The Sinclair Group - Exposing Millions of Unprotected Brains To Covert (Local) Propaganda Broadcasts

 

Map showing local Sinclair TV affiliates

Sinclair won't say a negative word about this mental misfit

We now have new evidence to explain why Joe Biden's approval and poll numbers continue to remain underwater despite a host of positives, i.e. inflation down, stock market up 10 % for year, more infrastructure projects with jobs etc.  The keyfactor to explain his 38% approval? The insidious propaganda spewed by over 100 local stations now owned by Sinclair Broadcasting Group, as pointed out by Joy Reid recently, e.g.

‘Nefarious’: Fake news on Biden's age pumped through local outlets by right-wing controlled Sinclair - YouTube

As one of her guests (Brian Stelter)  noted, it's equivalent to not merely putting the proverbial thumb on the scale in an election year, but a whole hand on the scale.  Sinclair especially keeps priming the "pump" about Biden's age, as if he is a totally mentally incapacitated toddler.  Most recently, they just grabbed a recent hit piece off The Wall Street Journal about Biden "slipping" (based on one dubious source, the coward and dimwit Kevin McCarthy who couldn't even keep his House Speaker's job).  The despicable aspect it that all the local Sinclair -owned stations ran with this hogswill, thereby reinforcing the meme Biden is "too old" for the job.  

The map at top - showed as part of Joy Reid's MSNBC segment, shows the extent of the Sinclair owned stations which must now be regarded as propaganda outlets, for Trump and the RNC. Indeed, every last one ought to feature a screen warning advising "Your mental health and decision making in the November election could be at risk by watching."

As noted by Joy's guest, Molly Jong-Fast, the reinforcement is the key given the vast Right wing echo chamber in which this crap percolates. So the spurious baloney first emerges in the New York Post or the op-ed pages of the Wall Street Journal, then it migrates to FOX News (also owned by Rupert Murdoch like the WSJ) then it is copied and recycled by the spin meisters in the other Sinclair stations.

As Ms. Jong -Fast put it:

"The fact that this gets into the local news where people are just trying to get the weather and the traffic seems particularly nefarious."

Given the propaganda is piped into 186 local stations it means that people who aren't even watching FOX and may have no interest in its lies, are still being fed lies by the anchors in the local affiliates. These folks aren't doing it on their own like Sean Hannity or Laura Ingraham, but they are under orders to read the prepared script (compliment of Sinclair boss man David Smith)

Worse, the FOXite and Sinclair stations won't even play Trump spiels or speeches any more because they've become too deranged. But they will play loops of Biden flubbing words in a talk or maybe stumbling a bit, to try to impose the image of a doddering elderly incompetent.  As Reid guest Matt Dowd put it:

"I've come to the conclusion that what Sinclair is doing is far more dangerous than what FOX is doing.  This is because we already know FOX is going to be right wing slanted so we filter it through that lens.  The problem is that people don't have that filter on when they watch the weather, local sports or any of that and also the local news. And when you look at the level of trust local news is trusted far more than other news."

We now know this no longer can be "taken to the bank".  If your local news outlet is owned and operated as a Sinclair affiliate, viewer beware. To use the words of LA Times columnist Michael Hiltzik (in describing RFK Jr's vaccine BS), "We've allowed this dangerous hogwash to be mainstreamed into the body politic like an IV drip of strychnine.”

In this case, the brains of that body politic are being disabled and incapacitated by that toxic "IV drip"  and they may not even be aware of it.  They need to be. The alternative is the autocratic nightmare of Project 2025 if Traitor Trump rises to power again.

Conservatives and the Right | Donald Trump

Does Project 2025's Secret Plan Include Moving Beyond Trump's Shadow?

by Thom Hartmann | June 21, 2024 - 6:04am | permalink

— from The Hartmann Report

In less than a month, Republicans will meet in Milwaukee to crown Donald Trump as their Emperor King and Sun God. But the real powers behind the GOP — the billionaires and their institutions that created Project 2025 as a how-to manual to convert American democracy into something like the old Confederacy — don’t much care about poor old Donald.

Sure, they want him to be the nominee because NBC trained him well in the dark art of playing a successful businessman on television. He brings in the rubes like nobody since Huey Long; he’s a singularly brilliant politician, much as Putin, Hitler, Orbán, and Mussolini are and were.

But he can also be irrational, impulsive, disloyal, dishonest, and unpredictable, qualities that make the men who want to revive the Confederacy to replace our republican form of government wary. They have big plans — far bigger than Trump’s tiny dream of vengeance — and don’t want him screwing things up.

