Digby's Hullabaloo Posts

They’re soon to be responsible for 20 million deaths

Anti-abortion Republicans would have you believe that they are all about preserving life. We know that isn’t true by their blood-thirsty attitude about anyone they consider an enemy but this takes it to another level:

The AIDS epidemic has killed more than 40 million people since the first recorded cases in 1981, tripling child mortality and carving decades off life expectancy in the hardest-hit areas of Africa, where the cost of treatment put it out of reach. Horrified, then-President George W. Bush and the U.S. Congress two decades ago created what is described as the largest commitment by any nation to combat a single disease.

The program, known as the U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, or PEPFAR, partners with nonprofit groups to provide HIV/AIDS medication to millions around the world. It strengthens local and national health care systems, cares for children orphaned by AIDS and provides job training for people at risk.

Now, a few Republican lawmakers are endangering the stability of the program, which officials say has saved 25 million lives in 55 countries from Ukraine to Brazil to Indonesia. That includes the lives of 5.5 million infants born HIV-free.

At the Catholic-run Nairobi orphanage, program manager Paul Mulongo has a message for Washington.

“Let them know that the lives of these children we are taking care of are purely in their hands,” Mulongo says.

The issue of abortion has been a sensitive one since PEPFAR’s inception in 2003. But each time the program came up for renewal in Congress, Republicans and Democrats were able to put aside partisan politics to support a program that’s long been seen as the vanguard of global aid.

“Most eras in countries are measured by loss of life in war and famine and pandemic,” said Tom Hart, president of the ONE Campaign, a nonpartisan organization that worked with Bush, a Republican, to create the program. “This era has been measured in lives saved.” The campaign has published a letter from dozens of faith leaders to Congress calling PEPFAR “a story of medical miracles and mercy.”

But the bipartisan support is cracking as the program is set to expire at the end of September. The trouble began in the spring, when the Heritage Foundation, an influential conservative Washington think tank, accused the Biden administration of using PEPFAR “to promote its domestic radical social agenda overseas.”

The group pointed to new State Department language that called for PEPFAR to partner with organizations that advocate for “institutional reforms in law and policy regarding sexual, reproductive and economic rights of women.” Conservatives argued that’s code for trying to integrate abortion with HIV/AIDS prevention, a claim the administration has denied.

In language echoing the early, harsh years of the epidemic, Heritage called HIV/AIDS a “lifestyle disease” that should be suppressed by “education, moral suasion and legal sanctions.” It recommended halving U.S. funding for PEPFAR, saying poor countries should bear more of the costs.

Shortly after that, U.S. Rep. Chris Smith, a longtime supporter of PEPFAR who wrote the bill reauthorizing it in 2018, said he would not move forward with reauthorization this time unless it barred nongovernmental organizations that used any funding to provide or promote abortion services. The threat from the New Jersey Republican threat comes with weight: He chairs the U.S. House Foreign Affairs subcommittee with jurisdiction over the program’s funding.

Because that proposal faces stiff opposition from congressional Democrats, Smith, with support from prominent anti-abortion groups, wants to cut PEPFAR’s usual five-year funding to one year if that ban is not included. He said that would allow lawmakers annually to revisit contracts with partners they believe may support or provide abortion services.

“It’s a false narrative that says that you can’t do (the program) year by year as we try to protect the unborn child,” Smith told The Associated Press.

Supporters of the program say that under existing U.S. law, partners are already prohibited from using its funding for abortion services. The head of PEPFAR, John Nkengasong, told the AP he knew of no instance of the program’s money going directly or indirectly to fund abortion services.

He warned that any instability in the flow of U.S. funding for PEPFAR could have dangerous implications for health globally, including in the United States. The key to controlling AIDS, he said, is the assurance that infected people have a pill to take each day.

Without that, the virus could come back, ”and about 20 million lives might be lost in the coming years,” he said. “The fragile gains that we’ve achieved will be lost.”

This was the one truly good thing George W. Bush ever did and it goes some way to mitigate at least some of his otherwise awful legacy. Now they’re going to toss that on the garbage heap along with anything else the Republicans ever did that might be considered decent. (There isn’t much.) I don’t know if Chris Smith is vulnerable in his N.J. district but if he is the Democrats should move heavily against him,

The “America First” Republicans don’t believe in any kind of foreign aid to anyone they don’t like. I’m sure they’d send it to Russia if they could, but African countries (or “shit-hole” countries as Trump referred to them)? No way.

