News that a doctor at an Arkansas jail was giving inmates Ivermectin for COVID cases made national headlines last month. The drug isn’t FDA-approved for that use, nor has it been shown as beneficial in fighting COVID.
Man Cited For Trespass After School Principal Confronted With Zip Ties Over Quarantine Rule
One of the three Arizona men wielding zip ties in a filmed confrontation with an elementary school principal over the school’s COVID-19 quarantine policy has been cited with trespassing, the Tucson Police Department told TPM.
‘Q Shaman’ Jacob Chansley Pleads Guilty In Jan. 6 Attack, Could Face Months Behind Bars
The so-called “QAnon Shaman,” Jacob Chansley, who with his spear, horns and face paint quickly became the most recognizable participant in the Jan. 6 Capitol attack, has pleaded guilty to obstructing an official proceeding, a felony.
Put It To A Vote
Since they are generally indifferent to the actual work and function of government, Republican elected officials are generally much more adept at holding test votes to put people on record for views out of step with public opinion. That’s a big benefit of holding the majority, even the slenderest of them: you get to schedule the votes. The new Texas abortion law is a case in point. De facto bans on abortion are not popular. Abortion vigilante bills are really, really unpopular. There are any number of ways you could craft votes which force everyone to go on record supporting or opposing them. You could craft actual laws or just sense of Congress resolutions. Whatever. It hardly matters. Good government scolds won’t like it. But who cares. Lets get to this.
Democrats Will Hold Hearings On Supreme Court’s Use Of Shadow Docket
Both the Senate and House Judiciary Committees have announced that they will hold hearings into the Supreme Court’s use of the shadow docket shortly after the Court virtually outlawed abortion in Texas through the expedited forum.
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Zeno’s Abortion Ban
One notable thing about a nakedly political Supreme Court majority is that a handful of legal academics, wholly cocooned from everyday life, aren’t terribly adept at politics. You can see this in the reaction to the Court’s effort to moonwalk Roe v Wade out of existence earlier this week. They seem to have thought they could throw up their hands and pretend they weren’t really doing anything or didn’t have any choice in the matter. Even John Roberts showed them the path toward overruling Roe through the normal review process some time next year. The majority both couldn’t hide its impatience to strike down Roe but also wanted to do so in the middle of the night – by not acting rather than acting – and that somehow no one would notice.
People noticed.
Angry White Dude Who Came At MSNBC Reporter On Air Has Been Arrested
The man who got in MSNBC reporter Shaquille Brewster’s face in the middle of a live shot in Mississippi during Hurricane Ida, was taken into custody on Thursday.
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A Tepid ‘Recovery’?
There’s a fairly anemic jobs report out today. The economy added 235,000 jobs in August. That’s just okay in normal times and pretty disappointing compared to recent months when closer to a million jobs were created. Commentary I’m seeing is pointing to a weaker than expected recovery. And that’s true as far as it goes. But what jumps out to me is that the dialog about the economy, the robustness and consistency of the recovery, hasn’t really caught up to the fact that COVID isn’t actually over.
Everything’s relative. We’re in a much better position than we were a year ago. Getting gravely ill from COVID is now mostly voluntary. But over 1500 people died in the US from COVID yesterday. Schools are opening but with various kinds of in-person mitigation. Most people I know are still not dining out or socializing or traveling in just the same way they did before the pandemic. More than a year ago, definitely. But not the same as two years ago. I’m not telling you anything more than we all know. My point is that we still appear to be operating in – or at least economics and politics talk seems to be operating in – this model of how quickly we’re bouncing back even though we’re still in it. So it’s not a huge surprise that we’re not bouncing back that quickly. Or that the bounce back is partial and limited.
Progressives Tell Manchin To Stick It
A lot of things happened. Here are some of the things.
Not Having It
Progressives are firing warning shots right back at Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV), who is demanding that Democrats put a “strategic pause” on the $3.5 trillion infrastructure bill.
- Senate Budget Committee Chair Bernie Sanders (I-VT) kept it blunt: “No infrastructure bill without the $3.5 trillion reconciliation bill,” he tweeted.
- Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) offered an alternative to Manchin’s demand: “Or maybe we hit the ‘cancel’ button on this so-called ‘bipartisan’ charade of an Exxon lobbyist drafted infrastructure bill unless we actually pass a law that helps people’s lives with healthcare expansion, childcare, climate action, etc,” she tweeted.
Manchin has weekly huddles w/ Exxon & is one of many senators who gives lobbyists their pen to write so-called “bipartisan” fossil fuel bills.
