All purpose news and politics thread part VI: This Is Not The Time For Posing

[Panfoot]

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/0...testing-338217

Trump administration ending support for drive-thru testing sites!

Guess he wasn't joking, after all!

And the GOP knew it and supports this.

I'm starting to think Trump's whole idea is "If there is nobody left in the country to vote, I win by default right?"

[numberthirty]

No surprise, right?

Speaking of which, there's a drive-thru/walk-up testing site literally right around the corner from my street. It's been in operation for close to a couple of months now, I walk by there every weekday on my lunch break, some days, it's busy as heck, other days, not so much, but it's been there for the less well off in my neighborhood. I can't imagine what would happen if it were to shut down.

Starting to wonder just how folks are running the numbers on what stays up and running.

It's not like Illinois is some Republican stronghold that Trump has a bunch of sway over. That said, I heard about three or four different hospitals will be shuttering their "Covid Only..." wings just as the state really heads into the "Actually Opening Up..." stage where everything except public pools can open up.

Just feels really, really optimistic.

[PaulBullion]

I know the elections are 540 months away still, but these polls won't help to improve Trump's foul mood:

[Tami]

New Jersey city says it has bad cops. Here's why they can't get the green light to fire them

For a lesson in the bureaucratic slog New Jersey towns trudge through when they want to fire cops — even after a judge says they acted improperly — look no further than Hackensack.

Officials in this city have spent three years trying to fire a group of police officers connected to the warrantless search of an apartment in December 2016, and the legal entanglement could extend well into 2021.

Hackensack officials, the state Civil Service Commission and an administrative law judge have all weighed in, with the judge sustaining charges of incompetence, conduct unbecoming a public employee and neglect of duty against all but one of the officers. Still, though the cops remain unemployed by the city, Hackensack has not received the green light to order final termination for all of them.

The case illustrates how a combination of powerful police unions, job protections embedded in labor contracts and New Jersey’s extensive civil service rules can place an insurmountable roadblock in front of a town’s efforts to get rid of cops who break the rules, according to Jessica Henry, who teaches justice studies at Montclair State University.

[worstblogever]

