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Liz Cheney says Republican colleagues voted her out because of 'threats on their lives' Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY) revealed on Sunday that some Republicans did not come to her defense while she was being ousted from leadership because of "threats on their lives." "There was really nobody that came to your defense," ABC host Jonathan Karl noted during an interview with Cheney that aired on Sunday. "You were pretty much alone on this." "It is very important to stand up for what's right," Cheney replied. "I know that there are many members who have expressed concern about their own security." "And I think that's an important point," she continued. "We now live in a country where members' votes are are affected because they're worried about their security, they're worried about threats on their lives. So I think that's part of it." Liz Cheney says Republican colleagues voted her out because of 'threats on their lives' | Salon.com Trump's father wouldn't have to worry about getting into the US- he was a good Nazi.

There is an answer as to how the world can be created by a loving God and yet manifest in such an apparently cruel and uncaring way. And it does not involve Zeemu. Trump officials used secret terrorism unit to question lawyers at the border: documents Taylor Levy couldn't understand why she'd been held for hours by Customs and Border Protection officials when crossing back into El Paso, Texas, after getting dinner with friends in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, in January 2019. And she didn't know why she was being questioned by an agent who'd introduced himself as a counterterrorism specialist. Levy was part of the legal team representing the father of a girl who'd died the previous month in the custody of the Border Patrol, which is part of CBP. “There was so much hate for immigration lawyers at that time," she recalled. “I thought that somebody had put in an anonymous tip that I was a terrorist." The truth was more troubling. Newly released records show that Levy was swept up as part of a broader than previously known push by the administration of President Donald Trump to use the federal government's expansive powers at the border to stop and question journalists, lawyers and activists. The records reveal that Levy and attorney Héctor Ruiz were interrogated by members of CBP's secretive Tactical Terrorism Response Team. The lawyers were suspected of “providing assistance" to the migrant caravan that was then the focus of significant attention by the administration and right-wing media. Officials speculated in later reports that immigration lawyers were seeking to profit by moving migrants through Mexico, and that “Antifa" may have been involved. The records were provided to ProPublica by the Santa Fe Dreamers Project, a public interest law firm and advocacy group that received them after filing a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit about the stops of Levy and Ruiz at the border in El Paso. Trump officials used secret terrorism unit to question lawyers at the border: documents - Alternet.org

Does this have anything to do with Catholic rituals?

Not good, but better.

Killing people in the name of an all-wise, all-powerful and loving God never seems to go out of fashion.

Texas GOP passes abortion ban based on weaponizing lawsuits against providers Legislation that would ban abortions after as early as six weeks — before many women know they are pregnant — and let virtually any private citizen sue abortion providers and others was given final approval by lawmakers Thursday and is headed to Gov. Greg Abbott, who has signaled he will sign it into law. Senate Bill 8, a Republican priority measure, is similar to "heartbeat bills" passed in other states that have been mostly stopped by the courts. But proponents of the Texas legislation believe it's structured in a way that makes it tougher to block. The bill was denounced by hundreds of lawmakers and doctors — in letters circulated by opponents of the measure — who said its broad legal language could open the door to harassing or frivolous lawsuits that could have a "chilling effect" on abortion providers and leave rape crisis counselors, nurses and clinic staff "subject to tens of thousands of dollars in liability to total strangers." Abortion rights advocates say it is among the most extreme restrictions nationwide. The bill, which would take effect later this year, bans abortions after a fetal heartbeat can be detected without specifying a time frame. A legislative analysis and the bill's proponents have said that can be as early as six weeks, though state Rep. Donna Howard, D-Austin, in a floor debate cited medical experts who say there is no fully developed heart at that gestational age and that the sound referred to as a heartbeat is actually "electrically induced flickering" of fetal tissue. The bill makes an exception allowing for abortions in the case of a medical emergency but not for rape or incest. It would be enforced by private citizens empowered to sue abortion providers and others who help someone get an abortion after six weeks, for example, by driving them to an abortion clinic. Those private citizens would not need to have a connection to an abortion provider or a person seeking an abortion, and would not need to reside in Texas. Texas GOP passes abortion ban based on weaponizing lawsuits against providers | Salon.com

