, Teresa said, describing her shock at the news of her stepson’s arrest. Gene told CNN his son followed a love interest to California about 20 years ago.

“I only have him as a good kid,” Teresa told The Daily Beast before getting off the phone to call the San Francisco PD, saying she wanted to speak to DePape first before commenting further. “Although, at this point, he’s not a kid anymore.”

DePape appears to have sold hemp jewelry, though the website for his business is currently down. (His only tweet reads “Mushroom Hemp Necklaces” and contains a broken link; his Pinterest page contains broken links to several multi-colored necklaces.)

Two relatives told CNN that DePape is estranged from his family, and an acquaintance from eight years ago said he was struggling with hard drugs at the time but was “trying to create a new life for himself.” She said she cut off contact with DePape after receiving “disturbing” emails in which he sounded “dangerous” and “out of touch with reality.” A second woman who worked with DePape about a decade ago said he told her he spoke to angels and that there was “a hard time coming.” Both women said he lived in a storage shed or storage unit at the time.

DePape’s last known address was in Berkeley, California, where he lived with nude activist Gypsy Taub. (Taub is perhaps best known for her nude nuptials in San Francisco, where DePape served as best man.) An SF Gate article from 2013 described the apartment as a three-bedroom, six-person flat that was “perpetually freezing.” DePape reportedly served as a “father figure” to Taub’s three children, who also lived in the apartment.

DePape, Taub, and her children attended a communal Thanksgiving dinner at a market in Oakland in 2008, according to the Oakland Tribune. Taub was quoted as saying, “We like to meet our neighbors. I want my children to learn that everyone is a human being and a friend.” Attempts to contact Taub on Friday were unsuccessful.

Two sources who spoke to the Associated Press said Mr. Pelosi sustained blunt force injuries to his head and body during the early morning attack, leaving him with bruising and severe swelling.

A spokesperson for Nancy Pelosi, who was in D.C. at the time, said her husband was taken to the hospital “where he is receiving excellent medical care and is expected to make a full recovery.”

Shattered panes of glass in what appeared to be the Pelosi home’s rear entrance were visible in footage from a local news chopper hovering over the scene.

The United States Capitol Police said in a statement that the Speaker was in D.C. with her protective detail at the time. It’s not clear what security detail was at the Pelosis’ residence, if any.

“Special Agents with the USCP’s California Field Office quickly arrived on scene, while a team of investigators from the Department’s Threat Assessment Section was simultaneously dispatched from the East Coast to assist the FBI and the San Francisco Police with a joint investigation,” Capitol Police said in a statement, adding that the assailant’s motive was still under investigation.

Larry Kamer, Mr. Pelosi’s spokesperson, told The Daily Beast on Friday morning that he did not have any information to provide.

Assaults are up 11 percent this year in San Francisco, and robberies are up 5 percent, although burglary has actually fallen significantly in 2022, according to statistics on the city police department’s website.

Threats against members of Congress, specifically, have skyrocketed recently, with the number of investigations launched by Capitol Police rising from 3,939 in 2017 to 9,625 in 2021, according to stats provided to The Hill last month.

Members have been granted additional funding for home security, but more is needed as threats continue to escalate, according to the AP.

According to a report released last week by Princeton University’s Bridging Divides Initiative, threats and harassment against public officials have reached “an inflection point.” Focused primarily on local officials, the report found “increasing general support for the use of threats and harassment... with respondents justifying such attacks on ideological grounds.”

Of 400 cases between 2020 and 2022, about 40 percent were related to election issues, 30 percent were related to education issues, and 29 percent to health issues—overwhelmingly COVID-19, the report found, noting that female officials were targeted 3.4 times more than men.

“Thank God [Nancy Pelosi’s] husband Paul is safe after being attacked in their home by an assailant,” Rep. Jackie Speier (D-CA) tweeted Friday. “While the motive is still unknown we know where this kind of violence is sanctioned and modeled.”

—with additional reporting by Zachary Petrizzo

===]]

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bipartisan gun bill months ago, modest cornyn caught shit?

an 8 22

House Oversight Committee Chairwoman Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.) has proposed two pieces of legislation aiming to incorporate more accountability measures for the firearm industry.

According to NBC News, the two bills seek to create penalties for gun manufacturers that sell "weapons of war" to civilian customers. The two measures focus on imposing tax increases and the creation of a criminal tracking system.

The first measure, the Firearm Industry Fairness Act, would "impose a 20% tax on the total revenue earned by manufacturers who produce assault weapons and high-capacity magazines."

READ MORE: New analysis explains why GOP believes the 'ideal' gun bill is no bill at all

The Democratic lawmaker explained that the money generated from the newly-imposed tax would be utilized for "gun violence prevention efforts and to support shooting victims."