The NY Times on rich GOPer hand wringing:

On Labor Day, Eric Levine, a New York lawyer and Republican fund-raiser, sent an email to roughly 1,500 donors, politicians and friends.

“I refuse to accept the proposition that Donald Trump is the ‘inevitable’ Republican nominee for President,” he wrote. “His nomination would be a disaster for our party and our country.”

Many of the Republican Party’s wealthiest donors share that view, and the growing sense of urgency about the state of the G.O.P. presidential primary race. Mr. Trump’s grip on the party’s voters is as powerful as ever, with polls in Iowa and New Hampshire last month putting him at least 25 percentage points above his nearest rivals.

That has left major Republican donors — whose desires have increasingly diverged from those of conservative voters — grappling with the reality that the tens of millions of dollars they have spent to try to stop the former president, fearing he poses a mortal threat to their party and the country, may already be a sunk cost.

Interviews with more than a dozen Republican donors and their allies revealed hand-wringing, magical thinking, calls to arms and, for some, fatalism. Several of them did not want to be identified by name out of a fear of political repercussions or a desire to stay in the good graces of any eventual Republican nominee, including Mr. Trump.

“If things don’t change quickly, people are going to despair,” Mr. Levine said in an interview. He is among the optimists who believe Mr. Trump’s support is not as robust as the polls suggest and who see a quickly closing window to rally behind another candidate. In Mr. Levine’s 2,500-word Labor Day missive, he urged his readers to pick Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina.

Other schools of thought exist. Some donors have backed Mr. Trump’s rivals despite believing that he is unbeatable in the primaries. These donors are banking, in part, on the chance that Mr. Trump will eventually drop out of the race because of his legal troubles, a health scare or some other personal or political calculation.

[…]

Privately, many donors said that the primary contest so far — especially the first Republican debate last month, in which Mr. Trump did not take part — had felt like a dress rehearsal for a play that would never happen. One donor’s political adviser called it “the kids’ table.”

One Texas-based Republican fund-raiser, who has not committed to a candidate and insisted on anonymity to discuss private conversations, said he regularly told major donors that like it or not, Mr. Trump would be the nominee.

“Intellectually, their heads explode,” the fund-raiser said. He said many donors were “backing off” rather than supporting a candidate, reflecting a fundamental belief that nobody can defeat Mr. Trump.

Large-dollar Republican donors, even those who enthusiastically or reluctantly backed Mr. Trump in 2016 and 2020, have made no secret of their wish to move on in 2024.

They supported him in 2016 and 2020 and they expected that there would be no lasting consequences? That the GOP electorate Trump and the right wing media convinced that know-nothing transgressive politics were a winner would suddenly shove all the ugliness and corruption back under a rock and go back to pretending they weren’t a bunch of bigots and nihilists? Well, that didn’t happen, did it?

And I’m quite sure they will “reluctantly” support him again. Because they are no better. In fact, they are worse because they had the power to do something about this and they didn’t because in their minds anything was better than supporting a Democrat who might try to raise their taxes or regulate their businesses. They own this situation as much as vile Trump.

I don’t know if you have the stomach for it, but this appearance by Alex Jones on Russian TV is not only bizarre it’s shockingly pro-Russia, even beyond what we’ve come to expect from the American right. (If you watch it, turn off the sound and just read the closed captions.)

Both of these people are clowns, of course, and it’s hard to imagine anyone taking them seriously. But I guess it shows that we aren’t the only culture that has such batshit crazy political media stars.

Still, maybe I’m showing my age but it’s still stunning to me to see an American right wing figure kowtowing and pandering to a Russian audience, begging them to understand just how much America really supports them and their aims. I never thought I’d see the day.

Vivek lies even more flamboyantly than he does

"I want you to answer my question. Three times I've asked it. What did Donald Trump do that was 'downright abhorrent'? It's your words."

