Tracker

When you have major relgious groups enthusiastically rubber-stamping every reprehensible thing you do as divinely approved, hubris is automatic.

FOR ANYONE WHO DOUBTED THAT TRUMP IS A MONSTER: Trump accused of withholding data needed to reunite families separated at border: 'Unconscionable' Following what one attorney described as months of deliberate stonewalling, the Trump administration has finally handed over key data that could help legal advocates reunite immigrant families separated under the Justice Department's destructive "zero tolerance" policy. In a court filing (pdf) Wednesday, attorneys with the ACLU said they have not yet been able to locate the parents of 628 children, down from 666 last month. The filing revealed that the Trump administration provided "information from another government database that had not previously been disclosed (the Executive Office for Immigration Review)" last Wednesday, the day before Thanksgiving. "Among other things, the information includes phone numbers that had not previously been disclosed," the court document reads. Lee Gelernt, deputy director of the ACLU Immigrants' Rights Project and one of the lawyers working to reunite families, told CNN that "we've been asking them for any additional information they have forever and we only finally got this information after outcry that parents still could not be found and the issue reached the presidential debate level." https://www.alternet.org/2020/12/trump-immigration/

‘They were wearing rhinestones’: Read this hilarious account of the most ridiculous witnesses at Michigan fraud hearing On Tuesday, Michigan lawmakers dedicated more than six hours to allowing evidence-free testimony on the unproven and, frankly, unprovable election fraud claims of Trump supporters. A good summary of these kinds of events came from a man named Bill Schmidt, who according to The Detroit News, had considered himself a lifelong Republican before this year's election. "Evil can be seen by evil people," he said. Schmidt reportedly told officials that while he saw people make mistakes, he didn't believe he saw anything nefarious or illegal take place. "Good people see goodness. What I saw is, I saw hardworking people working hard," he continued. "That's what I saw. That's America. That's democracy." Schmidt sounds like a reasonable person. But not everyone claiming fraud is as reasonable, and thinking about or watching or reading about the conspiracy-laden, fact-free bullshit that some believe is worth destroying our democracy for can be frustrating. Luckily, someone running a satirical account decided to produce a very sobering set of reports on the testimony in Michigan, so that you and I need not watch it all. https://www.alternet.org/2020/12/trump-michigan/

And its gonna get worse, cresting in two-three weeks . Then the mortality and morbidity will continue for months following barring a massive clampdown. Meanwhile, Australia has become nearly COVID- free.

Thid would be comical if it wan't for the fact that this pack of fools and thieves had free rein in the government for four years. We can only hope that there is a steady parade to the courts for them soon. That is the only way to deter them from doing this thing again.

Sully.

It was the cigarette-smoking man.

A pilot friend of mine says that pilots have a saying,"Any landing you can walk away from is a good landing"

U.S. Surpasses Record For Coronavirus Deaths In A Single Day More than 2,800 people died from COVID-19 in the U.S. on Wednesday, higher than the previous record of just over 2,600 dead in a single day in April.

C&W Music Awards!

Are you referring to Emily?

Only those who are not budget-conscious.

Waaaay high.

Apparently the latest vaccine to be rolled out for approval has been vetted in Britain and will be distribuuted in a matter of days. It seems to me that their approval processes will be substantially the same as Canda's, so why would it not make sense to review their protocols. If they are essentially the same as what Canada would be using, why not rubber-stamp them and start bringing in the GB vaccine as soon as available rather than repeating the process?

Here’s How Rudy Giuliani’s Push for a Preemptive Pardon Could Backfire Imagine what the old Rudy Giuliani, United States attorney, crime-buster, and thorn in the side of organized crime, would think of the current iteration. This is the last gasp of Donald Trump’s administration, and that means it’s pardon-seeking time for a subset of America’s felons. Those most likely to be successful, if past is prologue, are those who are supporters of Trump, have some sort of celebrity link, or who had knowledge of but kept quiet about Trump’s misconduct. One person reportedly seeking a preemptive pardon is none other than Rudy Giuliani. While the president’s personal attorney contested the New York Times report on Tuesday that the two had discussed a pardon as recently as last week—which would mean that the pair furiously fighting the election results are well aware Trump lost the election and will be leaving office next month—he notably didn’t say that he hadn’t discussed a pardon or that he wouldn’t accept one. Imagine what the old Rudy Giuliani, United States Attorney, crime-buster and thorn in the side of organized crime, would think of the current iteration, a man under investigation by the office he used to lead trying to persuade Trump to save him from the possibility of going to federal prison for his corrupt behavior. Here’s How Rudy Giuliani’s Push for a Preemptive Pardon Could Backfire (thedailybeast.com) (Julianni's conduct in the courts and outside of the courtroom ought to get him disbarred at the very least, even if he is pardoned by Trump proactively.)

$$$$. Next question?