See Also:

2024 Elections | Marjorie Taylor Greene

‘This Fox News Poll Is Wrong!’ MTG Explodes After New Poll Shows Rural Voters Preferring Biden

by Maya Boddie | June 21, 2024 - 6:12am | permalink

— from Alternet

Former President Donald Trump took the stage at the conservative Turning Point USA "People's Convention" last week, led by far-right activist Charlie Kirk, which Politico reported is currently "pouring tens of millions of dollars into an ambitious get-out-the-vote operation in three battleground states."

A devout Trump supporter, Kirk took to social media Thursday to point out what he believes is a fluke on Fox News' part — and fellow MAGA faithful Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) agreed.

“Okay, I’ve been studying this new FOX NEWS poll, and I have concluded it’s a complete outlier,” Kirk wrote via X (formerly Twitter.

"They have Joe Biden winning rural voters 50-48% over Trump. There is no way that’s possible. Zero," the far-right activist continued.

And:

Thom Hartmann

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Media | Republicans

The Dark Side of Politics: The GOP's MAGA Lie Machine

by Thom Hartmann | June 18, 2024 - 5:42am | permalink

— from The Hartmann Report

Hitler’s brilliant propaganda minister, Joseph Goebbels, famously told the Fuhrer, “Repeat a lie often enough and it becomes the truth.” Donald Trump and the MAGA faction of the Republican Party have taken Goebbels’ advice to heart, and it’s going to make this fall’s election one like we’ve never seen before.

Already they’ve been lying so often and so effectively that nearly all Republicans, and majorities or near-majorities of Americans, believe:

— the GOP lie that we’re in a recession (we’re in better shape, in most ways, than any time since the 1960s and inflation last month was zero while Ronald Reagan never got it below 4.1% in his entire eight years);
— Republican lies about crime being up (it’s down dramatically since Trump);
— their lies that “Democrats want elective abortion up to the moment of birth” (none have ever said that);
— Trump’s lie that the 2020 election was “stolen” from Trump by “voter fraud”;
— GOP lies that the southern border is “wide open”;
— the Republican lie that Social Security is on the verge of bankruptcy and must be saved by privatization or benefits cuts;
— their vicious lie that queer people are pedophiles targeting America’s schoolchildren; and
— their NRA lie that more and more deadly guns will keep our kids safe.

» article continues...

And:

Media

Firewalls of Ignorance and Disappearance: Corporate Media in the Age of Fascist Politics

by Henry Giroux | June 21, 2024 - 5:41am | permalink

"If you’re not careful, the newspapers will have you hating the people who are being oppressed, and loving the people who are doing the oppressing."
– Malcolm X

Bearing witness is a crucial marker of a responsible press and media. It brings to light the unnecessary suffering and hardship of those rendered voiceless and disposable, as well as the underlying forces that produce such conditions. It also serves to challenge those who “wallow in willful ignorance.”[1] Shattering the lies concealed by claims of innocence is a powerful weapon for holding power accountable, making it visible and subject to exposure and resistance. Bearing witness does not guarantee justice, but it provides the awareness necessary to turn propaganda against itself and mobilize people to function as a collective force of resistance.

Extending Permutation Groups: Transpositions And Applications Of Permutations To Solid Geometry

A transposition is a permutation which interchanges two numbers and leaves the others fixed. The inverse of a transposition T is equal to the transposition T itself, so that:

T2 = I (identity permutation, e.g the permutation such that I(i) = i for all i = 1,...n)

A permutation p of the integers {1, . . . n} is denoted by

[1 .. . .. n]

[p(1).. p(n)]


So, for example:

[1 2 3]
[2 1 3]

denotes the permutation p such that p(1) = 2, p(2) = 1, and p(3) = 3.

Now, let's look at EVEN and ODD permutations:

Let  P  _n  denote the polynomial of n variables x ₁,  x ₂ ……x _n which is the product of all the factors  x _i .. x _j  with i < j. That is:

P  _n ( x ₁,  x ₂ ……x _n) = P(x _i .. x _j)

The symmetric group S(n) acts on the polynomial  P  _n by permuting the variables. For p Î  S(n) we have:

P  _n ( x_p(1), x_p(2). . .x_p(n)) = (sgn p)  P  _n ( x ₁,  x ₂ ……x _n)

where sgn p = + 1. If the sign is positive then p is called an even permutation, if the sign is negative then p is called an odd permutation. Thus: the product of two even or two odd permutations is even. The product of an even and an odd permutation is odd.