On this date in 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, as well as 2019, "Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day" published profiles of Wisconsin Attorney General Brad Schimel, who we noted had elevated his career in Wisconsin politics by dragging his feet and refusing to prosecute cases against Republican Governor Scott Walker and Republican state legislator Joel Kleefisch when both were caught in ethical and potentially criminal endeavors in carrying out their offices. Schimel has gone on record to say he opposes minimum wage increases (during the greatest era of income inequality in our nation's modern history), and more importantly, he stated his desire to use his office to fight tooth and nail against honoring the Supreme Court's ruling in the Obergefell v. Hodges case, and even agreed his opposition to the law would be similar to those who opposed interracial marriage becoming legal 60 years ago. This of course made local reporters ask the question of if Schimel was a racist, and lo and behold after some digging, they found training videos from the State Department of Justice in 2009 and 2013 where Schimel made racist and sexist comments while instructing trainees, including putting on false accents to appear as racial caricatures. Of course, these details came up just prior to the 2014 election, and Schimel slid by and won office with 52% of the vote. Schimel's history of being terrible at his job and not pressing charges continued through 2015, apparently, as he decided against prosecuting oktwo Wisconsin police officers who gunned down a hostage during a siege at a motorcycle shop, with their body camera footage contradicting their version of events. He also to measures to remove environmental oversight from Wisconsin's water supply, and trust in big business interests to keep it safe. In 2017 alone, Schimel made headlines in Wisconsin for several controversies, including settling a case against a company caught as serial polluters without imposing a fine against them, claiming the company was sufficiently punished by making them invest in themselves to stop polluting in the first place and then dropping a fraud case against the wealthy Eliason brothers, where they faced 10 felony charges, instead, leaving the case to be handled in civil court and in lawsuits only. This, after a YEAR of trying to put a gag order on the case so no details about it leaked to the public. Then, the public discovered that he spent $10,000 of taxpayer money to create gold collector coins for himself, his staff, and Wisconsin Law Enforcement that say, “Kicking Ass Every Day”, by effectively saying his department was great, deserved them, and that they worked far harder than other state workers, like at the Wisconsin DMV. Schimel blatantly lied in a TV interview, Schimel claiming that Wisconsin does not have a back log of untested rape kits that have yet to be investigated when in reality… There were SIX THOUSAND OF THEM. And, in late April of 2017 a day after Brad Schimel claimed he would not be opening an investigation into potential voter fraud, he is threatened with being investigated himself by convicted felon and Breitbart “reporter” James O’Keefe. O’Keefe threatened to harass Schimel, he caved, and opened an investigation based on lies, at taxpayer expense. (Big surprise… they found no evidence of voter fraud.) In April of 2018, he got a little too honest and defended Wisconsin’s anti-democratic Voter ID law by proudly stating how it “helped Trump get elected”. (Thousands of voters were blocked from voting at the polls, particularly in Democratic-leaning districts.) Yeah, no more pretenses about mythical “voter fraud”, he outright admitted it helped swing a presidential election to Republicans, therefore, mission accomplished. A month later, in May of 2018, reports surfaced about how Schimel took time out of his busy schedule ten months prior in July of 2017 to attend an anti-gay conference in California hosted by a “Christian group”, the Alliance for Defending Freedom that’s actually more really of a “hate group”, by the definition of the Southern Poverty Law Center. Even worse for Schimel, there are e-mails that show he would have liked for no one to have noticed his little fun-times-hating-the-gays vacation stop, and his only defense for the trip was that it wasn’t on taxpayer expense. Of course, that’s because the ADF group itself paid for Schimel’s travel and hotel, which is a gift you have to report in your campaign finance reports, and he didn’t. On the ADF’s end… they apparently advised attendees on how to keep their attendance secret from the public, and how to avoid public records laws. Brad Schimel lost in the 2018 elections to Josh Kaul, a 36-year-old former federal prosecutor who worked in Baltimore, and has returned home to Wisconsin where his own mother once served at Attorney General. As his career seems over for now, we will set aside his profile at this time and take a look at another wacky Republican today instead. (Current crazy/stupid scoreboard, is now 882-45, since this was established in July 2014.)

[Tami]

New research explores how conservative media misinformation may have intensified the severity of the pandemic

The end result, according to one of the studies, is that infection and mortality rates are higher in places where one pundit who initially downplayed the severity of the pandemic — Fox News’ Sean Hannity — reaches the largest audiences.

[worstblogever]

Andy Harris

Welcome to what is the 882nd original profile here at “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day”, where we’ll be discussing the sitting U.S. House Representative from Maryland’s 1st Congressional District, Andy Harris, who was first elected to office in… yes, of course, the 2010 Tea Party Wave, after a failed Congressional campaign in 2008, and prior to that, a full decade in the Maryland State Senate from 1999-2009. That failed 2008 campaign involved Harris unseating incumbent GOP Congressman Gary Gilchrest by running to his right, and claiming that Gilchrest, a Vietnam veteran, was not truly supportive enough of the Iraq War during his time in Congress. Gilchrest ended up supporting Democrat Frank Kratovil in the general election, forcing Harris to try again in 2010. And Gilchrest is still disgusted with him until this day… which is understandable, given the circumstances.

Including the fact that Harris, a physician, ran for office by whipping up paranoia about the Affordable Care Act. But during his orientation in late 2010, he threw a tantrum that he would not be given health insurance immediately, and would have to wait all of two months until he was sworn in before it would kick in. Let us repeat that… the main who campaigned against socialized healthcare practically s*** himself in rage that he would have to wait two months to get some of it for himself.

Harris, the only Republican member of the Maryland delegation in the House, comes to our attention because while we would like to say he’s a son of a Hungarian immigrant father and Polish immigrant mother and that should make him a good example of a Republican with attitudes towards immigration… but no, it’s quite worse than that. Andy Harris likes to remember his father, Zoltan Harris, as a man who was taken to a Russian gulag for being a determined anti-Communist soldier… the timeline of that, however, neglects to mention that Zoltan Harris fought for the pro-Hitler Hungarian army that was fighting the Allies during World War II.

