So much for all those right-wing pundits who insisted that President Biden was falling apart because he slipped while jogging up the steps of Air Force One. Kate Sullivan posted a tweet showing our President and his wife out for a ride.  Biden appears to be moving at a very healthy clip and has no trouble maintaining control of the bike with one hand while waving at reporters and fans.

New York Times: “American intelligence officials have found no evidence that aerial phenomena witnessed by Navy pilots in recent years are alien spacecraft, but they still cannot explain the unusual movements that have mystified scientists and the military, according to senior administration officials briefed on the findings of a highly anticipated government report. The report determines that the vast majority of more than 120 incidents over the past two decades did not originate from any U.S. military or other advanced government technology, the officials said. That determination would appear to eliminate the possibility that Navy pilots who reported seeing unexplained aircraft might have encountered programs the government meant to keep secret.”

“But that is about the only conclusive finding in the classified intelligence report, the officials said. And while a forthcoming unclassified version, expected to be released to Congress by June 25, will present few other firm conclusions, senior officials briefed on the intelligence conceded that the very ambiguity of the findings meant the government could not definitively rule out theories that the phenomenon observed by military pilots might be alien spacecraft. Americans’ long-running fascination with UFOs has intensified in recent weeks in anticipation of the release of the government report, which is expected to be presented to Congress this month. The report concedes that much about the observed phenomenon remains difficult to explain, including their acceleration, ability to change direction and submerge. One possible explanation – that the phenomena could be weather or other research balloons – does not hold up in all cases, the officials said, because of changes in wind speed at the times of some of the interactions. The final report will also contain a classified annex, the officials said. While that annex will not contain any evidence concluding that the phenomenon are alien spacecraft, the officials acknowledged that the fact that it would remain off limits to the public was likely to continue to fuel speculation that the government had secret data about alien visitations to Earth.”

Thanks to the Cameo service, Donald Trump Jr. can prostitute himself for cash, and he gets far less than his father used to charge.

For just $500, you can have Junior talk very loud and fast to you in a personalized message for your birthday, anniversary or just because it’s Monday.  (Junior really doesn’t have a need to take your money.)  Or you can give that special loved one, like an ex-wife, a personalized gift of a message from Junior.

Listing himself as an activist/author/entrepreneur/political commentator and reality TeeVee personality (but strangely, not Silver Spoon heir),  Junior claims his Cameo proceeds will go to the Shadow Warrior Project, a non-profit that supposedly provides assistance to former military contractors who were hurt on the job.  (Why their employers, like Erik Prince, aren’t responsible for taking care of people injured while fighting private wars is not explained.)

LOOK AT THIS COOL AIRPLANE!!! pic.twitter.com/Ys3cAttrze

— Greg Kelly (@gregkellyusa) June 3, 2021

“Jan 6 was a dark day in the history of our US Capitol – that same day we reconvened the Congress and did our duty. You know, President Trump and I have spoken several times since we left office and I don’t know if we’ll ever see eye to eye on that day” – Vice Former Guy Mike Pence, speaking to a crowd of Republicans in New Hampshire, via Politico’s Meredith McGraw.

CNN: “Nicaraguan presidential challenger Cristiana Chamorro has been placed under house arrest and could now be disqualified from running for office, according to local officials. Chamorro, a journalist and the daughter of former Nicaraguan President Violeta Barrios, is likely the only opposition candidate to challenge incumbent Daniel Ortega, who is seeking a fourth term in the November 7 elections. The arrest came shortly before a virtual press conference scheduled for 12pm local time on Wednesday, her press team told CNN. Her brother Carlos Chamorro said on Twitter that police raided her home in Managua and stayed for more than five hours.”

“According to a statement from Nicaraguan Public Ministry, Chamorro was charged with money laundering and mismanagement of the Violeta Barrios Foundation, a non-profit organization she had chaired. She denies the charges. The Prosecutor’s Office said in a statement that it has requested precautionary measures be imposed on Chamorro, including travel restrictions and disqualification from running for public office.”

