The Washington Post reports that several staffers working on the final report for the House Select Committee investigating the January 6th Republican-led domestic terrorist attack on Congress have expressed frustration with vice-chair Liz Cheney’s insistence that the final report focus on Donald Trump’s involvement in the plot to overturn the 2020 election.

Some staffers have quit the investigation while others are pushing other committee members to include details about other aspects of the investigation in the report; according to the Post, some have complained the report is becoming a Cheney 2024 presidential campaign product.  The investigation was split into teams which each specialized on one aspect of the attack, including things like financing, the failure of DC law enforcement, or the role of extremist groups in the attack.

A senior committee staffer told team members in a conference call that the work of the Gold team–the team focusing on Trump’s actions and role–would be the focus of the report, while other work would be excluded unless it connected to Trump.  Cheney and others have disputed the characterization of the comment, saying other aspects of the investigation will be included in the final report, and committee members have said the committee intends to make its work product and much of its collected material available online for public review, so inclusion in the final printed report is less important.

Did you know the Speaker can enforce Single Subject Legislation on day one?

We have the opportunity to end the 3,000 page bills that you have to pass to know what’s in it.

— Lauren Boebert (@laurenboebert) November 23, 2022

First, no Speaker will enforce the Single Subject Legislation rule of the House.  It would lead to chaos as individual issue bills clog up committees and require hundreds of floor votes.  But the true genius (?) of Lauren Boebert, the alleged former prostitute who was a favorite of Senator Ted Cruz (R-Quintana Roo) and who enjoyed easy access to abortions, is that she screws up her job.

See, the “have to pass it to know what’s in it” is Boebert trying to throw shade at House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who said something similar during the passage of the Affordable Care Act.  But when  she said it, Pelosi was noting the ACA would have to go through Congressional reconciliation–the process by which a bill the House passes is matched with its partner bill passing the Senate to produce a bill that would pass both chambers.  When Boebert cites it, she’s demonstrating her ignorance about how bills become law that any high school graduate should know.

Two members of Donald Trump’s political cabal–Jason Miller and convicted criminal Steve Bannon–are advising Brazil’s lame duck President Jair Bolsonaro on strategies to overturn the legitimate results of the October Brazilian elections, which liberal Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva won, the Washington Post reports.

Given that neither Bannon nor Miller are believed to have an iota of knowledge about Brazilian constitutional law or election precedents, their involvement is likely to assist with the muckraking and violent protests that surrounded Trump’s unsuccessful effort to overturn the 2020 election.

Like Trump, the right-wing populist Bolsonaro was voted out of office, and like Trump, Bolsonaro is roiling up his cultish followers with unsubstantiated tales of election fraud.  Also like Trump’s supporters, Bolsonaro’s supporters believe the military will intercede for their candidate, with some camping out at the gates of military bases to encourage soldiers to act.

Maybe we shouldn’t let people like this and their extreme ideology anywhere near governing? https://t.co/UPAM9rp9C4

— Rep. Eric Swalwell (@RepSwalwell) November 23, 2022

Come January there will be 12 women serving as state governors, a new high over the previous (and current) record of nine serving simultaneously, FiveThirtyEight reports. The number of women serving in Congress will remain roughly the same however and will end up between 143 and 147 from the current 145 (about 27% of the total) depending on the outcome of four uncalled races.

It’s a hell of a lot of progress in what for pretty much all of human history has been a man’s line of work, but a quarter ain’t good enough for the fairer half of our population. It was largely women voters who stepped up again and again and unfucked the messes that largely male voters made over these last several years. It was women leaders like Nancy Pelosi and Kamala Harris who were instrumental in getting important legislation passed in the last two.

Republican Georgia Senate nominee and man who aspires to have Tucker Carlson’s resting bitch face Herschel Walker is set to claim a $1,500 homestead tax credit for his principal residence, CNN reports.  The problem for Walker’s candidacy for Senate from Georgia is that the tax credit it given in the state of Texas because Walker continues to list Tarrant County, Texas home as his primary residence.

Just like with New Jerseyan Mehmet Oz’s run for Senate in Pennsylvania, Walker’s campaign has been dogged by claims that he remains a Texas resident carpetbagging in Georgia.  Walker’s primary residence being claimed in Texas presents an issue because Walker voted in Georgia during the current election cycle.

Breaking Noose: Department of Justice prosecutors are hanging onto hopes they can get former Vice President Mike Pence to stick his neck out and testify to the grand jury investigating the failed Trump coup attempt and the January 6th 2021 Capitol riot, the New York Times reports.

Citing executive privilege, Pence said he would not respect a Congressional subpoena demanding his testimony about Trump’s efforts to block the certification of Joe Biden as winner of the election.  A Department of Justice criminal investigation presents a couple problems with that claim:  first, that this probe targets a criminal act which executive privilege does not cover and second, the Department of Justice is part of the Executive branch.