So, yes, neglecting to mention that your father was pro-Nazi is a concern.

More of a concern… the support for Hungarian fascists did not skip a generation, as Andy Harris has come out hard in support of Hungarian strongman and Putin ally Viktor Orban, actually writing it down on Congressional letterhead. And he’s snuck across the pond to speak at events in Budapest in favor of Orban, with his opening act being Sharon Slater, the head of an anti-LGBTQ hate group from Arizona who thinks that homosexuality is a “mental disorder” caused by childhood trauma that can be treated with gay conversion therapy. But Harris has gone as far as to write the U.S. State Department and ask them to pull the financial support our government gives towards journalists in Hungary, who, y’know, report on human rights violations being committed by Orban’s regime.

But that is not the only far-right Eastern European country where Harris has shown interest… in 2018, Harris planned to visit far-right Czech white nationalist Tomio Okamura with a delegation of true Congress-critters that included Dana Rohrabacher, Louie Gohmert, Paul Gosar, and of course, the ultimate racist in the House, Steve King. Not for nothing, but if your dad was in a pro-Nazi group and you didn’t hold the same ideals, maybe you wouldn’t want to hang out with trash like Okamura, who had called for the gassing of Jews, gays, and Roma.

But Andy Harris is not discriminating in the company he keeps, or political endorsements he gives… as in 2017, he endorsed Roy Moore even AFTER the public learned Moore had a long history of predatory behavior towards young girls (to say nothing of the rampant racism and homophobia). It's not a one off, where he sticks up for the worst people. After all, 2018, Harris came out hard in defense of Brett Kavanaugh, making accusations that his highly credible accuser, Christine Blasey Ford, was just “a troubled woman”, and her testimony should be disregarded.


I mean, there is no bottom for how gutless Andy Harris can be. He might pretend to be a patriot, but it’s hard to claim that when you go and vote against healthcare for 9-11 First Responders and call the Zadroga Act “fiscally irresponsible”. Or how in 2018 he was caught funneling campaign dollars to his wife illegally and was slapped with an ethics violation.

This has continued into current events, as he’s started feuding with fellow Republican and Maryland Governor Larry Hogan for responsibly keeping his state’s business closed during the Covid-19 pandemic. Harris compared Hogan’s “stay at home” order that applied to church services to “Communist China” and “North Korea”. Hogan, to his credit, blew Harris off, saying, “he’s got a right to say whatever crazy things he wants to say”.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

New research explores how conservative media misinformation may have intensified the severity of the pandemic

And, of course, Hamhocks, like every other talking head on Faux News made like Pontius Pilate and washed their hands (either publicly or privately) of any involvement for having made the severity of the pandemic worse than it is now.

[PaulBullion]

But her emails:

The Supreme Court ruled that the Suspension Clause of the Constitution, which allows people to bring challenges to their detention in federal court, doesn't apply to undocumented immigrants.

Justice Samuel Alito has the opinion. This is not good at all.

https://twitter.com/cristianafarias/...914574342?s=20

[worstblogever]

