2020 Election Fallout 15: More Information Is Being Revealed About The Big Lie

[GreyhoundFan]

Hawley and his treasonous buddies should all be kicked out of congress:

 

[WiseGirl]

Hope this is the right place this one.

 

[Howl]

20 hours ago, GreyhoundFan said:

Hawley and his treasonous buddies should all be kicked out of congress

I just need to rant about this for a bit. 

Hawley is a Dominionist.  Getting Trump back in office is key to bringing about the changes to government that he desires. Hawley and his co-religionists will do anything and are doing everything to bring that about.  Nothing is off limits and yes, there is a strategy and they are pursuing it will single minded fanatical devotion. 

The other group in the religious mix are trad Catholics, Opus Dei et al.. They are their own version of Dominionist.  How powerful are they? They've placed numerous people on the Supreme Court and that's the tip of the iceberg. Amy Coney "I'm not a partisan hack" Barrett is, and I can't emphasize this enough, literally a member of an ultra conservative Catholic cult.

They make common cause with people who share none of their ultimate goals.  I'd put Trump, Gaetz, Jordan, McConnell, Bannon and so many others in this latter category.  Amoral/sociopathic to a greater or lesser degree, they're ultimately about power and money and have zip religious sentiment in their cold, shriveled little hearts. 

Then there are the Republicans who are in a feeding frenzy because there is a possibility through gerrymandering, lying, voter suppression and corrupting the election process itself that they can attain power and never let it go. 

 

[GreyhoundFan]

This is a good read: "The Jan. 6 committee: What it has done and where it is headed"

Quote

In the days following the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, lawmakers began to discuss the need for an investigation focused on what led to the attack, how the building was breached so easily and how any similar event could be prevented from happening again.

The idea of the inquiry quickly became partisan.

First, many Republicans said any investigation should also focus on violence and damage to public property during the racial justice protests in the summer of 2020. Then they argued that Democrats would simply use the investigation as a partisan political tool by focusing on former president Donald Trump’s behavior in an attempt to tar the GOP ahead of the 2022 midterm elections.

Hope for comity wasn’t dead yet early in the year, and a bipartisan agreement was hammered out in May by the leaders of the House Homeland Security Committee to create an independent commission that was modeled on the panel that investigated the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

But it was rejected by most House Republicans and subsequently blocked by Senate Republicans.

House Democrats then decided to create a special investigative committee, and the House passed a resolution establishing one on a 220-to-190 vote on June 30, with two Republicans joining Democrats in voting in favor of the panel.

The Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol was born.

It is made up of seven Democrats and the two Republicans who voted to establish the committee, Reps. Liz Cheney of Wyoming and Adam Kinzinger of Illinois. They joined at the request of Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) after House GOP leaders decided not to participate in the inquiry because Pelosi rejected two of their proposed members.

Committee members say they are making great progress, but Trump and his GOP supporters continue to charge that the inquiry is an overtly partisan exercise designed to undermine Trump and his allies.

With midterm elections in November, this year looks to be contentious and demanding for the panel, with public hearings and publicly released reports on the agenda. What follows is a guide to what the committee has done and where its investigation is headed.

What has the House Select Committee done?

In a little less than six months, the committee has taken in a massive amount of data — interviewing more than 300 witnesses, announcing more than 50 subpoenas, obtaining more than 35,000 pages of records and receiving hundreds of telephone tips provided through the Jan. 6 tip line.

The task of wading through this torrent of information has been divided among five teams that the committee initially put together for its staff of about 40:

• One team, dubbed “Inside the Fence,” is devoted to understanding the preparation and response to the event by federal and local law enforcement.
• A second, called “follow the money,” is examining the funding for demonstrations against the election results.
• A third is investigating online misinformation and extremist activity.
• A fourth is looking at the pressure campaigns in Washington and in state capitols to overturn election results or delay certification of electors.
• A fifth team is focused on the organizers of the demonstrations on the National Mall and at the Capitol.

“We have had a remarkable number of people come in and want to talk with us or cooperate with subpoenas,” said a senior committee aide, who like others spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak on the record. “A lot who want to share the information that they have that’s relevant to our work, multiple hundreds of people and the individuals who have received the lion’s share of focus in the past few weeks, are really the outliers in what we’re doing.”

