Rush Limbaugh Dead - Good Riddance

The United States and, in fact, the entire world is a better place with today's death of right wing hate monger, Rush Limbaugh.  The former "top 40" radio DJ practically invented hate talk radio and spawned dozens of like minded right wing liars who pollute the airwaves with despicable lies and misinformation.

Using his sizable platform, Limbaugh advanced conservative ideas, though he often waded into conspiratorial waters and generated controversy for hateful commentary on gender and race. During the course of his career, Limbaugh started a number of fires with his commentary.

Limbaugh offered a conditional apology after he accused actor Michael J. Fox of exaggerating his Parkinson's disease and apologized when he insulted law school student Sandra Fluke. He relentlessly attacked President Barack Obama, going as far as to fan the flames of birtherism, the discredited idea that Obama was born outside the United States and therefore not eligible to be president. And, in the last few years, he peddled "deep state" conspiracy theories, providing cover for former President Donald Trump during his term, who he counted as a friend.

More recently, Limbaugh appeared to approve of some forms of political violence in the immediate aftermath of the January 6 insurrection at the US Capitol. He also drew backlash at the outset of the pandemic when he dismissed the coronavirus as the "common cold" and contended that it was being "weaponized" by members of the mainstream press to bludgeon Trump and harm his re-election chances.

Trump - Cultural Guardian

Trump has been labeled a "populist" by the media.  It was argued that much of Trump's appeal was to people with economic concerns.  The reality of Trump's appeal is far different.  Trump's MAGA mob see him as more than a politician.  They see him as a savior who appeals directly to their (and his) three main prejudices.

MAGA is “extremely politically organized and mobilized,” and so has an outsized influence on GOP elected officials even beyond its large numbers. His survey found they overwhelmingly believe voting should be made harder, not easier, and that they overwhelmingly support norm-breaking measures such as overturning the election and the idea of Trump serving as president beyond the constitutionally mandated two-term limit.

“They see Trump as the last thing standing between them and a fundamentally changed world,” Parker said. “They see him as more than a president, he’s a protector and guardian of a culture,” a fundamentally white, Christian culture.

“They want to go backward in time. This is one way they are very different than establishment conservatives.”

Prejudice #1 - Racism: 

Prejudice #2 - Misogynism:

Prejudice #3 - Immigrants 

Economic issues aren't as powerful as hate as motivators.

Losers, Fascists and Racists - Trump's Mob

So, did this mostly middle class, virtually all white mob attack the United States Capitol with the intent to disrupt a valid election because they felt affinity for a psychotic, inept megalomaniac or because they felt that Trump's continual flouting of the basic rules of commerce and society made them kindred spirits?  

I see Trumpism, in large part, as a cult of losers who see the rules and norms of a civil society as the cause of their failures.  Trump's entire career as a business and political failure was only possible because he and his father before him cheated, lied and stole their way to the point where they we accepted as something other than they really were and are.  Trump's mob appears to be made of failures who didn't have the financial cushion and snake oils salesman skill of their leader.

Nearly 60 percent of the people facing charges related to the Capitol riot showed signs of prior money troubles, including bankruptcies, notices of eviction or foreclosure, bad debts, or unpaid taxes over the past two decades, according to a Washington Post analysis of public records for 125 defendants with sufficient information to detail their financial histories.

The group’s bankruptcy rate — 18 percent — was nearly twice as high as that of the American public, The Post found. A quarter of them had been sued for money owed to a creditor. And 1 in 5 of them faced losing their home at one point, according to court filings.

The financial problems are revealing because they offer potential clues for understanding why so many Trump supporters — many with professional careers and few with violent criminal histories — were willing to participate in an attack egged on by the president’s rhetoric painting him and his supporters as undeserving victims.

The rest of the mob appear to be just garden variety racists and proto-fascists. 

Running Out of Water

 

California is remarkable vulnerable to the impact of climate change.  The state's agricultural economy depends on water that is accumulated during the winter rainy season.  The northern and central areas of the state are dependent on snowfall from winter storms that build a deep snow pack in the Sierra Nevada mountains.  The southern part of the state is nourished by some of that water, but also depends heavily on snow pack build up in the Rocky Mountains that feed into the Colorado River.  The forecast for both mountain ranges and the rivers their snow pack feeds is bleak. 

Climate change has shortened California's rainy season by a month since the 1960s.  

This year, the state saw a very delayed start to its annual rainy season, which is typically heaviest from January to March. Wildfires sparked as late as January. It’s a sign that the window of time where rainfall and snow can add to the state’s water reserves is shrinking, says John Abatzoglou, a climatology researcher at the University of California, Merced – and that window may be even narrower in the future.