South Carolina GOP panicked pro-Trump lawyer Lin Wood's loss will trigger a statehouse insurrection Far-right, pro-QAnon attorney Lin Wood, who struck out trying to prove voter fraud in the 2020 election and is now facing an ethics investigation and a criminal probe for alleged illegal voting of his own, has embraced a new project: running for chair of the the South Carolina Republican Party. According to POLITICO, this bid is also likely to go down in flames today, as incumbent party chair, Drew McKissick will likely rout him among party delegates. But GOP strategists are privately scared that his loss will not put an end to the base's embrace of his conspiracy theories. "Like Trump, Wood is already accusing McKissick of election fraud — without any evidence — even before the first ballots are cast Saturday," reported Marc Caputo. Meanwhile, "Wood has gone so far as to make dark insinuations that McKissick isn't doing enough to stop 'the real pandemic' of pedophilia, and suggested he needs to resign over unspecified 'nefarious activities' with GOP Sen. Lindsey Graham. Wood has also called the coronavirus pandemic a 'plandemic,' suggesting it was part of an organized plot." According to the report, Wood has even tried to cast doubt on the authenticity of Trump's endorsement of McKissick for re-election. "What's going to happen Saturday is that McKissick is going to win, and Lin Wood is going to say it was fraud and scream and holler conspiracy theories," Joel Sawyer, a former South Carolina GOP executive director, told POLITICO. "The problem in South Carolina is many of the people at the county level, the delegate level, have been echoing the former president's fact-free claims of election fraud, but those very people are now going to have to turn around and defend the legitimacy of this election. But they don't have a lot of moral authority to dispute fact-free claims of election fraud." South Carolina GOP panicked pro-Trump lawyer Lin Wood's loss will trigger a statehouse insurrection - Alternet.org

The roots of this sort of thing go waaay back. About 20 years ago, I was part of a fledgling internet technology forum- then called a chat group. One of the members at that time reported, from first-hand knowledge, that a major American food company had been hacked and their entire accounts receivable was encrypted and held for ransom- the amount quoted was 12 million dollars that was paid as quietly as possible. One would think that the word would get around to all the major companies if not all larger organizations that they ought to upgrade their security protocols. I seem to recall that as recently as a few years ago, Windows 95 was still being used by some organizations. You get what you pay for.

Not statistically significant.

This wrinkle, that a state governor can order defiance of a federal subpoena or arrest warrant because the governor does not like it is absolutely bizarre, even for American jurisprudence. Can you imagine that a premier or delegate could defy a criminal arrest warrant for a member of that province because s/he did not like it?

Right wing goes nuts over gas shortage, invents elaborate reasons why it's Biden's fault Republicans and their allies in right-wing media have found a new attack line against President Joe Biden's administration, attempting to generate over the evolving nationwide fuel storage that resulted from the hack of Colonial Pipeline, a private company, which has sent Americans into long lines to top off their tanks at inflated prices. As tanks began to run dry at gas stations along the East Coast, right-wing pundits fired up the outrage machine and started blaming Biden and his administration. Fox News host Tucker Carlson, during his Tuesday opening monologue, tried to blame the shortage on Biden's policies, suggesting that the administration "approves" of the short-term gas crisis, reportedly caused by a Russian dark internet operation called "Darkside" hacking into Colonial Pipeline's data. "In case 2021 didn't remind you enough of a grimmer version of the 1970s, we now have serious gas shortages in a country that just recently was energy-independent," Carlson said. "All along the East Coast of the country today, people couldn't fill up their cars. The footage looks like Venezuela." Carlson further remarked, in skeptical tones, that "the official explanation is that some mysterious gang of cybercriminals hacked the software at a major American fuel supplier called Colonial Pipeline." "What is this about?" Carlson then posed to his audience. "Well, you know. On some level — let's be honest about it — the White House approves of this disaster," he continued, blaming the Biden administration's policies of gradually moving away from fossil fuels. "Yes, some gas stations are closed tonight," Carlson continued, before launching into a dystopian future fantasy. "But soon enough, the lunatics plan to close them all — every gas station in the entire United States, shuttered forever, to make way for some new, as-yet-undefined means of transportation that will magically replace the gasoline engines we've used for more than 100 years. This is a green revolution. So who cares about some old pipeline?" Right wing goes nuts over gas shortage, invents elaborate reasons why it's Biden's fault | Salon.com

