OT: The Official COVID/Omicron Variant+ thread

[HarthorneWingo]

For those who are not familiar with him, Lawrence Tribe is perhaps the preeminent constitutional scholar in the country. Worth following

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[robillionaire]

I hope you are all doing well, crazy times for sure. Here's hoping that Omicron peaks very soon and then nosedives as it's done in other countries. We had been one of least affected places in the world here in Nova Scotia but the Omicron has really changed that and quickly, although we've seen much lower hospitalization and deaths. Hopefully, this will turn into the endemic phase sooner than later.

We're watching what looks like the collapse of democracy in your country, so many things going on nationally and especially State wide that seem to be a harbinger of some bad things to come. There seems to be a lack of imagination of what could happen and how it could affect everyday life. Perhaps it's the whole "American Exceptionalism" that make people think that it couldn't happen, some people need to deal with reality. Biden and the democrats need to see this as an existential threat to the country, they need to pass voting rights too the suite, time is of the essence. Also, they need to begin to talk over and over about what could happen if authoritarians take over the country. They need to take a cue from the Republicans and repeat stuff over and over, ad nauseam, to what this would mean to the average Joe Public. As a follower of politics, with a background in Economics and the Markets, the general public must be made aware that if democracy goes down, their houses would not be worth what it is now, the stock markets would not be where it is now, their pensions could be affected, their jobs could disappear, so many more negative consequences would be in the offing, you don't want to go there because once it starts, it's almost impossible to stop it.

Amazing watching what's going on now in the United States, fascinating for sure, but very scary.

Jethro

here’s some insight as to where it’s heading from a Canadian perspective

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-the-american-polity-is-cracked-and-might-collapse-canada-must-prepare/

[Jethrobodine123]

School official receives death threat for investigating Neo-Nazi students.

This is how it got started in Germany. This would’ve never been tolerated in my middle class high school or our community. This makes me feel like we’re losing this battle. They use the same bullying tactics to cause normal and decent school board members to resign over death threats and then take over their positions and change education policies.

Watch on YouTube

It's straight out of the authoritarian handbook:

Weaponize Fear – Embrace a language of violence, promote a more punitive culture, leverage military might at home. Give critics reason to believe they’ll be harmed if they oppose.

Target Outsiders — Stoke the fires of xenophobia by demonizing immigrants and foreigners. Blame domestic problems including economic woes on these scapegoats, and depict political opponents as sympathetic to these imagined enemies.

Undermine Institutions — Take over the courts, eliminate checks and balances, undo established treaties and legislation that limits executive power, weaken protections for free and fair elections.

Rewrite History — Exert control over schools and the media to indoctrinate the public with beliefs that reinforce autocratic power.

Exploit Religion — Appeal to the religious majority while targeting minorities. Conflate national identity with religious identity.

Divide and Conquer — Use hate speech and encourage violent actors to widen social rifts and use manufactured crises to seize more power.

Erode Truth — Attack the press as an “enemy of the people”; dismiss negative reports as “fake news,” counter legitimate information with disinformation, or “alternative facts.” Blast the media landscape with endless scandal and contradiction to overwhelm the traditional fail-safes.

J

Well, that was perfectly laid out. That’s exactly what’s happening. I don’t know if you got to watch Frontline last night but they covered the neo Nazi groups and events leading up to the 1/6 insurrection. I’m sure you can find it on the pbs website. Lots of interviews with members from all of the right wing groups. It’s very scary especially because we don’t know what - if anything - is being done to throttle them.

I did recorded it on my PVR but haven't gotten to it yet. It is very scary because they seem to be getting more and more brazen about using bullying or threats to get people who are sympathetic in position of power locally. This is happening on practically a daily basis.

J

[Jethrobodine123]

I hope you are all doing well, crazy times for sure. Here's hoping that Omicron peaks very soon and then nosedives as it's done in other countries. We had been one of least affected places in the world here in Nova Scotia but the Omicron has really changed that and quickly, although we've seen much lower hospitalization and deaths. Hopefully, this will turn into the endemic phase sooner than later.

We're watching what looks like the collapse of democracy in your country, so many things going on nationally and especially State wide that seem to be a harbinger of some bad things to come. There seems to be a lack of imagination of what could happen and how it could affect everyday life. Perhaps it's the whole "American Exceptionalism" that make people think that it couldn't happen, some people need to deal with reality. Biden and the democrats need to see this as an existential threat to the country, they need to pass voting rights too the suite, time is of the essence. Also, they need to begin to talk over and over about what could happen if authoritarians take over the country. They need to take a cue from the Republicans and repeat stuff over and over, ad nauseam, to what this would mean to the average Joe Public. As a follower of politics, with a background in Economics and the Markets, the general public must be made aware that if democracy goes down, their houses would not be worth what it is now, the stock markets would not be where it is now, their pensions could be affected, their jobs could disappear, so many more negative consequences would be in the offing, you don't want to go there because once it starts, it's almost impossible to stop it.