Most of the state’s water comes from an astonishingly low number of precipitation events – just three to five winter storms do the work of building up the snowpack and filling reservoirs. That makes California uniquely vulnerable. “In years where you miss out on one or two of those, you’re probably going to struggle to get close to normal,” says Abatzoglou.

Without water California's Central Valley, the most prolific agricultural area in the nation will become a dust bowl. Agricultural interests in the valley have long since increased their water demands beyond what seasonal rains and even the state's extensive reservoir system can support.  Instead they have pumped so much water from underground aquifer that the entire central valley is sinking.

For decades, farmers have relentlessly pumped groundwater to irrigate their crops, draining thick, water-bearing clay layers deep underground. As the clays compress, roads, bridges, and irrigation canals have cracked, causing extensive and expensive damage. In 2014, when NASA scientists flew radar equipment over the California Aqueduct, a critical piece of water infrastructure, they found that one section had dipped 20 centimeters over 4 months... Excessive pumping also jeopardizes water quality, as pollutants accumulate within groundwater and the clays release arsenic. Worst of all, the persistent pumping means that, one day, aquifers might run out of usable water. 

Southern California's dependence on the Colorado River watershed will once again create incredible stress on water resources in the most populous region of the state.  Population growth in the seven western states that depend on the Colorado River combined with the expansion of agricultural activity in regions of historical water scarcity are generating substantial demands on a system that depends on the same weather patters that have diminished Northern California's rainy seasons.   

A sobering forecast released this week by the Bureau of Reclamation shows the federally owned Lake Mead and Lake Powell — the nation’s two largest reservoirs and critical storage for Colorado River water and its 40 million users — dipping near-record-low levels. If those levels continue dropping as expected, long-negotiated agreements reached by the seven Colorado River Basin states in 2019 will go into effect, with water deliveries curtailed to prevent the federal government from stepping in and making hard water cuts.

The Bureau of Reclamation’s quarterly report was dire, showing Lake Powell at 42% of capacity and downriver’s Lake Mead at 40% capacity. And there’s not much water coming.

Climate change did not take 2020 off due to Covid-19.   

Also posted at Just Save One.

The Party Of Death

 
Today the prestigious medical journal, The Lancet, published a commission study that concluded that Trump and, to a large extent, his fellow Republicans are responsible for as many as 188,000 unnecessary Covid-19 related deaths in the United States over the past 12 month.

The US could have averted 40% of the deaths from Covid-19, had the country’s death rates corresponded with the rates in other high-income G7 countries, according to a Lancet commission tasked with assessing Donald Trump’s health policy record.

Almost 470,000 Americans have died from the coronavirus so far, with the number widely expected to go above half a million in the next few weeks. At the same time some 27 million people in the US have been infected. Both figures are by far the highest in the world.

In seeking to respond to the pandemic, Trump has been widely condemned for not taking the pandemic seriously enough soon enough, spreading conspiracy theories, not encouraging mask wearing and undermining scientists and others seeking to combat the virus’s spread.

What the study is careful to point out that Trump's policies and behavior may have been responsible for the excessive death rate, but government policy at almost every level - local, state and federal - has, since 2002, reduced the resources available to address public health issues in the US.

The commission condemned Trump’s response to Covid, but emphasized that the country entered the pandemic with a degraded public health infrastructure. Between 2002 and 2019, US public health spending fell from 3.21% to 2.45% – approximately half the share of spending in Canada and the UK.

Tax cuts for the rich and corporation, attacks on government health programs such as the affordable care act and persistent racism which leaves minority communities with sadly deficient health care are all characteristics of not just Trumpism, but long term Republican Party policy.  

 

Trump's Fascist Fantasy

During his January 6 rally, prior to sending his red hatted MAGA mob to attack the United States Congress, Trump presented the insurrectionist mob with a well produced fascist video. A productions that included many of the familiar Nazi tropes - "the stab in the back," rampant anti-Semitism ("the International Jew) and, of course, the glorious, heroic leader.

On January 6, Trump supporters gathered at a rally at Washington DC’s Ellipse Park, regaled by various figures from Trump world, including Donald Trump Jr. and Rudy Giuliani. Directly following Giuliani’s speech, the organizers played a video. To a scholar of fascist propaganda, well-versed in the history of the National Socialist’s pioneering use of videos in political propaganda, it was clear, watching it, what dangers it portended. In it, we see themes and tactics that history warns pose a violent threat to liberal democracy. Given the aims of fascist propaganda – to incite and mobilize – the events that followed were predictable.