If all this wasn’t enough, then there’s his partisan voting record…

• On January 5th, 2011, Rep. Harris votes the first attempt by Republicans to repeal the Affordable Care Act. This would be the first of scores of times he tries to kill the ACA over the next 8 years.
• On February 18th, 2011, Andy Harris votes to defund Planned Parenthood.
• March 17th, 2011: Rep. Harris votes to cut funding to National Public Radio.
• January 15th, 2013: Andy Harris votes against Disaster Relief Funding for victims of Hurricane Sandy.
• February 28th, 2013: Harris votes against the reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act.
• June 19th, 2013: Andy Harris votes against restoring $20.5 billion towards the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program.
• September 30th, 2013: Rep. Harris votes for the 2013 Government Shutdown. When the vote came up seventeen days later to re-open the government, Harris voted to keep it closed.
• Feb 26th, 2014: Andy Harris goes "all in" on the faux-scandal surrounding the IRS researching SuperPACs by voting for the "Stop the Targeting of Political Beliefs by the IRS Act".
• July 10th, 2014: Harris votes for House Amendment 1040, to prevent the implementation of the dreaded United Nations Agenda 21 Treaty, because conspiracy theorists were paranoid about climate change being used for global domination.
• January 22nd, 2015: Andy Harris votes for HR 7, an anti-abortion bill that makes even some Republicans pause before voting for it because of its language that tries to define the conditions for what “rape” is, in it.
• March 3rd, 2015: Harris votes against funding the Department of Homeland Security as part of a Republican protest of President Obama’s executive orders on immigration.
• September 11th, 2015: Harris votes against the United States' nuclear treaty with Iran.
• September 18th, 2015: Rep. Harris votes for a bill with most House Republicans to defund Planned Parenthood, based on highly edited “sting” videos submitted by a Pro-Life advocacy group that were repeatedly debunked by investigators.
• November 19th, 2015: Harris votes for the American Security Against Foreign Enemies Act, reacting to the terror attacks in Paris by jihadists from France and Belgium by trying to create greater restrictions to keep out Syrian refugees, of whom exactly zero were involved in those attacks.
• February 16th, 2017: Harris votes for HJR 69, to make it legal for hunters on wildlife reserves to kill several species of hibernating bears or wolves while they’re sleeping.
• March 16th, 2017: Andy Harris votes for HR 1181, which would allow veterans deemed mentally incompetent to continue to own firearms, and not have them taken away without a judge's written order.
• May 4th, 2017: Harris votes for the GOP's healthcare plan, that would allow 24,000 more people to die a year. Oh, and a provision in the bill would make sure that Harris would be allowed to keep his healthcare plan as it exists under the ACA, which would be repealed for the rest of the country. He and his Republican compatriots threw themselves a beer bash to celebrate taking away healthcare from millions and then gloated about it with Donald Trump at a White House press conference.
• June 8th, 2017: Andy Harris votes for HR 10, the GOP’s attempt to repeal Dodd-Frank financial reform, because what the country really needs is to allow the big banks to make the same mistakes that imploded the economy only a decade earlier.
• October 3rd, 2017: Harris votes for HR 36, the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act, that would try to create an unconstitutional ban abortion at 20 weeks (even though medical science tells us fetuses do not have the capability to feel pain until 29 weeks).
• December 19th, 2017: Andy Harris votes for HR 1, the GOP’s $1.7 trillion tax cut to benefit the wealthiest Americans and corporations permanently that coincidentally also removes the Affordable Care Act’s individual mandate and kicks 13 million people off their health insurance.
• February 18th, 2018: Rep. Harris and his fellow Republicans decide that poor big businesses are suffering too much at the hands of the Americans with Disabilities Act too much, and vote for HR 620, which would strip most of the civil rights protections guaranteed by it.
• January 22nd, 2019: Harris votes against HR 676, which would prevent Donald Trump from doing the unthinkable and walking away from our allies in NATO to appease the Russians.
• January 23rd, 2019: Rep. Harris voted against HR 648, because he was gleefully enjoying the longest government shutdown in history.
• January 27th, 2019: Andy Harris votes against HJR 30, which was meant to express disapproval of Donald Trump not acting against Russian Federation for attack Harris our democracy.
• February 28th, 2019: Harris votes against HR 1112, a bill which would have required universal background checks on all firearm purchases, and close the gun show loophole.
• March 7th, 2019: Harris votes against HR 183, a resolution to condemn anti-Semitism as a hateful extension of intolerance.
• March 14th, 2019: Rep. Harris votes against HJR 46, which sane members of Congress voted for to reject Donald Trump’s “national emergency” regarding the U.S. border and his attempts to reallocate funds for a border wall without Congressional approval.
• April 4th, 2019: Andy Harris is one of 158 Republicans who choose to vote against the re-authorization of the Violence Against Women Act, likely because they feel the 2nd Amendment remaining absolute is more important than preventing people with a history of domestic abuse from owning a firearm (which statistics show, makes them more likely to use those firearms against women in their lives).
• May 17th, 2019: Harris votes against The Equality Act, which would have prevented discrimination towards Americans based on their gender identity or sexual orientation.
• June 4th, 2019: Rep. Harris votes against the Dreamers Act, because he’s too xenophobic and partisan to care about immigration reform.
• July 12th, 2019: Harris is one of 12 Republicans who vote against the re-authorization of the Zadroga Act to provide healthcare to 9/11 First Responders.
• July 16th, 2019: Andy Harris votes against a resolution to condemn Donald Trump for his racist statements that four people of color in Congress should “go back where they came from”.

