Week of China, War, Voting Rights, Slush Fun
Trump Xi‑Whipped, VRA Gutted, Polls Trend Dem, Media Mush

I suppose he now needs a new distraction from his China visit which was a distraction from his attack on the Iran thugacracy which was a distraction from a set of files hidden somewhere in the Department of Justice.

There was nothing of value Fox hosts could report on anything Trump actually accomplished, so they glowed over variations of this:

Quoting Jesse Watters:

Yikes!
More detailed information is presented by Juliet in 52 minutes of entertaining podcast.

One passage stuck with me from his anti-slavery message-filled The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. The Widow Douglas takes in young Huck and reprimands him for smoking, a mean practice and wasn’t clean.

My blogging friend and occasional mentor Infidel753 continues his spirited, well researched, defense of Israel. In this segment, he presents Bill Maher with one of his trademark New Rule presentations. He attacks the left (which is to say folks like me) for being taken over by a vivid and unreasoning antisemitism.

As with many of his monologues, Bill’s objective is not to argue, but to jeer.

That’s okay with me. Jeering at the opposition can be healthy.
In fact, (ready?)
…of course that’s all right, because I done it myself:

Bill’s primary jeer concerns hypocrisy. He can make a good case for that.

Sadly, he ignores the obvious points that we can, instead, find in the excellent writings of Infidel himself.

Instead, Bill uses two tactics that are hopelessly flawed.

The first is to conflate any and all criticisms of Israel, and specifically of Prime Minister Netanyahu, with hatred of Jews as a group.

Bill makes a good case for Zionism. The extraordinary hatred against Jews for being Jews is not a passing phenomenon. That hatred justifies a permanent homeland, and Bill correctly shows that with a withering series of examples. I must confess to being more than a bit biased on this. By dictionary definition (I looked it up), I am and always have been a Zionist.

To equate criticism, even harsh criticism, even incorrect criticism, of Israel with antisemitism parallels too closely with long ago attacks on the patriotism of those of us who once opposed the Vietnam War.

And Benjamin Netanyahu? Really?

The other flaw in Bill’s presentation is reflexive whataboutism:

That’s how you know?

That last is partly illustrated with this:

Bill’s standard would tend to disqualify any protest by anyone at any time against any injustice. After all, aren’t there worse cases of oppression in the world?

In fact, circumstance does legitimately elevate some horrors to our immediate attention.

If we are participating, even in the sense of supplying arms, we have a greater interest. And we should.

If emphatic intervention can mitigate suffering and crush oppression, that opportunity can also and should also capture our interest.

Proximity and treaty obligation can be a factor as well.

In the case of Uighurs, active participation by unprincipled American politicians caught my attention years ago.

Although Fair and Unbalanced was hacked into and destroyed by a Moscow based Russian group, I was able to retrieve a few articles, beginning shortly after that site published my first post in 2008, on the oppression of Uighurs by Communist China.

I pointed out the participation in the smear campaign by American politicians mindlessly parroting Communist China’s propaganda against this intensely pro-American group.

It seems Obama had taken an interest in protecting Uighurs fleeing from China’s concentration camps, and some political figures were reflexively anti-Obama. Besides, these refuges were immigrants. Even worse, they were Muslim. That they were more pro-American than most American politicians didn’t matter.

And, to me, that made their defense more necessary.

The bedrock principle was and is as simple and as ancient as this:

Collective guilt against individuals because of an accident of birth is simply wrong.

Bill Maher does briefly, and only briefly, touch on what should be that hardcore first principle:

The case against antisemitism should flow from that.
It should be more than conflation and whataboutism.

If we want thoughtful, carefully researched, informed, and capable defense of Israel, of Netanyahu, of actions against Gaza, of indifference toward Palestinians on the West bank, and the continuation of the war against the brutally theocratic Iranian regime, we must look past Bill Maher’s jeering section.
We cannot rely on the boobocracy of the Trump administration.
We certainly cannot search for wisdom from MAGA folk on social media.

For better discussion, for vigorous debate, we must go to more capable and honest minds.

Like Infidel.

The pictures are good.
The links help.

Hegseth has been running our national defense as a continuing series of Fox News diatribes.