Back to transpositions! We just saw:

[1 2 3]
[2 1 3]

The above permutation is actually a transposition 2 <-> 1 (leaving 3 fixed). Now, let p' be the permutation:

[1 2 3]
[3 1 2]

Then pp' is the permutation such that:

pp'(1) = p(p'(1)) = p(3) = 3

pp'(2) = p(p'(2)) = p(1) = 2

pp'(3) = p(p'(3)) = p(2) = 1


It isn’t difficult to ascertain that: 

sgn (ps) = (sgn p) (sgn s) 

So that we may then write:

pp' =

[1 2 3]

[3 2 1]

Now, find the inverse (p^-1) of the above. (Note: the inverse permutation is defined as the map: p ^- 1  : Zn -> Zn), 

Since p'(1) = 3, then  p ^- 1 (3) = 1

Since p'(2) = 1 then p ^- 1 (1) = 2

Since p'(3) = 2 then  p ^- 1 (2) = 3

Therefore:  p ^- 1   =

[1 2 3]
[ 2 3 1]

 Disjoint permutations:

Expressing a permutation as a product of disjoint cyclic permutations is not hard at all. The key is to “cycle through” the mapping in the original to yield the different disjoint cycles, taking care to stop when the end element leads to a number (on the top of the original) that repeats. For example:

Express as disjoint permutations:

[1 2 3 4  5  6   7]

[4 5 6 7  3  1  2]

Solution: 1 goes into 4, 4 goes into 7, 7 goes into 2 – STOP! (Since 2 commences new cycle in next top position). So first disjoint cycle is: (1, 4, 7, 2).

Now, 2 goes into 5, 5 goes into 3, STOP! (3 repeats) So cycle is: (2, 5, 3). Then 3 goes into 6, and 6 into 1. Stop.

Answer: (1, 4, 7, 2)(2, 5, 3)(6).

Permutations applied to solid geometry (tetrahedron):

 Consider now the ordered tetrahedron (vertices ordered by number) shown below:

Call the ordering '1234'. In terms of signage (sign rules - e.g. for (+) or (-) being followed, it's important to note that a segment (1 2) induces orientation (+1) in the associated complex, but a segment (2 1) induces (-1). This is how differing segments acquire negative signage in the complex.   

 The boundary of the tetrahedron, in terms of its four faces can than be written:

- (1 2 3) - (1 3 4) + (1 2 4) + (1 3 4)

Suggested Problem:

Express  p =

[1 2 3 4]
[2 3 1 4]

as the product of transpositions, and determine the sign (+1 or -1) of the resulting end permutation

Bill Maher Mutates Into A FOXite Propagandist By Conflating 'The Left' With "Jew Haters"

 Israel is led by a prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, who has to stay in power to avoid potentially being sent to prison on corruption charges. To do so, he sold his soul to form a government with far-right Jewish extremists who insist that Israel must fight in Gaza until it has killed every last Hamasnik — “total victory” — and who reject any partnership with the Palestinian Authority (which has accepted the Oslo peace accords) in governing a post-Hamas Gaza, because they want Israeli control over all the territory between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea, including Gaza.-  Thomas Friedman, NY Times, American Leaders Should Stop Debasing Themselves on Israel

Bill Maher, for those unaware, has been on a tear now the past several months, undermining the coming election by conflating "the left" with anti-Semites on the issue of pro-Palestinian Gaza protests.  In his latest episode of Real Time (June 14) I counted no less than eight times this smarmy ass monkey cited the "Left" and "Hamas" in the same sentence. A perfect example of what I am writing about can be found at this link :

Bill Maher unloads: 'How come it's okay for the left to hate the Jews?' (msn.com)

(And note the FOX News source.  Obviously they are putting up more and more of his BS and you need to ask why)

This smug fucker has no clue that "the Left" does not hate the Jews. It doesn't because it is not one single indistinguishable entity. The vast majority of what's called "the Left"  hates the sumbitch authoritarian assholes like Netanyahu that use the cover of Israel and the Jewish state to carry out indiscriminate mass slaughter in Gaza under the cover of waging war.

 As one Reddit commenter aptly put it:

Bill Maher has been on his "Progressives love Hamas and support terrorism" propaganda for a few months. He makes a point to repeat it 5 times every show. I lost all respect for him, and after the 5th show of his constant, deceitful propaganda; I stopped watching his show for good. He's far too smart to be that ignorant and way off-base. He's intentionally trying to slander and mischaracterize people's views in order to demonize them. I NEVER thought I'd see the day when Bill Maher turned into a alternate facts, fake narrative, propagandist hack...Bill's labeling the Left as "loving Hamas and supporting terrorism" is the EXACT same tactic as labeling the Left as baby killers etc. He's literally doing the bidding of the same MAGA propagandists that he PRETENDS to be against

Which is exactly the take I had after viewing his latest Real Time. Generally, I let pass most of Maher's blathering - as he did on the Covid vaccines in 2020-21 -   e.g.

Bill Maher Dings The Left About Misinformation From A Poll When He Ought To Be Focused on The False Beliefs Of The Right 

And:

• Can We Help Bill Maher Increase His COVID IQ?