Maryland’s 1st Congressional District has a +14 Republican lean, which is amazing considering out of the rest of the state’s districts, the next most conservative is a +6 Democratic lean. Andy Harris isn’t likely to go anywhere unless he gets a primary challenge… but that could be more likely given with Steve King on his way out in January, the man with the next most conspicuous ties to European white nationalists is easily Harris. He’s currently starting to feel the pressure that’s sure to come in November when Donald Trump serves as the albatross upon the entire GOP’s ancient mariner. He’s been spotted by the DC media screaming at White House staff. Even if he survives re-election in 2020… after redistricting in 2020, Harris could be looking at a very different district that won’t make his presence at the Capitol as easy.

At least, we hope not. The less folks buddying up to white nationalists in Congress that we have, the better.

[Mister Mets]

But her emails:


https://twitter.com/cristianafarias/...914574342?s=20

It was a 7-2 decision.

https://apnews.com/d773ac5bdd0ac3eed...ign=SocialFlow

If Hillary Clinton had won the White House, it would be likely be a 6-3 decision because Kennedy would still be on the court.

[PaulBullion]

It was a 7-2 decision.

https://apnews.com/d773ac5bdd0ac3eed...ign=SocialFlow

If Hillary Clinton had won the White House, it would be likely be a 6-3 decision because Kennedy would still be on the court.

That's assuming this case would even have been brought to the SCOTUS under a Clinton presidency.

[Tami]

Screenshot_2020-06-25 (1) Joy Reid on Twitter Oh my God That is one hell of a jarring image to s.jpg

I can see how this would make them anxious. Even I would have been confused and concerned if I walked into that garage and saw it, and I'm not Black.

[Jack Dracula]

I was able to link to it, but it's not free access.

"Terrorists' Lawyers Received 9/11 Files"

"Sensitive records in lawsuit were not given to families of victims"

The lawsuit is going after Saudi Arabia, and apparently the lawyers for the families had to do a database search to learn that the FBI provided sensitive files to Saudi Arabia but would not provide those same records to the Lawyers representing the families.

The Saudis have had their claws deep into our government since the 1960's. Every Presidential administration since has bent the knee to some extent. Our current President may be indebted to them personally through bank loans arranged in the UAE by our Son-in-law-in-chief Jared Kushner.

[kidfresh512]

Dead people got $1 billion in COVID-19 stimulus checks, watchdog says

WASHINGTON — The federal government’s internal watchdog said Thursday that the IRS sent stimulus checks to more than 1 million dead people — worth more than $1 billion — under the coronavirus relief package approved earlier this year.
In the first of a series of reports on the government’s coronavirus response, the Government Accountability Office also warned that the popular Paycheck Protection Program has had limited safeguards and insufficient guidance and oversight planning, increasing the risk that borrowers may misuse or improperly receive loans.

"There is a significant risk that some fraudulent or inflated applications were approved,” the report states.

The report noted that as of April 30, nearly 1.1 million dead people received a stimulus check, totaling $1.4 billion, and urged the IRS to determine the best way to recoup the money.

Yet the Trump administration fights oversight and fights Congress at every step on trying to do its duty calling the Agency heads to account and looking into where all these trillions in money is going. If it wasn't for the media looking into this and digging into following the money we wouldn't have a clue where all the waste and fraud is going.

But, we are supposed to worry about non existent voter fraud by expanding mail voting to protect citizens. They whine up and down about that with 0 evidence. But, then fight having to explain and make sure the money allocated for Covid relief is going to where it should.