I asked @VivekGRamaswamy about his old tweets & writings, him criticizing Trump, and it got a little heated.
Watch:pic.twitter.com/3E13GBYlJ0

— Mehdi Hasan (@mehdirhasan) September 6, 2023

Okaaay:

HASAN: “You say [Trump] behaved in downright abhorrent behavior that makes him a danger to democracy. What was it that was downright … tell me what he did that was downright abhorrent.”

RAMASWAMY: “Let’s actually be really fair to your audience. So on Jan. 10, 2021, thereabouts, days after that incident, I wrote an op-ed in The Wall Street Journal arguing that censorship was the real cause of what happened on Jan. 6. …”

HASAN: “Which isn’t true …”

RAMASWAMY: “… Well, that’s what I wrote. I’m giving you the facts of what I said. That’s a hard fact. That was published in The Wall Street Journal.”

 CNN’s Daniel Dale fact-checked said facts, and surprise!

Ramaswamy’s claim is false. He never argued in The Wall Street Journal op-ed that censorship was the real cause of the January 6 riot. Rather, Ramaswamy and his co-author criticized social media companies for banning Trump and some of his supporters in the days after the riot. They argued that social media companies are violating the Constitution when they censor users, and they warned that Silicon Valley stifling the voices of disaffected Americans would lead to future “terror” that would make the Capitol riot look peaceful by comparison. They never argued in the op-ed that censorship was even a partial cause of the January 6 riot – which they described as “disgraceful,” “last week’s horror” and “a stain on American history” – let alone its primary cause.

He’s slick but not that slick.

By the way, did I say he lied more flamboyantly than Trump? Never mind:

Trump: During Biden's first 30 months in office just 2.1 million new jobs have been created. Biden makes up these stories like I used to be a fighter pilot. Did you ever see his golf swing? He says he’s a six handicap!! pic.twitter.com/0ZslEvk4Nz

— Acyn (@Acyn) September 9, 2023

All of that is a lie. All of it. Completely made up from beginning to end with no basis in fact whatsoever.

There have been over 13 million new jobs during the first two years, Biden never said he was a fighter pilot or that he has a 6 handicap. But you can bet Trump’s cult and Fox News will have at least half of America believing it’s true just because he said it. (I say at least half because according to the polls, more than 60% of people believe the lies about “the Biden Crime Family” so clearly there are a bunch of Democrats and Independents who believe this bilge too.)

What is it Emily’s List says? Early Money Is Like Yeast?

So, perhaps, are early branding ads.

In preparing the ground ahead of the next election, Democrats’ efforts always seem too little and too late. But with Biden’s low approval numbers, Democrats and their allies are not waiting to give their candidate a boost (Politico):

The cavalry is arriving extraordinarily early for President Joe Biden.

With poll after brutal poll showing the president in danger of losing a likely rematch with former President Donald Trump, his campaign is getting an unusual boost from a super PAC spending millions of dollars to resuscitate public opinion of him in major battlegrounds.

The ads are striking for both their timing and their content.

The election is still 423 days away, and Biden and an affiliate of his chief super PAC are already running TV ads in nearly every major battleground state — far earlier than normal for a presidential election. And instead of going on the attack, as super PACs usually do, the ads are trying to boost Biden’s image.

Future Forward USA Action, an arm of the top super PAC backing Biden’s reelection bid, is spending more than $12 million on an ad campaign that began Friday in the biggest markets of six major battleground states. That puts the outside group and the campaign — which is a month into its own sustained ad campaign — on the air earlier than Trump and his allies began advertising in earnest for the 2020 election, for example.

There’s another Future Forward ad I can’t embed here.

Biden and Future Forward are on the air already in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin — battleground states.

Oh yes, we’ve seen them here in North Carolina too.

Biden’s campaign is also advertising in North Carolina, which voted for Trump by 1.3 points in 2020. Thanks to its growing population, North Carolina now has more electoral votes (16) than Michigan (15) for the first time since Reconstruction and now has the same weight as Georgia.

But it’s Politico, so good news is always bad news for Democrats:

But Biden and his allies have a long way to go to convince voters his policies have made the economy better, despite some positive jobs and gross domestic product data recently. According to a new CNN/SSRS poll this week, a majority of Americans, 58 percent, think Biden’s policies have worsened economic conditions in the country, up from 50 percent when CNN asked the question last October.