The second piece of legislation, which is the Firearm Industry Crime and Trafficking Accountability Act, per the news outlet "would require every company that manufactures guns to create a system that tracks crimes committed with firearms they've sold, using data collected by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives."

"This summer, my Committee heard from those touched by gun violence in this country, including parents who lost their child, a doctor who lost his patients, and the mother of a young boy who lost his father," Maloney said in a statement. "These Americans, along with so many others from Uvalde, Buffalo, and Highland Park, urged Congress to take action to stop gun violence."

She added, "House Democrats have already passed a ban on assault weapons, but as we wait for the Senate to act, we must pursue other crucial reforms."

READ MORE: 'Quit filibustering it!': Angry constituents challenge Chuck Grassley over inaction on gun control

Per the House Oversight Committee, the proposed legislation would "mandate that those manufacturers cease distributing weapons to a retailer when they have reason to believe that the guns sold by that retailer are being trafficked or used for criminal purposes."

The latest follows a letter Maloney penned to executives from a number of gun manufacturers including Daniel Defense, Smith & Wesson Sturm, and Ruger & Co.

She noted that the information obtained from firearm manufaturers “has heightened the committee’s concern that your company is continuing to profit from the sale and marketing of weapons of war to civilians despite the harm these weapons cause."

READ MORE:'We did nothing': Texas GOP lawmaker criticizes state lawmakers for failure to incorporate stricter gun laws

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actual try at legal suppression or just a troll stunt to boost fundraising from the afflicted?

all purpose get out of jail card for libtard assholes?

FRREEEEEDUUUUUMMMB!

an 3 22

federal judge dismissed an anti-mask lawsuit against Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi on Wednesday, brought last year by three far-right-wing members of Congress, including Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene.The three extremist Republicans argued that the mask mandate, instituted to protect their fellow members of Congress and their staffs, was a violation of the First and the Twenty-Seventh Amendments.

The judge disagreed:

U.S. Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), Thomas Massie (R-KY), and Ralph Norman (R-SC) “said they were fined for entering the House to vote without wearing masks in May 2021,” Bloomberg Law reports.They were initially fined $500, but Congresswoman Greene has since racked up thousands of dollars in fines since last May.

“The representatives said they wanted to engage in a ‘protest against the double standard being enforced,’ and to demonstrate ‘the well-founded beliefs’ they shared that mask wearing ‘is not scientifically based’ and ‘not necessary for the vaccinated or naturally immune.'”

It was clear during oral arguments in December thatSenior U.S. District Judge Reggie Walton, a Bush 43 appointee, disagreed.

“Maybe if we took this pandemic seriously we wouldn’t have so many Americans in the grave,” Judge Walton said at the time, admonishing the three extremists.

In his ruling, Judge Walton was also dismissive of their victimization claim of being discriminated against for what the three called, “contrary viewpoint-based symbolic speech.”

Judge Walton also rejected their false claim of “recent scientific findings that the use of face coverings has no appreciable effect on slowing or halting the spread of COVID-19.”

Walton “said the consensus within the scientific community is clear that masks—and, in particular, well-fitting, protective masks—are effective in slowing the spread of the Covid-19 virus.”

A large part of their argument was the 27th Amendment makes it unconstitutional for them to be fined, which they claimed is a reduction in salary. The judge also tossed out that argument.

Here’s Congressman Massie complaining on Fox Business last year. “We’re ready to take this all the way to the Supreme Court,” he declared.[twt vid]

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random 12 21

Right Wing Round-Up: Pelosi’s Fake Mansion

Kyle MantylaBy Kyle Mantyla | November 30, 2021 5:32 pm

Leia Idliby @ Mediaite: Marjorie Taylor Greene and Nancy Mace Throw Down in Brutal Twitter Feud Over Boebert’s Racist Comments.

Cristina Cabrera @ Talking Points Memo: Another Video Shows Boebert Hurling Islamophobic Slurs At Omar Back In September.

Justin Baragona @ The Daily Beast: Fox Nation Host Compares Fauci to Nazi ‘Angel of Death’: ‘People All Across the World Are Saying This.’

Media Matters: Tucker Carlson calls Dr. Fauci “an even shorter version of Benito Mussolini.”

Jim Swift @ The Bulwark: Conservative Media Makes Up a Fake Florida Mansion for Nancy Pelosi.

Hemant Mehta @ Friendly Atheist: Evangelist: Your Circumcised Tithes Will Protect Your Family.

Tags: Lara LoganLauren BoebertMarjorie Taylor GreeneRobin BullockTucker CarlsonRound-Up