After we hear about Trump’s Department of Justice ordering the IRS to never, not ever, at any time from now to forever, audit Trump’s tax returns, or those of any member of his family, we come to a new bogus prosecution.

This on the heels of a bogus settlement between Trump’s DOJ and Trump his own self awarding $1.776 billion (with a B) to the pro-Trump January 6 insurrectionists. You may remember the lynch mob sending police officers to the hospital while searching the Capitol for Senators and members of Congress to kill. The fund is for the unjust suffering these Capitol tourists endured through prosecution, conviction, and time in prison for what we saw on our televisions.

Journalist Marcy Wheeler at EmptyWheel says there is more.

Remember Judge Aileen Cannon? The judicial Trump sock puppet in robes who kept maneuvering to impede any legal suffering by Trump for stealing and hiding tons and tons of documents?

When Trump was elected and the long delayed (by Judge Cannon) judicial proceeding was dropped, she ordered the investigation report sealed and kept from the public (ready?) ever and ever, from now to forever.

Marcy Wheeler finds that one of the prosecutors is now to be prosecuted by Trump’s DOJ for preserving at least some of the evidence.

Of what is she accused?

I see nothing in the Wheeler report about anyone ever storing any documents in a locked bathroom. Except, perhaps a faint implication:

Marcy Wheeler speculates on motive and legal consequence. One likelihood:

Here is why:

A better option:

Just in case you prefer a complete transcript (PDF)…

Remember the good old days, when corrupt politicians had the decency to at least try to hide corruption?

Shockingly, the report notes the scandal is not an Epstein thing.

James has a hard, very hard, time buying it.

Tiffany voted to overturn the 2020 election, opposed the war with Iran, voted for the war with Iran, loves the Trump tariffs, came out for state tax relief, lobbied against state tax relief, and campaigns for state tax relief.

James notices more:

Well…
    …okay so there is that…

She disagrees:

In Rural Missouri and elsewhere, she sees progress:

One example:

And then this:

She has details on one legal challenge by police officers the mob attacked, with resulting injuries and deaths. And there is a little resistance from Democrats and enough Republican Senate and Congressional members of Congress to pose serious problems.

She quotes from that suit as she reviews some of what actually happened that violent day, and why some of the insurrectionists were later charged.

The same analysis is now available in audio format, as Richardson narrates in podcast.

tengrain discovers an upside in ballots and courtrooms.

As if to emphasize that, Trumpers go all out to defend the slush fund.
One of several notable examples:

This is Trump shortly after that riot, trying hard to distance himself from the lynch mob he sent to storm Congress:

Trump’s throwing under the bus the criminal insurrectionists who had operated at his direction and Officer Fanone’s amazed reaction begin at about the 2‑minute mark:

He goes to the publication for which he writes and humbly offers a better way:

Okay, maybe not so humble.

Our favorite Earth-Bound Misfit notices another tripwire in the 14^th.

Trump is negotiating with himself the Treasury Department he controls. He wants millions of dollars to go to January 6 insurgents who stormed the Capitol in 2001, beating police officers bloody, hunting for legislators to kill.

One variation on the idea that they were completely innocent is they were just peaceably assembling to visit the building as tourists. Whatever the reasoning, they are said by Trump to have been unjustly persecuted by the American justice system.

So they are deserving of compensation for all their trouble after their lynch mob tried to kill any legislators they could find…

But it seems Section 4 of the 14^th is a largely unreported roadblock.

Mike John, Republican Speaker of the House of Representatives:

James Madison, American founder, 1819:

Sadly, the object of their worship was not himself able to attend, drawn as Trump was to playing golf instead.

It can be tough to lose a competition, but fair is fair. Golf wins again.

PZ Myers takes a look at complaints from creationists at Discovery Institute that scientists are too darn smug.

As I see it, complete understanding of another’s lifetime experience is not possible. Still, we try.
Empathy and help can come from the slightest insights.
Jack guides us with each small glimpse.

After a confrontation friendly nonconfrontational discussion with his wife, Dave goes entirely hypothetical, beginning with an acknowledgment on behalf of those of us of the male persuasion:

Then he goes entirely hypothetical with a completely imaginary female type person his wife may recognize from some sort of uh classic literary fiction.

Okay, he then caves to conflict avoidance and focuses on male issues, mostly concerning zippers.