MFA

If you've been keeping tabs on the Justice Department's investigation into Donald Trump's handling of classified documents, you know that things are not going particularly well for the ex-president. Last month, we learned that special counsel Jack Smith had uncovered "significant" evidence that the former guy had obstructed justice. We also learned that the National Archives and Records Administration was reportedly set to turn over "16 records that show Trump ... had knowledge of the correct declassification process while he was president" and did not responsibly act upon it. And today now brings a new report that the ex-president was expressly told he could not hold onto any classified documents following a subpoena last May from the DOJ"just another bit of counsel he obviously did not take.

A 'townhall' featuring a Democrat WOULD NEVER have a 'moderator' actively debating

It wasn't debating; it was fact checking. No network "worth their salt" should allow their platform to be used to spread lies and misinformation. Fox News paid $787,000,000 to discover that.

I'm guessing that many (most?) of the viewers that CNN has lost were left leaning. Progressives weren't happy with having the town hall in the first place and when the hostess was unable to restrain Trump from telling his lies, they tuned out.

Furthermore, left leaning viewers haven't been happy with new CEO and his reported conservative ideology. The town hall was just confirmation of their suspicions that he wants CNN to be more like Fox.

Many republican politicians, analysts, etc. are knowingly and willingly hypocrites. They perform for their constituents so as to win their votes. While it is necessary to point out their hypocrisy, it is not sufficient to address the issue that compels their constituents to vote for them. Many of those constituents are unreachable because they don't believe in democracy for all. Those that do can be reached by staging an intervention: confront them with the inconsistencies in their strongly held beliefs and their actions. Force them to come to terms with the consequences of their actions. Draw a short, straight line between those beliefs and the republican policies.

Finally, the really, really difficult part: it has to be personalized but in a "mass marketing" kind of way. For example a vignette with a middle age, middle class family discussing the financial aspects of caring for their aging parents who are in declining health and coming to the conclusion that they need the services of a nursing home. How are they going to pay the bill? Medicaid is an option; maybe the only option.

Dems need to do vignettes for "ALL" of social welfare programs and put them on social media platforms for the widest possible distribution.

States usurping local control worked out real good in Flint, Michigan didn't it.

Quite frankly, I don't understand why the affected municipalities haven't filed a federal lawsuit against the states.

The logistics of protecting a former president in jail will prevent it.

If there is the will to put a convicted Trump in prison, a way will be found.

Walton said even with the suspension, she does not regret taking the video. "I'm glad I took it."

As John Lewis would say, she got into "Good Trouble".

The teacher was placed on paid administrative leave. There should be no such thing as "paid administrative leave". A potential offender should be placed on leave and their salary should be put in escrow. If they are subsequently found to have done something wrong that requires termination, then they are terminated without having access to the funds placed in escrow. However, if they are subsequently absolved of any fault, they should be awarded their back pay.

This goes for any job, especially cops.

Herschel Walker, Tommy Tuberville: Not a good look for ex footballers.

Perhaps other ex footballers should speak up.

Go for it.

How should the media treat an American traitor and would-be dictator?

1) Not with free air time! If he wants to buy advertising, let him pay for it.
2) Media companies should have well publicized standards for the ads that they run. If an advertiser's ad meets those standards, run the ad(s). Otherwise, don't. Media consumers can then judge the truthfulness of an ad by the media's published standards.
3) If the media covers a story where the speaker is spreading information contrary to its published standards, the media company should debunk the lies in as near real time as possible.
4) Media companies should preface their stories about a person with a warning label of the person's truthiness, sort of like a FICO score for truthiness.
5) As with a person's truthiness, do the same for a person's background i.e. civil, criminal, impeachment(?). All of this is to put the consumer on notice as to what they are about to consume. The analogy from the food industry would be a nutrition label.

Once they get to Russia, Putin's next move will be to conscript them into military service to fight in Ukraine.

Russia is a good place for the righties.