Because he also delivered punch backs on Trump.  But those return fires have gotten fewer the last year as his "both sides" baloney has increased. Ordinarily, if this were not a critical election year I'd let this pass. But when one equates one side of the political spectrum as 'haters' with the other side of cultists and genuine haters (on the Trump right) there are serious issues and problems and people need to be made aware. This is given it gives incentive for unthinking voters and social media obsessives to make careless generalizations.  As the Reddit commenter also noted:

Then next episode he'll be absolutely appalled and shocked at how so many Americans can vote for Trump and all the "cultist" nonsense. So many vote for lesser of the two evils, so when they view the Left and Progressives as baby-killing, groomers who support Hamas terrorism; it's EASY to see how they can stomach Trump's mean tweets and all the other lies and bullshit

This is also a perspective shared by blogger Jaime O'Neill, e.g.

Can You Believe This Smug Asshole? I Mean, Really, Can You?

by Jaime O’Neill | May 5, 2024 - 5:48am

---

Bill Maher still says that are routinely kept from Fox viewers. But, as is increasingly the case, he once again gave up trying to suppress his inner-Fascist, unable to resist bitching about how the government is spending his tax money on people who hate Jews, by which he meant those students now protesting American policy toward Israel. So, Bill Maher, “comedian,” now transforms himself into the cliche of a fist-shaking old fart who builds arguments against damn near anything by first citing his onerous taxes.

By doing so, Maher engages in the most reckless of generalizations, repeating the toxically dangerous lie that all these hundreds of thousands of American students hate Jews even though no small number of them are, in fact, Jews themselves. The vast majority of the protesters aren't pissed off at Jews, per se. They are, as I am, righteously sickened by what Netanyahu (who just so happens to be the Jewish leader of Israel) has been doing since October of last year. Which, if it isn't merciless genocide, will have to do until the real thing comes along. No one should be labeled a "Jew hater" for being sickened by that. Common decency and morality demand that we be sickened by that. All of us. Not ju students

That emphasis in bold above is mine, because it's also exactly where I am at. I am goddamned sick of the tyrant Bibi Netanyahu blowing innocent Palestinians to smithereens - including thousands of innocent kids and even medical volunteers- then asserting he is going after Hamas. No he is not. He is reducing Gaza to rubble and slaughtering at will in order to keep his sorry, autocratic ass in power. Indeed, it was his carelessness in reducing security long before the October 7 Hamas attack that laid the basis for it. 

I have also noticed Maher in the last few Real Times spewing lots of venom at the college crowd and I sensed it was not merely because some small fraction were protesting for the Palestinians.  Again, Jaimie O'Neill hits the nail on the head:

Maher has had a hard-on about young people ever since some college kids (theretofore the source of a lot of his income) spoke out against his well-paid campus gigs. He’s been throwing a snit-fit about that damn near every time he opens his mouth. “What’s the matter with kids today?” is at the top of his agenda, and in that, too, he perpetuates the stereotype of crabby old men. As with Trump, his constant whining about being treated worse than anyone has ever been treated before grows tiresome.

Maher has said, as he did in the recent episode - if it's Trump vs. Biden he will vote for Biden's "head in a jar of blue liquid" before going for Trump.  Fine, but in the next breath - to his guests Ana Navarro and Joel Stein- he admits he's pining for a "fiftyish someone" to take his place at the convention. Navarro tried to get him back to reality about this being a binary choice but Maher remains in fantasyland pining for fantasy options that will never materialize.  Maybe it's time for Bill Maher to grow up or maybe find a new profession. 

In the meantime we have to scan for cheapfake videos circulating in the Right's sewage conglomerate which "enraptures" their mutts but which are absolutely destructive to democracy.  See e.g.

‘Cheapfake’ Biden videos enrapture right-wing media but deeply mislead

 Andrew Bates, WH press secretary pointedly noted as this brain rot erupted:

"President Biden’s right-wing critics don’t respect their readers or themselves and resort to misinformation and cheap fakes because his performance in office — fueling the strongest economic growth in the world, bringing violent crime to historic lows, and advancing our national security in the world — is so threatening to them that they feel a need to make things up,” 

 At least if we can get Maher to cease spouting his "the Left hates Jews" bunkum on Real Time there might be a chance to steer voters away from the rest of the Biden is too old memes - while focusing more on Trump's mental unfitness.

See Also:

Israel

How Much Longer, Bibi Netanyahu?

by César Chelala | May 30, 2024 - 5:29am | permalink

How much longer Bibi Netanyahu will you try to fool the world with your crimes? For how much longer Bibi Netanyahu will you call the actions of your armed forces technical mishaps, mistakes, blunders, unintended side effects, miscalculations?

What you and the armed forces under your command are doing are not mistakes, Bibi Netanyahu. What they are doing are called war crimes in the civilized world from which you no longer are part of.

