Tracker

57 GOP State And Local Officials Were At The Capitol Insurrection At least 57 state and local Republican officials attended the Jan. 6 rally in Washington that turned into a deadly insurrection, according to an updated HuffPost tally. Almost all of them are resisting calls to resign. They traveled from 27 states for the “Stop the Steal” demonstration near the White House. A couple of officials even gave speeches, warming up the crowd for then-President Donald Trump, who took the stage and regurgitated lies about the election results before instructing the “Make America Great Again” mob to march on the U.S. Capitol. Late last month, after identifying an initial 21 state and local GOP officials at the rally — among them a QAnon conspiracy theorist, a self-described member of a far-right militia and a man who once declared that “the only good Democrat is a dead Democrat” — HuffPost received emails from readers across the country identifying the additional 36 officials in this new tally. Some of the reader emails were urgent — “PLEASE, PLEASE REVISE YOUR ARTICLE TO REFLECT THESE INSURGENT SEDITIONISTS PLEASE!” read one — underscoring how communities across the country are still grappling with the fallout from the siege of the U.S. Capitol. Many are hoping that these officials will somehow face consequences for their actions. Nearly all 57 are facing calls to resign. Yet only two men, both of whom were arrested for their role in the riot — a member of the West Virginia House of Delegates and a secretary of the California Republican Assembly — have actually stepped down. Elsewhere, a Virginia state senator was censured and stripped of committee assignments. Two other censure attempts — of a city councilwoman and a school board member in California — were voted down. In Texas, a Pizzagate-conspiracy-theory-believing field organizer was fired. In most cases, the GOP officials have brushed aside calls to resign. “For a call to go out seeking my resignation is beyond the pale and reeks of cancel culture,” said Rob Socha, a city councilman in Hillsdale, Michigan. (Incidentally, at least four of the 57 GOP officials invoked “cancel culture” or being “canceled” while dismissing calls that they step down.) 57 GOP State And Local Officials Were At The Capitol Insurrection | HuffPost Canada (huffingtonpost.ca)

Fauci says it will be 'open season' for COVID-19 vaccine by April On Thursday, Dr. Anthony Fauci, the longtime director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, delivered hopeful news about vaccine availability and the country's lagging roll-out. On NBC's "Today" show, echoing remarks from earlier in the day, Fauci said there could be an "open season" on available vaccine doses by April. "By the time we get to April, that will be what I would call, for better wording, 'open season,' namely, virtually everybody and anybody in any category could start to get vaccinated," Fauci said. "From then on, it would likely take several more months just logistically to get the vaccine into people's arms, so that hopefully as we get into the middle and end of the summer, we could have accomplished the goal of what we're talking about — namely the overwhelming majority of people in this country having gotten vaccinated." (Good news as two more vaccines have applied for approval)

Lead 'Stop the Steal' organizer promises to punish enemies and build new society for Trump supporters Ali Alexander, the lead organizer of the so-called Stop the Steal campaign, has resurfaced after going into hiding following the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. Streaming on Trovo Wednesday night, Alexander claimed that while he has been licking his wounds, he has been plotting to restart rallies in March, abolish the media, and build a separate society for Trump supporters. As former President Donald Trump faces an impeachment trial this week for inciting an insurrection with his speech at the Stop the Steal rally the morning of Jan. 6, it appears Alexander has yet to face charges for his role. Alexander rebooted the so-called Stop the Steal campaign the day after Election Day, when Trump's lead began to slip as mail-in ballots began to be counted. He pushed voter fraud conspiracy theories, embraced QAnon conspiracy theorists and far-right activists in his campaign, claimed to be doing God's work, and organized three massive rallies in Washington, D.C., that featured the Proud Boys hate group, paramilitary groups like the Oath Keepers, and other extremists. Following Jan. 6, Alexander was booted off most major social media platforms and, as a result, is now streaming on Trovo, a gaming platform that appears to be growing in popularity among far-right actors kicked off other platforms. On Wednesday night, Alexander lamented the “racist, bigoted, anti-Christian, anti-Southern, anti-Republican, anti-conservative, anti-human smear machine" that he says targeted him, and he promised to create chaos. “We've got to get back in the driver's seat," he added. “They've done a great number on my life, they've cost me tens of thousands of dollars, they've really destroyed parts of my life, but in a lot of ways, I have no other choice but to announce that I'm building the future, so I'm making strategic investments in tools that fight deplatforming and to create chaos on existing platforms," Alexander claimed. “America is going to have a choice, and I promise you that, between going onto this dystopian future or fighting in what I'm calling the American sovereignty movement," he said. “And I'm gonna get back, and I'm going to do rallies again starting in March, I'm gonna have indoor gatherings in March, in Michigan, in Arizona, in Georgia, in Texas. I'm going to do a media tour." Alexander said he had been plotting how to do away with the free press and other “systems that control us": “So I want you guys to know that I've been licking my wounds, but I've been plotting, I've been planning, I've been scheming because we have to do away with this whole system. The free press is not free, and they're not the press, they need to be abolished. The systems that control us have to be abolished." “I'm going to create a society, and a community, and a culture, and a language for [Trump supporters], and there are tens of millions of us. … Winning can just be 10 million people creating a new megacity," he mused. “Let's build our own city, let's seriously build our own city, let's build a back-up city in South America." Lead 'Stop the Steal' organizer promises to punish enemies and build new society for Trump supporters - Alternet.org

You know its been too long without sex when you start wearing flipflops to remember what it sounded like.