It’s killing people. Our people. At least 12 last night. Sick of this “bipartisan” corruption that masquerades as clear-eyed moderation. https://t.co/KW8w7HUhvT
— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) September 2, 2021
- House Progressive Caucus Chair Pramila Jayapal (D-WA), who’s been at the forefront of hammering out the sweeping $3.5 trillion proposal, declared “no more pauses. No more excuses.”
- Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) ripped Manchin for trying to throw a wrench into passing legislation that addresses climate change even as extreme weather events like Hurricane Ida wreak havoc across the country:
Instead of writing op-eds, why don't you look into the faces of my residents who have had their basements flooded with sewage multiple times and their power out for days, Senator Manchin. We deserve better. https://t.co/jSMlIB4SYa
— Rashida Tlaib (@RashidaTlaib) September 2, 2021
Thar Be Showboats In These Waters
Manchin is trotting out the old centrist hobby horses – inflation! runaway public debt! – as his rationales for slowrolling the $3.5 trillion centerpiece of Democrats’ agenda.
- The West Virginia Democrat’s demand follows a failed attempt at a similar pressure campaign by nine centrist House Democrats to force House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) to put the bipartisan legislation to a vote before reconciliation.
- Manchin and Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-AZ) reportedly coached those Democrats behind closed doors before the gambit imploded, by the by.
The Jan. 6 Committee Included McCarthy’s Records After All
The House’s Jan. 6 select committee included House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy in its request to telecommunication companies this week seeking to preserve lawmakers’ records, according to CNN and Politico.
- It had been previously reported that the GOP leader wasn’t on the list, but CNN’s new report states that his name was added in the final draft of the request that was sent out on Monday.
- Hmm, could that be why McCarthy put out that fire-and-brimstone threat the next day swearing that “a Republican majority will not forget” if the companies go along with the committee’s request?
- After Politico and CNN’s reports came out, McCarthy spokesperson Mark Bednar accused Jan, 6 committee chair Benny Thompson (D-MS) of making the investigation “unserious and political” with “an authoritarian unconstitutional attempt to rifle through individuals’ call logs.”
Red States Enthusiastically Take Their Cues From SCOTUS
Republicans in Florida, South Dakota, and Arkansas have already pounced on the conservative Supreme Court’s greenlighting of Texas’ Draconian anti-abortion law.
- Florida state Senate President Wilton Simpson (R) says the legislature will introduce a similar bill.
- South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem (R) announced a plan to follow Texas’ lead.
Following the Supreme Court’s decision to leave the pro-life TX law in place, I have directed the Unborn Child Advocate in my office to immediately review the new TX law and current South Dakota laws to make sure we have the strongest pro life laws on the books in SD.
— Governor Kristi Noem (@govkristinoem) September 2, 2021
- Arkansas state Senator Jason Rapert (R):
As the original sponsor of the first #HeartbeatBill to pass in America in 2013, today I have ordered a bill be filed in Arkansas to update our law to mirror the Texas SB8 bill which was just passed as a Model Bill at @ChristLawmakers & upheld by the US Supreme Court. #arpx 1/2 pic.twitter.com/cjoeTmCKdz
— Jason Rapert (@jasonrapert) September 2, 2021
Key Analysis
“Five Justices Did This Because They Could” – The Atlantic
Ida’s Death Toll Keeps Climbing
More than 60 people have died in eight states from Hurricane Ida and her aftermath, including the flash flooding unleashed in New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Connecticut.
- President Biden is slated to visit New Orleans today to inspect the damage from the storm’s landfall.
War Hawks And Profiteers Go On TV To Tell Us It’s Bad We’re Doing Less War Now
The Washington Post lays out how most of the supposedly neutral military experts who show up on cable news to complain about the withdrawal from Afghanistan are ex-defense officials who were responsible for the U.S.’s disastrous operations in the first place or are otherwise just plain hungry for war.
- Those officials include ex-Trump National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster, Gen. David Petraeus, ex-Obama Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, and John Bolton, who Trump himself noted would have pushed the U.S. into “World War Six” if he had had his way.
- Even more grotesquely, some of the former officials and ex-lawmakers who’ve given hot takes on the withdrawal don’t mention during those interviews how they raked in some handy profits from the war after joining various defense industry companies, the Intercept notes.
*water rising to the ceiling in NY-based news studio
"How will we live down our national shame in Afghanistan? This ex-Raytheon board member will tell us next"— David Dayen (@ddayen) September 2, 2021
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SCOTUS Breaks Silence, Dashes Hopes As Conservatives Let Texas Abortion Ban Stand
In yet more late-night happenings, most of the conservative contingent of the Supreme Court let the Texas abortion ban stand just before midnight Wednesday.
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