You cannot feel pride for an army that carries out precision killings of your enemies but fails to recognize that among those you kill are children, women, and innocent health and aid workers.

You have fooled the whole world for too long, Bibi Netanyahu, but the world is now waking up. And the whole world is seeing you for what you are, Bibi Netanyahu.

And:

Joshua Frank

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Human Rights

US Bombs Have Helped Make Israel’s Collective Punishment of Gaza a Fact of Life

by Joshua Frank | June 1, 2024 - 5:16am | permalink

— from TomDispatch

As Amal Nassar lay in pain on a bed at the Al-Awda Hospital in the Nuseirat refugee camp in northern Gaza, the echoes of explosions and artillery fire could be heard all around her. It was mid-January and she had made her way to the embattled hospital to give birth to a baby girl she would name Mira. While Amal should have been celebrating her infant’s delivery, instead she was engulfed in fear, surrounded by the relentless nightmare of death and suffering that she and her family had experienced for months.

“I was muttering to myself, ‘I hope I die,'” she recalled.

Though gut-wrenching, Amal’s story is not unlike those of so many other young mothers in Gaza today. The World Health Organization estimates that more than 50,000 pregnant women are barely surviving there, while having babies at the rate of 180 births a day. Many of those women (especially in the north) are acutely malnourished, and few received any medical attention before their labor pains began, often weeks ahead of schedule.

And:

Israel

The ICC Takes on Israel and the US Congressional Mafia

by Medea Benjamin | May 30, 2024 - 5:24am | permalink

Senator Lindsay Graham was bursting with contempt for the International Criminal Court when he grilled Secretary of State Anthony Blinken at a May 21 congressional hearing. Wagging his finger, he warned that, if the ICC gets away with issuing arrest warrants for Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, “We are next.”

The audience at the hearing, stacked with CODEPINK pro-Palestine supporters, burst out in applause at the notion of the U.S. being hauled before the world’s highest court. “You can clap all you want,” an angry Graham retorted, “but they tried to come after our soldiers in Afghanistan.” Graham was thankful that in the Afghan case “reason prevailed” when the case was dropped, adding that the U.S. must level sanctions against the ICC “not only to protect our friends in Israel but to protect ourselves.”

And:

The Biden Administration | Middle East

The First Jewish Biden Appointee to Resign Over Gaza Speaks Out

by Amy Goodman and Denis Moynihan | May 27, 2024 - 5:31am | permalink

Israel’s assault on Gaza has provoked protests around the globe, including in the United States. While attention lately has focused on college campuses, another protest movement has emerged: dissenters within the U.S. government, who offer a behind-the-scenes critique of U.S. policies that are devastating Gaza. Despite this wave of informed dissent, U.S. President Joe Biden, while calling for a cease-fire, continues to provide arms and diplomatic cover to Israel.

“There’s widespread sentiment within all levels of the administration and all agencies that the president’s continued support for Israel’s assault on Gaza is disastrous,” Lily Greenberg Call said on the Democracy Now! news hour. She was a special assistant to the chief of staff at the Interior Department and a Biden political appointee, but resigned her position on May 15, citing, in her four-page resignation letter, “President Biden’s disastrous, continued support for Israel’s genocide in Gaza.”

And:

Bernie Sanders

No, I Will Not Be Attending Netanyahu's Speech

by Bernie Sanders | June 4, 2024 - 6:52am | permalink

And:

Donald Trump

Rule of Law: From Donald Trump to the Gaza Strip

by Robert Freeman | June 1, 2024 - 5:38am | permalink

And:

Gazans describe life in tents as ‘hell’ as summer’s heat arrives

And:

• Biden Was Right To Halt the 2,000 Lb. Bombs To Israel...

Solution to Simple Permutation Group Problem

 Let A = {1, 2, 3, 4, 5} and s  be the result (st)  

 Find: 1 t, 2t , 3t , 4t, and 5t

Compare to:  1 st, 2st , 3st , 4st, and 5st

Soln.:

Let:   t =

 [1 2 3 4 5]

 [3 5 4 2 1]

1(t)  = 2,  2(t)  = 5, 3(t)  = 4, 4(t)  = 2,  5(t)  = 1

From def. illustration:  s = st  =  

[1 2 3 4 5]

[4 2 5 3 1] 

Then:

1(st)  = 4,  2(st)  = 2 , 3(st)  = 5, 4(st)  = 3,  5(st)  = 1

Don't Count On Supreme Court Abortion Ruling To Protect Women's Abortion Access

 

                               Amanda Zurawski - went into septic shock in Texas

                            This Trump MAGA Mutt doesn't care
                                                                      

                           These pro- abortion protesters assembled one year ago.

