(Pictured above are the victims of the Las Vegas mass shooting, which prompted the bump stock ban...more here).
Jose Diaz-Balart of MSNBC speaks with retired ATF agent Jim Cavanaugh about the SCOTUS bump stock ruling (“horrible” and “nonsensical” are pretty good descriptions for starters IMO...as far as I’m concerned, if our media would publish photos of people victimized by these weapons of death, this discussion would be over in a hurry and legislation banning bump stocks would be passed faster than a fart, you might say...more here)...
...and Francesca, John, and especially Cenk of TYT give us their analysis of this legal disaster...glad John pointed out Sonia Sotomayor’s dissent which she read from the bench, which is about as much of an “FU” as is allowed for The Supremes...the opinion is tragically wrong when it comes to the operation of this instrument of utter carnage, and though I’m definitely not a legal scholar, it was apparently totally wrong on the law also (I wonder if we’re going to find out subsequent to this that Thomas was also gifted by Armalite or Smith and Wesson...wouldn’t surprise me in the least...shocked to give credit to #45, but the ATF under his awful purview did indeed do something right, albeit the bare minimum on this issue)...
...and Jason Johnson, sitting in for Chris Hayes, speaks with Dem CT U.S. Senator Chris Murphy about what we SHOULD be doing in response to garbage rulings like this, which is to push for a code of ethics for SCOTUS justices at a minimum...I would also argue for 10-year term limits and mandatory retirement at 70, but yeah, that will happen when the sky is full of lollipops and flying unicorns, I know...and this is a comparatively minor point, but I believe the death toll from the Las Vegas shooting was 58...
...and speaking of guns, David Pakman tells us that A Certain Treasonous Orange Pestilence (who apparently really “killed it” recently in a meeting with CEOs...not!) has a gun in Flori-DUUUH!, even though he’s a convicted felon...just about everyone else in this situation would go immediately to jail, do not pass GO, do not collect $200 (dated boomer reference...sorry), but of course, since we’re talking about Bronzer Beelzebub, not so much...
...and sticking with Mango Mussolini, even Chris Cillizza (who’s a charter member of the political/media/industrial complex as far as yours truly is concerned) has apparently had enough of his “fourth estate” brethren trying to find new and gut-churning ways to try and normalize Combover Caligula...when you’ve lost Cillizza, you’ve REALLY crossed the Rubicon, you might say...
...and if you think this latest sorry episode in our wretched history of caving in to the ammo-sexuals out there calls for another damn anti-gun song, then you guessed right.
I’m not familiar with Brendan Plank, but he presents AOC making a great speech on the stinking corrupt influence of unregulated dirty money in our government (as a lead-in to a congressional hearing), specifically on the SCOTUS (and Almost Silent Clarence Thomas and “Strip Search Sammy” Alito in particular...and by the way, when it comes to our Philistines in robes, this is good news I’ll admit, but the case was only shot down because the plaintiffs supposedly didn’t have “standing”; it SHOULD HAVE been shot down because the Comstock Act is hateful garbage)...
Update: Apparently, in making his argument to get rid of the ban on bump stocks, Thomas presented a diagram showing that the category of weapon covered by the ban wasn’t a “fully automatic” weapon of death and mass carnage (here).
Yep, perfectly normal behavior for a SCOTUS justice. Nothing to see here...
Update 6/21/24: And Thomas is the only SCOTUS justice who thinks domestic abusers should have guns - what a pitiable wretch this guy is (here).
...and Leeja Miller takes a look at what judges should and shouldn’t be doing...a lot of the Alito flag stuff is a rehash I realize, but the context is important IMO, including the background on Judge Aileen Cannon and the equally odious Matthew Kacsmaryk and his infatuation with the just-alluded-to Comstock Act (which, if congressional Democrats collectively had any brains, would have been rendered utterly null and void by now via federal legislation)...I’m actually shocked that Chuck Schumer tried to pass a bill to prevent “judge shopping,” but as usual, it was defeated by Senate Repugs and conservative judges and ignored by our Beltway courtier media...another reason to utterly despise the state of Alabama is that judicial complaints cannot be anonymous and they need to be notarized, and how the f*ck could something as preposterous as THAT be anything but a deterrent to filing a complaint (??!!) – also, the “Kids for Cash” scandal in Luzerne County, PA is a whole other sorry discussion; I once saw a documentary on that which was truly gut-wrenching...can’t recall the particulars at the moment unfortunately...important rehash of awful SCOTUS decisions starting at about 27:16 (NSFW/H)...