Only about a quarter of respondents, 24 percent, said Biden’s policies had improved the economy, while another 18 percent said they’ve had no impact.

But the key to shifting those perceptions (if you haven’t heard it before) is simplicity itself:

Repetition is really important
And so is repetition

— Anat Shenker-Osorio 🟧 (@anatosaurus) May 25, 2021

And starting early for a change is smart. It takes time.

Biden’s is also making sure women know who has their backs … and who doesn’t.

What your votes will decide in 2024

What’s on the 2024 ballot appears every day in stark terms.

Women’s rights

.@Irin: "Republicans don’t have a messaging problem. They have a woman getting sepsis problem. They have a teenager or pre-teen being forced to carry to term problem—no language change in the world can occlude the reality of what these policies actually mean beyond the rhetoric." pic.twitter.com/SoTOxdxZIf

— All In with Chris Hayes (@allinwithchris) September 9, 2023

Republicans also have a “Fugitive Slave Woman Acts” problem to add to the list above.

Climate change

that… seems like a lot? https://t.co/Qxz9rUHcm3

— Culture of Truth (@Bobblespeak) September 9, 2023

CNN: At least 14 people have died and several remain missing across Greece, Turkey and Bulgaria as torrential rain and severe flooding batter southern Europe.

Gun violence

Absolutely heartbreaking.

Praying for the family and loved ones of this precious life and those injured.

We must stop the tide of gun violence in our communities now.https://t.co/XghhyF3P7T

— Rep. Melanie Stansbury (@Rep_Stansbury) September 8, 2023

Another typical day in America:

Albuquerque police say a road rage shooting left an 11-year-old boy dead Wednesday night after he and his family left Isotopes Park.

As the boy and his family were driving away from the park, their vehicle pulled in front of another vehicle, according to APD Chief Harold Medina.

That vehicle made a U-turn and confronted the family on Avenida Cesar Chavez, Medina said. Then, someone in the suspect vehicle fired 17 shots at the family’s vehicle before reportedly leaving the area.

Ms Magazine:

In 2023 the Institute of Politics at Harvard Kennedy School found that “40 percent of young Americans are concerned about being victims of gun violence or mass shootings. One in three are concerned about someone close to them being a victim of gun violence or a mass shooting.”

This guy (or someone like him)

pic.twitter.com/N9hnDeaedh

— Frances Langum (@bluegal) September 9, 2023

Don’t get mad, get busy.

Meerkat mob!

Six fluffy bundles of joy have arrived at Taronga Western Plains Zoo in Dubbo, with the Zoo’s Meerkat mob welcoming its second litter of pups for 2023.

Mum Midra gave birth to six pups on Wednesday 2nd August, and while the pups are yet to be sexed or named, keeper Rez Onay said they’re doing well.

“Coming in each morning and seeing the pups, it’s the best part of the day,” Rez said.

They’re very cute and our main job is watching the behaviour of the family, making sure everyone is happy and well and looking after the new arrivals.

“The family is doing a great job of looking after the pups, who are putting on weight and getting more active each and every day.”

These arrivals bring the total number of meerkats at the Zoo to 20, including 14 in the breeding group at The Waterhole. Parents Midra and Howell have their hands full, with 10 pups under six months of age.

Meerkats can fall pregnant as soon as one week after giving birth, or once the pups are weaned at about eight weeks of age, so it’s not unusual for them to give birth again so soon,” Rez said.

“It’s really important in the meerkat mob for everyone to take turns babysitting; even the four pups we had earlier this year have taken on big brother and sister roles and are doing an amazing job looking after everyone, making sure that Mum and Dad are getting the food and rest that they need.”

The pups can now be seen in the meerkat habitat at The Waterhole, however the mob is protectively keeping them out of sight while they are so small – weighing just 70 grams!

“The best time to see the pups will be when they are about 4-5 weeks of age, when they’re a little bit more adventurous and exploring their exhibit!”

The Meerkats at Taronga Western Plains Zoo are ambassadors for their wild counterparts. While Meerkats are classed as ‘least concern’ by the ICUN, they still play a vital role in maintaining the ecological harmony of their desert homes by eating an insect rich diet.

