Due to increased #COVID19 transmission, LA County will be requiring masks indoors regardless of vaccination status, starting 11:59 PM on Saturday, July 17th. Wearing a mask when indoors with others reduces the risk of both getting and transmitting the virus. pic.twitter.com/fDE3ITVcEj

— Los Angeles County (@CountyofLA) July 15, 2021

Former Trump administration official and regular conservative news network guest Richard Grenell announced that he is not running in the upcoming California recall election for Governor Gavin Newsom, Politico reports.

Grenell’s decision may have as much to do with Newsom’s popularity than his desire for the state’s top office.  In recent polling, 57% of likely voters did not support the recall effort, while only 40% did.

A prolific GOP fundraiser, Grenell was the ambassador to Germany and then acting position of national intelligence under Donald Trump.  Grenell has developed a following on social media for being belligerent and insulting to Democrats and President Joe Biden.

“RINO will send troops to fraudulent inauguration, but will not send troops for real illegals invasion, spoken like a true RINO Republican”

– The current top comment on the Breitbart article “Exclusive: Indiana’s GOP Governor Will Not Send Police to Border After Sending Troops to Joe Biden’s Inauguration“, posted Thursday night.

US District Court Judge for the Eastern District of Michigan Linda Parker is considering sanctions against QAnon lawyer and election conspiracy theorist Lin Wood for broadcasting a portion of Monday’s hearing in which lawyers for the City of Detroit and the State of Michigan argued Wood and others should be disbarred for false claims regarding voting fraud.

Court rules bar the unauthorized recording or broadcasting of court proceedings.  While the hearing was available for public viewing via Zoom because it was a public hearing, Wood allegedly recorded the hearing and clipped parts of it which he put on Telegram, a social media site favored by conservatives, along with his commentary.

Parker wrote “IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that L. Lin Wood shall show cause, in writing, by July 22, 2021, why he should not be disciplined in accordance with Local Rule 83.22(d) for ‘broadcasting’ the proceeding on social media in violation of Local Rule 83.32(e)(2).”

Pic of Capitol rioter Nathan Wayne Entrekin, from the criminal complaint filed against him. Entrekin was arrested at his mom’s house, where he lives, in Arizona Thursday. Entrekin believes himself to be the righteous incarnation of some Mormon figure named Captain Moroni. Why Captain Moroni wore Roman garb is unclear, though the complaint contains several paragraphs of background detail about Mormon mythology (apparently included as necessary to provide context to the claims Entrekin made to an interviewer that day), probably more than you may care to learn right now.

After getting booted from the Orange County, California site they booked for the rally this Saturday, QAnon Congress critters Matt Gaetz and Marjorie Taylor Greene are not disclosing where they’ve booked the planned event just 48 hours before it’s scheduled to begin.

The Southern California Press-Enterprise reports that Gaetz and Greene were told last week that they were not welcome to hold their American First rally at the Pacific Hills Banquet & Event Center in Laguna Hills in heavily-Republican Orange County.   It was unclear why the banquet center canceled the event.

Gaetz and Greene had distributed social media invitations touting the event, but now they claim they will not announce where it will be held until 24 hours beforehand for unspecified “security concerns.”  Greene’s spokesman, Nick Dyer, apparently didn’t get the memo about the security concerns and confirmed to the Press-Enterprise that they have booked it at the Riverside Convention Center, 45 miles away.

“Lordstown Motors Corp said federal prosecutors in Manhattan are investigating the electric-truck maker’s vehicle pre-orders and its merger with blank-check company DiamondPeak Holdings. In March, shares of the company slumped after investment research firm Hindenburg Research said Lordstown had misled consumers and investors about pre-orders worth $1.4 billion for its Endurance truck. An internal investigation into Hindenburg’s claims in June acknowledged that Lordstown had overstated the quality of pre-orders for its electric trucks. The company’s chief executive and finance head also resigned, shortly after Lordstown said in June that it may not have enough money to stay in business over the next year. The company also said it had no binding orders, backtracking from earlier comments made by the startup’s president” Reuters reports.

“GREAT NEWS FOR OHIO! Just spoke to Mary Barra, CEO of General Motors, who informed me that, subject to a UAW agreement etc., GM will be selling their beautiful Lordstown Plant to Workhorse, where they plan to build Electric Trucks. GM will also be spending $700,000,000 in Ohio… in 3 separate locations, creating another 450 jobs. I have been working nicely with GM to get this done. Thank you to Mary B, your GREAT Governor, and Senator Rob Portman. With all the car companies coming back, and much more, THE USA IS BOOMING!” the “Dealmaker” tweeted on May 8th, 2019.

If you wonder how easy it is to hack into voting machines watch this movie Kill Chain. It’s made by democrats for democrats but it accurately sets forth some of the problems. https://t.co/w8c91emzn1

— Paul Gosar (@DrPaulGosar) July 15, 2021

The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department says “several” deputies and dozens of inmates have been injured in a “mass disturbance” at the Pitchess Detention Facility in Castaic, California, per a very brief report from KNBC. No word yet if it was a lover’s quarrel that erupted when Inmate #47 said to Inmate #3 he was the cutest little jailbird he ever did see.