Anderson Cooper of CNN just tried to defend CNN's broadcasts of the Trump Town Hall. IMO he failed. In essence, he tried to justify the broadcast by saying that it revealed Trump to be a liar and that the audience of primarily republican voters loved it. That Trump is a lying POS, that he hasn't changed, that he will never change and that republicans love him for his racist, misogynistic, anti-democratic and mean spirited values is not news!

Breaking the Trump fever cannot be done by appealing to large audiences because when they are in large groups, they draw strength from each other. Some Trump supporters can be "saved" by forcing them to confront the inconsistencies in their belief system. Other Trump supporters know what a POS he is but support him anyway because he is a means to an end. In most cases, that end is reversing or mitigating the impact of the demographic changes engulfing America.

US Approves Transfer of Seized Russian Funds to Ukraine

Excellent! Next the US and others should prep for the release to Ukraine the hundreds of billions that Russia has on deposit in banks around the world. Find out where Putin keeps his personal fortune and take that as well.

As a response to calls for common sense gun regulations, Republicans like to say that there are enough laws on the books to deal with the problem. All law enforcement needs to do is enforce the law. They fail to acknowledge and journalists fail to confront them with the fact that the deterrent aspect of laws is not having the desired effect. And even if those "laws" are enforced, what difference would it make if the shooter isn't around to be held accountable? It seems as if many (most?) of these shooters don't want to hang around to deal with the consequences of their aberrant actions.

So, if existing laws have lost their deterrent effect and the killer is dead so no enforcement action(s) can be taken, what good are the current set of laws? The answer is: we need new laws to limit the number of people that a single individual can kill/injure in a short amount of time.

Dems should expand their focus to include the lethality of weapons and not just their "style" i.e. AR-15.

The judge in the E. Jean Carroll case has forestalled a Trump move to declare that the trial was suspect because he didn't testify. The judge has given Trump the rare opportunity to testify "after defense rests" by extending to Sunday afternoon his ability to testify. If he doesn't take the opportunity then, closing arguments will begin on Monday.

Finally, the judicial system has become aware of Trump's tactics and is taking steps to "head him off at the pass".

Now I'm starting to understand why the Republicans are so against the implementation of any ethics policies for the Supreme Court Justices.

Of course! They want to use money/benefits as a tool to buy judges, politicians, etc. There aren't enough rich voters to affect the outcome of an election. So, they have to buy the outcomes they want. Rich people buy voters by exploiting the fault lines in American society i.e. race, xenophobia, guns, etc. They keep poor, uninformed voters in constant fear that undeserving minorities are coming for their jobs; their way of life.

Woman pulls knife on man who complained about her gas

There goes the "sugar and spice" theory.

We're talking about one of the biggest loudmouths in the history of speech...

While that is certainly true, Trump knows that a "pocket" pardon would be extremely controversial; something that could only be used as a last resort. As long as he can get the GOP and small donors to pay his legal bills, there is no need to break out the "pocket" pardon if it even exists. When he starts paying his legal bills out of his own pocket and/or he has exhausted all of his appeals, then the "pocket" pardon (if it exists) may be revealed. Then we would have another set of court cases which would ultimately have to be resolved by the SCOTUS.

It always was a pretense, mind you, but now they don't even pretend to care about it anymore.

The same applies to conservatives on the SCOTUS. Now that they (except for ACB) have been outed as violators of the public trust, democracy be damned; they will double down to cement their gains.

No court has yet considered the question of whether presidents can pardon themselves, even for crimes committed in the Oval Office. Article I, Section 3 of the Constitution states of impeachment, which is the most apparent remedy for presidential wrongdoing in office, that "the party convicted shall nevertheless be liable and subject to indictment, trial, judgment and punishment, according to law." Given that impeachments cannot be pardoned under Article II, the impeachment language " which makes former presidents subject to the criminal laws for impeachable conduct " could be read to suggest that crimes related to impeachments cannot be pardoned, either. Trump was impeached for his role in Jan. 6, with the House of Representatives charging him with "incitement of insurrection" against the U.S. government and "lawless action at the Capitol." Arguably, then, any crimes arising from the same conduct would be immune from a self-pardon.

