President Joe Biden, Patriot

The President gave a speech yesterday in Arizona.

Give it a listen:

Give it a read.

Some highlights:

Let me begin with the core principles. Democracy means rule of the people, not rule of monarchs, not rule of the monied, not rule of the mighty. Regardless of party, that means respecting free and fair elections; accepting the outcome, win or lose. (Applause.) It means you can’t love your country only when you win. (Applause.)

Democracy means rejecting and repudiating political violence. Regardless of party, such violence is never, never, never acceptable in America. (Applause.) It’s undemocratic, and it must never be normalized to advance political power.

And democracy means respecting the institutions that govern a free society. That means adhering to the timeless words of the Declaration of Independence: “We hold these truths to be self-evident.” A mission statement embodied in our Constitution, our system of separation of powers and checks and balances.

And:

And there is something dangerous happening in America now. There is an extremist movement that does not share the basic beliefs in our democracy: the MAGA Movement.

Not every Republican, not even a majority of Republicans, adhere to the MAGA extremist ideology. I know because I’ve been able to work with Republicans my whole career. But there is no question that today’s Republican Party is driven and intimidated by MAGA Republican extremists. Their extreme agenda, if carried out, would fundamentally alter the institutions of American democracy as we know it.

My friends, they’re not hiding their attacks. They’re openly promoting them — attacking the free press as the enemy of the people, attacking the rule of law as an impediment, fomenting voter suppression and election subversion.

Did you ever think we’d be having debates in the year — stage of your careers where banning books — banning books and burying history?

Extremists in Congress — more determined to shut down the government, to burn the place down than to let the people’s business be done.

And so on.

Donald Trump, Fraud.

From The NYTimes:

A New York judge ruled on Tuesday that Donald J. Trump persistently committed fraud by inflating the value of his assets, and stripped the former president of control over some of his signature New York properties.

From The Washington Post:

A judge overseeing a $250 million lawsuit against Donald Trump ruled the former president and his company committed fraud by inflating his net worth in business transactions, narrowing the scope of what the state’s attorney general must prove at an upcoming civil trial.

New York Supreme Court Justice Arthur Engoron also ordered the cancellation of Trump business certificates and imposed sanctions on attorneys representing him, two of his adult children, two other company executives and the business for repeating arguments that failed multiple times previously and were called “borderline frivolous.”

You can read the ruling here.

Then there's this also from The NYTimes:

The ruling came as part of the New York attorney general’s civil case against Mr. Trump. The attorney general, Letitia James, has accused the former president of fraudulently overstating the value of his assets on annual financial statements by as much as $2.2 billion a year in order to receive favorable terms on loans and benefits.

In the ruling, the judge, Arthur F. Engoron, agreed that Mr. Trump committed fraud when he sent those statements to banks and insurance firms. A trial in the case could start as soon as Monday; if Mr. Trump does not successfully have the ruling reversed before then, the proceeding will largely focus on the size of the penalty against him. Ms. James is seeking a fine of $250 million.

For instance, and this is from the ruling:

This Court takes judicial notice that the Trump Tower apartment in which Donald Trump resided for decades (the Triplex ) is 10,996 square feet. Between 2012-2016, Donald Trump submitted SFCs falsely claiming that the Triplex was 30,000 square feet, resulting in an overvaluation of between $114-207 million dollars. The misrepresentation continued even after defendants received written notification from Forbes that Donald Trump had been overestimating the square footage of the Triplex by a factor of three.

In opposition, defendants absurdly suggest that the calculation of square footage is a subjective process that could lead to differing results or opinions based on the method employed to conduct the calculation. Well yes, perhaps, if the area is rounded or oddly shaped, it is possible measurements of square footage could come to slightly differing results due to user error. Good - faith measurements could vary by as much as 10-20%, not 200%. (p. 21) [Italics in original.]

And followed closely by

A discrepancy of this order of magnitude, by a real estate developer sizing up his own living
space of decades, can only be considered fraud. (p. 22)

And so on. 

He's a fraud. And has been for a long long time.

 

 

Meanwhile, Outside

Science from the scientists at NOAA: 

The August global surface temperature was 1.25°C (2.25°F) above the 20th-century average of 15.6°C (60.1°F), making it the warmest August on record. This marked the first time an August temperature exceeded 1.0°C (1.8°F) above the long-term average. August 2023 was 0.29°C (0.52°F) warmer than the previous August record from 2016, but the anomaly was 0.10°C (0.18°F) lower than the all-time highest monthly temperature anomaly on record (March 2016). However, the August 2023 temperature anomaly was the third-highest anomaly of any month on record. August 2023 marked the 45th-consecutive August and the 534th-consecutive month with temperatures at least nominally above the 20th-century average. 

And:

The January–August global surface temperature ranked second warmest in the 174-year record at 1.06°C (1.91°F) above the 1901–2000 average of 14.0°C (57.3°F). January–August 2016—another year with El Niño conditions—holds the record for the warmest such period on record by just 0.03°C (0.05°F) above the current year-to-date anomaly. Global ocean surface temperature during this January–August 2023 period ranked warmest on record. According to NCEI's statistical analysis, there is a 95% probability of 2023 ranking among the two warmest years on record.

Science. 

And yet, from Scientific American:

Conservative activists and politicians in states across the country are trying to limit or distort the teaching of climate science to schoolchildren, marking a growing front in the culture war against social movements over race, gender identity and the environment.