FYI: Wisconsin shooter charged with two murders and out on bail immediately violated the terms of his parole by going to a bar and associating with known white supremacists. When police checked on his stated address, they were told that he did not live there and never did. The police went to court to have an arrest warrant issued on him for non-compliance, but were told by the presiding judge that the terms of Rittenhouse's release was that he had to provide an address, but not necessarily live there. Police and the victims of Rittenhouse were stunned at this ruling for some reason.

I would put this into the same category as the guy who found his cat had been run over on the street, so he skinned it and put the skin overtop of a drone. He then flew it all over his neighbourhood. Weird. Very weird.

It's Mary, and Liz is anti-gay.

This is a very volatile situation and will be for awhile.

And yet one their most popular female senators is openly lesbian. Moreover, in the past few years, several GOP federal politicians have been caught in soliciting gay sexual encounters, and that doesn't count the fundamentalist "ministers" who were also exposed.

Baby food allegedly riddled with poisonous metals—and the Trump administration did nothing about it Anew report reveals that the baby foods sold by a number of major manufacturers may be contaminated with poisonous heavy metals — and President Donald Trump's administration, despite knowing about it, did nothing. The House Oversight Committee released a report on Thursday based on a congressional investigation into the potential presence of toxic heavy metals — including lead, arsenic, cadmium and mercury — in baby foods. Four baby food manufacturers provided Congress with information about the amount of toxic heavy metals in their foods based on their own internal testing, including Beech-Nut Nutrition Company, Gerber, Hain Celestial Group, Inc. and Nurture Inc. Between those four companies, Congress found that the companies allow dangerously high levels of toxic heavy metals in their foods and that the foods sold by the companies frequently exceed even those standards. "The Food and Drug Administration has set the maximum allowable levels in bottled water at 10 ppb [parts per billion] inorganic arsenic, 5 ppb lead, and 5 ppb cadmium, and the Environmental Protection Agency has capped the allowable level of mercury in drinking water at 2 ppb," the report explains. "The test results of baby foods and their ingredients eclipse those levels: including results up to 91 times the arsenic level, up to 177 times the lead level, up to 69 times the cadmium level, and up to 5 times the mercury level." Three other major baby food manufacturers — Campbell, Walmart and Sprout Organic Foods — did not cooperate with the congressional investigators, leaving them "greatly concerned" about the possible toxic heavy metal contamination in their foods. Then again, as the chair of the subcommittee which conducted the investigation told Salon, the government has previously not forced these companies to be accountable for what they put in their baby food. Baby food allegedly riddled with poisonous metals—and the Trump administration did nothing about it | Salon.com

Forty Percent of America’s Coronavirus Deaths Were Avoidable: Lancet Study Reuters Around 40 percent of the Americans who have been killed by COVID-19 might have lived if better political decisions had been made before and during the pandemic, according to a new Lancet study. The paper, titled Public Policy and Health in the Trump Era, rips into former President Donald Trump, saying he “brought misfortune to the USA and the planet.” It describes Trump’s response to COVID as “inept and insufficient,” though it says the roots of the nation’s public-health problems go much deeper. Mary Bassett, a Lancet commission member and director of Harvard’s FXB Center for Health and Human Rights, told The Guardian: “The U.S. has fared so badly with this pandemic, but the bungling can’t be attributed only to Mr. Trump, it also has to do with these societal failures.” The paper estimates that, had America’s virus death toll matched up with the rates in other high-income G-7 countries, some 40 percent of deaths could have been avoided. Almost 470,000 Americans have died so far.

Bad News For Alberta? People with dementia are twice as likely to contract COVID-19, according to new study Recently, scientists have discovered peculiar connections between neurological conditions and COVID-19 risk. We know that there is a heightened risk of dying of COVID-19 complications for those with schizophrenia. Now, this week comes a new study which finds that people with dementia are twice as likely to contract COVID-19 as those without the deadly cognitive disease. The study, which was mainly written by researchers from Case Western University and published on Tuesday in Alzheimer's & Dementia: The Journal of the Alzheimer's Association, analyzed electronic health record data for nearly 62 million Americans adults. People with dementia are twice as likely to contract COVID-19, according to new study | Salon.com

Encouraging, but will hold my breath for the next two weeks to see if the variants show up in numbers.

That should cover the cost of a Stanford Binet test and therapy, but there is no fix for stoopid.