Florida Officials Reportedly Steeling For A Trump Extradition Block By Gov. Ron DeSantis Florida officials are preparing for possible interference by staunch Donald Trump ally Ron DeSantis, the state’s Republican governor, if New York City attempts to extradite the former president, Politico reported Thursday. Palm Beach County law enforcement officials are “actively” preparing for the possibility that Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance Jr. could indict Trump while the former president is living at his Mar-a-Lago resort, two high-ranking county sources told Politico Playbook. Vance’s office has been investigating whether Trump and his businesses have committed banking and tax fraud. Trump’s tax records were finally turned over to Vance’s office in February after a protracted legal battle over access that went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. A key concern is that DeSantis could use Florida law to block extradition if charges are filed against Trump. Under state law, DeSantis could intervene and even investigate whether an indicted “person ought to be surrendered” to law enforcement from another state, Politico reports. The wrinkle is that Trump is about to head to his golf resort in Bedminster, New Jersey, for the summer and has already said his goodbyes to Mar-a-Lago guests. New Jersey’s extradition law is similar to Florida’s and gives the governor the authority to investigate an extradition demand. But the state administration, Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy and residents are not expected to be quite so accommodating to Trump. Democrat Joe Biden won the state with 57.3% of the popular vote to Trump’s 41.4%. Any action by Vance could happen in the next few months. He announced in March that he’s not seeking reelection as district attorney. He’ll leave his position the end of they year and may want to wrap up the Trump investigation and any indictments before then. Florida Officials Reportedly Steeling For A Trump Extradition Block By Gov. Ron DeSantis | HuffPost

Bombshell NYT report uncovers a right-wing activist plot to go after the 'deep state' during the Trump-era Undercover operatives from right wing Project Veritas worked with a former British spy trained by Betsy DeVos' brother Erik Prince to wage a smear and sting operation to discredit "deep state" federal government officials on President Donald Trump's enemies list while he was in office, including the National Security Advisor and FBI agents. The New York Times broke the bombshell story, reporting that the "campaign included a planned sting operation against Mr. Trump's national security adviser at the time, H.R. McMaster, and secret surveillance operations against F.B.I. employees, aimed at exposing anti-Trump sentiment in the bureau's ranks." "The campaign," the Times reports, "shows the obsession that some of Mr. Trump's allies had about a shadowy 'deep state' trying to blunt his agenda — and the lengths that some were willing to go to try to purge the government of those believed to be disloyal to the president." "Central to the effort, according to interviews, was Richard Seddon, a former undercover British spy who was recruited in 2016 by the security contractor Erik Prince to train Project Veritas operatives to infiltrate trade unions, Democratic congressional campaigns and other targets. He ran field operations for Project Veritas until mid-2018." Bombshell NYT report uncovers a right-wing activist plot to go after the 'deep state' during the Trump-era - Alternet.org

Still horrible, but at least its down significantly from the past couple of days. We can pray that its the beginning of a trend that is the result of the vaccinations out-pacing the spread.

His government certainly had no intentions of helping and did not. In fact, the Reagan administration allowed the CIA to sell drugs into the US and use the money to buy weapons for the Contras in defiance of both American and international law. His people brokered the regulatory change that allowed the Saving and Loan scandal to bilk Americans out of their savings and transfer some 80 billion dollars into the pockets of predatory financial wheeler-dealers,

Exposé reveals Trump’s 2020 election conspiracy was part of a plan cooked up in a Texas airplane hangar in 2018 Two years before the 2020 election, the conspiracy that Donald Trump won the election was part of a plot cooked up by a Texas Republican businessman, reported a Washington Post exposé. In a shocking report, the Post revealed Russell J. Ramsland Jr. pitched an idea that "seemed rooted in evidence." The theory was that "voting-machine audit logs — lines of codes and timestamps that document the machines' activities — contained indications of vote manipulation." There was just one problem, they didn't have a candidate to test the theory. "We had to find the right candidate," said former Ramsland ally Laura Pressley. "We had to find one who knew they won." The problem was that in 2020 most races were clear, even the presidential race. U.S. Rep Pete Sessions (R-TX) wanted nothing to do with it, nor did state Sen. Don Huffins (R). But Donald Trump didn't want to lose and he certainly didn't want to lose by the amount he did in 2020. The meeting inside the airplane hanger had a "clandestine air," about it, the Post described. "Guests were asked to leave their cellphones outside before assembling in a windowless room. A member of Ramsland's team purporting to be a 'white-hat hacker' identified himself only by a code name." "The enduring myth that the 2020 election was rigged was not one claim by one person," said the report. "It was many claims stacked one atop the other, repeated by a phalanx of Trump allies." Exposé reveals Trump’s 2020 election conspiracy was part of a plan cooked up in a Texas airplane hangar in 2018 - Alternet.org Indeed, it was a coordinated effort among many Trump allies and lawyers. They weren't perpetrated by experts or insiders, as the report explained, it was conservative activists and Trump pals who pushed a company called the Allied Security Operations Group (ASOG) to "find" the evidence "where none existed." "Ramsland and others associated with ASOG played key roles in spreading the claims of fraud," said the Post. After fringe Republican Louie Gohmert was "briefed" by the ASOG he began promoting the conspiracies. Then they became part of Sidney "Kraken" Powell's lawsuits and Rudy Giuliani's efforts. Fox News has seized on the reports as well, hungry for Trump supporter ratings as the outgoing president attacked the network for calling Arizona for Biden on election night. "During that period, Trump was hyper-focused on making the case that the election had been rigged," reported the Post, citing former White House aides. "He would listen to 'literally anyone' who had a theory about it, in the words of one former senior administration official."