Ohio tea party leader urges Trump to suspend the Constitution, invoke martial law to push for new vote A Tea Party leader in Ohio took out a full-page ad in the Washington Times with a message to President Donald Trump urging him to take unprecedented action to force states to conduct a new vote in an effort to overturn the presidential election. According to Cleveland.com, the man responsible for placing the ad is Tom Zawistowski, the executive director of the Portage County Tea Party and member of the We the People Convention. The text was also published to the party's "We the People" website. In the ad, Zawistowski echoed a number of Trump's unfounded voter fraud claims as he suggested "when Democrat Joe Biden is formally elected the next president, as is expected, Trump should order the U.S. military to oversee a new election for federal candidates using only paper ballots," per the publication. "Without a fair vote, we fear, with good reason, the threat of a shooting civil war is imminent," the ad states, which also included subtle warning that if the president opts not to declare martial law, "we will also have no other choice but to take matters into our own hands, and defend our rights on our own." Zawistowski also wrote, "we wanted to express our concerns to the President, to the legislators, courts and Congress that We the People will NOT cede our exclusive Constitutional right to elect our Representatives to judges, lawyers, courts, Governors, Secretary's of State, Congress, corrupt election officials and local politicians, the corrupt media - or Leftist threats of violence! It is OUR EXCLUSIVE RIGHT to elect our President and that sacred right has been infringed by the massive, planned, illegal election fraud conducted by corrupt Democrat/Socialist Party operatives across our nation to steal our vote. We will NOT stand for it." https://www.alternet.org/2020/12/trump-election-2649108314/

I think that the current CPC party, who had credibility under Diefenbaker, Stanfield and Clark has sold its soul to the wingnut Alliance sect, and has become a living example of choosing power over principle. The Alliance bloc with the party holds a disproportionate amount of influence and will continue to do so. This will eventually force out the right-of-center traditional Conservatives and leave the dregs to devolve into a minor-league version of the GOP/Tea Party ruled by the fundamentalists. This will ensure Liberal governments for time to come unless they get really, really stoopid and arrogant.

The CPC party mirrors the leader and the leader mirrors the party. They have drifted so far over to the right that they are nearly over the horizon.

It would be a gesture of great value if at least the mainstream media simply boycotted ot walked out of McNinny's so-called press briefings. Neither she nor Trump nor the GOP deserve the airtime.

And 14 more deaths in the ;ast 24 hours. Horrible.

That would change nothing as the same fools who elected McConnell and all would simply elect another, equally daft and corrupt senator.

Historian Ruth Ben-Ghiat: Trump's coup is not over; his enablers aren't done. Author of "Strongmen": We're in a dangerous "state of exception," and it's too early to say democracy will hold By DEAN OBEIDALLAH DECEMBER 2, 2020 11:00AM (UTC) Dismiss Donald Trump and the GOP's attacks on the 2020 election at your peril, warns Ruth Ben-Ghiat, historian and author of the new book, "Strongmen: Mussolini to the Present." In our recent interview for Salon Talks, Ben-Ghiat — a professor of history and Italian studies at NYU — observes that Trump probably hasn't actually studied other leaders in history who transformed functioning democracies into authoritarian regimes. Nonetheless, his actions line up almost perfectly with many who have done just that, from Benito Mussolini in fascist Italy to Vladimir Putin in contemporary Russia. "For the strongman, politics is always personal," Ben-Ghiat explains which may sound ironic given that "strongmen" are all about displaying virility. As she explained in our conversation, they tend to take every slight personally, and that's certainly the case with President Trump, who constantly complains that he's a victim who has been treated unfairly, which for some reason has endeared him even further to his supporters. Even with Trump on his way out in January, Ben-Ghiat makes clear the threat of authoritarianism in America is not over. She explains that the Republican Party is increasingly embracing undemocratic methods to acquire and retain power, from voter ID laws to blocking Barack Obama's nomination of Merrick Garland to the U.S. Supreme Court in 2016. Some GOP elected officials — thankfully, not all — even enabled Trump's efforts to overturn or delegitimize the 2020 election results. https://www.salon.com/2020/12/02/historian-ruth-ben-ghiat-trumps-coup-is-not-over-his-enablers-arent-done/

Sounds fishy to me.

The research shows that once an individual has contracted the virus, illnesses show up (rarely) in 2 days but most began to display symptoms at 12 days but a few as late as 14 days.