With the estimated amount of damage to the building estimated at $1.5 million, prosecutors are including the cost of repairing the US Capitol on to the people charged in the January 6th domestic terrorism attack, the Washington Post reports.

When US Attorneys reached a plea deal with Paul Hodges of Tampa, who pleaded guilty to one felony count of obstructing an official proceeding of Congress on Wednesday, they included a provision stating that Hodges will be responsible for paying for a portion of the damage.

“Your client acknowledges that the riot that occurred on January 6, 2021, caused as of May 17, 2021, approximately $1,495,326.55 damage to the United States Capitol,” stated a plea agreement letter sent by Assistant U.S. Attorney Mona Sedky and signed by Hodgkins and his attorney in May.  Hodges agreed to pay $2,000 in restitution to the US Treasury.

https://youtu.be/KkZ75RWVh6I

CNN’s Paula Reid reported that the obstruction of justice investigation into Republican Florida Congressman Matt Gaetz concerns acts Gaetz reportedly took going back to October 2020 to hide his involvement in a child sex-trafficking ring involving his “wingman,” Joel Greenberg, who pleaded guilty to various federal charges earlier Thursday.

The MyPillow spot is around 38:00 mark. Let us know if we missed any other product placements.

High-profile attorney F. Lee Bailey, who defended such celebrity defendants as OJ Simpson and Patricia Hearst, died Thursday at his Massachusetts home, the AP reports.  He was 87.

Bailey’s client list included Simpson, accused of the brutal murders of his ex-wife and her friend; Hearst, a socialite heiress who went on a crime spree with her kidnappers; Army Capt. Ernest Medina, a military officer charged in connection with the My Lai massacre during the Vietnam War; and Dr. Samuel Sheppard, whose alleged murder of his wife was the inspiration of the movie and television show The Fugitive. One of Bailey’s most notorious clients was Albert DeSalvo, the so-called Boston Strangler, for which he was sentenced to life in prison.  Bailey said his disappointment in the guilty verdict stemmed from the lost opportunity to study DeSalvo psychosis:  “My goal was to see the Strangler wind up in a hospital, where doctors could try to find out what made him kill. Society is deprived of a study that might help deter other mass killers who lived among us, waiting for the trigger to go off inside them.”

New York City mayoral candidate Andrew Yang was pursued by angry protestors who decried Yang’s libertarian leanings in the city election and his professed plans to increase the number of police in the city, Politico reports.

The day after a debate between the three top candidates, Yang headed to the Park Slope YMCA – the gym preferred by incumbent mayor Bill DeBlasio – when he was followed by dozens of members of New York Communities for Change, causing Yang to turn around and move briskly in the other direction, media in tow. While Yang tried to make his prepared statements on the go but was drowned out by the shouts and jeers of the protesters calling him a “hedge fund manager” and a “Republican.”

Denver-based start-up Boom Supersonic will produce 15 luxury supersonic jet planes for United Airlines under an agreement signed Thursday with the airline, providing them with the first supersonic passenger airlines since the Concorde.

According to the Washington Post, the Overture airliners will travel up to Mach 1.7, meaning it can make a typical 6.5 hour trip between New York and London in just 3.5 hours.  Entirely configured for business class, the plane will be configured to carry 65 to 88 passengers.

The planes will fly on an as-yet unspecified type of jet fuel that will be environmentally sustainable, making it “net-zero carbon from day one,” according to the announcement from United.

“The world’s first purchase agreement for net-zero carbon supersonic aircraft marks a significant step toward our mission to create a more accessible world,” Blake Scholl, chief executive of Boom Supersonic, said in a statement.

