Too Many Outrages to Keep Track of

...maybe that's the point

As I try to cull out and comment on the news items and events that I think need to be focused on and share them with you I’ve lately been overwhelmed by the choices. It seems one four-alarm-fire after another is licking at our institutions and democracy, always with a MAGA Republican (alas, today there is no other kind of “Republican”) holding the flamethrower and another dozen throwing gas on the fire.

So in this edition of “Out-Takes and Sidebars” I am not gonna choose. I’ll feed you several stories with minimal comment and provide a liberal number of links that allow you to delve deeper where you wish.

AS ALWAYS I HOPE YOU WILL SHARE THE MATERIAL — ON FACEBOOK OR WHATEVER SOCIAL MEDIA YOU ARE ON…BY EMAILING IT TO, NOT ONLY TO PEOPLE WHO WILL FIND COMMON CAUSE WITH IT, BUT ESPECIALLY TO THOSE WHO ARE OBLIVIOUS TO THESE OUTRAGES AND THE EXISTENTIAL DANGER THEY REPRESENT.

Republican Project: Deconstruction of the Rule of Law in Service to Trump

One of my recent blogs highlighted all of the national GOP-ers who were abandoning their day jobs to run to NYC to undermine the legal system. That got worse after Trump was quickly convicted by a JURY OF HIS PEERS on all 34 counts of falsifying business records in order to cover up hush money paid in service of interfering with the electorate’s knowledge so as to influence an election. As Jennifer Rubin wrote in the WAPO, “The MAGA crowd has moved from attempting to delegitimize an election to attempting to delegitimize the judicial system — from defaming election workers to defaming jurors. In keeping with other fascist movements, the MAGA cult attempts to undermine every institution and person resisting its authoritarian leader.”

Here’s just two of the dozens of examples I could have chosen:

• Ted Cruz: “Number one, I’m angry, I’m furious, and number two, I’m heartbroken. I’m angry because we’re seeing a grotesque abuse of the justice system. It is a travesty of justice that has unfolded in New York. And I’m heartbroken because the rule of law matters in America. [We] have spent our adult lives fighting to defend the rule of law, and we have a justice system that is supposed to ensure equal justice under law for everyone…the New York justice system made itself a global laughingstock [with] a political decision that every banana republic in the world recognizes.”

• The “Accidental Speaker,” Mike Johnson: “I think that the justices on the court — I know many of them personally — I think they’re deeply concerned about [Trump’s conviction], as we are. So I think they’ll set this straight, but it’s going to take awhile.”

There was one exception among elected or active “R” politicians. Larry Hogan, who left office in one of the bluest states with an approval rating of 77% (an astonishing 81% among Democrats!), said prior to the jury announced its verdict:

“Regardless of the result, I urge all Americans to respect the verdict and the legal process. At this dangerously divided moment in our history, all leaders—regardless of party—must not pour fuel on the fire with more toxic partisanship. We must reaffirm what has made this nation great: the rule of law.”

For sticking his head up he got these responses, from...

• Chris LaCivita, a Trump aide who is also a top Republican National Committee official: “You just ended your campaign.”

• Lara Trump, the RNC Chair-by-Nepotism: “I will tell you one thing. I don't support what he just said there. I think it's ridiculous. He doesn't deserve the respect of anyone in the Republican Party at this point and, quite frankly, anybody in America, if that's the way you feel. That's very upsetting to hear that.”

To my knowledge, no one wearing a red jersey or an “R” on their chest came to Hogan’s aid. All you need to know about the character quotient in that party, and their posing as the party of “law and order.”

But here’s how one historian characterized what is going on in the MAGA age:

“We’ve entered new political & legal territory as a Nation. Donald Trump will now force every GOP candidate to trash our judicial system. There will be a chorus of poison likely worse than what we heard before Jan. 6th.  Should he win, he’d have a more toxic mandate than in ‘17.” – Historian Tim Naftali

Joe Biden said what any responsible public figure should have said:

“The American principle that no one is above the law was reaffirmed. Donald Trump was given every opportunity to defend himself. It was a state case, not a federal case. And it was heard by a jury of 12 citizens—12 Americans, 12 people like you . . . That’s how the American system of justice works. And it’s reckless, it’s dangerous, and it’s irresponsible for anyone to say this was rigged just because they don’t like the verdict.”

