News Bites for the Week of February 6. Ohio, Toiletgate, Canada. Michigan, MIT, Gazpacho, Inflation, God, more...
As of today, February 12, the seven-member Ohio Redistricting Commission tasked with redrawing both statehouse and congressional districts had no official maps, no plan to meet and no signs of compromise. The court-imposed deadline for new House and Senate maps is Thursday.
Ohio Senate President and Redistricting Commission member Matt Huffman declares "I don't see how we can conduct an election for the General Assembly and the congressmen on May 3.” That might be because the Commission purposely submitted 2 sets of known unconstitutional maps to run out the clock. Republicans are now accusing the Ohio Supreme Court Justices of gerrymandering for the Democrats, essentially saying ‘By not letting us cheat, you’re gerrymandering yourselves!’
In spite of over 60 court cases, Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose now claims the loser is right to say voter fraud is a SERIOUS problem. LaRose refused to provide evidence or any examples of SERIOUS fraud. However, he did point out that having found one possibly fraudulent vote for every 222,000 cast in Ohio’s 2020 election, it’s a SERIOUS problem. LaRose has failed to answer the many questions posed by reporters on the topic of voter fraud. Because…reporters.
Finding new ways to embarrass Ohio, the mayor of Hudson apparently thinks that the only way ice fishing on a pond in Hudson could be fun is if prostitution is involved. This is the same guy who thinks creative writing classes are child pornography. He seems kind of obsessed with sex.
In an effort to outdo the stupidity of the mayor of Hudson, a man from Akron tried to phone in a fake bomb threat to divert Ottawa, Ontario police from the truck protest.
The Akron man actually called the police department in Ottawa, OHIO, who explained who they were.
With caller ID, the Ottawa, OH police determined who and where the guy was and notified Ottawa, Ontario police.
THEN the Akron guy call the same police department back to tell them, untruthfully, that he had been shot, then retracted that statement when he was told he should call the Ontario, Canada police. He’ll face charges of criminal stupidity.
Truckers have blockaded the U.S.-Canada Ambassador bridge near Detroit. Plans for a convoy-style protest against masks in the U.S. gain supporters online.
Michigan has 2 international bridges blocked by Canadian protesters, so a 7-member Michigan GOP delegation felt it was critical, right now, to send a letter to the DHS secretary today about…the Southern border. As a reminder, Michigan’s southern border touches Indiana, Ohio, Wisconsin in the UP, and Canada. Yes, Windsor, Ontario is south of Detroit. https://t.co/dhn5OxTWRG.
Meanwhile a sitting US Senator is calling for acts of domestic terrorism against our homeland. Rand Paul calls on truckers to blockade the Super Bowl and DC: “I’m all for it. Civil disobedience…is a time-honored tradition in our country from slavery to civil rights to you name it. Peaceful protest, clog things up, make people think about the mandates.”
Toiletgate: NEORSD tweeted “Toilet paper, okay. Toilet papers, not okay.” The loser denied flushing White House documents down the White House toilet, which explains his angry tweets about having to flush the toilet ten times. Employees were summoned several times to unclog his toilet, finding those pieces of paper. Some of the White House documents that Trump improperly took to Mar-a-Lago were clearly marked as classified, including documents at the "top secret" level. And yes, “Unauthorized removal and retention of classified documents or material” at Mar-a-Lago is a federal felony punishable by up to 5 years in prison. See https://tinyurl.com/4r6cbnwp.
Show me a Venn diagram of this: Representative Thomas Massie, R-KY, a person with two advanced degrees from MIT, objected to Medicare-for-All because many Medicare patients died of COVID-19. Even though he is a two-time graduate of MIT, he failed to recognize that more than 75% of COVID deaths are 65 years of age or over--the exact demographic Medicare serves. With nearly every American seniors enrolled in the program, of course the vast majority of COVID-19 deaths were people on Medicare. So…Medicare bad.
In a speech, MTG decried Nancy Pelosi’s use of the “gazpacho police.” Twitter is on fire with dozens of memes like ‘sangria law’ and ‘antipho’. https://tinyurl.com/2p9yvefk. I have to assume the Gazpacho Police specialize in cold cases.
On February 8, the U.S. House passed a bill that would keep the U.S. government operating for a whole 4 weeks, through March 11. Because over the past 4 months the two sides of the aisle would not come to agreement on an omnibus spending bill. So, 4 more weeks ought to do it.
Madison Cawthorn might become the first person since the Civil War era to be disqualified from office under the “disqualification clause” of the 14th Amendment.
Every business exec knows that targeted marketing works. As evidence, just three demographic factors (% white, % non-college educated, % rural) explain 80% of state-by-state presidential voting results in 2020. https://bit.ly/368NQkl.
While Ted Cruz continues to blame President Biden for global inflation:
Tyson, one of the big 4 meat monopolies President Biden is targeting for price-fixing, saw profits nearly double after price hikes of 32% on beef and 20% on chicken, which the CEO attributed to the "continued resilience of our multi-protein portfolio."
Johnson & Johnson's CEO told investors that the need for medical care to “address suffering and death,” is part of J&J's “optimism” & “opportunity” for its future.
Kimberly Clark makes paper products like tissues, paper towels and diapers. CEO Mike Hsu crowed to investors about “multiple rounds” of “significant pricing actions” & admitted he plans to continue doing it throughout the year. Two years ago we couldn't buy them for any price.
The company 3M, which produces N95 masks (and other things) bragged on its earnings call that “the team has done a marvelous job in driving price.”
Chipotle increased its profits by 181% last year to $764 million, giving its CEO a 137% pay raise to $38 million in 2020 and blaming the rising cost of a burrito on a minimum wage worker who got a 50 cent pay raise.
From NYT: Five billion of the infrastructure dollars that Congress allocated last year is required to be used by states to install high-voltage chargers along interstate highways. Yay!
Further evidence of fractures in the Republican party: Peter Navarro, the now-subpoenaed top advisor to the loser, in support of the Big Lie, emailed that “Pence betrayed Trump. Marc Short is a Koch Network dog. Meadows is a fool and a coward. Cheney and Kinzinger are useful idiots for Nancy Pelosi and the woke Left.” When asked if Vice President Harris could change the outcome of the 2024 election, Navarro was noncommittal.
In addition to its obvious racial implications, Republicans trafficking in the Big Lie are following a more explicit focus on large cities to create a pretext for future efforts to overturn election losses. “Our concern is Milwaukee,” Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson recently gaslighted. “This is one of these big Democrat strongholds that just can’t seem to get their votes counted until they know exactly how many votes they need.”
Does anyone recall someone who actually did pressure election officials in Georgia to “find” precisely-plus-1 the number of votes he needed to overcome his deficit?
Students walk out at West Virginia’s Huntington High School after a mandatory Christian revival is held in the school during school hours. Teens of every faith were asked to give their lives over to Jesus to find purpose and salvation.
In other God news, former ‘Latinos for Trump’ president Bianca Garcia said her candidacy for a seat in the Texas Senate is endorsed by God so she can “make the devil run.” According to her, any Christian who doesn’t support her bid will be held accountable by God, and those who did not follow the Bible would go to hell when they died.
And more credit to the unknown: New York Mayor Eric Adams declared that his rise to the mayoralty was driven by God. “I never doubted it for one moment,” he said. “God told me, ‘Eric, you’re going to be mayor.’”
Florida’s 'Don't Say Gay' bill would limit discussion of sexuality and gender in Florida schools. President Biden slammed the bill, which Gov. Ron DeSantis supports.
In a rare break with his party, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has criticized the Republican National Committee over its censure of Kinzinger and Cheney. ###