November - December links

I wrote more posts in November than in any other month in the past year. The collection of links aside from the Ukraine scandal are paltry. Not much new in America.

Surprising Arizona politics. A tough, nasty, bigoted sheriff prompted many Latinos to run for elected office. This is another sign of the self-correction in the American political system. (But is it enough?)

Illegal gun sales. By law enforcement officials. Did they trust that the guns wouldn't be used on fellow police?

2nd amendment rationale. A viewpoint on the 2nd amendment, including its racial aspects. It's inspired me to look into the background of the 2nd amendment and try to sort out the contradictory arguments.

The GOP southern strategy. An article from back in 1970. It's the typical NYT style with a lot of side trips, but very interesting, focusing on the strategist who foresaw the realignment of voters.

How Kamala Harris failed. She lacked a clear strategy beyond being intelligent, black, and female.

Centrism is deluded. This article makes a strong case that there's no chance of working with Republicans. However, that's not the only reason to support someone like Biden or Buttigieg. Another reason is that those further left may not be able to win, not worth taking the chance, or just too socialist.

Flynn facing sentence. Mike Flynn tried to delay his sentence by promising he'd cooperate more with the Russian investigation. Then he fired his lawyers, brought in a new team to push the deep-state conspiracy narrative, and attacked the people he's supposed to cooperate with. The judge is not amused. A shorter version of the newstory and a longer version.

Media bias measured. Well, I'm not sure how the determination is made, but this site lists how biased a media outlet is, and how factual the reporting is. Plus it gives examples when there are issues with factual reporting.

Trump talking points. Someone allied with Trump launched a special site just for those holidays spent with your stupid liberal family members. It tells zipperheads how to argue, just in case they haven't watched enough Hannity lately. Are these good arguments? OF COURSE NOT. When do Trump supporters care about the quality of their arguments? Blather and blind, willful assertion are fine by them.

Image: snowflakevictory.com

Previously unknown information from the Mueller report

I wasn't expecting any surprises from the Mueller report, and I didn't really get any. No conspiracy between Russians and the Trump campaign - no surprise there. Russia did its thing without help from Trump, which really was the smart approach. Everything about the Trump contacts with Russia have already been leaked, thank God.

There were no surprises on the obstruction issue either. Trump was furious, wanted to fire Mueller, but was stymied by McGahn. I'm pretty sure this was reported already. Just to check, I fired up Google with the search term "McGahn refused fire Mueller," select some dates, and found plenty of articles, like this one from The Hill.

So what was new? I googled "surprises from Mueller report," but didn't get great results. Then I hit on "previously unknown Mueller report." That was the key.

So what's new? Trump dictating a hilarious statement for Jeff Sessions to read (full text here). Trump saying "I'm fucked" when he heard that a special counsel was appointed. Sarah Sanders admitted to Mueller that some of her statements (concerning countless FBI agents dissatisfied with Comey) were based on nothing. KT McFarland was asked to lie, but didn't. This was vaguely familiar, probably because she was squirrelly about some of her answers at confirmation hearings. I found a good list here.

I wasn't surprised that there weren't other conspiracy charges. The last indictment from Mueller would probably be the biggest. The last one was of Roger Stone, and he was charged with lying, witness tampering, and obstruction. The indictment told how he was in contact with Wikileaks, and that's the closest that anyone got to conspiracy.

So nothing really big from the Mueller report. The MSM had been reporting things all along, and they handled self-correction pretty well. Note that there wasn't any bombshell that Seth Rich had leaked the DNC material and was killed for it. Think of the many accurate reports in the media: Papadopoulus being approached; Manafort, Trump Jr., and Kushner in the Trump Tower meeting, McGahn refusing to fire Mueller, etc. The media seems to have been correct on those stories.

Of course, there are the redacted parts, and there may still be a few surprises. My guess is: nothing big.

Accurate again...

Image: redstatetalkradio.com

Links (1 of 2)

My tabs overfloweth.

Decoding anonymous sources. A good guide from Lawfare. How to interpret what reporters write, indicating how many sources they have and where they are. A good news organization follows these unwritten rules. Bad organizations pretend they follow the rules, but actually make up sources, use known unreliable sources, misleadingly edit and quote, and don't fire reporters and editors who don't follow good standards.

Now, one of those sources. Seymour Hersh is implicated in the Seth Rich-to-Wikileaks story. He claims it's just a rumor. I should dedicate a post to the Seth Rich story, but I'm too lazy. Briefly, Rich was a low-level staffer at the DNC or Hillary campaign and was killed in his DC neighborhood. Cue the conspiracy theories. Fox News got ahead of itself and coerced a contributor to say stuff he didn't actually believe, prompting him to sue. Seymour Hersh is involved because he is supposedly the source of some of that info. There's a tape of Hersh talking about the case. Strangely the tape begins and ends abruptly. I have suspicions that Hersh contradicts or says it's mostly his speculation. I haven't trusted edited tapes since Shirley Sherrod as smeared. Nonetheless, Hersh isn't saying what he knows. He ought to clear it up since the concern about a conspiracy is important here.

Sheriffs as the supreme law. Here is another right-wing idea to counter big, bad government. The concept is that the sheriff, being locally elected and accountable, is the supreme authority in a county, and doesn't have to enforce national laws. Remember Bull Connor and this doesn't seem so good. Joe Arpaio is supposedly an advocate for this idea. Luckily, he lost his last bid for reelection.

Another worrisome tactic to watch. Using Freedom-of-Information requests to undermine and sue small local school districts. Tactic supported by Steve Bannon. The goal is mirky, but maybe it's hidden in the settlements.

Russian election interference (another example). Something to watch. Fake accounts on Facebook bought ad time from Facebook. The purchase was automated, so even Facebook didn't know it was happening. Parking this timeline of Russia interference denial here. Hoping I can find it again.

Image: bostonglobe.com