Friday, February 03, 2023

SNIPPETS

After looking at American history, it's not unreasonable to wonder whether elite impunity is a national religion. SOURCE: WAPO // Daily 202

"Donald Trump's political operation has spent more money since he left office on lawyers representing the former president and a pair of nonprofits staffed by former Cabinet members than it has on Republican congressional campaigns, the Washington Post reports.

"The Department of Education in Ohio is investigating the openly antisemitic and racist Nazi homeschooling group with thousands of members being operated by a couple from Upper Sandusky, Ohio,” Vice…

Katja Lawrence, 37, also shares examples of how her family embraces Nazi ideology, including baking a Fuhrer cake for Hitler’s birthday and sharing a recording of her children shouting "Sieg heil.”

The fourth resident of The Villages in Florida admitted to voting twice in the 2020 election, WKMG reports.

"Advisors to Newsom and DeSantis, who are coming off landslide reelection victories, expect competition to escalate between the two governors, who could at some point run for president. But their differences are greater than one contest between two men. They also reflect widening national schisms over culture, lifestyle and the definition of freedom — between those who see institutions as forces to lift people up and those who see them bearing down on people.”

Inside Russia's Propaganda Machine: "Be sure to take Tucker." That is what one Russian news producer emailed a colleague, according to leaked documents published Thursday by The NYT's Paul Mozur, Adam Satariano, and Aaron Krolik. Relying on the leaked emails, the report provided a "rare glimpse into a propaganda machine that is perhaps Russia's greatest wartime success." And they showed how to spin up a narrative, "producers at the state media company cherry-picked from conservative Western media outlets like Fox News and the Daily Caller, as well as obscure social media accounts on Telegram and YouTube

 A.J. Bauer:  "The good news is 2023 will be the year that journalists finally learn how not to cover right-wing extremism in the United States. The bad news? They’ll learn by unwittingly bolstering its return to power in 2024."

Americans own nearly half the world's civilian-held guns ― but according to Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.), that's still not enough. "The Second Amendment is absolute, and it'S here to stay,” Boebert said Wednesday during a House floor speech. “A recent report states that Americans own 46% of the world's guns. I think we need to get our numbers up, boys and girls.”

On Doing Nothing | The Zen Teacher

March 9, 2020. One day a wife came in and saw her husband sitting in the La-Z-Boy recliner. "What are you doing?" she asked. "Nothing," he said. "You did that yesterday," she replied. "I know," the husband said. "But I wasn't done.". I recently had a discussion with a friend of mine about the difference between doing ...

The Art of Doing Nothing; Why Italians, not Americans, get this right.