Specifically:

In Ohio, legislators are expected to pass a bill that could require colleges and universities to teach “both sides” of climate change. A member of a local school board in Pennsylvania sought to block the use of a climate-themed novel in middle school because, he said, it was “propaganda.” Meanwhile, classroom content by a far-right group that produces animated videos that denigrate climate action is being approved for use in schools in numerous states.

You can read about the Pennsylvania part of the story here.

But of course everything's bigger in Texas:

Perhaps nowhere are climate lessons being reshaped by conservative politicians more than in Texas, where members of the education board have tried in recent years to block programs that teach about reducing greenhouse gases, emphasizing instead the benefits of fossil fuels. The state education board is now deciding whether it will block textbooks that accurately portray climate science.

Of course. 

Meanwhile its getting hotter out there. The science says so.

 

Wendy Bell - 9/11 Truther?

So I saw this on the cesspool formerly known as Twitter yesterday:

If I'm reading this right (and I'd like to think I am), I have to assume Wendy Bell, anti-vaxxer, election-denier, climate science denier, is also a 9/11 truther.

Who'd a thunk it??

The 9/11 conspiracy theory that Wendy so obediently spews is this: Since you can't see any evidence of a plane hitting The Pentagon, American Airlines Flight 77 did not hit the Pentagon. Therefore it must've been a cruise missile and therefore it must've been an inside job.

Of course, just like the rest of the spew that flows like a river out of Wendy's gob, this is BS.

Some questions for Wendy:

If Flight 77 did not hit The Pentagon, where did it go? What happened to the 50 or so passengers?

Did you know, Wendy, that among the passengers was Barbara Olson, prominent conservative pundit and wife of the then Solicitor General of the US, Ted Olson? Where did she go?

Science (meaning reality, Wendy) has the answer:

The remains of five people killed in the terrorist attack on the Pentagon were damaged beyond identification in the massive explosion and fire after a hijacked airliner crashed into the building's west side, officials said.

Investigators have identified remains of 184 people who were aboard American Airlines Flight 77 or inside the Pentagon, including those of the five hijackers, but they say it is impossible to match what is left with the five missing people.

Has had for decades.

Here's some more reality for you, Wendy:

Footage from two Pentagon security cameras outside the building shows the American Airlines flight crashing into the Pentagon. The footage was released by the U.S. Department of Defense in 2006 after conservative government watchdog Judicial Watch filed a Freedom of Information Act request two years earlier, the Associated Press reported. 

And then there's this:

There's the plane, Wendy.

In Case You Missed It - Sandra Weyer. Who?

This sentencing memorandum was filed in Federal Court on 9/8/23. It starts:

The United States of America, by and through its attorney, the United States Attorney for the District of Columbia, respectfully submits this sentencing memorandum in connection with the above-captioned matter. For the reasons set forth herein, the government requests that this Court sentence Sandra S. Weyer to 30 months’ incarceration, the high-end of the applicable Sentencing Guidelines range; three years of supervised release; $2,000 in restitution; and the mandatory $170 special assessment. 

And:

The defendant, Sandra S. Weyer, a 60-year-old mother of two and high school graduate, participated in the January 6, 2021, attack on the United States Capitol—a violent attack that forced an interruption of the certification of the 2020 Electoral College vote count, threatened the peaceful transfer of power after the 2020 Presidential election, injured more than one hundred police officers, and resulted in more than 2.9 million dollars in losses.

Note: she was found guilty in June.

She also did this:

Another Mastriano supporter, Sandra Weyer, has been charged with unlawfully entering the Capitol on Jan. 6. Federal authorities say she encouraged other rioters to “mace” a New York Times photographer who was being attacked by two rioters. Weyer was also at the eastern doors leading to the rotunda on Jan. 6, not far from Clarkson. She entered a not guilty plea after she was indicted in February.

You can read about the assault on the photographer here.

She's good people, no?

No.

So why am I directing your interest to the soon-to-be sentenced Sandy Weyer?

This is why:

Here’s Sandra Weyer posing with Doug Mastriano: pic.twitter.com/L9k3J7WTFh

— Ryan J. Reilly (@ryanjreilly) June 29, 2021

So. Any comment, Senator?

For the record, her sentencing memo contains this information:

     Weyer’s frustrations motivating her to storm the Capitol began in the days leading up to the attack on January 6, 2021, in her home state of Pennsylvania. Upset over the election results, Weyer participated in rallies and protests to decertify the election in favor of her chosen candidate.

     When those lawful efforts failed to achieve her desired result, Weyer and her associates decided to come to Washington, D.C. They drove a van approximately three hours from Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania to Washington, D.C. Weyer, who was in the front passenger seat, led her group in chants of “four more years!” during the drive. She recorded and   published her trip to her Facebook Live followers on social media in real-time. See Government’s Trial Exhibit 202.2. [Emphasis added.]

Evidently not in one of Doug's rented buses. 

For the record.

But still, any comment Senator? One of your followers, someone photographed with you, has been found guilty of crimes committed in the Capitol on January 6 and could be facing more than a year in jail.

Anything?

And please, will someone in the otherwise very capable Pennsylvania press corps stick a microphone in Doug's face and ask him about this? Or about anything else having to do with January 6? 

Please?