Amazing watching what's going on now in the United States, fascinating for sure, but very scary.

Jethro

here’s some insight as to where it’s heading from a Canadian perspective

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-the-american-polity-is-cracked-and-might-collapse-canada-must-prepare/

Yes there's been a few very good articles written here lately about what could happen south of us and what effect it may have on our country. It's hard to believe that this is being discussed here and very seriously, this is not something that is being said or written about in jest.

My best friend is a military expert and we're both political junkies, so we would have these long discussions about what was going on in the United States. After Trump was elected we both thought that there could be a civil war in the foreseeable future. Hopefully, it won't get to that but the possibility is there, now more than ever.

J

[HarthorneWingo]

Ari Melber, an attorney, cross-examines Trumpanzee sycophant, Peter Navarro, into confessing to participating with a coup.

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[HarthorneWingo]

According to 538, Biden approval poll is 43.1% and trending down. He needs to get out there and start signing some Executive Orders. Do something for crying out loud.

[HarthorneWingo]

The Lincoln Project definitely makes good anti-Republican ads. Got to give them the credit that’s due.

The Republican Year In Review

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[HarthorneWingo]

We’re losing the battle. The stupid, ignorant, and the greedy are too much to overcome.

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[Clyde_Style]

For those who are not familiar with him, Lawrence Tribe is perhaps the preeminent constitutional scholar in the country. Worth following

Read on Twitter

?s=21

I respect Tribe, but his bottoms up comment is misguided IMO. That's exactly what needed to be done and has happened and now they have the goods to round up the top people. It doesn't happen by going top down.

[thebuzzardman]

For those who are not familiar with him, Lawrence Tribe is perhaps the preeminent constitutional scholar in the country. Worth following

Read on Twitter

?s=21

I respect Tribe, but his bottoms up comment is misguided IMO. That's exactly what needed to be done and has happened and now they have the goods to round up the top people. It doesn't happen by going top down.

https://www.emptywheel.net/2022/01/05/merrick-garland-points-out-that-misdemeanors-are-easy/

[Jethrobodine123]

For those who are not familiar with him, Lawrence Tribe is perhaps the preeminent constitutional scholar in the country. Worth following

Read on Twitter

?s=21

I respect Tribe, but his bottoms up comment is misguided IMO. That's exactly what needed to be done and has happened and now they have the goods to round up the top people. It doesn't happen by going top down.

https://www.emptywheel.net/2022/01/05/merrick-garland-points-out-that-misdemeanors-are-easy/

I feel bad for Garland, he's a decent human being, there is no doubt in my mind that he cares about the law and how it's applied, he wants the DOJ to stay above the fray and not become politicized, he only wants to do the right thing, that's admirable. However, he is the wrong person to be the Attorney General of the United States at this point in time, when you're in a literal battle to save democracy, you need a different sort of individual to lead the justice department. Just like Tom Hagen in the godfather being replaced as the consigliere because they needed a wartime consigliere at that point in time.

J

[Clyde_Style]

For those who are not familiar with him, Lawrence Tribe is perhaps the preeminent constitutional scholar in the country. Worth following

Read on Twitter

?s=21

I respect Tribe, but his bottoms up comment is misguided IMO. That's exactly what needed to be done and has happened and now they have the goods to round up the top people. It doesn't happen by going top down.

https://www.emptywheel.net/2022/01/05/merrick-garland-points-out-that-misdemeanors-are-easy/

Good stuff. quoting Garland:

The actions we have taken thus far will not be our last.

The Justice Department remains committed to holding all January 6th perpetrators, at any level, accountable under law — whether they were present that day or were otherwise criminally responsible for the assault on our democracy. We will follow the facts wherever they lead.

Because January 6th was an unprecedented attack on the seat of our democracy, we understand that there is broad public interest in our investigation. We understand that there are questions about how long the investigation will take, and about what exactly we are doing.

I felt it was a great speech in large part due to his fairly dry coverage of the procedural aspects of the investigation. If you're oblivious to that, then you're either not paying attention or more interested in complaining about the wrong things.

I continue to be highly impressed by how this has been handled knowing full well this would be at minimum a two year process. Anything less wouldn't have brought the top dogs to the indictment phase with the sort of evidence that can lead to convictions. This was TREASON. It's incredibly serious. And it was the worst breach in modern history and so it has to be done right. Screw this up and democracy in America is toast. No justice served for trying to overthrow the republic will merely give future fascists free reign to try again.

