Month: July 2020

This op-ed was written by John Lewis shortly before he died and published today as the nation mourns him at his funeral:

While my time here has now come to an end, I want you to know that in the last days and hours of my life you inspired me. You filled me with hope about the next chapter of the great American story when you used your power to make a difference in our society. Millions of people motivated simply by human compassion laid down the burdens of division. Around the country and the world you set aside race, class, age, language and nationality to demand respect for human dignity.

That is why I had to visit Black Lives Matter Plaza in Washington, though I was admitted to the hospital the following day. I just had to see and feel it for myself that, after many years of silent witness, the truth is still marching on.

Emmett Till was my George Floyd. He was my Rayshard Brooks, Sandra Bland and Breonna Taylor. He was 14 when he was killed, and I was only 15 years old at the time. I will never ever forget the moment when it became so clear that he could easily have been me. In those days, fear constrained us like an imaginary prison, and troubling thoughts of potential brutality committed for no understandable reason were the bars.

Though I was surrounded by two loving parents, plenty of brothers, sisters and cousins, their love could not protect me from the unholy oppression waiting just outside that family circle. Unchecked, unrestrained violence and government-sanctioned terror had the power to turn a simple stroll to the store for some Skittles or an innocent morning jog down a lonesome country road into a nightmare. If we are to survive as one unified nation, we must discover what so readily takes root in our hearts that could rob Mother Emanuel Church in South Carolina of her brightest and best, shoot unwitting concertgoers in Las Vegas and choke to death the hopes and dreams of a gifted violinist like Elijah McClain.

Like so many young people today, I was searching for a way out, or some might say a way in, and then I heard the voice of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. on an old radio. He was talking about the philosophy and discipline of nonviolence. He said we are all complicit when we tolerate injustice. He said it is not enough to say it will get better by and by. He said each of us has a moral obligation to stand up, speak up and speak out. When you see something that is not right, you must say something. You must do something. Democracy is not a state. It is an act, and each generation must do its part to help build what we called the Beloved Community, a nation and world society at peace with itself.

Ordinary people with extraordinary vision can redeem the soul of America by getting in what I call good trouble, necessary trouble. Voting and participating in the democratic process are key. The vote is the most powerful nonviolent change agent you have in a democratic society. You must use it because it is not guaranteed. You can lose it.

You must also study and learn the lessons of history because humanity has been involved in this soul-wrenching, existential struggle for a very long time. People on every continent have stood in your shoes, through decades and centuries before you. The truth does not change, and that is why the answers worked out long ago can help you find solutions to the challenges of our time. Continue to build union between movements stretching across the globe because we must put away our willingness to profit from the exploitation of others.

Though I may not be here with you, I urge you to answer the highest calling of your heart and stand up for what you truly believe. In my life I have done all I can to demonstrate that the way of peace, the way of love and nonviolence is the more excellent way. Now it is your turn to let freedom ring.

When historians pick up their pens to write the story of the 21st century, let them say that it was your generation who laid down the heavy burdens of hate at last and that peace finally triumphed over violence, aggression and war. So I say to you, walk with the wind, brothers and sisters, and let the spirit of peace and the power of everlasting love be your guide.

Meanwhile, Trump, who couldn’t be bothered to pay tribute or even have the decency to STFU, has spent this week pushing racist housing policies and trying to manipulate, suppress and now, delay the vote. If there’s a more graceless barbarian on earth I don’t know who it might be.

Meanwhile, here were some words from former presidents who, for all their flaws, were not stone-cold,anti-democratic, authoritarian racists like Donald Trump:

Donald Trump gave an unmasked fundraising speech to an unmasked crowd yesterday in Texas. And he had this to say:

Corey Booker has nothing to do with any of this. Why do you suppose Trump picked him as the guy that’s supposedly going to run Obama’s supposed program?

Let me think about it. It’ll come to me.

Herman Cain has died of COVID-19. And his death is a serious cautionary tale:

Herman Cain's last public appearance was appearing at Trump's Tulsa rally without a mask. He posted an anti-mask tweet the day before that has since been deleted. https://t.co/8Z6MisLzAs

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) July 30, 2020

Here’s that deleted tweet:

He isn’t the only one who thought that. And it’s taking a toll:

For Tony Green, the coronavirus pandemic was just a “scamdemic” — until truth hit home hard

Imagine the sound and vibration of an old-fashioned electric heater going through your whole body. Imagine gasping for air with every step you take. Imagine rubbing Icy Hot all over your head to soothe a painful headache. Imagine your eyes in a bowl of water while you’re still seeing through them. Imagine collapsing and waking up in the ER only to find out COVID-19 attacked your central nervous system, and the doctor had just saved you from a stroke.