Those recalcitrant outliers, however, include witnesses who might be able to answer some of the key questions the committee is focused on, including the question of whether Trump’s action or inaction during the 187 minutes from when he told his supporters to march to the Capitol until he released a message telling them to go home amounts to a dereliction of duty.

The House has so far sent two contempt of Congress referrals to the Justice Department: one for Trump’s former chief of staff Mark Meadows and one for Stephen K. Bannon, Trump’s former chief strategist. Bannon has been indicted; the Justice Department has yet to say whether it will pursue charges against Meadows.

Meadows backed away from cooperating with the committee after producing thousands of documents for the panel, among them text messages and emails related to the events of the day, including from people telling him to get Trump to call off his supporters.

Jeffrey Clark, a former top Justice Department official who played a key role in Trump’s efforts to challenge the election results, has also been held in criminal contempt by the committee after refusing to answer many questions during a deposition. The committee has provided Clark with another opportunity to appear before the panel after he said he would invoke his Fifth Amendment protection against self incrimination, but that deposition date has been postponed.

The committee is also waiting on another crucial disclosure: 800 pages of Trump’s official records and communications related to Jan. 6. Whether those records have to be turned over is being litigated in the courts. Last month, the former president asked the Supreme Court to block the release of his White House records, arguing that the case is a unique conflict between a sitting president and his predecessor. Trump’s lawyer also argued that the committee is acting beyond the scope of its authority by discussing possible criminal referrals rather than focusing on legislative proposals.

President Biden has already determined that the material should not be protected by executive privilege and can be released to the committee. Rep. Bennie G. Thompson (D-Miss.), chairman of the committee, has asked the court to expedite consideration of Trump’s request.

What has the committee learned?

Each of the panel’s staff groups has made progress, according to people familiar with their work. The “Inside the Fence” team has developed questions about possible law enforcement and intelligence failures. The “Stop the Steal” group has studied the pressure applied on federal as well as state and local officials to overturn the election results. These include calls made by Trump to state leaders as well as the effort to press Vice President Mike Pence to intervene in the counting of electoral votes.

Some of these efforts — what Rep. Jamie B. Raskin (D-Md.) has referred to as the “political coup” — took place just a block away from the White House in a set of rooms and suites at the Willard hotel, where Trump’s outside legal team camped out in the weeks and days leading up to Jan. 6.

The committee is also scrutinizing efforts by Clark and others who suggested using presidential emergency powers to overturn the election, ranging from seizing assets of voting machine companies to deploying the National Guard or using the Insurrection Act.

In addition, the committee has started to focus intently on Trump’s actions that day as it begins to discuss whether to recommend that the Justice Department open a criminal investigation into the former president.

Thompson told The Washington Post in an interview last month that of particular interest is why it took the former president so long to call on his supporters to stand down — a posture panel members said could amount to criminally impeding or obstructing Congress’s official proceeding to count electoral votes.

“That dereliction of duty causes us real concern,” Thompson said. “And one of those concerns is that whether or not it was intentional, and whether or not that lack of attention for that longer period of time, would warrant a referral” to the Justice Department.

The committee is weighing other potential criminal referrals, according to Thompson and people familiar with the matter, surrounding the pressure put on state and local officials to overturn the results of the election as well as whether people raised money for the rallies and events surrounding Jan. 6 while knowing the claims of election fraud were false.

What is the committee focusing on going forward?

The panel continues to seek new information even as it begins to focus on two must-do tasks: a slate of public hearings to tell the story of Jan. 6 from start to finish, along with one or more written reports. The reports will not only detail the events of that day but make recommendations on how to prevent a similar situation from occurring again. This includes whether the laws overseeing how electoral votes are tallied (the Electoral Count Act), and that grant a president emergency powers, need to be changed.

“I consider it important for us to determine to what extent the president was prepared or preparing to mobilize the National Guard or any other part of forces under the insurrection act or any other emergency power in a statute,” Raskin said in an interview.

“After assembling a complete documentary record of what happened on Jan. 6 and what caused it, the main purpose of the Jan. 6 committee is to make recommendations as to policy changes that will prevent any further close calls with violent and lawless attacks on our government. So we have to look at fortifying our defenses against both inside political coup attempts and violent insurrectionary challenges to the government,” Raskin added.