The Georgia state Supreme Court on Wednesday rejected Republicans’ attempt to block counties from allowing early voting this Saturday ahead of the Senate runoff erection between incumbent Dem Reverend Raphael Warnock and shitbrained deadbeat dad Herschel Walker.

Separately, the court also reinstated the state’s ban on abortion after six weeks of pregnancy pending its decision on an appeal of a lower court’s ruling from earlier this month.

“The United States continues to support Ukraine with additional military assistance to help defend itself, including from the Kremlin’s relentless attacks on Ukraine’s critical energy infrastructure. Pursuant to a delegation of authority from the President, today I am authorizing our twenty-sixth drawdown of US arms and equipment for Ukraine since August 2021. This $400 million drawdown includes additional arms, munitions, and air defense equipment from US Department of Defense inventories. This drawdown Will bring the total US military assistance for Ukraine to an unprecedented level of approximately $19.7 billion, since the beginning of the Administration.”

“The United States will continue to stand with more than 40 allies and partners in support of the people of Ukraine as they defend their freedom and independence with extraordinary courage and boundless determination. The artillery ammunition, precision fires, air defense missiles, and tactical vehicles that we are providing Will best serve Ukraine on the battlefield. We are joined In our efforts by France and the UK, including the €50 million in air defense systems offered by UK Prime Minister Sunak during his recent visit to Kyiv, and we note Sweden’s recent air defense commitment valued at nearly $300 million. We will continue to support Ukraine for as long as it takes, so it can continue to defend itself and be in the strongest possible position at the negotiating table when the tune comes. We stand United with Ukraine,” says Secretary of State Tony Blinken in a statement.

An Netherlands judge last week ruled a group of activist liberal squatters can stay in an Amsterdam mansion owned by Russian tech oligarch Arkady Volozh, the New York Times reports. The court decided there was no legitimate reason for the house to lie vacant while Volozh, founder of shitty Russian Google knockoff Yandex, and his family are barred indefinitely from entering the EU.

In March squatters took over a London mansion owned by Trump-connected Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska. It’s not clear if they’re still occupying the place or if they’ve been kicked out by cops.

President Biden appears to be leaning toward running for reelection in 2024, Politico reports on the product of discussions with family as they celebrate Thanksgiving in Nantucket. No formal announcement appears imminent, but the entry of disgraced former President Trump, better than expected midterm results for Democrats, and the lack of a clear successor are all pushing the Lord of Ice Cream toward campaigning as an 81 year old incumbent.

Biden has reportedly privately made clear his belief he’s the only one who can defeat the Orange God Emperor and the grave threat he poses to American democracy again. It’s hard to argue with that even if Old Joe is, well, pretty freaking old. The midterms went far better for Democrats than even he might’ve expected, with independent voters breaking 49 to 47 for Blue. Staying the course is the smartest thing to do as Republicans work themselves up into increasing insanity.

Six people plus the gunman are dead after a shooting rampage at a Walmart store in Virginia on Tuesday night, the AP reports, just days after a MAGA maniac shot five people dead at an LGBT club in Colorado. “I am devastated by the senseless act of violence that took place late last night in our city,” Mayor Rick W. West said in a statement posted on the city’s Twitter account Wednesday. “Chesapeake is a tightknit community and we are all shaken by this news.”

UPDATE 11/23/2022 8:31 AM EST: The AP reports the assailant was a store employee who opened fire in a break room. All six of the victims were coworkers, and the shooter killed himself afterward.

Authorities in Florida arrested a 45-year-old man wanted in the murder of four people at a cannabis farm in Oklahoma after an automatic plate reader identified the suspect’s car, CBS News reports.  One additional person was wounded and is in critical condition.

Law enforcement officials say all people involved, who are all Chinese nationals, knew each other.  The dead included three men and one woman.  It is unclear what prompted Wu Chen to murder the others, nor is it known what relationship if any the people had.

Kingfisher County law enforcement initially responded to a call about a potential hostage situation at the 10-acre farm Sunday, but after surveilling the area with binoculars and drones, officers entered the scene and found the bodies.  They identified the suspect thanks to security cameras, which showed Chen spending a long period of time in the main shed of the property before the murders took place.

Well, first of all, this election is more than Herschel Walker,” Herschel Walker says, referring to himself in the third person perhaps because there’s no “i” in team, or something.  “This erection is about the people,” to which Ted Cruz nods approvingly and Lindsey Graham’s eyes wander.  Some polls say it’s Herschel’s erection to lose.

Also, note Lindsey’s “Run, Herschel, Run” button, which appropriates a saying from the movie Forrest Gump, in which the below-average-intellectually Gump is encouraged to “Run, Forrest, Run!” and gets an eventual scholarship to play football at Alabama, not Walker’s Georgia.  But Lindsey’s comparing Herschel Walker to Forrest Gump.  Forrest “Lieutenant Dan” fucking Gump, like it’s a compliment.