If that were the worst of it, it would be bad enough. But that’s not the worst of it. This is the story of one family’s harrowing fight with COVID-19.

Full disclosure: I am a gay conservative, someone that often juggles persecution for my sexuality while being true to my values. Such a combination requires a lot of tenacity to earn respect from either group.

I admit I voted for Donald Trump in 2016. I admit traveling deep into the conspiracy trap over COVID-19. All the defiant behavior of Trump’s more radical and rowdy cult followers, I participated in it. I was a hard-ass that stood up for my “God-given rights.”

In great haste, I began prognosticating the alphabet soup about this “scamdemic.” I believed the virus to be a hoax. I believed the mainstream media and the Democrats were using it to create panic, crash the economy and destroy Trump’s chances at re-election.

And so, believing the pandemic to be a hoax, my partner and I hosted family members on Saturday, June 13. On Sunday, June 14, I woke up sick.

By Monday, June 15, my partner and my parents were all sick. That same Monday, my in-laws traveled to witness the birth of their first grandchild. They took with them my father-in-law’s mother and one of my partner’s sisters. That night my father-in-law became ill. Then my mother-in-law and their daughter began feeling sick. So they cut their trip short.

Two days later, my father-in-law’s mother got sick. The new mommy and daddy got sick, too. We all tested positive for COVID-19. Only the newborn was spared.

My father-in-law and I both went to the hospital on June 24. The virus had attacked my central nervous system, and the staff stopped me from having a stroke.

My father-in-law’s mother was admitted a day later. On July 1, she died of COVID-19/pneumonia. The chaplain wanted the family to break the news to my father-in-law, and he learned how his mother lay on her deathbed and then drifted off without any family by her side, even though he was in the room next to hers.

On the day of her funeral, which was July 14, five more of our family members tested positive for the virus. That evening, my father-in-law was put on a ventilator.

You cannot imagine the guilt I feel, knowing that I hosted the gathering that led to so much suffering. You cannot imagine my guilt at having been a denier, carelessly shuffling through this pandemic, making fun of those wearing masks and social distancing. You cannot imagine my guilt at knowing that my actions convinced both our families it was safe when it wasn’t.
For those who deny the virus exists or who downplay its severity, let me assure you: The coronavirus is very real and extremely contagious. Before you even know you have it, you’ve passed it along to your friends, family, coworkers and neighbors.

And now, husbands, wives and children are being separated. The sick are taking care of the sick while those without symptoms are self-quarantining. I am aware of how my bias could discredit me with some, but trust me, you do not want this virus. And you do not want your loved ones suffering and dying from this because you are taking a “political stand” or protecting the economy over their lives.

We are all at the precipice of a common heartache.

The next time you’re put out because your favorite spots are closed or because they won’t let you enter without wearing a mask, and you decide to defy them rather than comply because you’re defending your rights and freedoms from being trampled, just remember: Your family and friends may be next.

Is that too harsh? Try imagining someone you care about on life support. Try being the one to pick the only 10 people allowed to attend a funeral for a loved one. But don’t fret; you’ve got time to ponder, because the mortuary is booked out for at least a week.

Now imagine one more thing: That pool party, the mixer or family reunion you’re pushing for resulting in you being cold and alone in a hospital bed, fighting for your life. Imagine the only human contact you feel is a stranger’s rubber glove giving you medication, checking your vitals and changing your diaper.

That is exactly what has happened to our family.

America, this is not going to go away without sacrifice. Either way, we are going to pay a price. Governments are faced with making difficult decisions, and they cannot appease and satisfy everyone.

But to do nothing is to be foolish. To ignore or question the validity of this virus, its contagiousness or the consequences of selfish attitudes is — at this stage — completely stupid.

I am calling myself out first, but now this is personal, and I fell on my sword. And I promise you, if we continue being more worried about the disruption to our lives than we are about stopping this virus, not one American will be spared.

Not one.

So much winning.

Seriously, how dumb do you have to be to do this when the country is in dire economic straits and your poll numbers are in the dirt? What is he thinking?

I get that the Republicans have decided that now’s the perfect moment to revert to their former phony fiscal conservatism — after all, it’s the most fun when people are suffering. But Trump was supposed to be the big “populist” right winger who not only provides the circus but hands out the bread.

Instead, he’s turned himself into Marie fucking Antoinette.

