Lessons of History and Trying To Avoid the Same Mistakes

[Sixties Fan]

 

[Sixties Fan]

 

[Sixties Fan]

The preposterous premise of the Twitter Files

This shouldn't need explaining. But, here we are.

jonathanweiler.substack.com

 

[Sixties Fan]

Enter Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who in 2020 advanced one of the more notorious legal actions on behalf of Derpy Don, demanding that the Supreme Court nix the election results in several swing states that Trump lost. The suit didn’t go anywhere because, like nearly everything Republicans do these days, it was a cynical political stunt designed first and foremost to confuse people.


The Houston Chronicle‘s editorial board noticed, though, and argues that Paxton—who, not for nothing, has remained under indictment for the past seven-plus years for felony securities fraud—is the very last person who should be given more power to look into fake election fraud.
After helpfully noting that the Inverness, Scotland, city council isn’t pulling out the stops to find the Loch Ness Monster, and Bigfoot is currently not on the agendas of municipal governments across the U.S., the editorial board bemoaned Texas state government’s focus on another ever-so-timid cryptid: the diabolical Democrat who infiltrated hundreds of local polling stations in order to steal the 2020 election from Donald Trump.
It’s a different story in Austin, where one of the most prominent elected officials in Texas is wasting his office’s time and resources and taxpayers’ money chasing after a mythical beast, injuring innocent bystanders in the process. Ken Paxton, who must surely be America’s most corrupt attorney general, continues his foolish quest for widespread voter fraud, despite fewer incidents of the phenomenon than credible Sasquatch sightings over the years. Elected to a third term last fall, Paxton has been on the hunt for fraudulent voters since he first took office in 2015, despite the fact that countless investigations have turned up nothing but a handful of picayune infractions.

To call his quest quixotic is an insult to Don Quixote. Unlike Cervantes’ misguided hero, Paxton surely knows the truth. He keeps up the pretense, though, in pathetic imitation of another Don, a former president whose incessant blatherings about stolen elections keep the MAGA faithful in high dudgeon more than two years after their hero was soundly defeated in a fair election. In Texas and in other fervid red states, the groundless election-fraud claim, as Jonathan Lemire puts it in his recent book “The Big Lie,” has “metastasized” from a campaign cris de coeur into the “cold, methodical process of legislation.”


(full article online)

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/1/20/2148281/--A-foolish-quest-Texas-paper-excoriates-GOP-plot-to-empower-AG-Ken-Paxton-s-voter-fraud-obsession?detail=emaildkre&pm_source=DKRE&pm_medium=email

 

[Sixties Fan]

he disgraced ex-president showed up at the memorial service over the weekend for Ineitha Lynnette Hardaway, better known as “Diamond” of the pro-Trump duo Diamond and Silk, and predictably hijacked the event, complaining about the length of the service and — why not — stumping for his re-election campaign in a meandering, cringeworthy "tribute" to the late Hardaway.


(full article online)

Trump turns memorial for vlogger Diamond into rally speech - and gripes about length

Trump adds he didn’t know Diamond’s partner Silk ‘at all’ before memorial

www.independent.co.uk

 

[Sixties Fan]

The Republican-controlled House has made the Internal Revenue Service a political target after Democrats bolstered the agency with new funding last year.

Within the first week of the new Congress, a dozen GOP lawmakers introduced a bill that would abolish the IRS altogether and replace the entire federal tax code with a national sales tax.
Separately, the House voted to rescind nearly $80 billion in funding for the agency that Democrats approved last year – with many top Republicans repeating the misleading claim that the money will be used to hire 87,000 auditors.
“Instead of adding 87,000 new agents to weaponize the IRS against small business owners and middle America, this bill will eliminate the need for the department entirely by simplifying the tax code with provisions that work for the American people and encourage growth and innovation,” said Rep. Earl “Buddy” Carter, a Republican from Georgia who introduced the Fair Tax Act earlier this month.

It’s highly unlikely that either bill will become law, given that Democrats still control the Senate. But the measures highlight how America’s two major political parties have very different strategies when it comes to addressing the embattled tax collection agency – which has seen its budget shrink by more than 15% over the past decade and has struggled to not only process returns on time but also answer taxpayers’ questions. Just 13% of phone calls were answered last year.

https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/23/politics/irs-fair-tax-republicans-abolish/index.html?link_id=19&can_id=6e84143cce349aec0c9a0b4e4a28c9c6&source=email-damning-new-kavanaugh-evidence-revealed-in-secret-documentary&email_referrer=email_1794186&email_subject=trump-ruins-maga-stars-memorial-with-cringey-speech

 

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[Sixties Fan]

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/1/24/2148994/-Trump-photographed-with-notorious-Philly-mob-boss-because-well-that-s-who-he-is?detail=emaildkre&pm_source=DKRE&pm_medium=email

 

[easyt65]

https://twitter.com/MarkJacob16

With all the arguments over whether MAGA Republicans are fascists, I reread William Shirer’s “The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich” to see how much the rise of Hitler and the rise of MAGA smell similar. Conclusion: They do. This thread lists 10 ways. Please take a look.

