What You May Have Missed
A roundup of the past seven days from the Hartmann Report
Betrayal. And Is Trump’s $2,000 “Dividend” Just a Corrupt Plan to Buy Votes?
Before I get into today’s story, last night was an absolute effing disaster. Eight Democratic-caucus senators sold us out by voting with the Republicans:
Chuck Schumer’s Quiet Betrayal: The Day the Democratic Party Forgot Who It Serves
What we witnessed this weekend in the United States Senate wasn’t “compromise.” It was surrender: the kind of gutless, morally bankrupt capitulation that betrays American families and feeds the billionaires devouring our democracy.
Call Them What They Are: Lickspittles to White Supremacy
The American media refuses to call them out, so I guess the job falls to me: you can cut the racism with a knife, it’s so thick. With the Trump administration, the Confederacy is actively rising again, using the Lost Cause mythology/lie as its basis.
The Epstein Affair Has Move From Sleaze to a Crisis for American Democracy Itself
The New York Times reported that Donald Trump personally called Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-CO) and then had Bondi, Blanche, and Patel take her into the top-secret no-recording-devices-allowed Situation Room to urge her to drop her support for releasing the Epstein files. He apparently also tried to reach Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) for the same reason.
Did Epstein’s Knowledge of Trump Become Putin’s Most Dangerous Weapon Against Ukraine?
“Russia unleashed a massive combined attack on Kyiv” last night, The Guardian reports. “Five people were hospitalised, including one man in critical condition and a pregnant woman, after a series of powerful explosions sounded in the city and air defenses were activated. …
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Saturday Report - Crazy Alert! Trump having sex with “Bubba”?!?
— “Good for me, but not for thee.” That appears to be the mantra of the Trump administration, as Attorney General Pam Bondi said of California’s plan to follow Texas’s recent gerrymander: “California’s redistricting scheme is a brazen power grab that tramples on civil rights and mocks the democratic process.” She added, without a trace of irony, “Govern…
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On the subject of the EpsteinFiels (Discharge petition and H.R. 4405)
The bill (H.R. 4405. even if passed by the House, has to pass the senate and signed by Trump who will of course Veto the bill, which the Senate can't (and wouldn't) override.
So what is achieved? There is the argument that 100 Republicans, in vulnerable seats, will sign the bill. This gives them cover for the 2026 election , only Republicans in vulnerable seats will sign on to H.R. 4405.
Trump may not be able to play chess, the Republican party can and has
Vulnerable Republicans keep their seats, as the Democrats can't use their vote against them, and H.R. 4405 goes nowhere, it never had a chance to begin with, the Senate would never approve it and Trump would never sign it.
And the cherry on the sundae, vulnerable Republicans keep their seats
Edit added: The latest ploy is claiming that they can't release the files, because they are involved in an investigation, inti Clinton, Larry Summers, et al, That is a possibility but I just can't see Trump signing HR 4405., thus no need for that ploy.