Change the words fascism and fascist with Trumpism and Trump and this indictment of Trump and his insurrection are shown in their true light - MAGA is a fascist cult of personality built around Trump. 

Fascism is a patriarchal cult of the leader, who promises national restoration in the face of supposed humiliation by a treacherous and power-hungry global elite, who have encouraged minorities to destabilize the social order as part of their plan to dominate the “true nation,” and fold them into a global world government. The fascist leader is the father of his nation, in a very real sense like the father in a traditional patriarchal family. He mobilizes the masses by reminding them of what they supposedly have lost, and who it is that is responsible for that loss – the figures who control democracy itself, the elite; Nazi ideology is a species of fascism in which this global elite are Jews.

I know it is hard to imagine Trump as the glorious leader of a great movement.  He is a lazy, cowardly bully, who exhorted the crowd by telling them he would "march with them" and then retreated to safety in the White House.  But, Hitler was an obscure Austrian, who prior to a stint in the German army in WW1, was a mostly homeless postcard illustrator.  So... there is no accounting for who will end up as the "glorious leader."

 

The Damage and Destruction Are Trump's Monument

Trump's wall along the US-Mexico border was a linchpin of his 2016 presidential campaign.  It was to supposed to be a signature achievement of his presidency.  There were however some significant issues with his wall.  First, everyone who studies the issue of people illegally entering the US realize that most enter the US through ports of entry not via cross country treks.  Second, building the wall would require substantial eminent domain actions by the US government against US citizens to take their border adjacent land to build the wall.  And, finally, despite Trump's exclamations to the contrary, Mexico would not pay for the building of the wall.  

What all of this meant was that the only quick and dirty wall building Trump could use as evidence of his promised "great wall" was in the refurbishment of existing border barriers and that new wall construction was mostly relegated to public lands along the border.  Public lands that included areas of substantial conservation and cultural value.  None of this mattered to Trump and his wall obsessed MAGAs.

“(The administration) really started to push out into remote, rugged terrain on public lands all across the borderline in Arizona, where the ecological value of those places is so much higher that the damage done by this construction is much more egregious,” said Randy Serraglio, Southwest conservation advocate with the Center for Biological Diversity.

For months now, construction crews have been dynamiting, drilling, pumping, excavating and clear-cutting public land. In places like Guadalupe Canyon in far eastern Arizona, simply building roads to bring in construction equipment involved blasting mountainsides and sending the rubble down to clog drainages. Previously wide-open landscapes where wildlife and water could move freely have been severed by the huge steel barrier. The Sonoran Desert’s iconic saguaros, protected by law, have been found lying in heaps next to construction sites.

“This is damage that will not ever be remediated or mitigated,” Serraglio said. “This is permanent.”

Bill Gates' Microchip

So.... Bill Gates is planning to use Covid-19 vaccinations to implant a tracking microchip into the American public.  Not surprisingly almost half of self-identified Republicans believe this to be true.  Apparently, it is important for Bill Gates to know where everyone is at any given point of time.  

Why has no one ever thought of this idea before.  Being able to track people's movements electronically.  It's a diabolic form of population control for which Republican will no stand.  For example, if such a tool were available, it would be possible to see if the mob that attacked the United States Capitol were somehow incited or inspired by Trump's rally a few blocks away for the Capitol.  Wait, such a tool exists and it pretty clearly shows the movement of MAGA from rally to riot.

Using a trove of leaked smartphone location data, @cwarzel and @stuartathompson identified some of the Capitol rioters.

In this time-lapse animation, smartphones moved from Trump’s rally to the Capitol. https://t.co/MV4foh0Olo pic.twitter.com/iSfdicvXWY

— New York Times Opinion (@nytopinion) February 6, 2021

A Slice of Hope

 The times, they are a changin'...

Trump Owns Them

Maybe her dad will shoot them in the face. Liz Cheney is a hard right conservative who was a reliable vote for every one of Trump's policies. Her father is part of what used to be the leadership of the Republican Party. Well, now the Republicans are the party of Trump and Taylor Greene. They are the QAnon/Fascist party and in Wyoming they want Liz to get out of their party.

Liz Cheney, the third-highest-ranking Republican leader in the House, was censured by the Wyoming Republican Party on Saturday for voting to impeach Donald Trump for his role in the January 6 riot at the US Capitol.

The overwhelming censure vote was the latest blowback for Cheney for joining nine Republican representatives and all Democrats in the US House in the January 13 impeachment vote.