“Florida GOP Rep. Matt Gaetz’s congressional campaign paid $25,000 in June for ‘legal consulting’ fees to a Manhattan criminal defense attorney, new campaign finance records show. Gaetz’s latest filing shows that he paid the sum to attorney Marc Fernich, who lists among his ‘notable clients’ the accused child sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, Mexican drug kingpin Joaquin ‘El Chapo’ Guzman Loera, and convicted crime family boss John ‘Junior’ Gotti” Business Insider reports.

“The legal payments from Gaetz’s campaign came after reports surfaced in late March that the third-term congressman was under investigation for sex trafficking. The New York Times reported that the Justice Department was investigating whether Gaetz had a sexual relationship with a 17-year-old and paid for her to travel with him. Gaetz has denied any wrongdoing. Fernich’s practice, according to his website, ‘centers on criminal defense, mainly sophisticated appeals and legal motions that can toss charges at the trial level or pave the way for future appeals.’ The Florida congressman’s campaign also spent $25,000 for ‘legal consulting’ from the law firm Zuckerman Spaeder LLP, the filings show. And Gaetz’s campaign paid a whopping $825,000 to the Logan Circle Group for advertising and ‘strategic campaign consulting’ between April 8 and May 14, the records show. Harlan Hill, the president of the DC-based Logan Circle Group and an ally of Donald Trump, has been responding to reporters’ inquiries about Gaetz since the scandal broke in the spring.”

Harlan Hill took a beating in his client list last fall after he called Kamala Harris an “insufferable lying bitch” on Twitter. The tweet’s still up too, for whatever reason. Hill also reneged on a vow to publicly eat his shoe if Trump lost, opting for the chickenshit “he really did win” excuse.

If Chadwick Boseman was a Trump fan he sure did a great job of hiding it, considering his final tweet before his tragic death celebrated now-Vice President Kamala Harris’s pick as Biden’s running mate with a picture of them hugging at an event protesting the MAGA Reich’s family separation policy. Seems clear “Bishop Larry” didn’t even bother doing his basic homework to come up with an explanation for why Boseman would appear publicly to be aligned with a high profile Dem.

“In an effort to further compel House Democrats to return to the State of Texas, I am chartering a plane that will be on standby in Washington, D.C. on Saturday. I am demanding all of our colleagues in D.C. to contact my staff immediately in order to secure their seat on the plane and return to Austin in order to do the state’s business” – Statement from Texas House Speaker Dade Phelan.

DECERTIFY THE ELECTION

— Wendy Rogers (@WendyRogersAZ) July 15, 2021

RECALL THE ELECTORS

— Wendy Rogers (@WendyRogersAZ) July 15, 2021

“Severe flooding in Germany and Belgium left at least 45 people dead on Thursday, with dozens of others missing and still more stranded on rooftops as violent storms lashed a swath of Western Europe. Swift-moving water from swollen rivers surged through cities and villages in three western German states, the hardest-hit region. In Belgium, where at least six people were killed, authorities ordered inhabitants of downtown Liège to evacuate as the Meuse River, which flows through its center, overflowed its banks. The storms and resulting high water also battered neighboring Switzerland, the Netherlands and Luxembourg as a slow-moving weather system threatened to dump even more rain on the inundated region overnight and into early Friday. The devastation caused by the severe weather came just days after the EU announced an ambitious blueprint to pivot away from fossil fuels over the next nine years, as part of plans to make the 27-country bloc carbon-neutral by 2050. And environmental activists and politicians were quick to draw parallels between the flooding and the effects of climate change” – New York Times.

Salt Lake Tribune: “A Utah pharmacist has admitted he gave COVID-19 vaccination cards to half a dozen people without giving them a shot of the vaccine. According to a stipulation order, the pharmacist surrendered his license and agreed to pay a $2,000 fine. He admitted that on or about June 30, he saw a ‘reluctant patient’ whose employer wanted the patient to get vaccinated. The pharmacist ‘allowed the pharmacy technician to counsel’ the patient on ‘alleged and/or unconfirmed adverse reactions’ to the COVID vaccines – and he ‘did not correct’ the technician when the patient was told ‘that the vaccination could cause infertility,’ according to the order.”

“The pharmacist was seen on surveillance video entering a room with the patient – off camera – and then returning. He was then seen taking a vial of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine from a refrigerator, recording the manufacturer’s lot number on the vaccine card and giving the card to the patient – but did not prepare a syringe or administer the vaccine. According to the stipulation order, the pharmacist said he was giving the patient ‘a choice.’ And also he said had done the same with a ‘handful of others… maybe five’ when he believed they were apprehensive about the vaccine.”

“The elite law firm Winston and Strawn is no longer representing Kraken lawyer Emily Newman in the Michigan sanctions fight. The filing provides no reason for withdrawal. Newman consents to substitution of new counsel” reports Reuters Legal Affairs writer Jan Wolfe.