Meanwhile, Outside

From the scientists at NOAA:

The July global surface temperature was 1.12°C (2.02°F) above the 20th-century average of 15.8°C (60.4°F), making it the warmest July on record. This marked the first time a July temperature exceeded 1.0°C (1.8°F) above the long-term average. July 2023 was 0.20°C (0.36°F) warmer than the previous July record from 2021, but the anomaly was 0.23°C (0.41°F) lower than the all-time highest monthly temperature anomaly on record (March 2016). July 2023 marked the 47th-consecutive July and the 533rd-consecutive month with temperatures at least nominally above the 20th-century average.

Climatologically, July is the warmest month of the year. As the warmest July on record, July 2023 was more likely than not the warmest month on record for the globe since 1850. The past nine Julys have been the warmest Julys on record.

Huh. 

From NASA:

Global climate change is not a future problem. Changes to Earth’s climate driven by increased human emissions of heat-trapping greenhouse gases are already having widespread effects on the environment: glaciers and ice sheets are shrinking, river and lake ice is breaking up earlier, plant and animal geographic ranges are shifting, and plants and trees are blooming sooner.

Effects that scientists had long predicted would result from global climate change are now occurring, such as sea ice loss, accelerated sea level rise, and longer, more intense heat waves.

And so on.

Wendy Bell - WHAT Is She Thinking?

Let's start here with my good friends at Wegner's Groceries:

As Rudy Giuliani is found liable for defaming Ruby Freeman, guess who #PittsburghsBiggestEmbarrassment and @NEWSMAX superstar Wendy Bell was defaming on Monday? Yes, in 2023. Yes, after everything about Ms. Freeman has been proven false. You guessed it! pic.twitter.com/F58y51bq8W

— Wegner’s Groceries (@grocerieswegner) August 31, 2023

Transcript.

WB: Ruby Freeman was complicit via video evidence of counting ballots with no election supervision for hours. And it just so happened that after those hours of tabulated those ballots, no matter how much they want to normalize, "We keep suitcases of completed ballots under this table every election. That wasn't a USB drive. Those were breath mints."

Is Wendy Bell not aware that there were Republican poll watchers there that night?

There were:

Central to claims of fraud is the insinuation that poll watchers, especially Republicans, were not allowed to watch the processing of ballots. This is not true; poll watchers were able to enter and monitor the facility at any hour.

And yet Wendy says that Ruby Freeman was counting ballots "with no election supervision for hours."

Something that Wendy Bell gets completely wrong.

Here's another. It's a big one.

Teams of investigators from the FBI, GBI, and Georgia SOS conducted independent and simultaneous interviews of Fulton County employees who were involved in the processing and scanning of absentee ballots at State Farm Arena on election night in November 2020. All employees interviewed provided a consistent account regarding how absentee ballots were processed and scanned that evening. Additionally, no one had any knowledge of observers, poll watchers, or the media being told they had to leave. Two poll watchers who identified themselves as members of the Georgia Republican Party had submitted affidavits as to what they observed on election night. Much of what they reported was consistent with what was reported by the Fulton County elections employees. Additionally, the Fulton County elections
employees’ accounts were consistent with the actions observed on the video surveillance footage. Both poll watchers confirmed that no one was told or instructed to leave State Farm Arena.

Furthermore, Investigators from three law enforcement agencies reviewed the entire unedited video footage of the events in question surrounding Freeman and Moss at State Farm Arena. There was no evidence of any type of fraud as alleged. Fulton County Board of Elections and Registration put specific processes in place to store ballot boxes underneath tables and to have them in a certain order to monitor and track ballots during the tabulation process so election workers would know where to begin the next day. No evidence was provided to show that Freeman or Moss deviated from that established process. The initial tabulation, the statewide audit involving a manual hand count of every ballot, and the machine recount reveal there was no evidence to suggest fraudulent ballots were scanned and counted in the final tabulated results for the November 2020 General Election in Fulton County.

Lastly, the FBI identified and interviewed the true creator of the Instagram account that reportedly contained a post by Freeman admitting she conspired to adversely affect the November 2020 election. The account creator admitted he created the fake account and confirmed the content that was posted on the account was fake.

All allegations made against Freeman and Moss were unsubstantiated and found to have no merit. [Emphasis added.]

The Georgia Secretary of State's office reported this on March 7, 2023 - almost 6 months ago. There's also the names of the Republican poll watchers in there, Wendy.

Finally, there's this about the USB drives:

The stark warning was entirely appropriate, and prescient. In addition to the examples Sterling identified, President Trump and his team were also fixated on Georgia election workers Ruby Freeman and Wandrea “Shaye” Moss. He and Giuliani mentioned Freeman repeatedly in meetings with State legislators, at public rallies, and in the January 2nd call with Raffensperger. Referring to a video clip, Giuliani even accused Freeman and Moss of trading USB drives to affect votes “as if they [were] vials of heroin or cocaine.” This was completely bogus: it was not a USB drive; it was a ginger mint.

Page 44 of the report issued by The Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol, December 22, 2022.

2 Questions, Wendy:

• Aren't you a little late with all this? The facts (and facts are stubborn things, y'know) have been out there for months and you're still getting them wrong.
  
• Aren't you now a little afraid that you (and yer lil buddy Brock, of course) are going to be sued for defamation?
  

No One Is Above The Law

 

Inmate P01135809

Questions About Giuliani and Ellis Mugshots

First, Rudy Giuliani:

Now, Jenna Ellis:

And now some context:

Three of Donald Trump’s key election lawyers, Rudy Giuliani, Sidney Powell and Jenna Ellis, surrendered Wednesday on charges in the Georgia election subversion case. 

