IF YOU ENJOY SR AND FIND IT USEFUL WOULD YOU PLEASE DONATE
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: The truth is there are two American politics, only intermittently tangential. Bribery is legal thanks to the Citizens United decision, and it will now, as this describes, be unmonitored. The government is for sale to the rich. It is post-Republic Rome all over again. Then there are the actual voters.
It is a trend that really began growing with Eisenhower, and he warned us about it and now, under Trump, it has become explicit and obvious.
More than half of all TV ads related to 2020 elections are sponsored by dark money groups. Credit: Krisanapong Detraphiphat/ Getty
Political groups that don’t fully disclose their sources of funding have already spent more than $100 million to influence 2020 races, a figure that is sure to rise as “dark money” backed super PACs unload their unprecedented cash reserves.
Dark money groups such as political nonprofits that don’t disclose their donors have spent nearly $14 million to influence 2020 races, according to Federal Election Commission filings. “Grey money” outside groups that disclose a portion of their funding — such as super PACs that take money from shell companies or political nonprofits — have spent over $89 million.
By choosing to keep their donors secret, these groups leave voters in the dark as to exactly who is funding their political activities. Under a new Trump administration regulation, the Internal Revenue Service won’t know either.
The IRS finalized a rule this week that will exempt some dark money groups from disclosing their donors to the IRS. Many of 501(c)(4) nonprofits affected by the new rule already don’t […]
Stephan: This is what buying the government looks like. Trump seeking status in his world, displays the power bestowed on him by his office and directs the government to serve his friends in ways like this. It's all personal.
Environmental groups fear the agency will cave to pressure from state regulators and chemical industry groups. Credit: Alexandros Maragos/Getty
Ethylene oxide is a particularly dangerous chemical that’s both extremely flammable and potentially highly toxic to humans. Just a brief exposure to enough ethylene oxide gas can trigger vomiting and diarrhea, and respiratory problems that can damage the lungs. Long-term exposures to the chemical have been linked to cancers, reproductive problems, irreversible and heritable genetic changes, and neurotoxicity.
Despite its volatility and toxicity, ethylene oxide is used ubiquitously in all sorts of industrial processes, from the manufacture of ethylene glycol — which is used to make antifreeze, among other products — to the fumigation of agricultural products and the sterilization of medical equipment.
Just how widely used is it? The National Air Toxics Assessment shows the cancer risk from air pollution broken down into individual U.S. census tracts. Of the 109 census tracts in the latest assessment with a cancer risk from air pollution higher than the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) upper limit, 91 percent of the risk comes from just […]
Stephan: Yet another report of the right-wing trying to rig the November election. In my opinion, American democracy hangs by a thread.
Six states are facing federal lawsuits and threats of litigation from the ultra-conservative nonprofit Judicial Watch that could jeopardize the integrity of upcoming primary and general elections.
The suits claim that states are not properly maintaining voter rolls as required by federal law, and raise the specter of voter fraud, arguing that improper maintenance could leave the door open to “dirty elections.”
Judicial Watch, which focuses on the courts and is funded primarily by large grants from conservative foundations, is suing Pennsylvania’s chief election official, along with county legislators and election officials in three of the state’s six counties with the most registered voters. Pennsylvania was critical to Donald Trump’s win in 2016. He won by less than 1 percentage point, losing only 11 counties, including the three suburban Philadelphia counties being sued by Judicial Watch. It was the first time Pennsylvania went red since 1988. Democrats almost certainly need to win the state — where former Vice President Joe Biden was born, and where his campaign is headquartered — to take back the White House.
The group has filed similar suits in North Carolina and Maryland. The Pennsylvania lawsuit follows notices Judicial Watch sent to 19 counties in Pennsylvania, California, Virginia, Colorado, and Kentucky last […]
Stephan: I live in a state where everyone votes by mail, and we have done so for years. No problems ever arise. Many Republicans in Congress vote by mail, the President and Vice President vote by mail. But Republicans do not want vote by mail to expand because more non-Whites, and young people will vote, and they will vote against Trump and the Republicans in Congress. So, the Republican Party in a great act of hypocrisy is doing everything it can to stop the expansion of vote-by-mail.
Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel Credit: AP /Paul Sancya
Republican National Committee (RNC) Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel frequently voted by mail before leading a lawsuit against California over the state’s mail voting expansion, according to voting records.
McDaniel announced on Sunday that the RNC, the National Republican Congressional Committee and the California Republican Party had sued Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom after he announced that all registered voters in the state would receive mail-in ballots for the upcoming elections.
“Newsom’s illegal power grab is a recipe for disaster that would destroy the confidence Californians deserve to have in the security of their vote,” she said in a statement.