On Saturday, only eight of the 74-member state GOP’s central committee stood to oppose censure in a vote that didn’t proceed to a formal count. The censure document accused Cheney of voting to impeach even though the US House didn’t offer Trump “formal hearing or due process.”

Going Over Jordan

While billeted in the Library of Congress while in Washington to protect our capitol some National Guard members showed off impressive musical skills and took advantage of near perfect acoustics.

I am a poor wayfaring stranger

I’m travellin’ through this world of woe

Yet there’s no sickness, toil, nor danger

In that bright land to which I go

I’m going there to see my Father

I’m going there, no more to roam

I’m only going over Jordan

I’m only going over home

I know dark clouds will gather ’round me

I know my way is rough and steep

But golden fields lie just before me

Where God’s redeemed shall ever sleep

I’m going home to see my mother

And all my loved ones who’ve gone on

I’m only going over Jordan

I’m only going over home

I am a poor wayfarin’ stranger

I’m travellin’ through this world of woe

Yet there’s no sickness, toil, nor danger

In that bright land to which I go

Christo-fascism - It's Here!

The "Christian" right wraps itself in the US flag.  They proclaim that the United States is a Christian nation and that as a Christian nation God needs to be in charge.  And, they will kill anyone who gets in the way.  Democracy is the enemy, freedom is an illusion and only the Godly are qualified to make decisions for the masses.  

They very much pushed the idea of a shadowy "one world government", and said that democracy is doomed to fail, has always failed.

And, no Sinclair Lewis did not say "When fascism comes to America it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross."  But, it doesn't matter who said it, it's the truth.

 

Republicans - Phonies, Tax Cheats and Grifters

Gun packing, Trump loving and newly elected Member of Congress Lauren Boebert appears to be just as much of a phony business person as Trump himself.  She apparently doesn't believe in paying her fair share of taxes.

Between August 2016 and February 2020, Shooters Grill, the gun-themed Rifle restaurant owned by Boebert, accumulated eight liens for nonpayment of unemployment insurance premiums, according to records from the Garfield County Clerk and Recorder’s office.

The liens, filed by the Colorado Department of Labor and Employment, indicate that Shooters Grill was delinquent on UI premiums dating back to its opening in 2013. By early 2020, Boebert’s restaurant owed the state a total of $19,552.86, including interest and penalties.

In a surprising twist Boebert payed off all of those liens just two weeks before the November election.  Subsequent financial disclosures from her campaign showed that she paid herself over twenty two thousand dollars as reimbursement for mileage travelled during her campaign.  Interesting...

Boebert appears to be as much of a failure at running a business as Trump himself.  

On a congressional financial disclosure statement that Boebert filed as a candidate in January 2020, she reported that Shooters Grill had posted a net operating loss of $242,347 in 2018. Boebert also disclosed liabilities that included a “business loan” valued at between $15,000 and $50,000.

And, of course, like Trump she doesn't believe in following the rules to keep the public safe during a global pandemic.

In May, public health officials in Garfield County revoked Shooters Grill’s license after Boebert repeatedly opened the restaurant for in-person dining in defiance of state and local coronavirus restrictions. The license was reinstated two weeks later, and Shooters Grill was allowed to reopen under the condition that it followed certain restrictions, including operating at 50% capacity.

Republicans have decided to unleash phonies like Boebert and Marjorie Taylor Greene on the United States.  As a political party Republicans gave up on truth and honest government back in the Reagan days and gave up on integrity and public service in the 1990s.  Now, it appears that they have given up on the very concept of reality. 

I Wasn't Fired, I Quit

Just like he claims that he wasn't fired as president, Trump has quit the Screen Actors Guild (SAG) just before being expelled by that organization.  

The president's resignation comes after the Screen Actors Guild board voted "overwhelmingly" that Trump violated the union's membership guidelines in the wake of the Capitol riot.

"Donald Trump attacked the values that this union holds most sacred – democracy, truth, respect for our fellow Americans of all races and faiths, and the sanctity of the free press," Carteris said last month. "There’s a straight line from his wanton disregard for the truth to the attacks on journalists perpetrated by his followers."

"Our most important role as a union is the protection of our members. The unfortunate truth is, this individual’s words and actions over the past four years have presented actual harm to our broadcast journalist members," said SAG-AFTRA National Executive Director David White. "The board’s resolution addresses this effort to undermine freedom of the press and reaffirms the principles on which our democratic society rests, and which we must all work to protect and preserve."