This morning, the Trump Campaign is responding:
“Those are the incoherent, conspiracy theory ramblings of a lost candidate who is out of touch with reality. President Trump has been clear that the election will happen on November 3rd.” – @TimMurtaugh Comms Director

— Ryan Nobles (@ryanobles) April 24, 2020

Okaaaay:

With Universal Mail-In Voting (not Absentee Voting, which is good), 2020 will be the most INACCURATE & FRAUDULENT Election in history. It will be a great embarrassment to the USA. Delay the Election until people can properly, securely and safely vote???

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 30, 2020

For all the concern about Russian interference in the election and the reliability of voting machines, a yooge threat to election integrity this fall is one of the men running for president. He distrusts mail-in ballots, at least when they are mailed by non-Republicans. Sabotaging voting by mail during its soaring popularity in the coronavirus pandemic does not require Donald Trump to accept help from Russia.

Vice News’ Aaron Gordon reports:

Post offices around the country are slashing their hours—including during the busiest times of day—with little notice as yet another abrupt cost-saving measure, according to interviews with union officials conducted by Motherboard and various local news reports. The USPS had also planned to close some offices entirely with just three weeks’ notice, likely in violation of federal law, but appears to be backtracking.

The sudden changes come as part of a slate of policies instituted by the new Postmaster General Louis DeJoy, a Trump donor with a history of anti-union practices at his private logistics firm New Breed Logistics, that are ostensibly about fiscal responsibility but have contributed to mail being delayed across the country and have postal workers concerned they’re no longer being allowed to do their jobs. Many postal employees also believe the changes will only make the post office’s financial situation worse.

Trump tweeted this local news report on mail delays, one might conclude, to depress voting by mail:

Check out this Mail-In Voting experiment by a local news station! pic.twitter.com/23tOdt1hYc

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 29, 2020

But the mail slowdown Trump is promoting he himself helped create with his choice of postmaster general:

On Tuesday, U.S. Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia sent a letter to DeJoy regarding the “imminent closure or significant reduction in hours and services” as post offices “in my state and across the nation.” Manchin’s letter noted that “this would likely be a violation of both federal law and United States Postal Service (USPS) rules that prescribe a specific closure process which requires, at minimum, 120 days’ notice,” a far cry from the three weeks under the current plan. By Tuesday evening, Coonan told Motherboard the post office had “walked back its position on closing the offices” and they are “currently reevaluating the situation.”

“It’s just asinine to think that you can shut something down or throttle it back in terms of the pandemic when basically the lifeline for voting and democracy is going to be in the hands of the Postal Service,” Manchin told reporters Wednesday.

But again, this is how the GOP defines law and order down, and democracy itself:

1. Find the line.
2. Step over it.
3. Dare someone to push you back .
4. No pushback? New line.
5. Repeat.

MSNBC’s Chris Hayes noted the slowdowns and vowed to not let them go unreported, “The only way that the administration can get away with gutting the post office is if they try to do it sneakily behind the scenes. And we’re not going to let them.”

There is more to the mail slowdown than Trump, Gordon reported days ago. Package deliveries are slower too:

DeJoy’s July 10 memo, titled “Pivoting For Our Future,” caught the media’s attention because of one particularly inflammatory line. “One aspect of these changes that may be difficult for employees is that—temporarily—we may see mail left behind or mail on the workroom floor or docks (in P&DCs [Processing and Distribution Centers]), which is not typical,” the memo stated.

Personnel cuts made to address the “fiscal kneecapping” of the 2006 Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act have left the popular service shorthanded during the pandemic. There are simply too many packages for the service to handle, a challenge that Congress has refused to address.

The same postal service will strain to deliver millions of mailed ballots this fall, Politico suggests:

The Postal Service hasn’t hit its own on-time delivery goals in five years, meaning that ballots may trickle in for days after an election. And now the pandemic is making successful deliveries more challenging. Mail across the system has slowed as more than 60 postal workers have been killed by the virus and thousands sickened or sent home to quarantine.

[…]

Those problems almost guarantee that everyone who loved the “hanging chads” debate of 2000 should steel themselves for the “what does that fuzzy postmark say?” debate of 2020. For the time being, different standards from state to state and slowed delivery times—both for absentee ballots going out and coming back—guarantee that tens of thousands of voted ballots nationwide will be thrown in the trash because they arrived too late to be counted. Pennsylvania, which now requires mailed ballots to be received by Election Day, rejected nearly 5 percent of absentee ballots in 2018, the vast majority because they arrived too late. Florida, home to George W. Bush’s 537-vote victory, tossed out 18,500 ballots that arrived too late to be counted in its primary this year.