Courtesy Zooborns

This is much more likely that we might want to think

You’ve no doubt heard about the release of the Fulton County Georgia Special Grand Jury findings by now and learned that they recommended indictment of 39 people including Lindsey Graham, David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler. Obviously, DA Fanni Willis decided to only indict half that number for what all the TV lawyers say are good reasons.

But this is a red flag and I think we’ll need to prepare ourselves for the possibility:

But perhaps the more practical lesson from the report, regarding the case ahead, is that it reinforces how difficult it might be to obtain convictions, including for Trump.

Indeed, on the vast majority of charges recommended by the Georgia special grand jury, the vote was not unanimous. To win convictions, however, all jurors must vote in favor.

Of the seven recommended charges against Trump, each featured precisely one grand juror who voted against, with between 17 and 21 grand jurors voting in favor. (Some grand jurors were absent for some votes.)

Of about 90 votes on recommending charges, just 14 were unanimous. Nearly half of those unanimous votes dealt with Georgia’s very broad law against making false statements “in any matter within the jurisdiction” of state or local government.

And none of the unanimous votes dealt with the central charge ultimately brought against all 19 defendants: an alleged racketeering conspiracy, also known as RICO.

As with the votes on Trump, the vast majority of the RICO recommendations featured one vote against. And more than 40 percent of the votes overall featured one vote against.

All of which suggests there was one special grand juror who frequently tried to stand in the way of what the vast majority of the other grand jurors sought to recommend — although it’s possible that the single holdout varied with each of the votes.

The special grand jury didn’t itself issue indictments. It just recommended them, with a separate grand jury later casting the decisive votes to charge the 19 defendants. Trial juries feature fewer individuals — 12, rather than two dozen — somewhat reducing the likelihood of a single juror’s standing in the way of what all the others want to do.

But recommending charges — the role of the special grand jury — presents a significantly lower bar (probable cause to support the charges) than will be confronted by the trial juries, which will have to determine the defendants’ guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.

This is a scenario Trump has spent almost the entirety of his political career effectively preparing for. Trump has regularly focused intensively on building a devoted and unceasingly loyal base, often at the expense of his broader appeal. This has involved launching into vast and conspiratorial theories of persecution. And polls show that a lot of Americans believe these things, with as many as 4 in 10 believing falsely that the 2020 election was stolen from Trump and as many as 1 in 5 saying that Trump has done “nothing wrong” — not even something merely unethical — in each of his indictments.

We don’t know whether the one special grand juror regularly voting against charges for Trump and the others fits into those buckets (or even that it is the same special grand juror). They might have objected on other grounds, and some of the votes on other recommendations were unanimous. But the frequency of the single “no” votes suggests that someone was rather dug in.

If someone like that were to be seated on the trial juries, including Trump’s, that could prove a significant hurdle, particularly given the higher standard of proof for conviction. If his trial remains in Fulton County, it could hurt the former president’s chances, as Trump took only 26 percent of the vote in the 2020 election there. If the trial is moved to federal court, the jury pool could be slightly more favorable to Trump, as he would likely use immunity to get the charges dropped.

That the vast majority of the special grand jury’s votes were nearly unanimous after Georgia District Attorney Fani Willis’s (D) team spent months presenting evidence would seem to be a strong affirmation of the case she presented. But the outcome also points to the challenges ahead on the bigger stage — including how crucial jury selection will be.

It’s Georgia. I wouldn’t be too surprised if a secret MAGA cultist winds up on the jury, especially if the judge agrees to remove some of the defendants to federal court which would include a much more conservative jury pool. Trump is certainly working overtime to taint the jury pool for just that outcome.

https://youtu.be/MSpRNuuHUiA?si=pX8H9eY7niMCj6YM

You see, she’s forcing poor old Joe out into the public where people are making fun of him.

She thinks RFK Jr would be the best candidate for the Democrats because the Democrats don’t like him.

She’s pretty sharp for someone ancient old Biden’s age. She certainly knows how to elegantly stick the shiv in Biden’s back. Fox News has primed her well.

No, not that kind. Ick.