The rough timeline being discussed among senior committee staffers includes a number of public hearings starting this winter and stretching into spring, followed by a possible interim report being released in the summer, with a final report coming out before the midterm elections in November. The midterms are a key date for the committee because political prognosticators expect Republicans to win the House and then shut down the panel.

The panel is also expected to continue pushing for cooperation from Republican lawmakers who communicated with the White House on Jan 6. It has already asked Reps. Scott Perry (Pa.) and Jim Jordan (Ohio) to answer questions, but both men have signaled they will not comply with the request.

The question of whether the committee has the legal authority to force sitting lawmakers to comply with its requests is expected to be the subject of court battles in the coming months.

Committee members have expressed confidence that they can overcome hurdles put up by reluctant witnesses and other legal challenges and complete an investigation that will affect how citizens view the attack even in this partisan moment for the country.

“It is very much one that brings together a group of us who have very different policy views, but who come together when the issues have to do with the defense of the Constitution, and so that does give me hope,” Cheney, the panel’s vice chair, told ABC News on Sunday.

 

[GreyhoundFan]

 

[formergothardite]

What does he mean by landing the plane in 9 days? It does sound like Hannity realized they were all in a world of trouble.

[GreyhoundFan]

Gee, a fourth MAGAt from The Villages has been arrested for voter fraud in the 2020 election.

 

[Howl]

1 hour ago, formergothardite said:

What does he mean by landing the plane in 9 days? It does sound like Hannity realized they were all in a world of trouble.

Landing the plane presumably refers to stopping the certification of votes in Congress and taking the count back to the key states in order to overturn the election. There was a specific time frame required to do that. 

Edited January 5, 2022 by Howl

[fraurosena]

On 1/4/2022 at 4:12 PM, Howl said:

Here's the deal.  The Mueller Report had irrefutable evidence of Trump's obstruction.  Tied up. With a bow.   Merrick Garland could have acted on this at any time since he was appointed and he hasn't.  There is zero evidence there are subpoenas out related to any malfeasance on Trump's part. 

If Merrick Garland delivers an anodyne update about DOJ and prosecuting rioters, Trump and the rest of the plotters are home free, because it telegraphs he has zero intention of taking on those at the top who planned an fomented the attempted coup.  The January 6th Commission can find whatever evidence, but DOJ is the entity that has to act. 

There's a debate of sorts raging among various people on twitter with legal backgrounds about whether Garland is doing what needs done in regards to Trump and DOJ is airtight on leaks, or if Garland has no intention of charging Trump with anything.  Statute of limitations is running out on some potential charges.   There's a rising chorus of voices insisting that Garland is ineffective,  the wrong person for the job and it's time for Biden to get an AG on the job that can get stuff done WRG Trump prosecutions.  I'd say there's zero possibility that Biden will give him the boot, so we're pretty much stuck with Garland. 

 

So here are my thoughts about possible reasons behind the apparent inaction from Merrick Garland's DOJ:

1. Merrick Garland is a cautious and meticulous man, and he's waiting for referrals from the January 6th Commission before he acts in order to show complete political impartiality. If true, I find this rather weak, as he could run a parallel investigation behind the scenes without waiting for the referrals and then use both the Commission's information as well as his own. Although, to be fair,  I must admit there is nothing to say that DOJ is not running a parallel investigation and he's not announcing this publicly in order to maintain the image of political impartiality. 

2. We must remember that Merrick Garland inherited a Trump-contaminated DOJ. His main focus right now could well be to root out that contamination so that his DOJ (and the FBI!) is once more impartial and non-partisan. We have no idea how deeply Trump agents were able to penetrate the department, and therefore we can't know how much time it would take to find and excise them. Garland simply cannot start an investigation into the insurrection before he has cleaned and cleared his department-- otherwise the investigation can be thwarted from within, and worse, any results could be tainted and untrustworthy.

 

[Howl]

Seth Abrams has a bit of a different take.  Unroll here. 

AG Merrick Garland said all correct things today—as we knew he would. The question was whether he'd go beyond being correct and be *illuminating*. As an attorney and former criminal investigator, here's my assessment of how he did on that score. I hope you'll read/share.