One of the things I find so blatantly obvious is this is well-coordinated between Pelosi, Biden and Garland with the understanding that the upper level indictments fall squarely in the lead-up to the mid-terms. This is circumstantial really since they couldn't really speed this up anyway, but it does happen to coincide with the time frame whereby the whole of the GOP up for election will be backdropped by the then ongoing indictments, trials and convictions of Trump, his top associates and Trump's family.

Tish James is readying her indictments, because you don't subpoena the witnesses you are about to charge until the whole underlying case has already been laid. And that will almost surely result in asset seizure of Trump properties. There is no positive end game there for Trump and his kids, because their refusal to testify (because, uh, we don't want to implicate ourselves in other criminal proceedings, gotcha) actually makes asset seizure a fait accompli by failing to rebut the charges in the NYS case.

And Alvin Bragg is probably very close to the same stages in the NYC CRIMINAL case which can put any of Trump and his kids behind bars.

So by the time the Jan. 6 Comm refers any of them for criminal charges to the DOJ there were will already be trials underway or completed in NYC.

That's the backdrop, so I expect Trump himself will be charged for the insurrection on some set of federal charges. Already floated was wire fraud so there's all kinds of angles they can approach this from in terms of charges that stick, not just the whopper of treason.

There's layers to this and whining about speeding things up completely misses all of this context. I'm more confident about the way this is being handled than pretty much anything I've seen from our top officials in some time. They have shown real gravity in addressing this. It convinces me they do want to preserve democratic institutions. Adam Schiff is in the thick of this and that MF is a prosecutorial hound dog. The right people are on board.

In parallel efforts, the DOJ is advancing cases now against states to challenge their bogus election restriction legislations enacted since the election to ensure GOP candidates win.

AND

Biden has stacked the courts more successfully than any POTUS. Last I read, it was 70% non-white judges and over half of them are women. His campaign pledges to promote diversity was real.

All of these efforts are part of the current administration's efforts to prevent a fascist takeover in the future. The GOP has shown they will destroy any freedom that gets in the way of attaining and holding on to power. This WH is showing they are committed to facing this threat. Anyone who wants to save democracy who tries to drag this administration on these particular issues is unwittingly playing for the other side.

[HarthorneWingo]

I respect Tribe, but his bottoms up comment is misguided IMO. That's exactly what needed to be done and has happened and now they have the goods to round up the top people. It doesn't happen by going top down.

https://www.emptywheel.net/2022/01/05/merrick-garland-points-out-that-misdemeanors-are-easy/

I feel bad for Garland, he's a decent human being, there is no doubt in my mind that he cares about the law and how it's applied, he wants the DOJ to stay above the fray and not become politicized, he only wants to do the right thing, that's admirable. However, he is the wrong person to be the Attorney General of the United States at this point in time, when you're in a literal battle to save democracy, you need a different sort of individual to lead the justice department. Just like Tom Hagen in the godfather being replaced as the consigliere because they needed a wartime consigliere at that point in time.

J

I think if they convened a Grand Jury, they could indict Trump now. I’m beginning to think that they are concerned that if they do that, then they’ll ignite the militias into action and things will get messy.

Here’s the other problem, if we lose the House in November, bye-bye 1/6/21 House committee investigation, That’ll be the first thing they stop.

[Jethrobodine123]

https://www.emptywheel.net/2022/01/05/merrick-garland-points-out-that-misdemeanors-are-easy/

I feel bad for Garland, he's a decent human being, there is no doubt in my mind that he cares about the law and how it's applied, he wants the DOJ to stay above the fray and not become politicized, he only wants to do the right thing, that's admirable. However, he is the wrong person to be the Attorney General of the United States at this point in time, when you're in a literal battle to save democracy, you need a different sort of individual to lead the justice department. Just like Tom Hagen in the godfather being replaced as the consigliere because they needed a wartime consigliere at that point in time.

J

I think if they convened a Grand Jury, they could indict Trump now. I’m beginning to think that they are concerned that if they do that, then they’ll ignite the militias into action and things will get messy.

Here’s the other problem, if we lose the House in November, bye-bye 1/6/21 House committee investigation, That’ll be the first thing they stop.

Absolutely, totally agree on both points. There is no doubt that how some would react to an indictment is something that is holding them back. Also, if the Republicans win the house, they will put an end to the investigation within 30 seconds of taking power, count on it.