That happened yesterday. 

A little more than a THOUSAND DAYS AGO, this happened:

And some context:

Having failed to gain traction in court, President Donald Trump’s campaign brought its case challenging Pennsylvania’s election results to a state Senate hearing Wednesday in Gettysburg, where it repeated its unfounded claims of widespread fraud to a welcoming audience of Republican legislators.

Addressing members of the state Senate Majority Policy Committee in a proceeding that played out like a campaign rally — with firebrand speeches from GOP lawmakers and whooping cheers from dozens of supporters — Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani pressed his baseless case that the election had been stolen and the truth covered up by “Big Tech,” the media, and the courts.

“I know crooks really well,” he told the panel, gathered in a conference room of the Wyndham Gettysburg hotel. “You give them an inch and they take a mile. And you give them a mile and they take your whole country.”

Then, with Trump attorney Jenna Ellis holding a cell phone to a microphone, the president himself addressed the crowd from Washington.

That was the meeting hosted by failed GOP candidate for PA Governor, State Senator Doug Mastriano. Jenna Ellis went on to become Doug's "senior legal advisor" for that failed campaign. In the picture, that's Jenna holding up the cell phone to the microphone so that the enthralled can hear their master's voice.

This event is even listed as "Act 8" from the Georgia indictment:

     On or about the 25th day of November 2020, RUDOLPH WILLIAM LOUIS GIULIANI and JENNA LYNN ELLIS appeared, spoke, and presented witnesses at a meeting of Pennsylvania legislators in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. During the meeting, RUDOLPH WILLIAM LOUIS GIULIANI made false statements concerning fraud in the November 3, 2020, presidential election in Pennsylvania and solicited, requested, and importuned the Pennsylvania legislators present at the meeting to unlawfully appoint presidential electors from Pennsylvania. During the meeting, JENNA LYNN ELLIS solicited, requested, and importuned the Pennsylvania legislators present at the meeting to unlawfully appoint presidential electors from Pennsylvania. DONALD JOHN TRUMP joined the meeting by telephone, made false statements concerning fraud in the November 3, 2020, presidential election in Pennsylvania, and solicited, requested, and importuned the Pennsylvania legislators present at the meeting to unlawfully appoint presidential electors from Pennsylvania. These were overt acts in furtherance of the conspiracy. [Bolding and CAPS in original.]

BTW, Jenna Ellis is quoted as saying that "Doug Mastriano is the Donald Trump of Pennsylvania.”

Will any of Pennsylvania's political reporters be asking Pennsylvania State Senator Doug Mastriano for a comment on the indictment/arrest/mug shot of either Rudy Giuliani or Jenna Ellis?

$200,000 - And That's Not All!

From the NYTimes:

A judge in Atlanta set bail for former President Donald J. Trump at $200,000 on Monday in the new election interference case against him, warning Mr. Trump not to intimidate or threaten witnesses or any of his 18 co-defendants as a condition of the bond agreement.

And see that last part? It's here in the agreement:

The Defendant shall perform no act to intimidate any person known to him or her to be a codefendant or witness in this case or to otherwise obstruct the administration of justice. This shall include, but is not limited to, the following: 

a. The Defendant shall make no direct or indirect threat of any nature against any codefendant; 

b.. The Defendant shall make no direct or indirect threat of any nature against any witness including, but not limited to, the individuals designated in the Indictment as an unindicated co-conspirators Individual 1 through Individual 30; 

c. The Defendant shall make no direct or indirect threat of any nature against any victim; 

d. The Defendant shall make no direct or indirect threat of any nature against the community or to any property in the community; 

e. The above shall include, but are not limited to, posts on social media or reposts of posts made by another individual on social media;

And then there's this part:

The Defendant shall not violate the laws of this State, the laws of any other state, the laws. of the United States of America, or any other local laws.

I'm absolutely sure Donald J. Trump will have absolutely no problem with these restrictions.

Absolutely none. Nope.

 

 

Indicted! (For A FOURTH Time) - Some Local (PA) Connections

You can read the indictment here.

Of course, I'm looking for local connections.

Hey, found one! Here it is:

Act 8. 

     On or about the 25th day of November 2020, RUDOLPH WILLIAM LOUIS GIULIANI and JENNA LYNN ELLIS appeared, spoke, and presented witnesses at a meeting of Pennsylvania legislators in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. During the meeting, RUDOLPH WILLIAM LOUIS GIULIANI made false statements concerning fraud in the November 3, 2020, presidential election in Pennsylvania and solicited, requested, and importuned the Pennsylvania legislators present at the meeting to unlawfully appoint presidential electors from Pennsylvania. During the meeting, JENNA LYNN ELLIS solicited, requested, and importuned the Pennsylvania legislators present at the meeting to unlawfully appoint presidential electors from Pennsylvania. DONALD JOHN TRUMP joined the meeting by telephone, made false statements concerning fraud in the November 3, 2020, presidential election in Pennsylvania, and solicited, requested, and importuned the Pennsylvania legislators present at the meeting to unlawfully appoint presidential electors from Pennsylvania. These were overt acts in furtherance of the conspiracy. [Bolding and CAPS in original.]

And look! Here's another one that follows right after:

Act 9.