The Supreme Court’s decision yesterday not to impose restrictions on a key abortion drug (Mifepristone), while a victory for abortion rights advocates, ought not be taken as a 'slam dunk' win. The case brought by anti-abortion extremists was dismissed on a technicality, i.e. they did not have "standing".  Which means none of those bringing the case were themselves exposed to or suffered injury. As Justice Brett Kavanaugh - who wrote the conclusion noted - just because the use of the drug contradicts the plaintiffs' beliefs doesn't mean they suffered injury.  But the court left the ultimate ruling up in the air, given as several justices said, at some future point states or their legal agents could have standing. Perhaps if the drug is being used in violation of a state law.  As  noted in a NY Times piece:

While the Supreme Court on Thursday rejected an attempt to nullify federal approval of the abortion pill mifepristone, liberals fear a new Trump administration could rescind the approval or use a 19th-century morality law to criminalize sending it across state lines.

See e.g.

Alabama SC Ruling Overshadows Trump Allies Draconian Plan To Ban Abortions Nationwide Using 1873 Law 

But leave it to the smarmy WSJ editors (p. A14 today) to take a swipe at "the left", barking irrelevantly: "So much for the Left's denunciations of the court's majority as  'Christian Nationalists'."  Uh no, Bozos.  Those denunciations still stand and the current technicality ruling does not in any way eradicate the future threat or the shameless travesty of the original Dobbs decision two years ago, e.g.

Five Wingnut Ideologues Gut A NY Gun Law, Kill Roe v. Wade And Aim For Other Rights - And What We Can Do About It 

Nor does it placate women's advocates given another high court abortion ruling is on the way and may not turn out the same way.  After all, this abortion ruling gave all the court's Xtian nationalists a convenient fig leaf cover given it was based on the outlandish assumption that 'some day' a woman suffering from complications (of taking mifepristone)   would present herself for treatment to one of the rabid Xtian drs. acting as plaintiffs- thereby conferring standing for the zealot doctor's stake in the drug's availability.  Righto, and Martians are on the way to kidnap Trump and bury his ass on Olympus Mons.

So the conservo justices' votes were essentially meaningless in terms of costing them respect by their white Xtian nationalist cheerleaders.

In other words, the ruling crystallizes and sets the stakes for the next presidential election in terms of abortion access nationwide. And no woman with any sense or intellect should assume this ruling provides protection.  It doesn't.  The Trump cabal's Project 2025  in conjunction with the cooperation of the New Apostolic Reformation (NAR) will incept a full-fledged theocracy among which the top priorities will be a national abortion ban. See e.g.

Heritage Foundation Staffers Polishing Jackboots For Anticipated March Into Trump’s White House

Think it can't affect you, think again. Amanda Zurawski was delayed being able to get a medical exception to have an abortion in Texas and it damned near cost her her life. She had suffered a premature rupture of membranes that meant her unborn daughter would not survive. However, Texas doctors - under that state's infernal laws - delayed providing an abortion until she went into septic shock. She has since appeared in an ad for President Biden's election campaign in the hope more women can be alerted to the risk if Trump should gain power again. Her case is also a reminder that temporary SC rulings on critical issues like abortion only go so far.

Look, a president has enormous power to influence federal agencies that oversee abortion policy.  Thus, a potential Trump administration -  especially with the awesome multiplied power of the NAR and Heritage Foundation's Project 2025- could unilaterally choose to do what the Supreme Court did not: impose strict restrictions on mifepristone, one of two drugs used in over 60 percent of abortions. Or even move to take the drug off the market entirely.  Given the drug is responsible for effecting 63% of abortions nationwide this would be a huge hit.

While President Biden has repeatedly pledged to safeguard access to abortion pills — which leading medical associations agree are safe and effective, traitor Trump has tried to coyly distance himself from the issue.  He's given a weak lip service to limited choice only, vowing he will “leave it to the states” -understanding it’s a loser issue if he can’t pull the wool over voters’ eyes. But anyone who's paid attention, and that means reading real news reports from genuine (i.e. valid) sources, knows that the Project 2025 cabal and NAR have him under their thumbs.  Once in power, in other words, Project 2025 will be on auto-pilot and even if Trump wanted he would be unable to halt its excesses. After all, he's signed onto it with both Heritage and NAR. He can't then 'bite the hands' of them that got him to the dance.

But make no mistake the Project 2025 mandate, which is now embedded in a 920 page document (compliments of the Heritage Foundation), is to implement a nationwide abortion ban. No exceptions, no medical outs - even in the most extreme life -threatening instances.

According to  James Bopp Jr., the general counsel for the National Right to Life Committee:

“What I have heard, which seems likely to me, is what the Trump administration would do is repeal the Biden regulations and go back to the Trump policy,”

 We also know that antiabortion zealots have grown increasingly frustrated that the landmark 2022 Dobbs ruling has done little to reduce the sheer volume of abortions nationwide. They are pissed at this inefficacy and certainly will demand the whole 'hog' or cut - should Trump be voted in by enough imbeciles or careless cowards determined to vote 3rd party.  Because they can't tolerate Biden or Trump and their egos make them believe they have a real choice.  