1. A big lie about treachery is used to foment resentment. Nazis: We didn’t really lose World War I. It was a “stab in the back” by Jews and other "November criminals." MAGA: We didn’t really lose the 2020 election. It was a “steal” by politicians and Blacks in big cities.




2. There’s an obsession with purity of the culture. Nazis: “Racial mixture” was a threat to Aryan culture, Hitler wrote. MAGA: “Great replacement theory” says immigrants threaten white culture.



3. Chaos is something to be exploited, not addressed. Nazis: Economic distress is a great political opportunity. MAGA: Economic distress is a great political opportunity.



4. The super-rich bankroll the right-wing seizure of power. Nazis: Thanks to I.G. Farben, Deutsche Bank, Thyssen, Krupp, etc. MAGA: Thanks to the Mercers, Uihleins, DeVos, Thiel, etc.



5. Some people think the fascist threat is overblown. Nazis: While Hitler posed a major threat, some said he "ceased to be a political danger.” (2 weeks later, he was chancellor.) MAGA: While Trump poses a major threat, many people think it’s “just politics,” no worries.


6. There’s a cult of personality. Nazis: The German army made a pledge of loyalty to Hitler personally. MAGA: Trump’s supporters bill him as “the most moral president” in U.S. history.



7. Christianity is used to legitimize the movement. Nazis: “The party stands for positive Christianity.” MAGA: Trump is described as the “Chosen One” protecting American Christianity.





8. Books are the enemy. Nazis: Any book that “acts subversively on our future” must be burned. MAGA: “I think we should throw those books in a fire,” says a Virginia school board member.




9. An independent news media is the enemy. Nazis: Any newspaper that “offends the honor and dignity of Germany” must be banned. MAGA: The press is the “enemy of the people.”



10. Educators are pressured to be politically compliant. Nazis: Teachers took an oath to “be loyal and obedient to Adolf Hitler.” MAGA: Florida’s DeSantis accuses teachers of “indoctrination” and pressures them to avoid references to America’s racist history and LGBTQ people.



I'm not saying that MAGA will end up as horrifically as Nazism. I am saying that America 2022 feels too much like Germany 1932, and I don't want to take the risk of watching MAGA cultism play out. We have to stop it now.



Why did Twitter put a “sensitive” warning on this thread? Who knows? My only theory is that it has a “hateful symbol”—a swastika on the cover of Shirer’s book about Nazism.

Democrats / Liberals have made eliminating the remindets of the past or simply tring to re-write it one of their agendas. In ding so they ensure the past will repeat itself.

 

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New Footage of Paul Pelosi Attack Should Put Right-Wing Conspiracy Theorists to Shame

The video clearly shows Nancy Pelosi's 87-year-old husband was telling the truth about the attack—but some experts fear it could still be edited or manipulated.

jezebel.com

 

[Sixties Fan]

https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/26/media/directv-drops-newsmax/index.html?link_id=9&can_id=6e84143cce349aec0c9a0b4e4a28c9c6&source=email-fox-news-hit-with-lawsuit-over-blackmail-sex-abuse-3&email_referrer=email_1799982&email_subject=mtgs-biden-attack-backfires-beautifully-on-house-floor

 

[Sixties Fan]

 

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As soon as President Joe Biden entered the White House, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton launched an unprecedented campaign of obstruction to block his agenda in the courts. Paxton took advantage of a quirk—really, a loophole—in the federal judiciary: A state can pick the specific judge who will oversee its case by filing in a small division where only one judge sits. Using this strategy, Paxton has positioned his cases before a rotating cast of the same conservative judges, most of them nominated by Donald Trump. They have dutifully played their role in this pantomime of litigation, issuing an unending series of sweeping injunctions that block Biden administration policies nationwide for months or years.

On Thursday, the administration finally said: enough. In response to yet another Texas lawsuit exploiting this loophole, Biden’s Justice Department called out Paxton—and, implicitly, the judges playing along with his scheme. The DOJ highlighted Texas’ “blatant” and shameless “judge-shopping,” urging a transfer to another court “in the interests of justice.” Naturally, Trump-nominated Judge Drew Tipton is unlikely to oblige; that is, after all, why Paxton hand-picked him for this lawsuit. But the DOJ’s filing marks a new phase of battle against Republicans’ judicial gamesmanship: The Justice Department is playing hardball in the lower courts, forcing compromised judges to address their own complicity in a cynical partisan chicanery.

(full article online)

Biden’s Justice Department Finally Stands Up to Out-of-Control Texas Judges

Trump appointees keep playing along with Texas’ brazen judge-shopping. The Biden administration finally said: enough.

slate.com