     On or about the 25th day of November 2020, immediately after the meeting of Pennsylvania legislators in Gettysburg , Pennsylvania, where RUDOLPH WILLIAM LOUIS GIULIANI and JENNA LYNN ELLIS appeared, spoke , and presented witnesses, DONALD JOHN TRUMP invited a group of the Pennsylvania legislators and others to meet with him at the White House. Later that day, DONALD JOHN TRUMP, MARK RANDALL MEADOWS, RUDOLPH WILLIAM LOUIS GIULIANI, JENNA LYNN ELLIS and unindicted co-conspirators Individual 5 and Individual 6, whose identities are known to the Grand Jury, met with the group of Pennsylvania legislators at the White House and discussed holding a special session of the Pennsylvania General Assembly. These were overt acts in furtherance of the conspiracy. [Bolding and CAPS in original.]

A few things you should've noticed about these "overt acts in furtherance of the conspiracy" to keep Trump in power in 2020:

• That was State Sen Doug Mastriano's meeting in Gettysburg.
  
• Mastriano was one of the Pennsylvania legislators at that meeting in the White House.
  
• Jenna Ellis later joined Doug Mastriano's legal team during his campaign for Governor of Pennsylvania.

According to the State of Georgia, Doug Mastriano was part of the conspiracy. 

Any comment for the blog, Senator?

More to come.

So What Happened, Senator, On January FIFTH?

On CNN's "State of the Union" former Vice President Mike Pence was asked whether Donald Trump asked him to overturn the 2020 election and this was part of his answer:

The presidency belongs to the American people, and the American people alone. But, look, in the days before, the president was talking about us rejecting votes. Then, late in the process, his lawyers suggested that we return votes to the states.

But, frankly, the day before January 6, if memory serves, they came back, his lawyers did, and said, we want you to reject votes outright. This -- they were asking me to overturn the election. I had no right to overturn the election. I know we did our duty that day, and I couldn't be more encouraged, whether it's here in New Hampshire, in Iowa or all across the country, how many people come up to me and express their appreciation for the stand that we took.  

Last December, The Philadelphia Inquirer reported:

According to the committee, Trump spoke to Mastriano on Jan. 5, then told the White House operator that Mastriano would be “calling in for the Vice President.”

It’s unclear if that call happened. Mastriano did send two emails on behalf of Trump the night of Jan. 5. One was signed by state legislators from across the country and asked Pence to delay ratifying the election for 12 days.

We wrote about this earlier this year and still Pennsylvania State Senator Doug Mastriano has yet to explain (or even mention, as far as I know) his phone call to the White House on January 5 - the day before January 6.

In the middle of Trump's pressure campaign to get Pence to overturn the election, Doug calls the White House, talks to Trump for a few minutes and then Trump tells the then VP's office for them to expect a call from Doug.

What did Doug Mastriano say to Donald Trump the day before Trump's mob stormed The Capitol?

Did Doug talk to Mike Pence that night? What did they talk about?

Questions still unanswered.

 

 

Does Doug Mastriano Have An Explanation For This?

We'll start here:

A hot mic picked up State Sen. Devlin Robinson (R-Allegheny) calling a first responder from Pennsylvania Task Force 1 a "d*ck" during a committee meeting on Tuesday.

Robinson leaned over to Mastriano and said "Yeah, this guy looks like a dick." pic.twitter.com/XVgrfHUevM

— The Keystone (@TheKeystone) August 2, 2023

And some context from PoliticsPa:

Two Pennsylvania state lawmakers are in the hot seat after they were caught on a live microphone and on video making a disparaging remark about a Philadelphia Fire Department captain.

The Senate Veterans Affairs and Emergency Preparedness Committee, chaired by Sen. Doug Mastriano (R-Franklin), held a hearing in Coraopolis that focused on legislation introduced by Sen. Devlin Robinson (R-Allegheny). The proposal was to create a Pennsylvania Task Force Urban Search and Rescue team, based in Allegheny County, to assume primary coverage in the western part of the state.

And then:

As [Capt. Ken] Pagurek was walking to his seat, Robinson leaned over to Mastriano and made a disparaging remark about Pagurek. Mastriano, as seen on the video, could be seen laughing at the comment.

Doug can be heard laughing, too. Give a listen.

State Sen Robinson has issued an apology for calling the guy a dick:

pic.twitter.com/LwOAi2ARXc

— Senator Devlin Robinson (@SenRobinsonPA) August 3, 2023

State Sen Doug Mastriano, as far as I can tell, has not yet apologized for laughing.

 

One Thing To Remember About Jeffrey Clark (Pennsylvania Edition)

Ok, let's start here:

Donald Trump’s team was aware that, if he refused to leave office after the 2020 election, it could spark a mass wave of civil unrest. But the man Trump sought to appoint as attorney general had an easy answer for that, according to the new indictment of the former president: invoke the Insurrection Act.

The indictment lists six as-of-yet unindicted co-conspirators. Co-Conspirator 4 is described as “a Justice Department official who…attempted to use the Justice Department to open sham election crime investigations and influence state legislatures with knowingly false claims of election fraud.” The indictment later refers to this individual as the man Trump intended to put “in charge of the Justice Department.” The description matches Jeffrey Clark.

And:

This same Deputy White House Counsel now “tried to dissuade” Co-Conspirator 4 from taking the post of Acting Attorney General. The counsel again made clear his conviction that there had not been meaningful fraud in the election. And he warned that there would be “riots in every major city in the United States” if Trump attempted to remain in office, against the will of the electorate.

