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When I began Schwartzreport my purpose was to produce an entirely fact-based daily publication in favor of the earth, the inter-connectedness and interdependence of all life, democracy, equality for all, liberty, and things that are life-affirming. Also, to warn my readers about actions, events, and trends that threaten those values. Our country now stands at a crossroads, indeed, the world stands at a crossroads where those values are very much at risk and it is up to each of us who care about wellbeing to do what we can to defend those principles. I want to thank all of you who have contributed to SR, particularly those of you who have scheduled an ongoing monthly contribution. It makes a big difference and is much appreciated. It is one thing to put in the hours each day and to do the work for free, but another to have to cover the rising out-of-pocket costs. For those of you who haven’t done so, but read SR regularly, I ask that you consider supporting it.
Stephan: Here, in contrast to what the Biden Administration is doing, is what the MAGA world is doing. After what I saw at CPAC I think it is important to call out evil when you see it. And the MAGA movement is evil and should be recognized as such. Fox knows what it is doing, but it is very profitable and so they suspend any sense of honor or ethics and do it anyway.
A power station in Odessa, Texas, where electricity was cut to many homes and businesses this week. Credit: Jacob Ford/Odessa American/AP
Millions of Texans, trying to survive a winter storm without heat or electricity following the catastrophic failure of the state’s power grid, were at least spared immediate exposure to the torrent of lies about what went wrong in their state being pumped out by Fox News.
As the widespread blackouts continued, so too did the all-out campaign of lying on behalf of the fossil fuel industry from Fox News hosts and Republican elected officials in Texas, who repeated the false claim that frozen wind turbines were to blame, hour after hour, even though wind energy is expected to power just 7 percent of the state’s grid in winter.
At the end of one report from Texas on Tuesday, Fox News anchor Harris Faulkner interjected, falsely, that “millions of Americans, in the cold and dark, say the lack of power is because of green energy policies and the vilification of oil, gas, and coal — the stuff that really keeps you warm.
Stephan: As we wake up each morning the Republican Party is trying to stay in power as a permanent racist minority by destroying the guts of our democracy. They want to keep the forms but not the substance. They want to get over two centuries of history, transforming it in a way that is evil. And they are doing this out in the open without shame because they think they can get away with it. Can they? You hold the answer.
WASHINGTON — Led by loyalists who embrace former President Donald J. Trump’s baseless claims of a stolen election, Republicans in state legislatures nationwide are mounting extraordinary efforts to change the rules of voting and representation — and enhance their own political clout.
At the top of those efforts is a slew of bills raising new barriers to casting votes, particularly the mail ballots that Democrats flocked to in the 2020 election. But other measures go well beyond that, including tweaking Electoral College and judicial election rules for the benefit of Republicans; clamping down on citizen-led ballot initiatives; and outlawing private donations that provide resources for administering elections, which were crucial to the smooth November vote.
And although the decennial redrawing of political maps has been pushed to the fall because of delays in delivering 2020 census totals, there are already signs of an aggressive drive to further gerrymander political districts, particularly in states under complete Republican control.
The national Republican Party joined the movement this past week by setting up a Committee on Election Integrity to scrutinize state election laws, echoing similar moves by Republicans in a number of state legislatures.
Republicans have long thought — sometimes quietly, occasionally out loud — that large […]
On the top, the uniform of a Nazis SS officer. On the bottom, the CPAC stage. Do you think this design happened by chance? Could it be any clearer if you have eyes to see?
Today, as I watched clips from the alt-right CPAC Trumper conference there was something about the image I was looking at that evoked an old memory. Something blatantly evil. I couldn’t identify it, but the more I watched the stronger the feeling became. I went looking for it and synchronistically within three searches I found it. As I looked at the image I had found I realized that CPAC had done this deliberately. It was a kind of hidden message, a visual dog whistle that would mean something only to people already a part of the CPAC world, and maybe a few people steeped in history. The Republican Party is now, openly for those who know, explicitly fascist, White Supremacist, and neo-Nazi.
Stephan: A golden Trump, an image straight out of the Bible, but MAGAs apparently have no sense of irony. The Republican Party is getting weirder and weirder.
Social media was ablaze this morning with a video taken at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington of a golden statue in the image of Donald Trump. People right away associated the graven image with the golden calf of the Bible—when Moses took so long bringing Yahweh’s Law down from Mt. Sinai that his brother succumbed to pressure to erect an idol to a competing god. “Mentioned in Exodus 32 and I Kings 12 in the Old Testament, worship of the golden calf is seen as a supreme act of apostasy, the rejection of a faith once confessed,” according to the Encyclopedia Britannica. “The figure is probably a representation of the Egyptian bull god Apis in the earlier period and of the Canaanite fertility god Baal in the latter.”
