Stephan: Just as Trump found the White Supremacy Neo-nazis in Charlottesville to be "good people," so he found the White racist milita Trumpers who flooded armed with assault weapons into the Michigan statehouse to be, "very good people, but they are angry." America's gun psychosis has nurtured an evil: the armed White Supremacist movement.
When you look at pictures of these people what do you see? What I see is a highly ritualized fear group, who mask their fear with hatred. They are a cadre, a cohort, very distinct, and they go to great lengths to define themselves. All are White. They are all male. They seem to range in age from 25 to 45. They all dress alike, particularly favoring Camo and baseball caps with the bills forward. They look like they smell. A large percentage are overweight with a belly hanging out over their pants. They favor a kind of frontier beard, and they clearly have a fetish about guns, particularly assault rifles.
This group is a growing menace in the country. It is just a matter of time until there is an incident. And they are cultivated and funded by the uber-rich, for their own purposes. This is straight out of Germany in the early 1930s, as Hitler was coming to power. If you think that isn't true spend a few minutes doing a Google on "the rise of Nazism" and read what comes up.
Protestors try to enter the Michigan House of Representative chamber and are being kept out by the Michigan State Police Credit: EFF KOWALSKY/AFP/Getty
President Trump threw his support behind armed right-wing protesters who entered the Michigan Capitol shouting and blocked the office of Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, claiming that they are “very good people, but they are angry.”
“The Governor of Michigan should give a little, and put out the fire,” Trump tweeted. “These are very good people, but they are angry. They want their lives back again, safely! See them, talk to them, make a deal.”
The president did not explain what he meant by “a deal.” Whitmer, a Democrat who has become a favorite punching bag for the president, extended the state’s social distancing guidance Thursday through May 15. However, she lifted many of the restrictions which had become a flashpoint for the protests, such as opening travel between primary and second homes and allowing residents to go boating and play golf. (Golf carts still remain verboten, though.)
Residents are still required to stay home as much as possible and […]
Stephan: To say that Alex Jones is a vulgar intellectually challenged boor, and a christofascist provocateur seems self-evident. Why would anyone pay attention to this man? And yet the Alex Jones Show is the 56th most popular radio program/podcast in the United States and the 13th most famous. In other words, millions of Americans find this man a creditable source of information. They constitute the Trumper hardcore. And here is what Mr. Jones has to say:
Far-right conspiracy theorist and Infowars founder Alex Jones has a long history of saying outrageous things in order to draw attention. And this week on his radio show — with the deadly coronavirus pandemic raising concerns about safety at food processing plants and integrity of the supply chain — Jones threatened to resort to cannibalism if faced with food shortages.
“I’ll admit it: I will eat my neighbors,” Jones told listeners. “I’m not letting my kids die.”
Jones asserted that although he is stocking up on food as much as possible, he will resort to cannibalism if food shortages become a reality and he ever runs out of food. Jones told listeners, “I’m literally looking at my neighbors now going, ‘I’m ready to hang them up and gut them and skin them and chop them up.’ And you know what? I’m ready. My daughters are not starving to death. I’ll eat my neighbors.”
Jones added, “My children are not going hungry. I will eat your ass. And that’s why I want the globalists to know: I will […]
Stephan: The lowest marriage rate recorded in our history is a trend with all sorts of social implications.
WASHINGTON—The share of Americans getting married has fallen to its lowest level on record, according to government figures released Wednesday that reflect how economic insecurity and changing norms are eroding the institution.
The U.S. marriage rate fell 6% in 2018, with 6.5 new unions formed for every 1,000 people, according to a report by the National Center for Health Statistics. That was the lowest rate since the federal government began keeping data in 1867, said Sally Curtin, a statistician at the center and lead author of the report.Marriage rate in the United States(1900–2018)Source: National Center for Health Statistics1905’20’35’50’65’80’95’10051015
“Millennials are in peak marriage years, their 20s and 30s, and it’s still dropping,” Ms. Curtin said. “This is historic.”
The new report shows how marriage rates plunged near the start of the Great Depression in the 1930s, then rebounded sharply after World War II, hitting a high of 16.4 marriages per 1,000 people in 1946. The marriage rate began a near-steady decline in 1982 that lasted until 2009, then remained near flat before inching upward in 2014. Ms. Curtin said there was […]
Shira A Scheindlin, United States District Judge (Ret.) - The Guardian (U.K.)
Stephan: "After three years of Trump’s appointments, the federal judiciary is 73% white and 66% male, but it will be even more male and pale by the end of his term," this report begins. I have been telling you this for three years. The Republican Party under Trump and Moscow Mitch is restructuring the American judicial system so that it is christofascist: White, racist, "Christian" and corporatist. We are going to be living with this distortion of our legal system for decades. It will be one of the major legacies of Trump and McConnell when, hopefully, they are both voted out of office in November. It's up to you to make that happen.
The US Capitol is seen from the supreme court in Washington DC on 27 April 2020. Credit: Tom Brenner/Reuters
Whether or not he is re-elected, Donald Trump will be revered by conservatives for his judicial appointments. As of March, Trump has appointed 193 judges to the federal bench, with another 39 pending on the floor of the Senate or in the Senate judiciary committee. Those nominations will surely be acted on favorably by the Senate before 20 January 2021, when there may be a new president and a new Senate. There are another 38 district court vacancies awaiting nominations. In one presidential term, Trump may appoint up to 270 federal judges, or 31% of the entire federal judiciary. For perspective, Barack Obama appointed 329 in eight years.
There is no doubt that the Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell, will confirm Trump’s appointments until the very last day of his term. This is of course the same Senate gatekeeper who infamously blocked Obama’s final supreme court nomination, Merrick Garland, for an entire year – on the ground that in the final year of a presidency, the […]
Stephan: While the Pandemic dominates all media, and everyone is looking elsewhere, the Trump administration is busily at work dismantling America's democracy. How? Read this.
Don McGahn in Trump Tower in 2016. Credit: Drew Angerer/Getty
Barring Congress from enforcing its subpoenas in court could push lawmakers toward arresting senior Trump administration officials or pursuing even more extreme measures, several appeals court judges suggested Tuesday.
It was the second time in recent months that the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals has openly mulled the bizarre and unnerving prospect of armed conflict between the House sergeant-at-arms and FBI agents if other, more peaceful options for the House to obtain information from the executive branch are closed off.
The discussion occurred as lawyers for the House and Justice Department sparred over efforts by Democrats to force former White House counsel Don McGahn to testify about his knowledge of alleged wrongdoing by President Donald Trump.
Most of the nine judges who joined in the rare en banc session Tuesday seemed receptive to the House’s concerns, with one judge musing the Trump administration was so intent on sidelining the courts that the public would be left only with “revolution” as an alternative.
A lawyer representing the Trump administration offered a […]