Hayley Miller REPORTER/ 2 hours ago Capitol security footage never before seen by the public will be shown during the prosecution's presentation this week, senior aides on the impeachment managers' team told reporters on a call this morning. The footage will provide new insight into the "extreme violence that everyone suffered" and "the threat that it could have led to further violence and death to many,"

If I were Trump's lawyer, I would want my retainer up front, and a big one, too. The yahoos who presented arguments at the impeachment mistook volume for cogent arguments. Won't affect the outcome, though but I would love to be wrong about that.

Report reveals how Trump's team conspired to protect his interests as COVID-19 ransacked the US Former President Donald Trump's administration is under fire for hindering the government's pandemic response and rolling back Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) coronavirus mitigation guidelines in an effort to protect his interests. According to CNBC News, the latest reports stem from documentation compiled during the House Oversight investigation launched back in September 2020. Based on the documents, the Trump administration is said to have intentionally suppressed COVID-19 testing by rolling back the CDC guidelines. To justify the scaling back of COVID testing, former Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) scientific advisor Paul Alexander argued there was little significance in testing asymptomatic individuals, according to emails obtained by the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis. Report reveals how Trump's team conspired to protect his interests as COVID-19 ransacked the US - Alternet.org Here is link to the powerful video presented to the US Senate: Watch: House impeachment managers' damning video links Trump's 'Stop the Steal' speech to the Capitol siege - Alternet.org

‘Can’t afford to lose’: Drudge Report takes on Trump The Drudge Report, a staple of conservative power brokers and right wing political leaders for decades, slowly turned anti-Trump starting late last year, stunning GOP stalwarts. Following The New York Times' bombshell about the president paying just $750 in federal taxes in 2016 and 2017, and no taxes for 15 out of 20 years, the Drudge Report on Monday just destroyed Trump. The Drudge Report is essentially a link aggregator, rewriting headlines and combining links to create a very clear picture of what they want readers to see. Here's how it looks right now: "LOST MORE MONEY THAN MADE?" reads one headline from the top of Drudge, about the Times' exposé. "FINANCED EXTRAVAGANT LIFESTYLE WITH USE OF BUSINESS

With handing the Jet audiocast over to CJOB, it sure looks like this was planned for some time.

Watching the CNN coverage of the Trump impeachment trial and the supercut being shown in the Senate is devastatingly ugly.

I hope that witnesses are called to publicly testify under oath as to the full extent of Trump's culpability and insane arrogance and constitutional experts are called to testify as to the complete fallacy of the Trump defenders' defences of his actions. Then, if the GOP senator apologists want to acquit him in the face of all that evidence, they will stand exposed as the frauds and conspirators they are.

Insiders at the GOP report that there is a need to defend Trump because if they do not, no future GOP president would dare to do what Trump has done to favour Republicans, their donors and supporters with illegal acts. An impeachment and conviction would end the erosion of legal process and responsibility that began with Nixon and continued with Reagan and Bush 2. Ignoring of all the illegal stuff that Bush 2 and his cronies has led directly to the Trump abuses of power and confirm that the president of the US is above the law and not hampered by it.

Republicans defend Trump ahead of impeachment trial by blaming Nancy Pelosi for Capitol riot GOP shifts blame to Democrats for Capitol riot, call impeachment a “diversionary operation” As Donald Trump's second impeachment trial looms near, bringing the former president's incitement of insurrection into greater focus once again, members of the GOP are –– in another ambitious act of baseless conspiracy –– deflecting blame onto their Democratic counterparts for the riot and framing impeachment as a "diversionary operation" meant to distract from Democratic culpability. The idea that Democrats, who were chiefly targeted by rioters themselves, are responsible for the riot, is not entirely novel. Shortly after the Jan. 6 riot, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-SC, tried to put House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-CA, under scrutiny, asking in an interview with Fox News, "Where was Nancy Pelosi? It's her job to provide Capitol security." A month later, former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows and Senator Ron Johnson, R-WI, are now taking Graham's cue, leading the charge to position their Democratic colleagues as enablers of the insurrection. Republicans defend Trump ahead of impeachment trial by blaming Nancy Pelosi for Capitol riot | Salon.com

WHO Says It’s Found No Evidence That the Coronavirus Came From Wuhan Lab Reuters/ World Health Organization investigators working in China say they’ve found absolutely no evidence to support the theory that the coronavirus originated in a Wuhan laboratory—and they think it’s such an outlandish theory that they’re going to bring an end to their research into it. Peter Ben Embarek, an animal-diseases expert, announced the decision during a press conference following a long-awaited visit by WHO experts to the city of Wuhan, where the virus was first identified. Embarek said it’s “extremely unlikely” that the virus came from a lab, and that the most likely cause of the initial outbreak was the virus jumping from an undetermined “intermediary host species” to humans. The lab-origin theory was fueled by the U.S. State Department under President Donald Trump, which claimed last month that it had obtained intelligence that researchers at the lab became sick with COVID-19-like symptoms in autumn 2019.