May the Week's News Rise to Byte You
May the Week's News Rise to Byte You
Watergate included an 18 minute gap in the secret Nixon White House recording system. This gap covered hours and hours.
Meanwhile, after a jury convicted him of contempt of Congress, this guy - who likes to say he wants to burn down the government - offered this threat:
Speaking to Fox News host Tucker Carlson, Bannon warned committee staffers that Republicans would have their own committee if they returned to power.
"We have to have a real January 6 committee, including to get to the staffers now and see about the lies and misrepresentations they put on the national television to defame people," Bannon said.
"I would tell the Jan. 6 staff right now: preserve your documents because there's going to be a real committee, and this is going to be backed by Republican grassroots voters to say we want to get to the bottom of this for the good of the nation."
The Trump ally said that Republicans need to take offensive action if they take back the House in the midterm elections.
"We have to really govern, and I mean govern on offense. Every committee in the House needs to be an oversight committee. We have to go after the Biden administration, which is illegitimate," Bannon said.
I certainly hope the judge takes this into account at his sentencing and give him a chance to boost his deliberate martyrdumb.
He continues to carry the Trump banner, though, convinced Trump will win a second term and turn our civil service system back into a patronage system loyal only to you-know-who, ruining the careers and retirement plans of thousands of dedicated workers who’ve done nothing wrong.
Even for people who don’t particularly like Joe Biden - whose initial plans would have been the most progressive since the 1960s (but were derailed by two Democratic turncoats, Manchin and Synema), this is why it’s of utmost importance to vote this Fall in the midterms, before Trump and Bannon succeed in destroying our system of government completely and unleash the evil forces of dictatorship.
Matt - the pedosex trafficker - Gaetz would like a word with women to put their minds at ease about rights and shit.
The guy stutters so badly that he refers to himself in the third person. He has difficulty saying the word ‘I’. He played in All Star games for two major league sports. When his playing days were over, he fulfilled a promise to his Mom, and got a degree in Family and Child Development.
He stepped up in a big way recently. No, he’s not running for Senate or any office.
He sponsors an annual bike ride in his home state of Alabama to raise funds for disaster relief. He began that after a series of tornadoes killed nearly 250.
“It’s the children. ... It’s the children. ... It’s the children,” Jackson said, pausing before each repetition to gather himself. “If it doesn’t bother you, something’s wrong with you.”
He flew in to Texas with a check for $170,000 which paid for the funerals of all 21 Uvalde victims.
Not to spoil his act of compassion, but I’m also aware of a politician who went to Uvalde. Senator Ted Cruz. He went there to console the police.
Be like Bo.
Is this the way to go in the future?
Power grid failures, mass shootings, but hey, they’ll track down any woman who might need an abortion. The minimum wage is $7.25/hr there, the same as it was 13 years ago. High school and college students working up to 20/hrs a week? They can be paid less, $6.16/hr.
Texas is not alone with this minimum wage. TN SC MS LA AL WY UT OK ND NC KY KS IA IN ID also have a $7.25 minimum wage. That’s 16 Republican dominated states. The swing states of WI, PA, GA, NH also can pay that low. The federal minimum wage hasn’t been raised in 13 years - the longest period without an increase since the minimum wage began during the Great Depression. Mostly because it was blocked by a Republican Congress from 2010-2020.
The last federal minimum wage increase occurred in 2009 due to the housing bubble collapse. It helped lift the country out of that fiasco, caused by over-speculation by wealthy investors and lots of shenanigans by banks and other lenders.
Texas is now the poster child of states with terrible priorities, due to its Tea Party state government. Notably, it was also reported this week that a plant in Alabama that’s a supplier for Hyundai was employing child laborers - but immigrant children only. Is this the new American vision?
With inflation raging due to unreal property value increases (speculators rule!) and gas price increases caused by dictators in Saudi Arabia, Russia, Venezuela, etc., the GOP has the chutzpah to claim inflation is caused by wage increases …… and Joe Biden.
I won’t give the Democrats a break on this one, though. After 18 months, this Congress has yet to get a minimum wage increase so if either House of Congress goes Republican in November, I expect no increase in the next two years, as well.
A recent survey rating the most affordable and least affordable cities to live in on minimum wage indicates, of the 15 least affordable, Texas has 5. North Carolina has 3. No other state has more than 1.
Tea Party wages with failing power grids, nearly 400 cops refusing to stop a school shooter and a decline in human rights. Woo-hoo! What’s not to like about the Texas model?
Some local issues that deserve national attention now.
Today’s the last day of the World Athletic Championships here in Eugene, which is known as Track Town USA. It’s a city of 180,000 residents and in the period leading up to this track meet, local social media was abuzz with worries after reports that 200,000 outsiders were about to descend on us.
Today’s the final day. What do the early results indicate?
It’s been a bust for downtown restaurants and food carts. Business has dropped because people feared there’d be too much traffic and too many crowds. Apparently, other than a few nightspots, all that outside money has flowed to the sponsors of the Hayward Field events, local hotels and AirBnBs.
Meanwhile, Eugene’s now joining most of the country with a rising heatwave here for the next 8 days. Concern is rising that the heat could trigger wildfires nearby, though an unusually long, wet spring might spare us that.
Those driven out by wildfires 2 years ago are still trying to rebuild or replace homes lost in those fires. The delays have been exacerbated by covid, rising prices and supply chain issues.
Once again, it looks like Terry McDonald, head of the local St. Vincent de Pauls, has a rescue plan. He’s been the greatest innovator turned developer for building affordable housing in the area and providing solutions and services to our homeless population here… for more than 3 decades.
Manufacturing mobile homes, to aid those who lost their homes in fires as well as low income and homeless people. The homes will be energy efficient, fire-resistant and affordable.
Terry’s always been an out-of-the-box thinker. If this venture succeeds, he thinks it’ll become a model that will spread across the country, providing affordable housing that may also protect people from the perils of global warming ahead.
On local social media, I hear some folks grouse about the higher prices at St. Vinnie’s thrift stores. Some, like me, don’t mind paying a little more since we know the money gets invested in all the right places.
That’s the good and the bad of the past week or two. Once again, be like Bo. And like Terry.