His main point is this

Spoiler

4/ But what attorneys, legal analysts, and criminal investigators *also* know is that it's *impossible* to hide a large-scale federal probes completely. There are subpoenas, raids, document demands, court filings, interrogations, and more that are hard—or even impossible—to hide. 

5/ Some of these investigatory events can't be hidden because they happen at least marginally in public (e.g., filings, raids and contested subpoenas). But it's also impossible to hide a large-scale federal probe because of (a) leaks, and (b) voluntary disclosures from witnesses. 

6/ Rich, powerful, well-connected Trumpists in particular are infamous for howling into the nearest microphone the second they are treated as any other suspect, witness, or defendant in America would be treated. Indeed their cowardice and hypocrisy have long been defining traits. 

7/ So while AG Garland pretended in his speech that the substantive criticism DOJ is facing comes from people angry that Trump and his January 6 co-conspirators haven't been charged with anything yet, he knows that this is *not* the criticism coming from those in the legal field. 

8/ Instead, the criticism DOJ is facing that matters most—criticism that comes from those who understand how criminal investigations and prosecutions work—is that there is *no evidence whatsoever* that DOJ is conducting *any* large-scale investigation of high-level coup plotters. 

Also,  Merrick Garland has some baggage in the form of a not wonderful mentor. 

Edited January 5, 2022 by Howl

[fraurosena]

Oh, to have been a fly on the wall...

Ex-White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham says she 'cooperated fully' with January 6 committee

Former White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham met Wednesday on Capitol Hill with the House select committee investigating the January 6 insurrection, according to multiple sources familiar with the meeting. 

"I cooperated fully with the committee," Grisham told reporters as she left the panel's office Wednesday evening. The former White House aide and chief of staff to first lady Melania Trump declined to provide additional comment and said she wouldn't get ahead of the committee.

Her meeting with the committee came after she had a phone call with committee member Democratic Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland during which Raskin encouraged her to meet with the panel.

A source told CNN that Grisham and Raskin had in-depth phone call about her knowledge of events behind-the-scenes at the White House on January 6. The source said that Grisham was "candid" about events in the White House at the time, many of which Grisham was present for, including knowledge of conversations involving former President Donald Trump that day. 

Grisham left her job as press secretary and White House communications director by Trump in April 2020, just shy of a one year in those positions. She never held a press briefing in the briefing room while press secretary. Grisham was replaced by Kaleigh McEnany. She immediately returned to the East Wing, picking up the title of chief of staff to Melania Trump, who told CNN at the time she knew Grisham would "excel as chief of staff." 

Grisham continued her close relationship with Melania Trump and Donald Trump and was often with the first couple on trips, including visits to Mar-A-Lago, and remained one of their most trusted staffers. It was Grisham who had to wake up Melania Trump in her bedroom when she fell asleep waiting on results from election night. 

On the afternoon of January 6, in the wake of the insurrection, Grisham became the first Trump administration official to resign that day as a result of the insurrection.

Grisham later confirmed in her memoir of her time in the White House that she sent Melania Trump a text that said, "Do you want to tweet that peaceful protests are the right of every American, but there is no place for lawlessness and violence?" to which Trump replied with one word: "No." 

CNN has reported that on January 6, Melania Trump was conducting a photo shoot of some of the carpets in the White House that she had had installed, and was disinterested in using her voice to condemn the violence, nor tell her husband to condemn the violence. It wasn't until January 11, 2021, that Melania Trump publicly acknowledged the insurrection. 

With the exception of Dan Scavino, Grisham was one of the longest serving members of the Trump administration, starting her time with Donald Trump as a press aide on his campaign.

[Cartmann99]

The video is NSFW because of language.

 

[Cartmann99]

Unrolled version is here.

You may remember Representative Kim from this picture of him after the attack:

Spoiler

 

[Cartmann99]

Adam Kinzinger is absent because of his wife's pregnancy:

Spoiler

 

 

[Cartmann99]

Spoiler

 

[WiseGirl]

 

[GreyhoundFan]

"Cyber Ninjas, the firm hired to conduct an election review in Arizona, ordered to pay $50,000 a day in sanctions"

Quote

Cyber Ninjas, the firm hired to conduct a partisan review of election results in Maricopa County, Ariz., has been ordered to pay sanctions of $50,000 a day until it turns over records from the review sought by the Arizona Republic newspaper.

