Saturday Report 3/16/24 - When did it become a crime for two consenting adults to have an affair?

The Best of the Rest of the News

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— When did it become a crime for two consenting adults to have an affair? The white Republican Judge Scott McAfee, former president of the College Republicans and a member of the Federalist Society at the University of Georgia who is up for reelection this fall, has ruled that Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis has to fire her lead prosecutor because they had a romantic relationship. I’ve referred to this on the air in the past — to quote Clarence Thomas from his confirmation hearing— as a “high-tech lynching,” and stand by that. Nathan Wade was only picked after several other high profile prosecutors turned down the job; not one bit of evidence was produced demonstrating either of them financially benefited from their relationship or this prosecution — to the contrary, both have cost them dearly, both in terms of finance, security, and personal reputation. In fact, he took the job at considerably less than his normal rate of pay and at great personal risk, given how rabid and violent Trump supporters are against Black people who dare challenge him. What astonishes me is how even commentators on MSNBC and other “left” venues are condemning Willis for “poor judgment.” Georgia is only one of multiple swing states where Donald Trump criminally tried to steal the election through electoral college fraud, but it’s the only state where a prosecutor has had the courage to try to hold him and his co-conspirators to account. No matter how this case goes forward, the Trump team has succeeded in putting every prosecutor in America, particularly those who are Black or female, on notice that they go after Trump at their own personal peril. Which, of course, is exactly how fascists have operated throughout history.

— Former RNC Chairman implies Trump takeover of the party is good news for Democrats. Michael Steele, former RNC Chair and now an MSNBC host, points out how Trump is an incompetent businessman who relies on grift and scams for his “successes,” and that’s not a formula that will work running a political party. Already, major Republican donors are backing away, concerned that their contributions will no longer support congressional, state, and local Republican candidates and races. Trump famously doesn’t tolerate anybody who doesn’t suck up to him and stroke his ego; already a bloodless (so far) “Night of the Long Knives” purge of the RNC has occurred, as minority outreach, early voting, and local support programs around the country were closed this week. Trump’s hubris and ego often make him his own worst enemy, but Democrats should never underestimate his feral, psychopathic cunning and utter lack of a moral or ethical core. I’m expecting him to use the RNC as a personal piggy bank while promoting more hate and violence through the organization he has now corrupted.

— Now that Donald Trump has officially agreed with the GOP’s 70+ year effort to cut Social Security benefits and gut Medicare, it’s safe to say, as Nobel Prize winning Economist Paul Krugman recently pointed out in The New York Times, “Social Security and Medicare are on the ballot.” Republicans and their billionaire owners have hated Social Security and Medicare since they were put into law in 1935 and 1965 respectively, calling both programs “socialism” and “communism” that “takes from the rich to redistribute wealth to the lazy.” ’Nuff said…

— “Foreclosure King” Steve Mnuchin may organize a bid to buy TikTok. One of the big points Viktor Orbán made when he addressed CPAC in Dallas last year was that Republicans needed to own all of American media and social media, like he and his oligarch cronies have done in Hungary and Putin has done in Russia. Now the man who made his millions throwing over 30,000 families out of their homes during the 2008 housing crisis and leveraged his position as Trump’s Treasury Secretary into a billion-dollar grift from the Saudi dictator, says he’s going to try to organize a group of investors (presumably including the Saudis, who, for years, owned about 7 percent of Fox “News”), to buy the social media site if Congress and President Biden force a divestiture from its Chinese Communist Party-affiliated masters. Since Elon Musk took over Twitter, most progressives with any sort of profile have seen their followers stagnate (I’ve added fewer than a thousand in over a year, for example) while rightwing accounts have exploded, sometimes by the millions, because the new algorithm apparently promotes conservatives and shadow bans progressives. Facebook isn’t far behind in tilting hard toward rightwingers after Mark Zuckerberg‘s secret private meetings with Trump in the White House, and if Mnuchin buys TikTok it’ll be a trifecta. For what it’s worth, I’ve added daily posts to Tribel, Spoutible, Mastadon, Bluesky, Threads, Substack Notes, and Post News: you may want to consider checking them out, as all seem to be progressive-friendly or at least neutral.

— Fareed Zakaria asks, “Is America as determined as Putin?” The murderous Russian dictator, who has a growing following among Republicans and those who claim to be the “far left,” recently told an interviewer that seizing all of Ukraine is “a matter of life and death” for Russia. In fact, it’s more a matter of life and death for Putin: dictators who lose wars — even stupid ones — generally don’t have a long lifespan. When Russia hacked the RNC back in 2016, they must have gotten some really juicy stuff (are you listening, Lindsay Graham?) on the GOP, as more and more Republicans are falling into line with Trump’s obsession around fastening his lips to Putin’s ass and selling out the people of Ukraine. As are some so-called “lefties,” although their motivations are generally more financial: it’s a great way to “stand out from the crowd” and get support from Putin- and Xi-aligned media outlets, social media, and oligarchs. Zakaria points out that “time is not on Putin’s side,” but his apparent control over useful idiots like Mike Johnson and Donald Trump is causing America to hesitate in supporting our democratic ally who we pledged to stand with when we, Russia, and the UK signed the Budapest Accord in 1994. If Putin wins, expect Xi to take Taiwan and WWIII to begin in Europe and Asia…

— Crazy Alert! Republican politician says she wants President Obama executed on live television to raise money for the GOP. According to CNN, Michelle Morrow, a recent winner of a North Carolina Republican Primary, said: “I prefer a Pay Per View of him in front of the firing squad. I do not want to waste another dime on supporting his life. We could make some money back from televising his death.” Sick and twisted doesn’t begin to describe today’s Republican Party.

— Hunter in a Farmer’s World Alert! How to Avoid Becoming the Victim of the ADHD Industry: We have in this country a sickness-based health-care industry, rather than a wellness-based one…

— Video of the week: every woman in America should watch this:

You can also view it on Xitter here.