Like it or not and whoever is to blame, timing when you mail your ballot is a real issue. In my county, 13 ballots postmarked in late February for March 3 primary arrived after March 6 cutoff. Just over 80 ballots in all went uncounted, included 35 postmarked after Election Day. It was a tiny fraction, a tenth of a percent of ballots cast. You just do not want yours in it.

I am advising voters here not to mail absentee ballots later than two weeks ahead of Election Day. Even better: Mail them back ASAP after receipt (North Carolina will mail absentee ballots September 4; find your state’s dates here), or drop them off in person ASAP at their local Board of Elections or at an early voting site for processing long before Election Day. Flatten the absentee ballot processing curve.

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For The Win, 3rd Edition is ready for download. Request a copy of my free countywide GOTV mechanics guide at ForTheWin.us. This is what winning looks like.
Note: The pandemic will upend standard field tactics in 2020. If enough promising “improvisations” come my way, perhaps I can issue a COVID-19 supplement.

There is no way the New York Times would ever have printed an op-ed by Dr. Stella Immanuel. That’s because she holds indisputably insane ideas. Instead, the Times published a news article when her latest bumper crop of crazy notions about the coronavirus were irresponsibly re-tweeted by the (I just can’t fucking believe it) the president of the United States and his idiot son.

That is exactly the right way to handle extremist nonsense that rises to the legitimate attention of the public.

The problem is that the Times thinks Tom Cotton, who holds views just as nuts and as extreme as Dr. Immanuel, is someone the Times thinks does in fact deserve a Times opinion column. (The link is to a later version of the original op-ed that was sanitized by the addition of a disclaiming introduction.) Instead the Times (as an institution) strongly believes that publishing Cotton’s op-ed advocating violence against American citizens demonstrated their commitment to a wide and diverse range of opinion worthy of discussion.

The Times is oblivious to the obvious fact that Cotton is as disordered and dangerous in his thinking as Dr. Immanuel. I wonder why? It couldn’t be simply that Cotton is white, could it?

PS Trust me, despite Bennet’s resignation, nothing’s changed, culturally, at the Times’s top management. And it’s only a matter of time before more extreme right insanity appears in the op-ed pages.

Kevin McCarthy accidentally calls Louie Gohmert "Congressman COVID" pic.twitter.com/UcQcvHtEU9

— The Recount (@therecount) July 29, 2020

McCarthy’s loose lips and malapropisms are legendary. But you have to love the fact that the Republicans are constantly dinging Biden for gaffes like mistaking “million” for “billion” when they have people like this in the leadership.

Or this, for that matter:

in which Trump refers to the year 2030 as "230" pic.twitter.com/OMqkfpTpNK

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) July 29, 2020

From the campaign accusing their opponent of cognitive decline comes this hit followup https://t.co/xdiQZwDdGI

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) July 29, 2020

Rush Limbaugh shared this with his millions of listeners:

What this is, Dr. Stella Immanuel is a doctor from Nigeria. She’s an MD, and she’s currently working in a Texas emergency room, and she is a 1000% believer in hydroxychloroquine, and she has more experience prescribing it than American doctors because she has been treating malaria patients for years with it.

It’s primarily a malaria drug, and so she and some other doctors gathered on the steps of something (it looked like the U.S. Capitol) to promote hydroxychloroquine, and to talk about how great it is and how there’s no need for masks; if we would just give everybody this drug, that we would end the emergency. She’s a firm believer that hydroxychloroquine is the magic bullet.

If we just give it to patients, both as a preventative and as a curative, that we would be able to open the schools. We’d be able to open the country, open the economy. And there have been a bunch of people who have retweeted her remarks, and every one of those people have been taken down from Twitter. Donald Trump Jr. has been taken down from Twitter.

Sidney Powell, Michael Flynn’s lawyer, retweeted what Dr. Stella Immanuel said, and they have been taken down. They’ve been accused of violating Twitter standards. So anybody who retweets Dr. Stella Immanuel’s words gets killed on Twitter. Facebook has wiped all of them out too. They do not want this out. And the Daily Beast, The Daily Beast…

Have you seen this story? The Daily Beast has a story. Oh, everybody is trying to destroy this woman. “Do you know that she believes that alien DNA was implanted in the human race thousands of years ago, and there’s a secret in that DNA that could unlock things and we could cure many diseases?” They’re trying to portray her as some wacko, unbelievable kook out there. But they want to make sure nobody sees what she said yesterday.