“GOP WI Sen Johnson says he’s ‘undecided’ about running for re-election in 2022. Says ‘I haven’t made that decision. I don’t feel any pressure to make it, really, any time soon.’ Adds ‘I’m going to do nothing to hamper our ability as the GOP to retain this US Senate seat'” – Chad Pergram, Fox News.

“After seeing the emails, our Country is fortunate I didn’t do what Dr. Fauci wanted me to do. For instance, I closed our Borders to China very early despite his not wanting them closed. The Democrats and the Fake News Media even called me a ‘xenophobe.’ In the end, we saw this was a life-saving decision, and likewise with closing our borders to Europe, specifically to certain heavily infected countries. I was later given credit, even by ‘Tony,’ for saving hundreds of thousands of lives. Dr. Fauci also didn’t put an emphasis on speed of vaccine production because he thought it would take 3, 4, or maybe even 5 years to create. I got it done in less than 9 months with Operation Warp Speed. In retrospect, the vaccine is saving the world. Then, I placed the greatest bet in history. We ordered billions of dollars’ worth of vaccines before we knew it even worked. Had that not been done, our wonderful vaccines would not have been administered until October of this year. No one would’ve had the shot that has now saved the world and millions of lives!” – Statement that goes on and on via shitty Right Wing-ish news site Breaking911.com

Crooks and Liars put together an excellent analysis of various photos tweeted by South Carolina Congresswoman Nancy Mace and concluded that she’s almost certainly full of shit on her claim that her home was vandalized with “Antifa symbols” on Monday (The Crooks and Liars article is mostly just a long string of tweets, so there’s no real point tying to excerpt it here). The most damning piece is how they point out her front door and lawn are monitored by at least two home security system cameras (plus a Ring doorbell) and Mace has not made that footage public, which you think she’d have done to show everyone the “Antifa” scumbags who “attacked” her home.

“Joel Greenberg, the former Seminole County tax collector who recently pleaded guilty to six federal charges – including sex trafficking of a child – is now set to face sentencing Aug. 19, records show. In a pair of orders filed Thursday, U.S. District Judge Gregory A. Presnell also formally accepted Greenberg’s guilty pleas, which he made after striking a plea agreement with prosecutors last month. The deal requires Greenberg to cooperate with authorities in the sprawling investigation, which has reportedly taken aim at U.S. Rep. Matt Gaetz, a former friend and ally.”

“According to reports, that probe concerns, among other things, whether Gaetz along with Greenberg paid for sex with women and a 17-year-old girl, allegations Gaetz vehemently denies. Greenberg could face at least 12 years in prison – the statutory minimum for his offenses – though prosecutors have indicated they will recommend a lesser sentence if Greenberg’s provides substantial assistance” – Orlando Sentinel.

Charles C. W. Cooke, National Review: “Two days ago, the New York Times’s Maggie Haberman reported that Donald Trump ‘has been telling a number of people he’s in contact with that he expects he will get reinstated by August.’ In response, many figures on the right inserted their fingers into their ears and started screaming about fake news. Instead, they should have listened – because Haberman’s reporting was correct. I can attest, from speaking to an array of different sources, that Donald Trump does indeed believe quite genuinely that he – along with former senators David Perdue and Martha McSally – will be ‘reinstated’ to office this summer after ‘audits’ of the 2020 elections in Arizona, Georgia, and a handful of other states have been completed.”

“I can attest, too, that Trump is trying hard to recruit journalists, politicians, and other influential figures to promulgate this belief – not as a fundraising tool or an infantile bit of trolling or a trial balloon, but as a fact… The scale of Trump’s delusion is quite startling. This is not merely an eccentric interpretation of the facts or an interesting foible, nor is it an irrelevant example of anguished post-presidency chatter. It is a rejection of reality, a rejection of law, and, ultimately, a rejection of the entire system of American government. There is no Reinstatement Clause within the United States Constitution. Hell, there is nothing even approximating a Reinstatement Clause within the United States Constitution. The election has been certified, Joe Biden is the president, and, until 2024, that is all there is to it. It does not matter what one’s view of Trump is. It does not matter whether one voted for or against Trump. It does not matter whether one views Trump’s role within the Republican Party favorably or unfavorably. We are talking here about cold, hard, neutral facts that obtain irrespective of one’s preferences; it is not too much to ask that the former head of the executive branch should understand them.”