Now, there’s more important stuff going on right now. The parliamentarian of the United States Senate, for instance, ruled last night that the provision in the president’s covid relief package that raises the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour cannot pass by way of “reconciliation,” […]
Stephan: If you ever needed proof that Congressional Republicans do not care a whit about the wellbeing of American society, including the people who voted for them, I don't know how they could have made it clearer than they did with this vote. Here is a list of the men and women who voted against the Democratic Covid-19 relief bill, your relief package. In 2022 it should tell you how to vote.
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., speaks during his weekly news conference in the Capitol in Washington on Friday, Feb. 26, 2021. Every single member of the GOP House caucus, joined by two Democrats, voted against a sweeping Covid-19 relief package early Saturday morning. Credit: Caroline Brehman/CQ-Roll Call, Inc/Getty
Though House Democrats in the end had the votes to assure final passage of a sweeping Covid-19 relief package overnight—securing approval with a final 219-212 tally—it was the Republican Party membership in total lockstep, joined by two lonely members of the majority party, that voted to deny struggling American families, frontline workers, state governments, local communities, small businesses, and the nation’s schools and public health system nearly $2 trillion in urgent assistance to stabilize the economy, beat back the pandemic, and ensure solid footing for a robust recovery.
The two Democrats who sided with the GOP were Rep. Jared Golden, who represents Maine’s 2nd District, and Rep. Kurt Shrader, who represents Oregon’s 5th District. Direct from the roll call:
Stephan: The other day a Black reader wrote me and asked for something I thought represented White privilege saying if I wrote about it how did I understand it. The next day I saw this story, and as I read it, it struck me as an almost cartoonish example of White privilege. Imagine what would have happened to a Black or Brown man who killed a man in a hit and run, then lied about it. Do you think he would have gotten away with three misdemeanors and face only 90 days in jail like this cretin?
Jason Ravnsborg speaks in Sioux Falls, S.D., on Feb. 23, 2014. South Dakota Gov. Kristi L. Noem is calling for the resignation of the state’s attorney general, who is facing misdemeanor charges for striking and killing a man with his car. Credit: Dirk Lammers/AP
Days after South Dakota Attorney General Jason Ravnsborg fatally struck a man while driving in September, detectives told the Republican official they had found a pair of broken reading glasses inside his Ford Taurus. They belonged to the man he killed.
That was a problem, detectives said, because Ravnsborg, 44, said he didn’t know he had hit a man until the following day, when he returned to the scene and found the body of Joseph Boever, 55, in a ditch.
“They’re Joe’s glasses, so that means his face came through your windshield,” one of the detectives said in an interview released by the South Dakota Department of Public Safety on Tuesday.
The interviews raise questions about the conduct of the state’s top law enforcement official in the Sept. 12 incident, giving […]
Stephan: More good news from the Biden administration, although it got very little media coverage. Jennifer Granholm is just the person we need as energy secretary. She understands the issues and she has integrity, and the courage and strength to see rational climate change oriented energy policies are put in place and pursued.
Biden’s pick for energy secretary Jennifer Granholm
The Senate voted 64-35 on Thursday to confirm former Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm as secretary of the Department of Energy.
Why it matters: Granholm, only the second woman to head the department, will play a key role in President Biden’s efforts to accelerate the U.S. shift to clean energy and help other countries do the same.
Granholm said she hopes to strengthen solar and wind power usage, and to boost the development of clean-energy technologies, like electric vehicles.
The big picture: Granholm served two terms as Michigan’s governor from 2003 to 2011, during which she focused on boosting the auto and manufacturing sectors.
She served as Michigan’s attorney general from 1998 to 2002.
Granholm has also worked as an adviser to Pew Charitable Trusts’ Clean Energy Program.
The bottom line: Granholm’s experience working with the auto industry, especially its venture into electric vehicles, is viewed as an important asset in fulfilling Biden’s climate agenda.
While serving as governor of Michigan, Granholm secured $1.35 billion in federal funding for factories in her auto-focused state to produce electric vehicles,
Sarah Kaplan and Aaron Steckelberg, - The Washington Post
Stephan: I think we are looking at the future. Countries like Saudi Arabia and Russia whose entire economies are dependent on oil and gas are in for a big wakeup call, and so are states like Texas. Economies with oil dependence had better start planning for the future.
The Aptera can go 150 miles after just 15 minutes at an ordinary charging station. Starting price is $25,900.
The dream began in 1955, with a tiny, toylike creation called the “Sunmobile.” Built from balsa wood and hobby shop tires, it was just 15 inches long. The 12 selenium solar cells that decorated its exterior produced less horsepower than an actual horse. But it was proof of a concept: Sunlight alone can make a vehicle run.
The years went on, and the dream evolved into a converted vintage buggy with solar panels on its roof. Then a glorified bicycle, a retiree’s garage project, a racecar that crossed the Mojave Desert at 51 miles per hour.
It is a dream of perpetual motion. Of travel that doesn’t do damage to the planet. Of journeys that last as long as the sun shines.
There are problems with this dream, big ones. Clouds come. Night falls. The laws of physics […]