A Michigan man is facing two federal felonies of transmitting threats to injure someone relating to messages he made earlier this month menacing FBI director Christopher Wray and Democratic California Congressman John Garamendi, CNN reports.

The latest in a number of people arrested for threatening politicians (typically Democratic or liberal targets), Neil Matthew Walter–note the three first names which typically signify a child molester or a serial killer–left a message on the voicemail of Garamendi’s DC office November 4th saying, “John. Hey John. You’re gonna die John. You’re gonna die.”  A week later, in the comments of a live stream featuring an interview with Wray, Walter posted, “I will kill you director Wray you will die I will kill you in self-defense.”

When police in Walter’s hometown learned of the threats and went to perform a welfare check on him, Walter picked up a handgun and refused to put it down.  According to court documents, Walter–who is obviously white–held the weapon as he went on a prolonged rant about “kids being raped, a lawsuit with Putin, and how he is calling everyone all the time, but no one is doing anything about the kids,” a conspiracy theory embraced by the QAnon base of the Republican Party.  He also claimed he was defending himself against a tyrannical government.

With the Biden Administration catching a record number of undocumented border crossers at the southern border, Republicans believe that impeaching Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, who oversees the record setting effort, Reuters reports.

While participating in a photo op at the border in Texas, expectant future Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy threatened Mayorkas with impeachment when the Republicans get a scant majority in the House.  McCarthy said he wants to impeach Mayorkas because Mayorkas has overseen the interdiction of a record number of migrants who, McCarthy claims, are coming to the United States because of favorable immigration policies of the Biden Administration.

“Our country may never recover from Secretary Mayorkas’ dereliction of duty,” McCarthy said at a press conference after he had a photo op looking wistfully into Mexico from Texas, like Ted Cruz does. “This is why today, I am calling on the secretary to resign.  If Secretary Mayorkas does not resign, House Republicans will investigate every order, every action and every failure, determine whether we can begin impeachment inquiry,” he said.  Republican theatrics in the House will go nowhere because Democrats control the Senate.

Arizonans demand answers and deserve transparency about the gross incompetence and mismanagement of the General Election by certain election officials. I will not stop fighting until ALL voters receive justice.

See you in court. pic.twitter.com/5jJ6WWt8IK

— Abe Hamadeh (@AbrahamHamadeh) November 23, 2022

Keep in mind this MAGA dipshit candidate for Arizona Attorney General already has an automatic recount coming in his race given the extremely thin margin of Dem opponent Kris Mayes’ apparent win. So he’s still in this. But it’s not clear he’s looking for any kind of specific relief like counting improperly rejected ballots or whatever so much as just demanding a court declare him the winner.

We think. It would help if the jackass would actually link the complaint instead of posting a screenshot of the first page. That would certainly clear things up here so we can stop speculating.

“After a two-week jury trial, a federal jury in Honolulu, Hawaii, found defendants Kaulana Alo-Kaonohi, 32, and Levi Aki Jr., 33, guilty of a hate crime for their racially motivated attacks on C.K., a white man who was attempting to move into their Native Hawaiian neighborhood of Kahakuloa on Maui… At trial, the evidence showed that C.K., purchased a house in Kahakuloa and decided to move there with his wife and three daughters after his wife was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis and forced to retire. When C.K. arrived in Kahakuloa, he was harassed and threatened by various Kahakuloa residents who told him things like, ‘This is a Hawaiian village. The only thing coming from the outside is the electricity,’ and ‘You don’t even belong in Hawaii,'” says a DOJ press release.

Continued: “On Feb. 13, 2014, when C.K. was unpacking his belongings with his elderly uncle, the defendants, who had never met C.K. before, stormed onto his property and demanded that he pack his things and leave, threatening to ‘tie [him] up and drag [him]’ and make him ‘go missing’ if he did not comply. When C.K. replied that he owned the house, defendant Alo-Kaonohi dragged his index finger along C.K.’s jaw and told him, ‘Your skin is the wrong [fucking] color.’ Defendant Aki then picked up a roofing shovel and handed it to defendant Alo-Kaonohi, who struck C.K. in the head with it, opening up a bloody wound on the back of C.K.’s head. Later on, after C.K. had already begun packing up his possessions, the defendants attacked him a second time,”

Trumpian Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro is filing a formal court challenge to the results of last month’s election, which he lost to leftist former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, saying that millions of votes collected using electronic voting machines, Politico reports.

Somewhat incuriously, Bolsonaro’s requested disqualification would flip the results of the election, giving him 51% of the vote, the same percentage Lula garnered in the actual election.  Bolsonaro’s attorney Rudolpho Giulianaro filed a 33-page notice with the federal election authority stating results from machines manufactured before 2020 because they do not have a system to individually identify internal logs, a system shortfall that the authority previously determined did not undermine the integrity of the vote counts.  If Bolsonaro’s request is granted, it would nullify votes collected by 59% of the machines used in the election, roughly 280,000 machines.