“A Harwinton man has been arrested in connection with the riot at the United States Capitol in Washington, DC on Jan. 6. Richard Crosby Jr., 25, of Harwinton, has been charged with entering and remaining on the floor of Congress, as well as additional charges. He was arrested Thursday morning in Harwinton and appeared virtually after a federal criminal complaint was issued by the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. Other charges read during the court proceeding include obstruction of justice, specifically Congress; entering and remaining in a restricted building or grounds; disorderly conduct in a restricted building or grounds; disorderly conduct in the Capitol; and parading, demonstrating or picketing at the Capitol.”

“Crosby is among more than 400 people who have been arrested in connection with the Capitol breach. An assistant federal defender in Connecticut was appointed to defend Crosby and the judge said another attorney will be appointed when the case goes before a judge in the District of Columbia. Neither Crosby nor his public defender responded to the charges during the court hearing. Crosby, wearing a sweatshirt and sweatpants, said he understood his rights when he was questioned by the magistrate judge” – WNBC.

Ron Brownstein, The Atlantic: “It’s not just voting rights. Though this year’s proliferation of bills restricting ballot access in red states has commanded national attention, it represents just one stream in a torrent of conservative legislation poised to remake the country. GOP-controlled states – including Florida, Tennessee, Georgia, Texas, Arizona, Iowa, and Montana – have advanced their most conservative agenda in years, and one that reflects Donald Trump’s present stamp on the Republican Party. Across these states and others, Republican legislators and governors have operated as if they were programming a prime-time lineup at Fox News. They have focused far less on the small-government, limited-spending, and anti-tax policies that once defined the GOP than on an array of hot-button social issues, such as abortion, guns, and limits on public protest, that reflect the cultural and racial priorities of Trump’s base.”

“In part, this sharp right turn reflects a conscious backlash against unified Democratic control of Congress and the White House. Jessica Anderson, the executive director of Heritage Action for America, one of the country’s foremost grassroots conservative groups, told me that right-leaning voters have shifted more of their effort toward red states because they realize that they currently have no chance of advancing their causes at the national level. But the push, she added, also reflects a determination to elevate social and cultural issues that Trump stressed, after the GOP’s congressional leadership had generally downplayed them in favor of economic priorities such as cutting taxes and regulation. ‘You can make the argument that the work at the state level is a rebuttal or a critique of too much of the GOP leaving this stuff behind,’ she said. ‘Trump said it matters.’ The lurch right in Republican-controlled states extends to some economic issues: Nearly two dozen states, for instance, have rejected the increased unemployment benefits that congressional Democrats approved earlier this year in President Joe Biden’s stimulus plan. But the social and racially tinged issues that Trump moved to the center of GOP messaging have dominated legislative sessions in state after state.”

“Coke is too ‘woke’ for one North Carolina county’s government. Surry County has voted to ban all Coca-Cola vending machines in its office buildings over backlash to the Atlanta-based soft drink maker’s criticism of new restrictive Georgia voting laws. ‘The left wing in America, they defund, they boycott, they cancel, they tear down statues – all sorts of egregious actions,’ Eddie Harris, a county commissioner, told WXII in a video interview. ‘The expectation from them is the opposing political side will cower in the corner and we’re supposed to accept that and it’s supposed to be OK. And it’s not OK.’ The all-Republican county commissioners voted 3-2 last month to remove the vending machines, but WXII said the machines had yet to be taken out. It’s not clear how many vending machines there were in county buildings in Surry, which has roughly 73,000 residents in the northern part of the state” – New York Post.