2024 Archives

Posted at Hartmann Report on Feb. 17, 2024

Saturday Report 2/17/24 - Trump is a Serial Criminal

The Best of the Rest of the News. — Trump was fined $364 million in his second major fraud conviction. — Trump's "owner," Vladimir Putin, murdered Alexei Navalny. — The FBI blows up the latest Republican scam to impeach Biden. — Geeky Science: Is this the future of Covid? — Russian arms production worries Europe's war planners while the Baltic states ready for an invasion. — Does America have MAGA fatigue? — Crazy Alert! Republicans in Utah want the 10 Commandments to be taught as "American History" to young children in public schools. — Hunter in a Farmer's World Alert! ADHD: How to Remember Names. — Trump wants to turn the RNC into his own personal slush fund.

Posted at Hartmann Report on Feb. 16, 2024

Trump's "Sell-Out" Price is $10,000-A-Plate

It shouldn't surprise us when we learn Republicans are willing to set aside their deep-seated hatred of trans people in exchange for a $10,000-a-plate fundraiser... Remember when Republicans lost their minds because Anheuser-Busch hired transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney to promote their diet beer brand, Bud Lite? Trump is now telling them to back off, because an Anheuser-Busch lobbyist named Jeff Miller is throwing a $10,000-a-plate fundraiser for him next month in Washington, DC.

Posted at Hartmann Report on Feb. 15, 2024

The NRA & GOP Broke America: How Many Dead Children's Voices Must We Hear?

The NRA, GOP and SCOTUS have made the Second Amendment of the Bill of Rights into such a suicide pact, drenching our nation with our own children's blood. "The Court would have us believe that over 200 years ago, the Framers made a choice to limit the tools available to elected officials wishing to regulate civilian uses of weapons, and to authorize this Court to use the common-law process of case-by-case judicial lawmaking to define the contours of acceptable gun control policy. Absent compelling evidence that is nowhere to be found in the Court's opinion, I could not possibly conclude that the Framers made such a choice." -- Justice John Paul Stevens' dissenting opinion in District of Columbia v Heller.

Posted at Hartmann Report on Feb. 14, 2024

Fix the Insurrection Act Before Trump Uses it to Create a Police State

During the January 6th attack, militia members were glued to Trump’s Twitter feed, anxiously awaiting Trump’s proclamation of the Insurrection Act and instant deputization of them. When Senator Tommy Tuberville was meeting with the Trump family and team the night of January 5th in the DC Trump Hotel, plans had already been laid for the Proud Boys and other fascist street gangs to seize control of the Capitol to prevent the certification of Joe Biden’s 7-million-vote victory. The key would be invoking the Insurrection Act, a basket of laws dating from 1792 to 1874 that’s been used a bit over two dozen times, the first by George Washington and the most recent by President George HW Bush in response to the riots that erupted around the police beating of Rodney King.

Posted at Hartmann Report on Feb. 13, 2024

How The Richest Democracy in the World Abandons Americans

America is now the most unequal society in the developed world. Our billionaires are the richest, and our poor people are the poorest of any functioning democracy on Earth… Every now and then we all get those moments of shocking clarity and insight that give us a new perspective on reality. Mine came over the weekend when I was watching the political shows on cable TV. This one had to do with the stunned realization of how we’ve normalized the damage that corrupt Republicans on the Supreme Court have done to our country by legalizing political bribery. An ad came on for a company that buys life insurance policies. The senior citizen in the ad says something to the effect of, “We learned that we could sell our policy when a friend did so to pay their medical bills.”

Posted at Hartmann Report on Feb. 12, 2024

Trump and His Traitors to Democracy are Shockingly Brazen

Increasingly Americans are being forced to choose sides: are we with democracy, or will we elect Trump and join Russia, China, and North Korea in making the world safe for dictators? Trump and Putin are collaborating to tear America apart. And Trump and his allies in Congress and across the spectrum of rightwing hate media aren't even trying to hide it. Americans aren't used to thinking of our country as a battleground. We haven't been invaded by another country's military since the War of 1812 and haven't seen blood shed on our soil in formal armed conflict since the Civil War. But the United States is very much a battlefield today; instead of bullets and bombs, the weapons being used are digital, psychological, and social.

Posted at Hartmann Report on Feb. 11, 2024

The Borking of America: The Hidden History of Monopolies

In 40 short years, America has devolved from being a relatively open market economy and a functioning democracy into a largely monopolistic economy and a monopolist-friendly political system. One of the principal architects of that transformation was Robert Bork. Most Americans, if they remember Robert Bork at all, remember him as the guy who railed against homosexuality and “forced integration” in such extreme language that his nomination to the Supreme Court by Ronald Reagan had to be withdrawn. But Bork’s most important effort—one he worked on for more than 15 years nearly full-time—was in reshaping the business landscape of this country.

Posted at Hartmann Report on Feb. 10, 2024

Saturday Report 2/10/24 - Fascism Fear Fear Fear Alert! Hanniity confesses migrant "beat down" on his show was a lie. Surprised?

The Best of the Rest of the News. — The Supreme Court has wimped out on Trump. — Trump steals classified documents, the ones about US spies in Russia are missing (and our spies are dying), and Biden wrote a letter to Obama when he was VP that he kept, and now the media and this idiot special counsel and lifelong Republican hack Robert Hur are doing their best to conflate the two. — Pink triangles come to Kansas? — Smartmatic is suing OAN, and they busted the CEO! — Crazy Alert! Republicans want Florida schools to teach kindergartners all about the “threat of communism.” — Fascism Fear, Fear, Fear and Even More Fear Alert! — Geeky Science! Tornadoes aren’t supposed to happen in the winter

Posted at Hartmann Report on Feb. 9, 2024

The Shameful Failure of Yesterday’s SCOTUS 14th Amendment Arguments

The simple reality is that the future of American democracy is as much on the line in this case as it was in 1866: that was lost in yesterday's arguments, but should have been central to them… The single most astonishing thing about yesterday's oral arguments before the Supreme Court was the almost complete lack of historical context in those arguments about an insurrectionist staying on the ballot. The fear that led Colorado to ban Trump from the ballot was that he'd keep his word and "suspend the Constitution" and "be a dictator on day one." Neither were mentioned even once: the words "suspend" and "dictator" don't appear anywhere in the transcript.

Posted at Hartmann Report on Feb. 8, 2024

Will SCOTUS Remove the Threat of Trump or be as Political & Corrupt as Bush v Gore Was?

Odds are, however, that this decision will be as political and corrupt as the 2000 Bush v Gore was. But I'm more than willing to be surprised. Donald Trump is a threat to America. His loyalty to Putin also makes him a threat to world peace, as he just showed us by killing the Senate bill to secure the border and provide aid to Ukraine, Taiwan, Israel, and the Palestinians in Gaza. And today the Supreme Court will have an ability to remove that threat by simply following the plain language of the US Constitution that says people who've engaged in insurrection or provided aid and comfort to same can't hold public office. Today's arguments, ironically, will also be the second time the 14th Amendment has been invoked to try to change the outcome or the setup for an election. The first was Bush v Gore in 2000, and we know how that turned out. So, what can we expect? Will the Court follow the law?