I do not know where you are getting your information, but you are way off base. Admittedly, there is more of a theoretical difference between the Dems and the GOP, but Trump's actions are far beyond anything attempted by any previous president- even the Bushes, Nixon and Reagan never tried to use the military to overturn an election result, or openly supported fascists and racists, or encouraged a coup attempt, or openly supported pedophiles, or boasted about sexually assaulting women, or subverted the DOJ. Trump is a self-admitted sexual predator, a malignant narcissist and a sadist. If you think that there is a precedent for this kind of behaviour in the GOP, let alone the Dems, you live in a different world.

Right-wingers staking out hardware stores in pursuit of latest anti-Biden conspiracy theory Amateur sleuths are racking up page views by staking out hardware stores and filming stack of lumber in the latest online conspiracy theory. Lumber prices have tripled as demand for housing has jumped and the pandemic throttled production, but lumber-shortage truthers are recording videos of wood just as coronavirus skeptics filmed half-full hospital parking lots last year in an effort to prove the pandemic was a hoax, reported The Daily Beast. "I'm just astounded at how much lumber is here, and I'm wondering why there's such a problem at the lumber yard," says the owner of a YouTube account called "Ken's Karpentry" in a widely viewed video. "We're still seeing the prices increase at the lumber yards, so I'm not sure why." That video, with the blaring title "TRAIN LOADS OF LUMBER JUST STACKED UP !!!! Why," has been viewed nearly 500,000 times and was cited by the pro-Donald Trump blog Zero Hedge as proof that lumber prices were being artificially inflated. "Could the lumber industry, controlled just by a few players, be pulling the playbook straight out of the diamond industry to limit supply to drive up prices?" wrote pseudonymous ZeroHedge writer "Tyler Durden." Right-wingers staking out hardware stores in pursuit of latest anti-Biden conspiracy theory - Alternet.org

‘WTF Is Wrong With You?’: NRA Trashed For Tasteless Meme After Mass Shooting The National Rifle Association picked a really weird way to mark a Mother’s Day that began with a Colorado mass shooting that killed seven people. Seven people were killed on Sunday in Colorado Springs, Colorado, in the year’s 194th mass shooting, according to the nonprofit group Gun Violence Archive. The wave of violence has led to new calls for gun control measures. But on Sunday ― Mother’s Day ― the National Rifle Association posted a meme suggesting that mothers arm their young daughters. “MAMA DIDN’T RAISE A VICTIM” read the text over an image of a woman and a young girl with firearms.