A superior court judge in Maricopa County found the Florida-based company in contempt of court Thursday and ordered the sanctions, according to the Republic.

Maricopa Superior Court Judge John Hannah had previously ordered the company to turn over emails, text messages and other documents to the publication.

“It is lucidly clear on this record that Cyber Ninjas has disregarded that order,” Hannah said.

The order of sanctions comes as the company claims to be shutting down.

Jack Wilenchik, a lawyer representing Cyber Ninjas, said that the company has laid off all employees, including its former chief executive officer Doug Logan, and is now insolvent, according to Newsweek. Wilenchik said the company is unable to go into its records to find the audit documents.

NBC also reported that a company representative said in a text message on Thursday night that it is shutting down.

“Cyber Ninjas is shutting down. All employees have been let go,” Rod Thomson, the company’s representative, said.

The court action came during the same week that Maricopa County officials released a lengthy report concluding that the November 2020 election was administered properly and not marred by fraud.

The 93-page document debunks, one by one, vague allegations of potential problems previously identified by the GOP-led state Senate, which hired Cyber Ninjas, and championed by former president Donald Trump and his allies.

Maricopa County, home to Phoenix, is Arizona’s largest county.

In September, the Senate announced its contractors’ recount reconfirmed the accuracy of the county’s tally — which showed that Joe Biden edged out Trump in the large and diversifying county by more than 45,000 votes, helping Biden win the key swing state.

 

[Cartmann99]

 

[Howl]

On 1/4/2022 at 10:44 AM, GreyhoundFan said:

Hawley and his treasonous buddies should all be kicked out of congress

Hawley et al. are Christofascist Domionionists. 

It's incredibly important to frame Jan 6 as a Christofascist manifestation.  Jim Rigby is a Presbyterian minister in my city.  He posts regularly on facebook and does an amazing job deconstructing how religion has become the footsoldier of fascism. 

Jim Rigby: "When religion is based on boundaried ethics, a rejection of scientific truth and a worship of God as a magical power broker, it is a matter of time until that bad religion spirals out of control into mindless violence."

THE ROLE OF BAD FAITH IN THE JANUARY 6 INSURRECTION  It is a mistake to leave religion out of the story of the January 6 insurrection:

Spoiler

In case you've forgotten, one of the themes of the rally was “The Jericho March” which is a biblical story of a walled city that was breached when Joshua and his small band of warriors marched around the city walls blowing ram's horns until the walls "came a-tumbling down." That is why some of the protestors on January 6 were blowing ram’s horns.

The founders of the Jericho March described the movement in the following way, “The Jericho March™ is biblically focused on Joshua 6. Jericho was a city of false gods and corruption. Just as Joshua was instructed to march around the walls of Jericho seven times, Jericho Marchers™ pray, fast, and march at a specific place and time until darkness is exposed and the walls of corruption fall down.”

The January 6 "Jericho March" was billed as peaceful protest but when religion is motivated out of superstition, fear, or hatred it quickly spirals out of control.

Even the biblical story of Jericho was not a peaceful demonstration. As the book of Joshua records, “As soon as the people heard the sound of the trumpets, they raised a great shout, and the wall fell down flat; so the people charged straight ahead into the city and captured it. Then they devoted to destruction by the edge of the sword all in the city, both men and women, young and old, oxen, sheep, and donkeys.”

Jack Jenkins of Religious News Service chronicled the prayers given by the insurrectionists on January 6. Paula White led the opening prayer saying, "God, you said you honor your word and your name above all things. So as we hold you, in covenant with you, today, let justice be done. ...And as you have allowed me to have a relationship with (Donald Trump) and his family for 20 years, right now, as his pastor I put a hedge of protection around him. I secure his purpose. I secure his destiny. I secure his life, God, and I thank you that he will walk in a holy boldness and a wisdom, God, and that you will go before him. You will be his rear guard, and you will go in front of him this day and every day, God."