...and Beau lets us know what he thinks of the U.S. House’s vote to hold Attorney General Merrick Garland in contempt, which is beyond ridiculous; as noted here, the numbskulls who voted Yes were BIG MAD that Garland wouldn’t provide a recording of Biden being interviewed by Special Counsel Robert Hur, even though Garland made a transcript of the recording available...one of the guilty culprits supporting this nonsense is this guy, and to do something about Bri-Fi, click here...and as noted here, Gym Jordan, Andy Biggs and PA’s own Scott Perry voted to hold Garland in contempt even though they blew off a congressional subpoena also...
...and I know I’m late on commenting on what that numbskull Byron Donalds said about how Lyndon Johnson and the “welfare state” somehow made poverty worse for African Americans (GREAT point that most welfare recipients are white), but Chris Williamson on Rebel HQ pushes back a bit here.
And by the way, for actual proof that Donalds is nothing but a total assclown, I give you the following from here...
It was in the areas of civil rights and economic assistance that the Great Society was most effective. The Civil Rights Act (1964) made employment discrimination and segregation in public accommodations—on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, or national origin—illegal. This legislation was followed by the Voting Rights Act (1965), which guaranteed minority voter registration and voting by restricting the use of literacy tests and poll taxes. The Immigration and Nationality Services Act (1965) did away with the national origin quotas put in place in 1924; this law opened the door to waves of Asian and Latin American immigrants, a pattern still apparent in the early twenty-first century. The 1968 Civil Rights Act outlawed discrimination in housing and granted constitutional protections to Native Americans living on reservations. Johnson’s so-called War on Poverty had its roots in the Economic Opportunity Act (1964), which established an Office of Economic Opportunity (OEO) to manage a variety of “community action” programs. The OEO was never meant to deal with poverty by raising welfare payments or guaranteeing wages, but to help the poor help themselves through education, job training, and community development. The Job Corps, Project Head Start, the Model Cities Program, the Neighborhood Youth Corps, Upward Bound, and VISTA were the most important new programs designed to assist poor people.
Here’s the clip...
...and I have to admit that I was saddened to hear about the passing of longtime journo Howard Fineman, who ran the political coverage mostly for Newsweek but also worked for HuffPo towards the end...I always thought he was a pretty straight shooter on the topics that truly mattered...my condolences...
...and Jon Stewart had a great clip IMO about “corporate morality” when it comes to Pride Month (which June is)...as usual, he makes the point with humor that business doesn’t care about a damn thing except its bottom line (and just to try and piss off Candace Owens, I’ll go out of my way to shop at Target today...somewhat NSFW/H)...
...and speaking of corporations trying to hoodwink us, Eric Gardner of More Perfect Union tells us about what’s in “lunchables,” namely, unsafe levels of lead, sodium, and chemicals that could cause significant health issues for kids later in their lives (and yes, I’m sure Kraft Heinz can produce some data to refute that, but I’m skeptical of the nutritional value of this product all the same...and speaking of food, I thought this was important also)...
...and I think this is a pretty cool rockin’ newer tune to help us get to the weekend, so here goes.
Update: Sorry I neglected to mention this earlier.
(Oh, and by the way, when it comes to presidential family members accused of or prosecuted for alleged or actual illegal behavior, I’ll care about this if and when we as a nation ever decide to get serious about this and this.)
To begin, Brian Tyler Cohen tells us that it looks like “Strip Search Sammy” Alito got suckered in a bit by Lauren Windsor, posing as some conservative activist, and Alito buying in hook, line and sinker (and I have no problem with Windsor doing that, by the way, given the garbage from James O’Keefe and Project Veritas)..and “Hangin’ Judge” JR looks slightly more reasonable here, though as Cohen correctly IMO points out, Roberts kind of blithely disregards the utter wreckage that has taken place during his era on the High Court (and based on this, Martha-Ann Alito may be nuttier than her old man)...
...and NEVER forget who was responsible for making sure Alito ended up on The Supremes...
...and this clip from Beau is truly depressing, but I’m sure he’s right...I don’t want to imagine what passes for thought processes on the part of people who actually think that someone like Bo-Bo Boebert is any kind of a serious politician (and yes, a “serious politician” is an actual thing, such as the terrific state rep and state senator for the district in which we reside), but apparently, there are bipeds out there with what must be barely functioning brain synapses who apparently are going to send this guttural harpie back to Washington so she can play act at being an actual U.S. House Rep for two more years (and believe me when I tell you that I want to be wrong about that)...
...and Mike Figueredo of The Humanist Report tells us about the American College of Pediatricians, which sounds completely respectable but is in fact a hate group as designated by the SPLC; they pretend to be a reputable medical org, but in this latest ridiculously cruel instance, they call for a ban on all medical care of any type for trans youth and adults...important to differentiate between this group of hacks and frauds and the American Academy of Pediatrics, which is completely reputable as Figueredo points out (NSFW/H)...
...and Sam and Emma of The Majority Report tell us that it looks like Alex Jones is going to have to completely liquidate to pay the $1.5 billion Sandy Hook settlement, including giving up Infowars in all likelihood...awesome! And boy, is Sam ever right about Ground News...