Maryland Governor Issues Blanket Pardon For Lynching Victims Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan (R) on Saturday granted posthumous pardons to 34 lynching victims. His office said it was the first time a governor had issued a “blanket pardon” of this kind. Some children were among those pardoned, including Howard Cooper, a 15-year-old Black boy who was hanged by a white mob in 1885, and 13-year-old Frederick “whose full name was lost to history,” Hogan said. The governor signed the pardons at an event memorializing Howard, who was killed after an all-white jury found him guilty of raping a white woman. The woman never testified, but the jury reportedly reached its verdict in under a minute. Before Howard’s attorneys were able to appeal the conviction to the U.S. Supreme Court, the boy was dragged from a Baltimore County jailhouse by an angry mob and hanged on a nearby sycamore tree. According to a historic marker that was unveiled Saturday at the site where Howard was lynched, the boy’s “body was displayed so angry white residents and local train passengers could see his corpse” and pieces of the rope that had been used to hang him were later “given away as souvenirs.” “Howard’s mother, Henrietta, collected her child’s remains and buried him in an unmarked grave in Ruxton. No one was ever held accountable for her son’s lynching,” the marker reads. (Very magnanimous of them) Jim Crow Ballot ‘Purity’ Phrase Yanked From Texas Vote Suppression Bill At Last Minute. GOP lawmakers ultimately decided not to advertise the segregationist nature of the voting measure. A segregationist term from the Jim Crow era referring to the “purity” of ballots was yanked at the last minute before the Texas House passed a measure restricting voting. Eighteen amendments — 13 of them from Democrats — were added to the Republican election bill before it was passed 78-64 Friday. But an initial fight was over the bill’s statement of purpose. It initially said that said the measure was designed to “preserve the purity of the ballot box” — a phrase “drafted specifically to disenfranchise Black voters following the Civil War,” Democratic Rep. Rafael Anchía told bill sponsor Rep. Briscoe Cain (R). “Are you aware of the history of that?” he asked in comments on the floor. “No, I’m sorry to hear that ... Those are troubling things,” Cain said. Cain later noted that he’d be willing to agree to an amendment to change “purity” to “integrity or something,” reported the Austin-American Statesman. The word was stricken from the bill.

No real difference. Horrible.

Pro-Trump pastor shares bizarre conspiracy theory with his congregation to support his claims that Trump is still president A self-proclaimed Christian prophet is circulating an unfounded conspiracy theory that he believes is proof that Donald Trump is still President of the United States. According to Newsweek, megachurch pastor Johnny Enlow recently shared a Facebook post with his followers as he explained why he has reason to believe former President Donald Trump is still president. Enlow claims to have had a "vision" of Trump holding "a golden scepter" which he believes is proof that Trump is still in office. Enlow claims that in his vision, he could see Trump "seated on a throne holding a golden scepter... [with] a golden crown on his head." He said the vision was Trump's "PRESENT status from heaven's perspective." "Heaven does not recognize [Joe Biden] having any scepter nor wearing any crown. From heaven's perspective, there is only the legitimacy of [Trump]. God has assigned a massive contingency of angels to that scepter and to that crown." Pro-Trump pastor shares bizarre conspiracy theory with his congregation to support his claims that Trump is still president - Alternet.org

We're almost there. It ought to be frightening to Americans that their president and his gang violated almost every law or tried to- spying on the media and threatening them, trying to use the US military to impose martial law, conspiring with a foreign adversary to influence the election and on and on. This has become so normalized that many Americans hardly notice, and that is probably what Trump's GOP wants.

900,000 Americans Estimated To Have Died From COVID-19, Study Says Public health experts agree that official COVID-19 death tolls are undercounts, but there is disagreement over how high the actual tolls are. headshot Around 905,000 Americans may have died from COVID-19, according to a new study that arrived at a substantially higher number than the official government tally of 577,000 U.S. deaths.

Trump DOJ secretly obtained WaPo phone records: report There's a new bombshell report on the actions by the Justice Department under Donald Trump. "The Trump Justice Department secretly obtained Washington Post journalists' phone records and tried to obtain their email records over reporting they did in the early months of the Trump administration on Russia's role in the 2016 election, according to government letters and officials," Devlin Barrett reported on Friday for The Washington Post. "In three separate letters dated May 3 and addressed to Post reporters Ellen Nakashima and Greg Miller, and former Post reporter Adam Entous, the Justice Department wrote they were 'hereby notified that pursuant to legal process the United States Department of Justice received toll records associated with the following telephone numbers for the period from April 15, 2017 to July 31, 2017.' The letters listed work, home or cellphone numbers covering that three-and-a-half-month period." Jeff Sessions was attorney general during the time period the DOJ was investigating. The newspaper's acting executive editor, Cameron Barr, blasted the news. "We are deeply troubled by this use of government power to seek access to the communications of journalists. The Department of Justice should immediately make clear its reasons for this intrusion into the activities of reporters doing their jobs, an activity protected under the First Amendment," he said. Trump DOJ secretly obtained WaPo phone records: report - Alternet.org