Saturday Report 7/27/24 - Trump chickens out on debating Kamala, proving once & for all, that even roosters have their limits...

The Best of the Rest of the News

— Project 2025 mastermind's alarming ties to radical catholic sect Opus Dei revealed. The Catholic Church spends, both directly and indirectly, billions of dollars a year in America, much of it devoted to influencing public policy, particularly around abortion and birth control. Now, reporting in The Guardian discloses that Kevin Roberts, the head of the Heritage Foundation that’s spearheaded Project 2025, is (along with Leonard Leo and possibly several members of the Supreme Court) a member of the little-known and secretive Catholic group Opus Dei (“work of God” in Latin). One of Opus Dei’s cornerstone principles, according to the report, is that there should be no such thing as a wall of separation between church and state. And a read of Sam Alito’s Dobbs decision shows that he agrees with that sentiment, taking the specifically Catholic view — and imposing it on America — that a human is a human upon conception, rather than, for example, the legal definition under Roe v Wade or the definitions of other major world religions, that a fetus is a human when viable outside the mother’s womb or at birth. Is it “anti-Catholic” to point out that every current Republican appointee to the Court is Catholic and appears devoted to imposing the Catholic religion’s perspective about “life” (and, according to Clarence Thomas, homosexuality, marriage, and birth control) on America? Not a chance, although I often hear from Catholics who think it’s wrong that I point out what their church is doing. Frankly, I’ll stop mentioning the Church’s involvement in American politics and public policy when they stop inserting themselves into our politics and public policy. Until then, there needs to be more mention of this rather than less; imagine if it were Moonies on the Court imposing the late Reverend Moon’s religious views on America. Or hardcore Muslims arguing that women should be wearing hijabs and prevented from driving? There would be hell to pay in the media. The fact that the Catholic Church is so rarely mentioned is another example of how deeply it’s penetrated the halls of power in America. George Washington, Ben Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and Thomas Paine wouldn’t have stood for this intrusion of organized religion into our politics and policy, and neither should we.

— Is JD Vance the new Dan Quayle? Vance, a recent (2019) convert to hard-right Catholicism, wondered out loud what would happen if “every day (Jewish) George Soros sends a 747 to Columbus to load up disproportionately Black women to get them to go have abortions in California. … [I]f that happens, do you need some federal response to prevent it from happening?” He added, “And I’m pretty sympathetic to that actually.” Setting aside the racism implicit in the question (we already get that he’s probably a racist; he’s a Republican), it raises an interesting question: how is he proposing federal authorities should police this? Should every woman going through TSA screening also have a quick ultrasound or X-ray to determine if she’s pregnant? A urine test (maybe a long row of porta-potties could be placed along the TSA line)? Or just fill out a form “under penalty of criminal perjury” certifying that they’re not pregnant? That last would fit with Vance and Ted Cruz’s letter to HHS Secretary Javier Becerra demanding that police gain the legal right to demand health, menstruation, and abortion records from the physicians of every woman in America to catch Red state women heading to Blue states for abortions; they could just later compare the records with the forms and imprison those women who committed perjury by claiming they weren’t pregnant when they got on the plane. But how will they enforce this when women just drive across state lines? Or take busses or Amtrak where there’s no TSA? Inquiring minds want to know. Increasingly, as more and more of Vance’s history and worldview become known, it’s appearing that Trump made a blunder of epic proportions in throwing this not-too-bright political newbie into the wild world of presidential politics. Dan Quayle — who convinced Mike Pence not to accept the fake electors and overturn the election — is looking better every day. (Last minute addendum: Anthony Scaramucci, who knows Trump well from having served in his administration, says he fully expects Trump to dump Vance any day: “It’s just a question of how many Scaramuccis J.D. is going to last.” Stay tuned…)

— House Democrats Launch Bold Crusade to Elevate American Workers to New Heights. America’s first middle class, which emerged in the years after WWII because of changes in labor and tax laws put into place by President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s administration, was largely created by the power of organized labor. The main reason our middle class shrank over 15 percent between 1981 and 2020 was the relentless war on unions Republicans waged and Democrats (until Biden) generally failed to fight. To rebuild our middle class, Democrats in the House of Representatives just introduced the Labor Enforcement to Securely (LET’S) Protect Workers Act that would tighten child labor standards (which Republicans and Democrat Jared Golden have worked to weaken), penalize employers who deny workers family and medical leave, and protect the right to join a union. It won’t pass this year because Republicans control the House, but getting legislation like this into the hopper in case Democrats can pull a clean sweep this fall is a top priority. The leaders of this effort are Representatives Bobby Scott, Mark Pocan, Debbie Dingell, Donald Norcross, and Steven Horsford.

— Trump runs afowl: Chickens out of debate with Kamala. Claiming that “Barack Hussein Obama” is concerned that “Kamala Harris is a Marxist fraud who cannot beat President Trump, and they are still holding out for someone ‘better,’” Donald Trump posted to his Nazi-infested social media site that he’s pulling out of the debate scheduled for September 10th with ABC. Obama, of course, loudly and proudly endorsed Harris, as did his wife Michelle, but Trump either didn’t get the memo or is simply lying through his teeth (or typing fingers) as usual. In any case, he’s chickened out and deserves every bit of ridicule that will be coming his way. If there’s anything that terrifies this guy, it’s a strong woman who’s sent rapists and con men like him to jail.

— United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres called out the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, and Norway for expanding fossil fuel production. As heat waves, both on land and in the oceans, and severe weather break records around the world, the UN chief was explicit: “I must call out the flood of fossil fuel expansion we are seeing in some of the world’s wealthiest countries. In signing such a surge of new oil and gas licenses, they are signing away our future. The leadership of those with the greatest capabilities and capacities is essential. Countries must phaseout fossil fuels—fast and fairly.” The world has now pretty much exceeded the 1.5 degrees Celsius “danger point” the IPCC identified years ago, and will continue warming for decades even if we were to stop all fossil fuel use today. If you’d like to see the worst-case scenario we could be headed toward (unlikely, but increasingly possible), check out this 12-minute video that Leonardo and George DiCaprio and I put together a few years back. Let your legislators know it’s time to cut fossil fuel use and production.

— Shocking Murder of Sonya Massey Exposes Urgent Need for Police Reform. When Louise and I lived in Germany and traveled extensively across Europe, we discovered that cops in most European countries are well-paid, tightly regulated, and must meet very, very high standards to get a job on the force. We had interactions with several, and they were always polite and professional. In some countries the training period is well over a year, whereas in America many police go from being hired to carrying a gun in a matter of days, weeks, or a month or two. The cop who shot Sonya Massey in the face after she called 911 because she though there was a prowler near her house was, we now learn, discharged dishonorably from the Army for “serious” infractions and had bounced from police department to police department before ending up in Sangamon County, Illinois. He never should have been given a badge and a gun. The United States is one of the few (perhaps the only) countries in the developed world that doesn’t have federal standards for law enforcement officers. It’s time to impose them, now.

— Hunter In a Farmers World Alert!

ADHD As Hypervigilance Run Amok

— Wisdom School Alert!

Why Humanity Has a Deep and Ancient Connection to Water