As we most things Trump does, his departure from SAG was done in the most classless and clueless possible way.

..."Which brings me to your blatant attempt at free media attention to distract from your dismal record as a union," Trump wrote. "Your organization has done little for its members, and nothing for me—besides collecting dues and promoting dangerous un-American policies and ideas.

Without me, you're nothing.   How can we get by without Trump?

Deus Vult

Trump's MAGA mob includes large numbers of self-described "Christians".   In fact this group makes up Trump's most fervent and, increasingly violent, faction among the various fascists, white supremacists, misogynists and other anti-democratic hoards that have decided to elevate Trump to near godlike status. 

...the Christian right is readying its troops for an escalation of the culture war: a campaign to delegitimize not only Biden’s presidency, but any Democratic election victory. Bachmann, during the prayer call just hours after the insurrection, claimed that Democrats also “stole” control of the Senate when Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock won their seats in Georgia – a development Bachmann repeatedly called a “coup.”

That narrative means that Republican lawmakers can rest assured that their most loyal base will have their back as they reject Trump’s second impeachment, obstruct the Democratic legislative agenda and refuse to accept the legitimacy of the Democratic president and Democratic leadership of Congress. The movement’s new jeremiad, a battle against the democratic process itself, is just getting started.

They Are The Storm...

Why do Republicans hate the United States?    Each day they fall more in thrall of various QAnon spouted conspiracies.  

The GOP bears no resemblance to the party of Abraham Lincoln. It is now the party of Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), who believes in the hallucinatory QAnon conspiracy theory, who has suggested that former secretary of state Hillary Clinton is a child murderer and who thinks 2018's California wildfires may have been ignited by a giant space-based laser somehow controlled by Jews. Also, high-speed rail is involved somehow.

They have apparently decided that free and fair elections are no longer necessary.  Secession from the union whose flag they wrap themselves in is now becoming a core tenant of the party in some states.  

Just look at the party’s state affiliates. On Jan. 4, the Arizona G.O.P. retweeted a “Stop the Steal” activist who’d pronounced himself willing to “give my life” to overturn the election. Said the party’s official account: “He is. Are you?” An Arizona lawmaker has since introduced a bill that would let the Legislature, controlled by Republicans, override the presidential vote of the state’s increasingly Democratic citizenry.

The Oregon Republican Party approved a resolution suggesting that the Capitol siege was a “false flag” attack. The Texas Republican Party has adopted the QAnon slogan “We are the storm” as its motto, though it insists there’s no connection. The chairman of Wyoming’s Republican Party, who attended Trump’s rally on Jan. 6, said he might be open to secession.

If this is how the vast majority of those Americans that register as Republicans think, the United States is doomed.

 

But, Your Honor I Booked The Trip Before I Committed Sedition

Always get trip insurance.  That's an important tip to any MAGAs planning violent insurrection.

One of the rioters who stormed the US Capitol during the January insurrection asked a federal court to let her leave the US for a vacation she booked in Mexico.

...[she] streamed a live video on Facebook after leaving the Capitol where she said that she had attended Trump's speech and went to the Capitol before Trump had finished speaking.

It said she mentioned House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's office being broken into, saying "We did break down the Nancy Pelosi's office door and somebody stole her gavel and took a picture sitting in the chair flipping off the camera."

And, according to the FBI, she said in the video: "f--k yes, I am proud of my actions. I f---ing charged the Capitol today with patriots today. Hell, yes I am proud of my actions."

Trump's $175 Million Scam

Trump's whole "stolen election" tantrum wasn't really about the election at all. It was a scam. Trump found a way to make a boat load of money crying about the election he lost by millions of votes. His MAGA hoards dumped millions to help with his legal cases and Trump repaid them with a small dollar public relations campaign and the worst (as in cheapest) legal team in history.
Keep in mind that he is even refusing to pay Rudy Giuliani for his efforts. His cult members at the Republican National Committee got 35 cents on every dollar Trump raised so you can see why they were on board with amplifying his lies.

Former President Donald J. Trump and the Republican Party leveraged false claims of voter fraud and promises to overturn the election to raise more than a quarter-billion dollars in November and December as hundreds of thousands of trusting supporters listened and opened their wallets.

But the Trump campaign spent only a tiny fraction of its haul on lawyers and other legal bills related to those claims. Instead, Mr. Trump and the G.O.P. stored away much of the money — $175 million or so — even as they continued to issue breathless, aggressive and often misleading appeals for cash that promised it would help with recounts, the rooting out of election fraud and even the Republican candidates’ chances in the two Senate runoff races in Georgia.