Co-Conspirator 4 had an answer for the Deputy White House Counsel, the indictment alleges, that was equally disturbing and glib: “Well,” he said, “that’s why there’s an Insurrection Act.”

Connecting the dots, that's what Jeffrey Clark said. Rolling Stone sums it up:

But the current indictment alleges that the Insurrection Act was considered as a means to use the power of the military — or perhaps even informal militias — to suppress the righteous outrage of American voters at the theft of an election — by the thief himself, with the guidance and cheer-leading of his hand-picked lackey at the Department of Justice. 

And here's the thing for Pennsylvanians to keep in mind whenever they see the name Jeffrey Clark pop up in the discussion of Trump's coup attempt;

Pennsylvania Congressman Scott Perry introduced Clark to Trump:

The President raised, among others, debunked claims about voting machines in Michigan, a truck driver who allegedly moved ballots from New York to Pennsylvania, and a purported election fraud at the State Farm Arena in Georgia.None of the allegations were credible, and Rosen and Donoghue said so to the President.At one point during the December 27th call in which Donoghue refuted President Trump’s fraud allegations, Donoghue recorded in handwritten notes a request President Trump made specifically to him and Acting Attorney General Rosen: “Just say the election was corrupt and leave the rest to me and the Republican Congressmen.”Donoghue explained: “[T]he Department had zero involvement in anyone’s political strategy,” and “he wanted us to say that it was corrupt.”“We told him we were not going to do that.”

At the time, neither Rosen nor Donoghue knew the full extent to which Republican Congressmen, including Representative Scott Perry, were attempting to assist President Trump to overturn the election results.

The Committee’s investigation has shown that Congressman Perry was working with one Department of Justice official, Jeffrey Clark, regarding the stolen election claims. Perry was working with Clark and with President Trump and Chief of Staff Mark Meadows with this goal: to enlist Clark to reverse the Department of Justice’s findings regarding the election and help overturn the election outcome.

After introducing Clark to the President, Perry sent multiple text messages to Meadows between December 26th and December 28th, pressing that Clark be elevated within the Department. Perry reminded Meadows that there are only “11 days to 1/6.... We gotta get going!,” and, as the days went on, one asking, “Did you call Jeff Clark?”

 Jeff Clark was where he was because Scott Perry got him there.

Something for every Pennsylvanian to remember.

 

 

TRUMP INDICTED! AGAIN - AGAIN!

As we all know by now, this happened yesterday:

Donald Trump was indicted on felony charges Tuesday for working to overturn the results of the 2020 election in the run-up to the violent riot by his supporters at the U.S. Capitol, with the Justice Department acting to hold him accountable for an unprecedented effort to block the peaceful transfer of presidential power and threaten American democracy.

The four-count indictment, the third criminal case against Trump, provided deeper insight into a dark moment that has already been the subject of exhaustive federal investigations and captivating public hearings. It chronicles a months-long campaign of lies about the election results and says that, even when those falsehoods resulted in a chaotic insurrection at the Capitol, Trump sought to exploit the violence by pointing to it as a reason to further delay the counting of votes that sealed his defeat.

You can read the indictment here. 

It opens with this:

The Defendant, DONALD J . TRUMP, was the forty-fifth President of the United States and a candidate for re-election in 2020. The Defendant lost the 2020 presidential election. 

And sums things up rather nicely a few paragraphs down:

The purpose of the conspiracy was to overturn the legitimate results of the 2020 presidential election by using knowingly false claims of election fraud to obstruct the federal government function by which those results are collected, counted, and certified.

And the indictment lays out "three criminal conspiracies." Here they are:

a. A conspiracy to defraud the United States by using dishonesty, fraud, and
deceit to impair, obstruct, and defeat the lawful federal government function
by which the results of the presidential election are collected, counted, and
certified by the federal government, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 371;

b. A conspiracy to corruptly obstruct and impede the January 6 congressional
proceeding at which the collected results of the presidential election are
counted and certified ("the certification proceeding"), in violation of 18
U.S.C. § 1512(k);and

c. A conspiracy against the right to vote and to have one's vote counted, in
violation of 18 U.S.C. § 241.

Not surprisingly, our own "swing state" of Pennsylvania show up more than a few times.

Like here on page 5:

The Defendant's conspiracy to impair, obstruct, and defeat the federal government function through dishonesty, fraud, and deceit included the following manner and means... 

b. The Defendant and co-conspirators organized fraudulent slates of electors in seven targeted states (Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, New Mexico, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin), attempting to mimic the procedures that the legitimate electors were supposed to follow under the Constitution and other federal and state laws. This included causing the fraudulent electors to meet on the day appointed by federal law on which legitimate electors were to gather and cast their votes; cast fraudulent votes for the Defendant; and sign certificates falsely representing that they were legitimate electors. Some fraudulent electors were tricked into participating based on the understanding that their votes would be used only if the Defendant succeeded in outcome-determinative lawsuits within their state, which the Defendant never did. The Defendant and co-conspirators then caused these fraudulent electors to transmit their false certificates to the Vice President and other government officials to be counted at thecertification proceeding on January 6.

Those pesky "fake electors" again, amirite?