He goes on to repeat all the looney things she said in that video and even reads from the Daily Beast article that revealed all of her completely insane rantings about alien DNA and demon sperm and the rest. Then this:

Mr. Snerdley informs me that he has had sex many times with witches, but not in his dreams. He’s had a whole bunch of witches, and it hadn’t been any doubt about it, and he doesn’t think that Dr. Immanuel is in any way weird to point this out. ‘Cause it happens to everybody now and then.

In fact, Snerdley said to me, “I defy any guy to tell me that he’s not had sex with a witch, at least once in his life.” Of course, it depends on how you define witch. But we get Mr. Snerdley’s point.

All right. So we had Gerard call from Atlanta a moment ago. He said, “Does it frustrate you that so many people on the conservative side do not even now understand the radical nature of the American left?” Oh, yeah. For 25 years it’s been a frustrating thing. Here’s an example. Dr. Stella Emanuel. She appears to the steps of the Supreme Court.

She’s out trying to demand everybody to listen to her truth about hydroxychloroquine. She is what? She is a black, immigrant, female doctor. The left is trying to destroy her. Wait a minute! I thought it was the right wing that had all the mean-spirited, racist bigots. So I asked myself, “When are the American people gonna wake up and realize it’s the Democrats, it’s the American left trying to destroy a black, immigrant, female doctor?”

It ain’t us.

We are touting her.

We’re calling attention to her.

But the American left — which is protecting us from vile racism and trying to erase from our history the vile era of slavery, the party of Black Lives Matter — is out destroying a black, immigrant, female doctor. And I ask myself: Why don’t people on our side see the hypocrisy, or the true nature of the hatred the left has for people who simply do not agree with them?

Can you believe the shamelessness of this garbage?

First, he lugubriously calls out the left for being mean to an African immigrant from Nigeria, someplace their idol Donald Trump would normally call a shithole country and he would agree. Please.

But it’s the rest of this that’s truly ridiculous. “The left” isn’t trying to destroy this woman because of some political disagreement. It’s because of a disagreement about medical science that is resulting in people placing their hopes in a snake oil miracle cure! That this woman also happens to be a total nutcase is only made more relevant by the fact that the president called her “very impressive” yesterday no doubt after watching her say this:

IMMANUEL: Andrew Cuomo’s brother, the, you know, crazy one? That dude. I knew he took hydroxychloroquine. Do you know why? He kept saying that he was having nightmares. I knew he took some form of hydroxychloroquine, or one of them, probably the batch version. These people are taking hydroxychloroquine! I dare everyone in D.C.

All you talking heads on CNN, give me a urine sample. If I check your urine and you don’t have hydroxychloroquine in your urine, then ask America not to take it. You senators? All of them! You know why they don’t wear masks? Anthony Fauci can sit around, not wear a mask? Because they are all on hydroxychloroquine. They know it, but they want Americans to die. Anthony Fauci, I’m talking about… Oh, what? Just name them, all these talking heads on CNN. Give me a urine sample. I dare you!

Rush played that for his audience. And rather than running in the opposite direction, appalled that anyone would take this person seriously, they are all in.

If Trump were leading his cult to be responsible they would probably do it. At least a lot more would be. Instead he’s got them drinking bleach, popping Hydroxychloroquine and refusing to social distance and wear masks. His devoted minions in the right wing media are amplifying it every day.

And it’s killing us.

I wonder if Rush’s oncologists think he should be out there mingling with the likes of Louis Gohmert and taking the Hydroxy cure? I have a feeling he’s not doing that.

Can you believe this?

Yesterday, the Attorneys General from 22 states issued a letter to Secretary of Health and Human Services Alex Azar calling on him to rescind a recent directive that shifts the responsibility for COVID-19 reporting from the CDC to the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). 

The letter urges Secretary Azar to “restore the CDC to its rightful role as the primary repository for and source of information about the nation’s public health data” and notes that the decision to “bypass the CDC” erodes trust in COVID-19 data, hinders state and local response efforts, and risks millions of lives.

The authors argue that any need to improve data reporting and analysis should be addressed by adapting existing CDC systems, including through the use of US$500 million designated by the CARES Act to update CDC data collection and reporting systems. They contend that the new mechanism “circumvent[s] our nation’s top public health experts.”

According to the letter, the new data reporting system is operated by private contractors rather than health experts employed by federal health agencies, and it separates data reported by hospitals from other sources, including nursing homes and other long-term care facilities.

They are obviously trying to manipulate the numbers. I don’t think you can assume otherwise. I guess they think this will help Trump get re-elected which is worth the killing of vast numbers of Americans to achieve.