But voting records provided to Salon by the advocacy group Progress Michigan show that McDaniel has voted absentee in Michigan’s elections for years, including earlier this year.Igor Derysh✔@IgorDerysh
RNC Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel repeatedly voted by mail before leading California mail voting lawsuit, according to voting records obtained by @ProgressMich
“Voting by mail is safe and secure, and Ronna Romney McDaniel […]
MICHAEL MURRAY, Retired Superintendent of the Outer Banks Group, Member of the Coalition to Protect America’s National Parks, - The Hill
Stephan: Is there anything too despicable to which Trump will not sink in his attempt to get re-elected? As this sad little story illustrates, it appears there is not. He thinks, the Magas who like killing animals, thinking of it as a sport, which it is not, will be convinced by this nastiness to vote for him. They probably will.
Many people would agree that hunting methods such as killing black bear mothers with cubs in their dens, “harvesting” grizzly bears over bait, “taking” female wolves and coyotes and their pups during denning season, are deeply offensive, particularly on public lands, like the national preserves managed by the National Park Service in Alaska.
Yet, Secretary David Bernhardt’s Interior Department has pushed the Park Service to revise its 2015 Alaska national preserve hunting regulations that prohibited these despicable hunting practices.
The National Park Service manages 14 park units in Alaska, including some that Congress established as “national preserves.” Sport hunting in the national preserves was authorized under the 1980 Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act (ANILCA). Under ANILCA, Alaska State hunting regulations generally apply in national preserves except when in conflict with federal regulations.
Under the “conservation mandate” of the Organic Act of 1916, the National Park Service manages native wildlife populations to maintain the natural abundance, diversity and distribution of those populations in all park units throughout the country. This […]
Stephan: With this pathetic little story, I'm just going to let Trump speak for himself.
As he headed into Memorial Day weekend, Donald Trump complained that he was COVID-19’s biggest victim. “He was just in a fucking rage,” said a person who spoke with Trump late last week. “He was saying, ‘This is so unfair to me! Everything was going great. We were cruising to reelection!” Even as the death toll neared 100,000 and unemployment ranks swelled to over 38 million, Trump couldn’t see the pandemic as anything other than something that had happened to him. “The problem is he has no empathy,” the adviser said. Trump complained that he should have been warned about the virus sooner. “The intelligence community let me down!” he said.
The White House declined to comment.
Trump’s outburst reflected his growing frustration that, at this stage of the race, he is losing to Joe Biden. According to a Republican briefed on the campaign’s internal polls, Trump is trailing Biden by double digits among women over 50 in six swing states. “Trump knows the numbers are bad. It’s why he’s thrashing about,” the Republican said.
David Corn, Washington, D.C. - Bureau Chief - Mother Jones
Stephan: The whole Michael Flynn business has been classic Trumpian grift. Michael Flynn, as this report lays out, is everything he pleaded guilty to. But that is just part of it, and David Corn, in my opinion, has it right. Trump's psychological issues dominate any consideration beyond himself. As a result, the damage Trump and his minions are doing to the United States will be studied by scholars and scientists for generations. Unfortunately, we have to live through the debacle of his presidency, and its effects.
Trump and Flynn
Michael Flynn did something far worse than lie to the FBI. He betrayed the United States. That’s the major revelation of the just-released transcripts of the conversations he had during the presidential transition with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak. Trump and his crew tried to undo reality and whip up a baseless conspiracy theory that Trump has dubbed the “Obamagate” scandal, with a supposedly victimized Flynn in a starring role.
Up until now, the Flynn scandal has generally centered on his criminal case, in which Flynn, Donald Trump’s first national security adviser, was charged with—and pleaded guilty to—lying to FBI about his calls with Kislyak. Flynn told bureau agents that he had not discussed the sanctions imposed on Russia by the Obama administration in response to Vladimir Putin’s attack on the 2016 election. Well, he had. And Flynn had even encouraged the Russians to not retaliate severely, suggesting that when Trump took office things between Moscow and Washington could be smoothed over. The FBI knew this because US intelligence had intercepted those calls, presumably part of routine surveillance of the […]
Stephan: The Magas, willing peasants in the service of a small group of rich White billionaires gets its marching orders from the rightwing media establishment led by Fox and its disinformation specialists. At one level it is laughable. At another, it purveys a daily poison that is slowly toxifying American society with its lies and propaganda. The effects can be objectively measured.
Sean Hannity, Fox’s most popular propagandist
Donald Trump wants to go after social media because Twitter pointed out one of his lies. And, in fact, social media has done a lot of damage to America and the American body politic, with the most visible example being its help in putting Donald Trump in the White House in 2016.
But even more concerning should be Fox News and right wing hate radio. A new study out of Columbia university finds that when people in any particular ZIP Code experience a 1% increase in Fox News viewership, it “reduces the propensity to stay at home by 8.9 percentage points compared to the pre-pandemic average.”
In other words, one of the reasons that so many people have died in America right now is because conservative media has been repeatedly and consistently promoting the idea that this virus is a Democratic hoax or a “bad flu.“
Right wing media has gone from being the fringe home of crackpots and paranoids to a major influence in American culture and politics.
