Hartmann Report

Big money is the cancer that has been eating away American politics ever since the Supreme Court blew up hundreds of good government laws designed to protect our democracy from predators like Trump. Donald Trump wasn’t joking back in 2000 when he first seriously considered running for president and told us, “It’s very possible that I could be the first presidential candidate to run and make money on it.” While president, he raked in an estimated $1.6 billion, much of it (particularly during the pandemic) money from pushing government contracts and the like to his own properties and companies.

Lying about religion — in the sphere of politics — ceases to be about religion and instead becomes about power. A power that has sought, repeatedly throughout history, to replace democracy. It’s not often that a photograph makes its way into a Supreme Court ruling, but it happened this week because Justice Sonia Sotomayor felt it necessary to expose Neil Gorsuch and his Republican colleagues on the Court as unrepentant liars. Lying has become a habit for Republicans on the Court.

Instead of fleeing the Democratic Party, we must reach out & tell our leaders that we have their backs. That they can afford to be brave, and together we can save our freedoms and our republic. We’re in the midst of a war for the future of America; abortion is the most obvious battlefield right now. And when you’re at war, you don’t want Neville Chamberlain running the country: you want Churchill, Zelensky, or FDR. There was an era when the Democratic Party had that kind of courage; many of us lived through it and remember it well.

If we don't get a correction - get ready for the vigilantes to come for your daughter when she’s raped and looking for options on the internet… Across America, women and girls are deleting period-tracking apps from their smartphones and fitness trackers so police and bounty-hunter vigilantes from Red states can’t use their data to pinpoint people getting abortions or having “suspicious” miscarriages. But that won’t be enough.

When corporations gained the protections that had been written for persons in the United States, a substantial shift began in who bears what risk, resulting in an imbalance that now affects virtually all parts of the world. Most companies handle risk responsibly, but many corporations are legally allowed to avoid responsibility in ways that would never be permitted for an individual. Risk is a matter of who suffers when something goes wrong. Corporations and their shareholders may risk loss of income or even loss of their investment, but that pales in comparison with the risks that humans share as a result of a corporate activity—such as degradation of the environment, higher rates of cancer and other diseases, job-related disfigurement or death, community and family breakdown after a factory is closed and jobs are shipped overseas, and even a life with no income or health insurance if we choose not to affiliate with a corporation.

The Best of the Rest of the News — This is a crime. Corrupt Republican Associate Justice Clarence Thomas appended a concurrent opinion to yesterday’s Hobbs decision arguing that next the Supreme Court should end our right to contraception (Griswold), gay marriage (Obergefell), and reverse the legalization of gay sex (Lawrence) — The January 6th hearing on Thursday produced one of the most shocking moments of the entire Trump election theft saga. — Could you go to jail or lose your home for telling others not to buy products from a company or country whose practices you deplore? — It’s not just progressive authors and talk show hosts talking about the fascist danger to America: now five respected, high-profile, retired generals have signed up to defend democracy as well. — How the rest of the world deals with medical expenses. — A supermarket/drugstore chain in Florida has announced it won’t vaccinate kids under 5 years old. Why? — Crazy Alert! Tucker Carlson claims the FDA’s plan to reduce nicotine in cigarettes to make them less addictive and reduce the 500,000 deaths from tobacco every year is all part of a plan to de-masculinize “working class men.”

The big difference between 2000 and 2020 is that in 2000 Stone’s plan worked: he stopped the vote count and cemented Bush’s ascent to the White House, even though Bush lost the election. As the January 6th Committee continues to unpeel layers of criminality and conspiracy, it’s important to note that the Stone/Bannon/Trump “Stop The Steal” scheme did not originate in 2020. It was, in fact, 20 years in the making. Roger Stone, Trump’s dirty trickster who was sentenced to 40 months in prison before Trump pardoned him, rolled out version 1.0 in Florida in 2000, helping the George W. Bush campaign stop a Florida Supreme Court-mandated statewide recount that would have handed the election to Al Gore.

Violence is the cardinal characteristic, the logo, the brand identity of fascism. Every fascist movement in history has lifted itself to power on the scaffold of violence. Blood alone moves the wheels of history. –Benito Mussolini “Have you noticed that people are getting meaner?” the villain asks in a Paramount+ promo for their new show Evil. “What does it mean?” asks the “nice” character. “It means,” says the evil character with a note of triumph in her voice, “that your side is losing.” And here we are. The lede of an above-the-fold story in yesterday’s Washington Post lays it out: “In the past 24 hours, there has been an uptick in the number of violent threats against lawmakers on the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, and all lawmakers on the committee are likely to receive a security detail…”

How did a corrupt senator even find himself in a position where he could’ve handed two pieces of paper to the VP that would have changed the outcome of our presidential election? The Electoral College. We just learned from the January 6th hearings that Wisconsin Republican Senator Ron Johnson tried to hand a phony slate of electoral votes from Michigan and Wisconsin to Vice President Mike Pence just before the election was certified on January 6. How did a corrupt senator even find himself in a position where he could’ve handed two pieces of paper to the Vice President that would have changed the outcome of our presidential election? The Electoral College.

The GOP has planted their flag deeply into the soil of fear and hate, right up to and including a call to repeal the Voting Rights Act of 1965 - this year we must vote as if our future depends upon it. The Texas GOP’s state party meeting last week gave America a clear insight into Republican thinking going into this year’s election and the 2024 presidential race. They’ve planted their flag deeply into the soil of violence, fear, white supremacy, and hate right up to and including a call to repeal the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Democratic candidates across the nation, on the other hand, show that party is leaving behind the neoliberalism of Clinton and Obama and moving forward with a futuristic “Freedom Agenda.”