And this on page 8:

The Defendant widely disseminated his false claims of election fraud for months, despite the fact that he knew, and in many cases had been informed directly, that they were not true. The Defendant's knowingly false statements were integral to his criminal plans to defeat the federal government function, obstruct the certification, and interfere with others' right to vote and have their votes counted. He made these knowingly false claims throughout the post-election time period, including those below that he made immediately before the attack on the Capitol on January 6:

b. The Defendant asserted that there had been 205,000 more votes than voters in Pennsylvania. The Defendant's Acting Attorney General and Acting Deputy Attorney General had explained to him that this was false.

So Trump was told the "more votes than voters in Pennsylvania" thing was false? And he went with it anyway?

Huh.

By the way, this was a falsehood that State Senator Doug Mastriano also pushed.

But on page 19 there's this:

On November 25, the day after Pennsylvania's Governor signed a certificate of ascertainment and thus certified to the federal government that Biden's electors were the legitimate electors for the state, Co-Conspirator 1 orchestrated an event at a hotel in Gettysburg attended by state legislators. Co-Conspirator 1 falsely claimed that Pennsylvania had issued 1.8 million absentee ballots and received 2.5 million in return. In the days thereafter, a Campaign staffer wrote internally that Co-Conspirator l's allegation was "just wrong" and "[t]here's no way to defend it." The Deputy Campaign Manager responded, "We have been saying this for a while. It's very frustrating."

Ah, yes. The indictment is mentioning Doug Mastriano's "hearing" in Gettysburg, isn't it?

Yes, it is. Take a look:

WHAT: At the request of Senator Doug Mastriano (R-Adams/Cumberland/Franklin/York), the Senate Majority Policy Committee is holding a public hearing Wednesday to discuss 2020 election issues and irregularities. The hearing will feature former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani.

By the way, Rudy Giuliani is far more likely than not Co-Conspirator I.

State Senator Doug Mastriano should be asked about these connections to Donald Trump's coup attempt.

What did he know? When did he know it?

As for Donald Trump: 

Lock him up!

Lock him up!

Lock him up!

Meanwhile, Outside...

Some climate science from the climate scientists at NOAA:

June 2023 set a record as the warmest June for the globe in NOAA's 174-year record. The June global surface temperature was 1.05°C (1.89°F) above the 20th-century average of 15.5°C (59.9°F). This marked the first time a June temperature exceeded 1°C above the long-term average. The Junes of 2015–2023 rank among the ten warmest Junes on record. June 2023 marked the 47th consecutive June and the 532nd consecutive month with global temperatures, at least nominally, above the 20th-century average.

And of course, there's a chart:

And so on.

But wait. There's more. 

According to this report out of the Imperial College of London:

• Heatwaves are amongst the deadliest natural hazards with thousands of people dying from heat-
  related causes each year. However, the full impact of a heatwave is rarely known until weeks
  or months afterwards, once death certificates are collected, or scientists can analyse excess
  deaths. Many places lack good record-keeping of heat-related deaths, therefore currently
  available global mortality figures are likely an underestimate.
• In line with what has been expected from past climate projections and IPCC reports these events
  are not rare anymore today. North America, Europe and China have experienced heatwaves
  increasingly frequently over the last years as a result of warming caused by human activities,
  hence the current heat waves are not rare in today's climate with an event like the currently
  expected approximately once every 15 years in the US/Mexico region, once every 10 years in
  Southern Europe, and once in 5 years for China.
• Without human induced climate change these heat events would however have been extremely
  rare. In China it would have been about a 1 in 250 year event while maximum heat like in July
  2023 would have been virtually impossible to occur in the US/Mexico region and Southern
  Europe if humans had not warmed the planet by burning fossil fuels.
• In all the regions a heatwave of the same likelihood as the one observed today would have been
  significantly cooler in a world without climate change. Similar to previous studies we found
  that the heatwaves defined above are 2.5°C warmer in Southern Europe, 2°C warmer in North
  America and about 1°C in China in today’s climate than they would have been if it was not for
  human-induced climate change.

Yea. It's getting hotter and hotter out there.

I'm Back - What Did I Miss?

I've been away for a few weeks and now I'm back.

What have I missed?

Oh, yea. This:

The letter former President Donald Trump received from special counsel Jack Smith informing him that he is a target of the federal investigation into efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election mentions three federal statutes related to the deprivation of rights, conspiracy to defraud the U.S. and tampering with a witness.

Those three federal statutes were included in the letter Trump said he received Sunday night, according to two attorneys with direct knowledge of the document. The context surrounding the statutes is unclear, and including them in the letter does not necessarily mean that Trump will be charged with related counts or that an indictment would be limited to only those three statutes.

Digging deeper, we find this: 

The letter to Mr. Trump from the special counsel, Jack Smith, referred to three criminal statutes as part of the grand jury investigation into Mr. Trump’s efforts to reverse his 2020 election loss, according to two people with knowledge of its contents. Two of the statutes were familiar from the criminal referral by the House Jan. 6 committee and months of discussion by legal experts: conspiracy to defraud the government and obstruction of an official proceeding.

But the third criminal law cited in the letter was a surprise: Section 241 of Title 18 of the United States Code, which makes it a crime for people to “conspire to injure, oppress, threaten, or intimidate any person” in the “free exercise or enjoyment of any right or privilege secured to him by the Constitution or laws of the United States.”

The Times explains:

A Justice Department spokesman declined to discuss the target letter and Mr. Smith’s theory for bringing the Section 241 statute into the Jan. 6 investigation. But the modern usage of the law raised the possibility that Mr. Trump, who baselessly declared the election he lost to have been rigged, could face prosecution on accusations of trying to rig the election himself.