“A judge in Iowa considered new motions Thursday filed by the defense for Cristhian Bahena Rivera, a Mexican national who was convicted of first-degree murder in the death of University of Iowa student Mollie Tibbetts. Tibbetts, 20, disappeared in July 2018 while on a run in her hometown of Brooklyn, Iowa. Bahena Rivera, 27, who came to the United States illegally as a teenager, led investigators to her body in a remote cornfield about a month after she vanished.”

“He was expected to get life without parole, but Judge Joel Yates delayed sentencing Wednesday after the defense came forward with two new witnesses. The defense motions requested a new trial and asked the judge to compel prosecutors to provide more information on other suspects investigated in the death of Mollie Tibbetts allegedly linked to a sex trafficking ring. The defense’s first new witness, an inmate at a county jail, told investigators that a fellow inmate, Gavin Jones, confessed to him that he and another man stabbed Tibbetts, and that Bahena Rivera was framed. According to Bahena Rivera’s lawyer, Jennifer Frese, Jones allegedly admitted he was involved with a ‘trap house’ and Tibbetts was abducted for purposes of sex trafficking. The second new witness, Jones’ ex-girlfriend, told a local sheriff’s office that she was in a car with Jones a month earlier when he said, ‘That Mexican shouldn’t be in jail for killing Mollie because I raped her and killed her,’ according to Iowa News Now. In court on Thursday, Frese said the ex-girlfriend was granted a protective order against him after Jones allegedly held a gun to her head” Fox News reports.

This would sure be an interesting development, especially after in August 2018 Newt Gingrich emailed Axios to tell them “If Mollie Tibbetts is a household name by October, Democrats will be in deep trouble. If we can be blocked by Manafort-Cohen, etc., then GOP could lose [the House] badly” which showed just how sincerely their hearts ached for Tibbetts’ family having lost their daughter. Then there was some Neo-Nazis who pushed a robocall about her death. Some asshole on The Hill even changed his Disqus name to “Midterms for Mollie” at one point.

So the reaction – if it’s proven in court that the guy was indeed innocent all along – would be something to watch, given how much the murder fed into the xenophobic batshittery of the lead up to the 2018 Midterms. Then again it might not get any notice on the right at all since fanboys these days only really seem to be obsessed with imaginary sex traffickers and not real ones.

I really dislike covering the statements from Donald Trump.  I mean, with a passion.  To me, they’re like giving a spoiled adolescent underserved attention, much the same way people take Tucker Carlson seriously.

But through his spokesperson, Trump released a statement this afternoon that finally had a nugget of truth in it, and that should be examined.  He’s apparently quite upset that the avalanche of books about his term in office are garnering significant attention, as are some of the people quoted in the books.

“Nobody had ever heard of some of these people that worked for me in D.C.,” Trump wrote. “All of a sudden, the Fake News starts calling them. Some of them — by no means all — felt emboldened, brave, and for the first time in their lives, they feel like ‘something special,’ not the losers that they are — and they talk, talk, talk!  Many say I am the greatest star-maker of all time.  But some of the stars I produced are actually made of garbage.”

I’m lookin’ at you, Junior.

https://youtu.be/7OZmNbBDQ6k
The only feed I could find is from this weird channel with only ten videos. One of which is clips of Trump’s first impeachment inquiry in December 2019 but titled “League of Legends Zyra Support Silver 3 Going for Gold” meaning the guy confused a video file of him playing a competitive online PC game with video of the US House and still has not fixed it almost 2 years later, so I think it fits pretty well with the overall theme of the most populous county in Arizona’s 2020 ballots being “audited” by a company called “CyberNinjas” whom have zero experience with such a task.

“Despite massive Voter Fraud and Irregularities during the 2020 Presidential Election Scam, that we are now seeing play out in very big and important States, I never threatened, or spoke about, to anyone, a coup of our Government. So ridiculous! Sorry to inform you, but an Election is my form of ‘coup,’ and if I was going to do a coup, one of the last people I would want to do it with is General Mark Milley. He got his job only because the world’s most overrated general, James Mattis, could not stand him, had no respect for him, and would not recommend him. To me the fact that Mattis didn’t like him, just like Obama didn’t like him and actually fired Milley, was a good thing, not a bad thing. I often act counter to people’s advice who I don’t respect”

“In any event, I lost respect for Milley when we walked together to St. John’s Church (which was still smoldering from a Radical Left fire set the day before), side by side, a walk that has now been proven to be totally appropriate – and the following day Milley choked like a dog in front of the Fake News when they told him they thought he should not have been walking with the President, which turned out to be incorrect. He apologized profusely, making it a big story, instead of saying I am proud to walk with and protect the President of the United States. Had he said that, it would have all been over, no big deal, but I saw at that moment he had no courage or skill, certainly not the type of person I would be talking ‘coup’ with. I’m not into coups!”

“In fact, around the same time Milley, in a conversation, was an advocate of changing all of the names of our Military Forts and Bases. I realized then, also, he was a much different person than I had hoped. I said to him, ‘spend more time thinking about China and Russia, and less time on being politically correct'” – Trump just again confirming what everyone’s been saying about him.