Notice Rev. White was not asking that Donald Trump obey God, but that God to obey her prayer and protect Donald Trump. And then, Jacob Anthony Chansley, popularly known as the Q Shaman, prayed, "Thank you, Heavenly Father ... for this opportunity to stand up for our God-given inalienable rights. Thank you, divine, omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent Creator God for filling this chamber with your white light and love. Thank you for filling this chamber with patriots that love you and that love Christ. ...Thank you for allowing the United States of America to be reborn. Thank you for allowing us to get rid of the communists, the globalists and the traitors within our government."

I would suggest the insanity of Trump religion is an exaggerated example of bad religion which is much more common. When religion is based on boundaried ethics, a rejection of scientific truth and a worship of God as a magical power broker, it is a matter of time until that bad religion spirals out of control into mindless violence.

Existentialist philosopher Sartre used the term “bad faith” to describe the temptation to renounce our freedom and to turn ourselves into passive objects. One of my philosophy professors, Robert Solomon, used two examples of "bad faith" from the writings of Sartre. Prof. Solomon talked about a waiter who acts at being a waitsperson so stereotypically that you know they are playing a role. And he used the example of a woman who does not want to hold hands with a new boyfriend, but alsoo does not want to hurt his feelings, and so she just pretends her hand isn't a part of her as he holds it. Instead of taking responsibility for our agency, bad faith is surrendering our ethical agency to a creed or code.

Getting rid of Donald Trump is not as important as getting rid of the "bad faith" that gave him power in the first place. We are responsible for how we treat others. We do not have the right to surrender personal responsibility to any religion or nation. Christian Churches need to get the American flag out of our pulpits and do what is right for the whole world. We need to stop equating justice with authority. And, we need to stop using creeds as an excuse not to think for ourselves. It is time for American religion to take responsibility for our duty to love justice, enact kindness, and live humbly out of our highest value.

 

[47of74]

CNN had this up this morning

Quote

Barbara Walter is a professor at the University of California San Diego and has a new book out, "How Civil Wars Start and How to Stop Them."

When I asked her what everyday Americans could do to protect democracy, she sent back a thoughtful and lengthy email, which I'll boil down to a few key points.

Vote. Even in presidential elections, there are millions of Americans not taking part in the democratic process. The share of nonvoters is even larger in midterm elections, and larger still at the local level.

"If they voted it would perhaps change the makeup of Congress and break the minority's hold on power in many places," Walter said.

All well and good but I have no interest in hearing what guys like Dick Cheney and Karl Rove have to say.  Of course according to them it's all Democrats fault and Democrats started it all.  And CNN fails to mention how Republicans are going out of their ways to make it as hard as possible to vote, protest, or even connect. 

[Howl]

Some big news at CNN today.  Turns out #1 at CNN had a multi-year affair with #2 and they finally ended both their marriages to be together.   Speculation was that they were very vulnerable to blackmail during the affair and Trump used this to his advantage to force the hiring of people whose coverage would be unfavorable to Biden. 

Don't know, but it could have happened that way. CNN has been busy shitting on Biden for the last three or four months. 

 

[Ozlsn]

1 hour ago, Howl said:

Don't know, but it could have happened that way. CNN has been busy shitting on Biden for the last three or four months

The MSM in general though seems to have taken the role of "critising those in power" to mean "slag them off for everything, no matter how ridiculous".  There is always room for criticism, but if it's constant and doesn't also focus on what opposition is/isn't doing to enable constructive progress then it's as pointless as constant unwarranted praise. It frustrates me immensely how poor the state of journalism has become in some quarters - and on my home turf how utterly onion paper-skinned some politicans are.

[Howl]

No surprise that it's Chick-fil-A, Xtians favorite fast food place.  Official statement of corporate purpose: "To glorify God by being a faithful steward of all that is entrusted to us."  Founder was Southern Baptist. 

[fraurosena]

Entirely expected, of course, but noteworthy nonetheless. Also of course, he won't comply.

From the linked article:

In Wednesday's letter, Thompson said McCarthy may have information about Trump's state of mind and decisions in the aftermath of the riot.

"It appears that you may also have discussed with President Trump the potential he would face a censure resolution, impeachment, or removal under the 25th Amendment," Thompson wrote. "It also appears that you may have identified other possible options, including President Trump’s immediate resignation from office.”

Edited January 13, 2022 by fraurosena

[fraurosena]