A glimmer of hope? “Meanwhile, More Than Half of Voters Approve of Trump’s New York Conviction.”

“It Was Martha-Ann, Not Me!” — Alito Further Sinks Supreme Court Credibility

It took 3+ years, but a bizarre episode that had been buried came to light. Seems that in January 2021, after 60-some courts had rebuked the “stop the steal” claims, and AFTER the wide ranging conspiracy to overturn the Presidential election culminated in the January 6 violence that Trump provoked (a conspiracy, by the way, that included Alito’s colleague Clarence Thomas’s wife!), a flag associated with the J-6 rebels flew at Alito’s house in the Virginia suburbs.

The Justice and the Missus

Subsequently, it was revealed that during the summer of 2023 another flag associated with Christian Nationalism — which was also visible among the January 6 rioters — flew over the Alito’s Long Beach Island (NJ) beach house. Amid calls for his recusal from the various January 6 cases before the Supreme Court because of perceived bias, Alito blamed his wife for the flags and apparently offered an explanation that included a false timeline. According to Jonathan V. Last of The Bulwark: “The problem is that Justice Alito lied to the public.”

Of course, he’s refused to recuse. And Maryland Congressman Jamie Raskin suggested that the DOJ and John Roberts both had the power to challenge Alito’s decision. So far, neither has acted. Raskin wrote in a NY Times guest essay:

Many people have gloomily accepted the conventional wisdom that because there is no binding Supreme Court ethics code, there is no way to force Associate Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas to recuse themselves from the Jan. 6 cases that are before the court. Justices Alito and Thomas are probably making the same assumption.

But all of them are wrong…

The U.S. Department of Justice …can petition the other seven justices to require Justices Alito and Thomas to recuse themselves not as a matter of grace but as a matter of law…specifically the due process clause, and the federal statute mandating judicial disqualification for questionable impartiality, 28 U.S.C. Section 455…The constitutional and statutory standards apply to Supreme Court justices. 

Read it all here.

As usual, Democrats have not vocally pushed for this. As one of them once said: “We always bring a butter knife to a gunfight.”

Imagine what the other side would be doing….

Johnson Appoints a Seditionist and a Pill-Pusher to the House Intelligence Committee

Pennsylvania’s Scott Perry was one (of at least 11) of the guys Trump was referring to when he implored DOJ leadership to “just say it was corrupt and leave it to me and the Republican congressmen.” In fact, he may have been a ringleader. And he was one of those who sought a pardon.

The hapless and comical Ronny Jackson — the former WH physician who attested to Trump’s “excellent health” and “incredible genes” — was rewarded for his flattery when Trump nominated him to be Secretary of Veterans Affairs. He was, however, forced to step aside amid the allegations of professional misconduct that ultimately led to his military demotion amid allegations that he mistreated subordinates, sexually harassed a woman and drank and took sleeping pills while serving as the White House physician.¹

This checkered history did not stop his Texas district from electing him to represent them in Congress in 2020, however.

Apparently these were the most qualified MAGAs that the Accidental Speaker Mike Johnson could find to fill two seats on one of the House’s most sensitive — and important — committees, “prompting criticism from members of both parties.”²

It was reported that both appointments were made on the orders of Trump, who wants no one with any independence from him anywhere near a committee that might look into his ties to …..??

Bannon Sentenced, Will (Finally) Be Jailed (for Far to Short a Term) 1252 Days After Declaring (on 1/5/21): “All Hell is Going to Break Loose Tomorrow”

Bannon will have to go to jail — not for his likely and obvious role in the January 6 riots — but for refusing a subpoena to testify about what he knew about it. Despite his refusal to testify, listen here to what the J-6 committee learned anyway. Bannon was first sentenced in October 2022 but allowed to stay out of prison while he appealed. So he was free to continue to spew poison into the blood of the MAGA crowd; and that he did…every day. Unfortunately, the sentence is for a paltry four months.

Johnson Names Trump Allies to Intelligence Panel, Prompting Concerns - NY Times

1.

2. Ibid.