So the choices for women are now out there: Protect their health - of which abortion access is one part - or forfeit bodily autonomy and become a handmaiden 'baby baker' slave to the theocrats and Trumpite extremists.  The choice is binary this election and no one should forget it.  

Meanwhile yesterday, the key movers and shakers of the congressional Reepturd felon worship cult, bowed and scraped as they greeted their expected future Overlord.  Even lining one of his two birthday cakes with 47 candles (the other had 45) in the expectation he will be president # 47 as well as having been # 45.  After all, these balless maggots know that his psychopathic, transactional nature means that if they don't pay obeisance to the orange roach now they will pay later after distracted, hoodwinked  (often lower IQ) voters return him to power.  

At the same confab, the traitor insurrectionist floated a proposition to the equally noxious Business Roundtable (WSJ today, p. A4, 'Trump Floats An All Tariff Revenue Model') replacing the income tax with a "tariff only" revenue system. The only downside? This would return the country to a 19th century fiscal policy which would "amount to a tax cut for high income people but effectively be a tax increase on (average) consumers who would have to pay the tariffs passed along to them in higher prices" after these universal tariffs are imposed. 

Contrary to Dotard's version of "economics", tariffs aren't paid by foreign governments on whose products they are imposed.  They are paid initially by U.S. companies that import whatever goods - whether baby formula or HDTVs - and then these are passed on to American consumers. Result? Higher cost, more inflation.  And this is the character so many in the swing states want back in power again? What mix of MJ candies and shrooms are they munching?

 Maybe, hopefully, enough voters will wake up in time to ensure  that  the twice impeached, formerly convicted  No. 45  does not become Arch-Dictator and Criminal No. 47.  But so far the omens aren't sanguine given the traitor and convicted felon is ahead in the polls in all the swing states.

 

See Also:

Abortion Rights | Donald Trump

After Supreme Court’s Abortion Pill Decision, Donald Trump Is Even More Likely To Ban Abortion

by Amanda Marcotte | June 16, 2024 - 5:24am | permalink

— from Salon

For close court watchers, it wasn't surprising that the Supreme Court rejected an effort by Christian right forces to take away access to the abortion pill. The case was too ridiculous, even for the current iteration of the court, which is dominated by six Republican appointees fighting varying levels of corruption allegations. The lawsuit was brought by a group of doctors — and dentists — who do not prescribe the medication in question, mifepristone. It was based on a total lie, which is that the drug is dangerous. (All evidence shows it's safer than Tylenol. The risk of death from Viagra is 10 times higher.) And the argument was eye-rollingly silly: The plaintiffs claimed to be worried they'd be asked to treat abortion patients in an emergency, an instance that rarely comes up, due to the drug's safety. When it does, emergency room providers have a right to ask a pro-choice doctor to step in to handle it.

What was more surprising was how decisive the court was in dismissing the anti-abortion arguments. The decision was unanimous, for one thing, with even the effusively misogynist justices like Sam Alito and Clarence Thomas going along with it. In his opinion, Justice Brett Kavanaugh used forceful language that likely precludes all future efforts by Christian right groups to rework the complaint and try again. "[A] plaintiff ’s desire to make a drug less available for others does not establish standing to sue," he wrote, making it clear that even this Supreme Court cannot see the "personal stake" that these plaintiffs had in what other doctors are prescribing to patients.

And:

Abortion Rights | Republicans

Voters Care About Abortion More Than Ever — and That’s a Problem for the GOP

by Joan McCarter | June 16, 2024 - 5:03am | permalink

— from Daily Kos

Republicans have created a disaster on abortion since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade two years ago. They have no message to justify their extreme forced birth positions. Their candidates are afraid to talk about it. And their standard bearer—convicted felon Donald Trump—can’t give a coherent statement about where he stands.

Meanwhile, Democrats are on offense, knowing public opinion is on their side.

New Gallup polling shows just how much the GOP needs to worry about abortion. Not only does it show a record high support for abortion rights, but it also shows that a record high percentage of voters—32%— say they’ll vote solely on the issue. That breaks down to 23% of pro-choice voters and just 8% of anti-abortion voters.

This is a pretty significant change from Gallup’s survey on abortion two years ago.

And:

Abortion Rights | Supreme Court

Abortion Pills Are Safe From the Supreme Court — for Now

by Joan McCarter | June 14, 2024 - 6:36am | permalink

— from Daily Kos

The Supreme Court’s unanimous decision to preserve access to abortion pills shows just how flimsy this case was. It never should have survived in the lower courts to reach the Supreme Court, and even the most extreme justices—including Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas—would have been embarrassed upholding the lower courts’ decision.