In addition, Section 3 of the 14th Amendment holds that "[n]o person shall . . . hold any office, civil or military, under the United States . . . who, having previously taken an oath . . . to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof." If Smith's grand jury indicts Trump under the section of federal sedition law which provides that "[w]hoever incites, sets on foot, assists, or engages in any rebellion or insurrection against the authority of the United States or the laws thereof, or gives aid or comfort thereto . . . shall be incapable of holding any office under the United States," a self-pardon would clash with the Supreme Court's longstanding recognition, discussed below, that pardons cannot undermine other parts of the Constitution.

If Trump were ever re-elected POTUS, you can bet he would attempt a self pardon if he hasn't issued a secret pardon of himself prior to leaving office. If he did issue himself a "pocket" pardon, he would reveal it if Smith obtains a conviction. Then there would be another round of litigation as to the constitutionality of the pardon.

In any event, what's stopping Trump from proclaiming that he issued himself a pardon? Does a "pocket" pardon need a timestamp to prove that it was issued while he was still POTUS?

The South, like red states everywhere, are refusing to invest the resources necessary to have a large, viable middle class. With a large, viable middle class, schools can be properly funded out of property taxes so that teachers are paid adequately. This republican obsession on lower and lower taxes for the wealthy is going to doom the states and eventually the country to having a middle class that is to small of fund many of the things we take for granted: good schools, hospitals, roads, bridges, libraries, etc.

Yeah, the rich pay a lot of taxes. I wish they didn't. I wish that typical Americans earned more money so that they could pay more in taxes. But no! The rich want to hoard all of the money and then bitch about having to pay so much in taxes.

The right like to take the position that rich people create jobs. Rich people don't create jobs; employers create jobs in response to CONSUMER DEMAND. Smart, people, in response to consumer demand, create companies that meet that demand. These people may eventually get rich because they responded to consumer demand. Their wealth may then be used to create other companies that respond to consumer demand.

What's happened is a lot of rich people don't want to do the work to sustain their wealth i.e. increasing production capacity, starting new businesses, etc. They would rather bribe politicians to rig the rules (regulations, tax policy, etc.) in their favor.

Why GQP Voters Are So Loyal To Dotard

I think zealous Trump voters support him because he offers them a way of dealing with the demographic changes that are occurring in the country. At their core, they are bigots, plain and simple. They see in Trump a champion that will fight for their entitlements; anything that will give them an edge wrt them undeserving minorities. They don't even believe that Trump is above the law or that any person should be above the law. They have to take the position that Trump broke no laws; it's just a witch hunt or it's the weaponization of politics. They have to cling to the belief that breaking laws is wrong. Otherwise, how would they prosecute all of those minorities that break laws?

Thiel, who was an early backer of Donald Trump before later cutting ties, instead would like the GOP to address ways of boosting innovation in the U.S. and competing with China.

Good luck with that. Not likely to happen. They are too absorbed in culture wars to focus on anything else. Also, while individual republicans may be creative, as a party, they aren't known for innovation. At its core, conservatism implies a maintenance of the status quo which is anti-innovation.

Some of these companies act like mobsters and "bust out" a business. They find a business with low debt and good credit, take over the company, put in their own high paid execs, borrow a lot of money and then declare the company bankrupt. American capitalism at work.

Any anchor from FOX or other mainstream media outlets that knowingly and willingly booked crackpots and purveyors of information that they knew to be lies but were presented as truths, should get the boot. It is not that these crackpots and liars should not be on MSM, it's just that they should be exposed on MSM as crackpots and liars.

How is that any different from MSNBC?

What are the documented/confirmed lies that have been spread by MSNBC?