NATIONAL DOG PARENT APPRECIATION DAY UPDATES
Who Are Good People? We Are Good People!!
-Many parts of liberal/progressive political culture continues to lament the out-of-court settlement agreed to between Fox News and Dominion Voting Systems, sad over the dream of seeing Tucker Carlson and Sean Hannity break down LAW AND ORDER-style admitting that their 2020 reporting on Ex-President Trump's claims of a 'STOLLEN' and rigged election were nothing but lies. And while the over 7,000 pieces of evidence already made public clearly demonstrates that they were lies and that Carlson and Hannity (and many others) clearly consciously lie, some realities need to be made public as well. To wit ...
-The $787.5 million payment is the fifth-largest settlement fee paid in American legal history.
-As a publicly-traded company (even one controlled by private equity firms as Dominion is), their duty is to serve their shareholders and employees - and a fee that is three times as much as the entire valued worth of the company more than clears that bar.
-The payment is going to be made now rather than languish in several years of appeals that would have undoubtedly been made post-trial.
-Given that judges are humans (and the admitted sprinkling of Trump-appointed judges throughout the judiciary), the potential that any verdict could be overturned on appeal was and is always a potential final outcome.
-As MSNBC's Lawrence O'Donnell pointed out, the payment made to Dominion could have been made months ago, BEFORE all the discovery that took place and been made a part of the public record - and wasn't. So the information is public.
-There are still multiple lawsuits Dominion is pursuing, against other corporations (Newsmax and OAN) and individuals (among them Rudy Giuliani, Sidney Powell, and Mike Lindell).
-And there is a second company, Smartmatic, who still has a defamation lawsuit against many of the same players, for over $2B in damages, which can use much of the same evidence in their suits as well.
-Oh, and there's also still the Fulton County investigation into Trump's attempts to find 11,780 votes to flip that state's results (Biden won clean) and the whole January 6 insurrection investigations still ongoing.
-In summary, you can be sad that there was apparently no agreement to make Fox try to tell their viewers that they were lied to, but the truth is out there and there is more coming. Breathe ...
-Breathe ...
-Now breathe one more time ...
-While we were waiting in vain for the Dominion trial, Rep. Kevin McCarthy (SINO-R, CA) went to Wall Street to lay out his terms for not imperiling the world economy - continuing to demand that the only way the UltraMAGA Republicans will vote to extend the debt ceiling (1/3 of which was created by Ex-President Trump and their $2B tax cut to the wealthiest Americans) if draconian tax cuts are made to various social safety net programs (including, weirdly and perversely, SNAP programs that provide lunches and food meals to children - because Republicans are all about protecting the kids). The UltraMAGA majority within the GOP expanded the demands to include a total negation of the 2021 Inflation Reduction Act and the creation of what in reality would be a national sales tax that would disproportionately fall on the heads of the constituents they allegedly represent. Biden continues to refuse to link any budgetary demands with the GOP's budget demands that will need to be negotiated separately.
-The self-declared war between not-even-official-yet GOP Presidential candidate Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL, man) and the Disney Corporation continues, asymmetric as it may be. Recall that DeSantis passed a bill that appeared to take away Disney's power to essentially rule the area of Disney World freely was inverted when, the week before the DeSantis-appointed board took power, the Disney-appointed board lawfully passed a bill that essentially blocked the DeSantis board from ever exerting any influence whatsoever. In retaliation, DeSantis has now threatened to build a prison just outside the border of the Disney property - all in an apparent attempt to show DeSantis can be even more Trump-ish than Trump himself.
-How's it working? The latest poll from NH show Trump with a comfortable 33-point lead over DeSantis - all while a Trump ally is now running an ad in the state mocking the report that DeSantis once ate pudding with three of his fingers rather than find a spoon to do it with.
-Ew.
-On this date in 1775, the Battles of Lexington and Concord officially began the American Revolutionary War. On this date in 1927, a ten-day sentence for portraying a prostitute in a play on Broadway (which she wrote) launched the career and notoriety of Mae West. On this date in 1993, a standoff between federal agents and the Branch Davidian cult ended in a fire that killed 80 - and that anniversary was marked in 1995 when Timothy McVeigh detonated a van full of fertilizer in front of the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, a terrorist act that killed 168. And on this date in 2011, Fidel Castro stepped down as Cuba's Communist Party Leader.
-Happy Birthday to Eliot Ness, Dick Sargent, Jayne Mansfield, Dickie Goodman, Dudley Moore, Jack Pardee, Genya Raven, Bernie Worrell, Tim Curry, Frank Viola, Al Unser Jr., Ashley Judd, Kate Hudson, Hayden Christensen, Ali Wong, Joe Mauer, Candace Parker, and Maria Sharapova.
-Rest in Peace/Rest in Power to Lord Byron, Benjamin Disraeli, Charles Darwin, Charles Bidwill, Daphne Du Maurier, Bernard Edwards, Octavio Paz, Doc Blanchard, Grete Waitz, Greg Ham, Levon Helm, Allan Arbus, Milt Pappas, Jim Steinman, and Walter Mondale.
-Feed the Worms: Curly-headed black-and-gold football-playing evil person (for playing on said evil team) Troy Polamalu entered Earth on this date.
-Suge Knight was born on this date. You decide if he gets a Happy Birthday or if he Feeds the Worms.