CNN has a behind the scenes report on the Supreme Court’s deliberations in the Alabama gerrymandering case in which they surprisingly found that the state had violated the Voting Rights Act:

When the Supreme Court considered the challenge to an Alabama congressional map that shortchanged the state’s Black voters, liberal justices expected the conservative majority to side with Alabama – if not gut the 1965 Voting Rights Act altogether.

Instead, the justices emerged from their first closed-door conference meeting on the case in October 2022 without a solid majority for either side, CNN has learned. Ordinarily, this meeting, held without any law clerks or other staff present, results in a clear understanding among the nine justices of which party will prevail in a case. In the Alabama dispute, sources said, it was far from certain which side would win.

What happened next defied predictions from inside and outside the court. A series of negotiations, most notably between Chief Justice John Roberts and fellow conservative Justice Brett Kavanaugh, transformed what many thought would be a ruling undercutting the Voting Rights Act into a forceful affirmation of the law.

Roberts and Kavanaugh enjoy a decades-old kinship and often confer privately on matters. Most internal debate takes place among all nine justices, whether in regular closed-door sessions or the circulation of memos. But Roberts regularly reaches out to Kavanaugh behind another set of closed doors to understand his views and, as happened here, to secure his vote.

Ambivalent during early internal debate, Kavanaugh eventually gave Roberts enough confidence that he could write an opinion for a majority.

Kavanaugh has since become the focus of Alabama officials who directly flouted the Supreme Court’s June decision and are now seeking another chance before the court.

[…]

Based on public statements and court filings from Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall and Solicitor General Edmund LaCour, the state is counting on Kavanaugh to switch his vote or otherwise assist Alabama in its effort to keep a single Black-majority district.

They may believe they have an inside track behind the scenes, too, according to news reports on officials’ efforts to game out the justices for a second round. The Alabama Political Reporter, a daily news site, wrote in late July that “Republican lawmakers believe their DC connections have ‘intelligence’” that Kavanaugh “is open to rehearing the case on its merits.”

Speculation regarding how Kavanaugh would vote in the future may have little basis in fact. Moreover, the return of the dispute so quickly to the high court would likely give the majority, including Kavanaugh, pause for any reversal of sentiment regarding Voting Rights Act remedies for a state’s dilution of Black voting power.

The attention on Kavanaugh underscores his perceived judicial flexibility – and heightens interest in his vote when the merits of the case were heard last session.

Kavanaugh, appointed by former President Donald Trump in 2018, has demonstrated in some speeches that he prides himself in being conscious of how race permeates the justice system and American life.

In a July public appearance in Minnesota, shortly after the court session had ended, he emphasized his sensitivity on racial issues. Asked about significant cases he’d written over the past five years, he referred to two cases, playing up their racial dimensions. One case from 2020 (Ramos v. Louisiana), he explained, involved “the racist history” of non-unanimous juries, the other, from 2019 (Flowers v. Mississippi), impermissible race discrimination in jury selection.

“Racism has no place in the criminal justice system,” he said.

Kavanaugh has often invoked the fictional character of Atticus Finch, a small-town Alabama lawyer fighting a racist system in “To Kill a Mockingbird,” citing him on the importance of understanding the perspectives of others. Kavanaugh told a Notre Dame law school audience earlier this year, for example, that he keeps a grade-school copy of the book in court chambers.

“On the inside cover, in my handwriting from back then,” he said, “is written the phrase ‘Stand in someone else’s shoes.’ And that’s what (the English teacher) taught us was the lesson of ‘To Kill a Mockingbird.’ And I think to be a good judge, and to be a good person, it’s important to understand other people’s perspectives.”

Uh huh… unless they’re women, of course.

Kavanaugh is a political animal but he’s an establishment guy like Roberts and they’re trying to balance the lunacy on the far right of the court. He also cares about his personal reputation so I suspect that his confirmation hearing still stings on some subliminal level. Good. Maybe he’ll spend his years on the court thinking about history remembering him for his grotesque performance before the Senate Judiciary Committee and he’ll at least try to correct that.

He’ll never be someone who really cares about people (he’s a Republican, after all) but if, unlike most of them, he still has a modicum of shame he might join with Roberts as a counter to the batshit crazies. I’m not optimistic but you never know.