Former President Barack Obama’s denunciation of the Capitol riot and Trump’s incitement, aided by Republican elected officials, gained a great deal of press. You can read it here. But there was less coverage of one of his tweets that I felt was extremely important.
Category: abuse of power
AMERICA: WHAT DO WE DO NOW? (Part 2)
An incredibly brave Not-Soon-Enough-President Biden boldly denounced both Trump-the-inciter and the “domestic terrorists” (good for him for using the term) who ransacked the Capitol last Wednesday. It’s worth noting that Biden has stated that he’d decided he had to run for President after Charlottesville, when Trump referred to the white supremacists as some of the “good people on both sides.” Even before he selected Kamala Harris as his running mate, they had both framed this election against Trump as the “battle for the soul of the nation.” And though the election is over, that battle is not.
AMERICA: WHAT DO WE DO NOW?
I thought I was done with Trump. I hoped never to write about the man again. But what he and his supporters are threatening to do to our democracy today is beyond the beyond. How do we respond? And, my thoughtful readers from other countries whose lives are intertwined with ours, I welcome your perspectives too. We clearly need all the help we can get.
Why Does the Justice Department Say a Sitting President Can’t Be Indicted? The Original Rationale’s Kinda Mind-Blowing…
I missed this story the first time around in 2019, but I think it’s worth covering now as Donald Trump fades into the sunset (a little wishful thinking on my part) and we review how we got to where we are—and where we may need to change our procedures. This need for reexamination covers many areas, but the Justice Department’s a big one.... It appears that Trump might owe a debt of gratitude to Spiro Agnew. Spiro who? Spiro Agnew, Richard Nixon’s Vice President at the time of the Watergate scandal. But this policy is unrelated to Watergate—or even to the President directly. That’s what makes it so very odd.
RAGE…DISGUST…COMPASSION…SADNESS…HOPE?
Last night, I finished reading Begin Again: James Baldwin’s America and Its Urgent Lessons for Our Own. The author, Eddie S. Glaude, Jr., is a Distinguished Professor of African American Studies at Princeton University. ... Though Glaude speaks of Baldwin’s rage, and his own rage, the rage that came to mind when I started this piece is mine.
“Something Is Not Right Around the Court…”
At the hearings for Judge Amy Coney Barrett, President Trump's ultra-conservative nominee to replace the late liberal giant Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the Supreme Court, Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (Dem, RI) gave a remarkably clear and extremely important tutorial on the forces that are really moving the Supreme Court's decision-making in ways large and small...I hope you will view this video, which succinctly captures so much about why our government is failing to meet the needs of the American people.
“BATTLE for the SOUL of the NATION”
I am including this video of the speech Democratic Presidential nominee Joe Biden delivered at Gettysburg in its entirety because I think it gives a good overview of the man and his values. I hope you’ll spend the full 22 minutes to watch it....I am as eager that it be seen and heard by folks outside the US as by American voters because I know the world needs reassurance that most of us in the US have not gone crazy.
THE TRUMPIAN AUDIT…WITH SOME POST-DEBATE COMMENTS
NOTE: I composed the acrostic below before last night’s debacle. I thought about not posting it because it seems almost quaint today. However, as I mull over Trump’s performance in the debate, I wonder whether the recent disclosures of his mounting financial problems—and the evidence many of us have long suspected that his alleged empire and fabulous wealth are in fact a house of cards—contributed to his unhinged performance.
This Man Has a Plan to “Unpack” the Federal Courts
The McConnell-Trump impact on the judiciary may cast a dark shadow upon us all for decades. But Glenn Kirschner says that need not be the case--and he offers a three-point plan.
Think Trump’s Not Moving Toward Total Autocracy? This International Analyst Knows the Signs Too Well…
Michael McFaul, former Special Assistant to President Obama and Sr. Dir. for Russian and Eurasian Affairs at the NSC, and former US Ambassador to Russia, has some trenchant observations about the meaning behind the show at last week's Republican National Convention.
Fighting Our “What If Trump Won’t Leave?” Paranoia
I had promised myself—and you—that I would stop talking about the gross elephant trampling through our Constitution (with apologies to real elephants, wonderful creatures that they are!).
My way of dealing with my strong feelings about Trump has been to make him tiny and powerless in my mind—even as I recognize his increasingly dangerous actions and expect them to continue to heighten as Election Day nears.
But then I read an article in The Boston Globe with the scary title “A bipartisan group secretly gathered to game out a contested Trump-Biden election. It wasn’t pretty.”
Barr’s Army: The Slender Legal Reed for Overtaking American Cities
Portland, Oregon Mayor Ted Wheeler and other elected officials have been telling Washington in no uncertain terms: “Take your troops out of Portland.”
Wheeler has called the unidentified federal individuals dressed in camouflage and driving unmarked vans President Trump’s “personal army.” You’ve no doubt heard that there have already been casualties in this foray.
But it would be more appropriate to call them “Barr’s army.” Our quite-recent history includes Attorney General Barr’s giving the orders for the attack on nonviolent protesters outside of the White House to facilitate Trump’s photo op holding a Bible.