J

[thebuzzardman]

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1jxAFWeAVpVpWwMSLcpaYyb16J5GromIfQA7G3wGhHA4/edit

Capital Attack timeline by the Sedition Hunters group, the ones collecting all the data crowdsourced style

[Clyde_Style]

I feel bad for Garland, he's a decent human being, there is no doubt in my mind that he cares about the law and how it's applied, he wants the DOJ to stay above the fray and not become politicized, he only wants to do the right thing, that's admirable. However, he is the wrong person to be the Attorney General of the United States at this point in time, when you're in a literal battle to save democracy, you need a different sort of individual to lead the justice department. Just like Tom Hagen in the godfather being replaced as the consigliere because they needed a wartime consigliere at that point in time.

J

I think if they convened a Grand Jury, they could indict Trump now. I’m beginning to think that they are concerned that if they do that, then they’ll ignite the militias into action and things will get messy.

Here’s the other problem, if we lose the House in November, bye-bye 1/6/21 House committee investigation, That’ll be the first thing they stop.

Absolutely, totally agree on both points. There is no doubt that how some would react to an indictment is something that is holding them back. Also, if the Republicans win the house, they will put an end to the investigation within 30 seconds of taking power, count on it.

J

Just watch the live proceedings that will be commencing soon. You guys are so off the mark I can't get into it with you. Yes, America is a mess, but this investigation is one of the good things happening and it is being handled very well.

And, NO, they are not going to wait for the mid-terms to file charges. The DOJ can't be voted out in the mid-terms and they will be running the show by that point.

[BadNewsBarnes]

So the latest ****storm surrounding a famous tennis player...

Novak Djokovic's mother says her son is being treated "like a prisoner" inside a detention hotel, as he awaits news on his visa application.
Djokovic's appeal to enter Australia and participate in the Australian Open has been adjourned until 10am local time on Monday before a final decision is made. Djokovic's father, Srdjan, accused Australian authorities of holding the 20-time Grand Slam champion "captive".
Now the 34-year-old's mother, Djina Djokovic, has publicly protested her son's situation and says his accommodation is "terrible".

https://www.eurosport.com/tennis/australian-open/2022/novak-djokovic-s-mother-says-her-son-is-being-treated-like-a-prisoner-as-he-waits-for-visa-appeal-de_sto8695249/story.shtml

Basically, his visa was terminated because he wasn't vaccinated for COVID or prove that he recently had COVID, requested a medical exemption for the Aussie Open.

[El Poochio]

3/3 in negative tests I am like Steph Curry

[Clyde_Style]

So the latest ****storm surrounding a famous tennis player...

Novak Djokovic's mother says her son is being treated "like a prisoner" inside a detention hotel, as he awaits news on his visa application.
Djokovic's appeal to enter Australia and participate in the Australian Open has been adjourned until 10am local time on Monday before a final decision is made. Djokovic's father, Srdjan, accused Australian authorities of holding the 20-time Grand Slam champion "captive".
Now the 34-year-old's mother, Djina Djokovic, has publicly protested her son's situation and says his accommodation is "terrible".

https://www.eurosport.com/tennis/australian-open/2022/novak-djokovic-s-mother-says-her-son-is-being-treated-like-a-prisoner-as-he-waits-for-visa-appeal-de_sto8695249/story.shtml

Basically, his visa was terminated because he wasn't vaccinated for COVID or prove that he recently had COVID, requested a medical exemption for the Aussie Open.

Trying to turn this into a personal tragedy is lame. What did they expect to happen? Australia was going to make an exception for him?

[Jethrobodine123]

So the latest ****storm surrounding a famous tennis player...

Novak Djokovic's mother says her son is being treated "like a prisoner" inside a detention hotel, as he awaits news on his visa application.
Djokovic's appeal to enter Australia and participate in the Australian Open has been adjourned until 10am local time on Monday before a final decision is made. Djokovic's father, Srdjan, accused Australian authorities of holding the 20-time Grand Slam champion "captive".
Now the 34-year-old's mother, Djina Djokovic, has publicly protested her son's situation and says his accommodation is "terrible".

https://www.eurosport.com/tennis/australian-open/2022/novak-djokovic-s-mother-says-her-son-is-being-treated-like-a-prisoner-as-he-waits-for-visa-appeal-de_sto8695249/story.shtml

Basically, his visa was terminated because he wasn't vaccinated for COVID or prove that he recently had COVID, requested a medical exemption for the Aussie Open.

What a joke, his father was calling for marching on the streets for god's sake. Get the F out of here with that s%$#! Just because your son hits a ball with a racket and is good at it, you expect him to get away with murder. Djokovic is an entitled brat who thinks only about himself, he's known to be an **** with a capital A. Good for the Australians for telling him you're not welcomed here.

J