If you look at how the statute starts:

If two or more persons conspire to injure, oppress, threaten, or intimidate any person in any State, Territory, Commonwealth, Possession, or District in the free exercise or enjoyment of any right or privilege secured to him by the Constitution or laws of the United States, or because of his having so exercised the same...

You'll see a scary word: conspire. If they're looking down this road, aren't they looking for a conspiracy?

More on that in a bit. Back to The Times:

The line of 20th-century cases raised the prospect that Mr. Smith and his team could be weighing using that law to cover efforts by Mr. Trump and his associates to flip the outcome of states he lost. Those efforts included the recorded phone conversation in which Mr. Trump tried to bully Georgia’s secretary of state to “find” enough additional votes to overcome Mr. Biden’s win in that state and promoting a plan to use so-called fake electors — self-appointed slates of pro-Trump electors from states won by Mr. Biden — to help block or delay congressional certification of Mr. Trump’s defeat.

“It seems like under 241 there’s at least a right to an honest counting of the votes,” said Norman Eisen, who worked for the House Judiciary Committee during Mr. Trump’s first impeachment. “Submitting an alternate electoral certificate to Congress (as opposed to casting false votes or counting wrong) is a novel scenario, but it seems like it would violate this right.”

So on top of everything else, it looks like they're looking at the fake electors. The Times calls them "self-appointed slates of pro-Trump electors from states won by Mr. Biden" in case you missed it.

That happened in Pennsylvania. Did you know that?

Yea, I'm sure you did.

And look who was involved in Pennsylvania:

Previously undisclosed emails provide an inside look at the increasingly desperate and often slapdash efforts by advisers to President Donald J. Trump to reverse his election defeat in the weeks before the Jan. 6 attack, including acknowledgments that a key element of their plan was of dubious legality and lived up to its billing as “fake.”

And:

As they organized the fake elector scheme, lawyers appointed a “point person” in seven states to help organize those electors who were willing to sign their names to false documents. In Pennsylvania, that point person was Douglas V. Mastriano, a proponent of Mr. Trump’s lies of a stolen election who is now the Republican nominee for governor.

And then there's this from WESA:

An earlier media report, published last week in the online political journal Politico, also features an email from Bobb that links Mastriano to the effort. It reported that "Bobb wrote [that] Trump's team was waiting to hear from the office of state Sen. Doug Mastriano ... to get a room for the alternate electors" in Harrisburg, where Mastriano represents Adams County and adjoining areas.

They needed him to get them a room?? 

How much you wanna bet that Doug Mastriano's name at least came up at some point in Jack Smith's investigation of Trump's "fake elector" scheme?

Probably a safe bet.

Any comment for the blog, State Senator Doug Mastriano?

 

 

Break

I'm taking a break.

See you in a bit.

Hottest Day Ever (SO FAR)

First, there's this from Reuters:

Monday, July 3, was the hottest day ever recorded globally, according to data from the U.S. National Centers for Environmental Prediction.

The average global temperature reached 17.01 degrees Celsius (62.62 Fahrenheit), surpassing the August 2016 record of 16.92C (62.46F) as heatwaves sizzled around the world.

And then this from The Washington Post:

Tuesday was the hottest day on Earth since records began in 1979, with the global average temperature reaching 62.92 degrees Fahrenheit (17.18 degrees Celsius), according to data from the U.S. National Centers for Environmental Prediction. 

As a result, scientists believe July 4 may have been the hottest day on Earth in around 125,000 years, due to a dangerous combination of climate change causing global temperatures to soar, the return of the El Niño pattern and the start of summer in the northern hemisphere.

And The BBC:

Scientists say the reading was the highest in any instrumental record dating back to the end of the 19th century.

The high heat is due to a combination of the El Niño weather event and ongoing emissions of carbon dioxide.

Researchers believe there will be more records in the coming months as El Niño strengthens.

Hence the "SO FAR" in the title to this blog. 

The Climate Reanalyzer at the University of Maine has a handy chart:

See that jagged green line in the center at the top of the chart? The one that's pointing more or less upward?

That's now.

Meanwhile, Outside...

Yes, we all know about Trump's legal difficulties and how the Supreme Court rejected the so-called "Independent State Legislature" theory.

But it's still getting warmer outside.

Take a look. This is some science from the scientists at NOAA:

May 2023 was the third-warmest May for the globe in NOAA's 174-year record. The May global surface temperature was 0.97°C (1.75°F) above the 20th-century average of 14.8°C (58.6°F). The past nine Mays have ranked among the 10 warmest on record. May 2023 marked the 47th consecutive May and the 531st consecutive month with global temperatures, at least nominally, above the 20th-century average.

And, like always, the chart:

Then there's this for the three months March-April-May:

The March–May 2023 global surface temperature was 1.06°C (1.91°F) above the 20th-century average. This ranks as the third-warmest March–May period in the 174-year record and 0.10°C (0.18°F) cooler than the warmest March–May period (2016). The ten warmest March-May periods have all occurred from 2010 to present.

And finally, the year-to-date:

The January–May global surface temperature ranked fourth warmest in the 174-year record at 1.01°C (1.82°F) above the 1901–2000 average of 13.1°C (55.5°F). According to NCEI's statistical analysis, the year 2023 is very likely to rank among the 10 warmest years on record.

Yep. It's still getting warmer out there.