But make no mistake, this is a temporary reprieve. Anti-abortion forces are gearing up for more attacks.

Writing for the court, Justice Brett Kavanaugh acknowledged that the challengers have “sincere legal, moral, ideological, and policy objections” to elective abortion “by others” and to the Food and Drug Administration’s relaxed regulation of the drug, mifepristone. However, he wrote, “those kinds of objections alone do not establish a justiciable case or controversy in federal court.”

And:

Leonard Leo and Project 2025 Are Coming for Your Rights! If You Don’t Believe it Ask its Organizers

by Bill Berkowitz | June 14, 2024 - 5:38am | permalink

“Project 2025 offers a 900-page playbook [Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise] for restructuring the federal government in order to accomplish the policy goals of Christian Nationalists,” Laser wrote. “Rolling back the rights of LGBTQ+ people, ending marriage equality and even restricting divorce options, banning abortion and limiting reproductive health care, throwing up roadblocks to racial justice, eliminating the Department of Education and diverting public funds to private religious schools, and redefining religious freedom as a license to discriminate.”

And:

Religious Right

Christian Right’s New Apostolic Reformation Chasing Christian Voters in Battleground States

by Bill Berkowitz | May 24, 2024 - 5:33am | permalink

Everybody knows that the presidential election will come down to six or seven battleground states. There’s bad news for the Biden campaign as a recent poll has Trump leading him in 5 of six swing states. And to add fuel to the bad-news fire, Lance Wallnau, a major figure within the New Apostolic Reformation, an ultra-Christian Nationalist movement, has launched a major campaign chasing Christian voters in districts in those states. According to veteran journalist Frederick Clarkson, “Apostle Wallnau's Courage Tour is not just a tent revival road show. This is a sophisticated, targeted, political outreach campaign to increase evangelical turnout in selected counties in swing states.”

First, recent polling. According to The New York Times’ Nate Cohn, “Donald J. Trump leads President Biden in five crucial battleground states, a new set of polls shows, as a yearning for change and discontent over the economy and the war in Gaza among young, Black and Hispanic voters threaten to unravel the president’s Democratic coalition.

And:

Donald Trump

The Right Is Bonkers: Trump’s No Messiah, Not Law-Abiding, Not Most Electable

by Robert Becker | May 30, 2024 - 6:01am | permalink

And:

Donald Trump

‘Not an Accident’: Trump’s ‘Unified Reich’ Video Alarms Historians and Fascism Experts

by David Badash | May 22, 2024 - 7:02am | permalink

— from Alternet

Political experts, historians, and scholars of fascism are sounding the alarm after Donald Trump posted video Monday afternoon that promised a “unified Reich,” once again echoing language used by Adolf Hitler and Nazi Germany.

“Trump’s continued use of Nazi rhetoric is un-American and despicable. Yet too many Americans are brushing off the glaring red flags about what could happen if he returns to the White House,” former Trump White House deputy press secretary Sarah Matthews warned. “When someone shows you who they are, believe them.”

The video features made-up newspaper headlines claiming a Trump win of the 2024 presidential election. It asks, “What’s Next for America,” and promotes “the creation of a unified Reich.”

“The 30-second video, which Mr. Trump posted on his social media site, Truth Social, features several articles styled like newspapers from the early 1900s — and apparently recycling text from reports on World War I, including references to ‘German industrial strength’ and ‘peace through strength,'” The New York Times reported. “One article in the video asserts that Mr. Trump would deport 15 million migrants in a second term, while text onscreen lists the start and end days of World War I.”

And:

Thom Hartmann

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Donald Trump

Why is the Guy Who Told Us to Drink Bleach a Step Away from Being President?

by Thom Hartmann | May 24, 2024 - 6:35am | permalink

— from The Hartmann Report

Americans are dumbfounded. How is it that half this nations’ voters are on the verge of returning to office a guy who:

— Began his life of crime busted for writing “C” for “Colored” on Black rental applicants’ forms,
— Mismanaged the Covid crisis so badly America had the developed world’s highest mortality rate with at least a half-million unnecessary deaths,
— Is credibly accused of sexual assault by more than twenty women (one 14 years old) and found by a jury — twice— to have raped one of them,
— Forcibly tore nursing babies from the arms of their mothers with almost a thousand of those children still missing,

— Praised Nazis who marched chanting “Jews will not replace us!” as “very fine people,”
— Conspired with militia leaders to storm the US Capitol, leading to the death of 5 civilians and 3 police officers,
— Regularly quotes Hitler’s vicious, racist rhetoric referring to human beings as “scum” and “vermin” while claiming people of color “poison the blood of our nation,”