...and I'm in a mood for a summer tune, and this came immediately to mind.
Farron Cousins tells us that there have been about 1,000 complaints trying to get Judge Aileen Cannon removed from the classified docs case for Our Treasonous Orange Nightmare...yeah, this Judge William Pryor is all “nothing to see here” while Cannon’s ridiculous behavior on the bench goes unchallenged...and I guess we’re supposed to just ignore the fact that Pryor is also one of the most hard-right jurists in this country, to the point of being considered for the Court of Hangin’ Judge JR under the Gropenfuhrer, as Cousins informs us...
...and David Pakman tells us about U.S. Senate Repugs blocking a bill to protect contraception as noted here, including Tim Scott, who of course tries to take this in the direction of OMIGOD, THE DEMOCRAT PARTY WANTS POST-BIRTH ABORTIONS!!! while of course refusing to answer the question put to him by Bret Baier of Fix Noise, which is why the hell did you vote against a bill to protect contraception (the reality perspective against Scott’s ridiculous nonsense is here)...
...and John, David Shuster and Wosny Lambre of TYT bring us the story of cops in Burlington, Vermont staging a mock shooting as part of some classroom exercise...um, wasn’t there a (checks notes...) REAL attack there that paralyzed a Palestinian, with 2 others getting shot (here)? Who could have POSSIBLY imagined that this was a good idea? And maybe I shouldn’t say this, but having been to that town a couple of times, I would have thought they would know better than to do this, but I shouldn’t bias my observations I know...
...and Chris Hayes presents the following on “Dark Brandon” dealing with OPEC to minimize the shock of oil pricing...Hayes speaks with oil trader Dan Dicker on how “No Malarkey Joe” has manipulated the oil market to our benefit, which may be something else that generates a collective “yawn” from our oh-so-august-in-their-imaginations corporate media...I think that graph at about 6:20 tells a pretty amazing story about “buying low and selling high”...
...and continuing with money matters “across the pond,” I have to admit that I went out of order with my clips from Jonathan Pie – apologies – but here is his take on the U.K. economy under the rule of the Tories, and Rishi Sunak in particular...kind of a dark reason not to fear anything from Labour (maybe there really is no more dough), but there you are (NSFW/H)...
...and happy 75th birthday to drummer Frank Beard of ZZ Top.
David Pakman lets us know in this clip that Steve Bannon pretty much ran out of delaying tactics to keep himself out of the slammer, so now he’s availing himself of municipal accommodations as the price for his fealty to a certain Treasonous Orange Pestilence...
...and as long as we’re dealing with Our Ochre Abomination, I have to say that I was wondering if anybody in the “fourth estate” was actually going to call out the leader of Cult 45 for his call to get elected so his ol’ buddy Vlad The Butcher would supposedly free Murdoch Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, and Chris Hayes commendably did so...props to him, and for linking this sorry episode to Nixon’s trickery to scuttle the Paris peace talks before the ’68 election, as well as the deceit of The Sainted Ronnie R and his allies to keep our hostages in Iran and get Jimmy Carter voted out of office...
...and Jesse Dolllemore tells us about more insane, utterly stoo-pid lies from Generalissimo (And Convicted Felon) Trump at another one of these seemingly never-ending Charlie Kirk/Turning Point U.S.A. gatherings, one spiced up with a guttural curse word from this allegedly presidential individual (spoken in a church, no less, and cheered on by the life forms in attendance as noted here – NSFW/H)...
...and in other political news, Mike Figueredo lets us know that Mondaire Jones, former member of “the squad” in the U.S. House, basically stabbed Jamaal Bowman in the back to try and help Jones’s thin electoral prospects...it looks like Jones is trying to position himself as a “best bud” of “Bibi,” but as Figueredo points out, Jones’s congressional opponent Mike Lawler has beaten him to the proverbial punch on that one with laws not allowing criticism on Israel...and I agree that George Latimer looked pretty pathetic ignoring the queer individual asking him about returning campaign donations from people/groups who also support Dementia J. Trump (and “full Fetterman,” huh? Well...NSFW/H also)...
...and a hat tip goes out to Crooks and Liars for the reminder that yesterday marked the 70th anniversary of the confrontation between Sen. Joe McCarthy and U.S. Army lawyer Joseph Welch, in which Welch famously asked McCarthy “Have you no sense of decency, sir” (a question that we could ask a lot of politicians in this moment IMO, but I digress)...Welch was standing up for a lawyer named Fred Fisher, who had been unfairly attacked like so many others at the hands of McCarthy and his hatchet man Roy Cohn (here)...
Update 6/22/24: Looks like lying Monica is looking for a participation trophy here.
...and I was sorry to hear this about guitar legend Robin Trower...best wishes for a full recovery.
