CNN: “Former President Donald Trump’s political confidant Roger Stone made cameos in a pair of court filings on Thursday related to Oath Keepers accused of participating in the Capitol riot. In one filing, prosecutors included a photo meant to tie two alleged Oath Keepers accused of conspiracy to one another – and the photo showed them apparently standing next to Stone at an event to promote his books. In another court filing, two others in the right-wing paramilitary group who are accused of storming the US Capitol discussed via text message being Stone’s security in Washington around January 6.”

“The relationship between Stone and the Oath Keepers – and that they provided security for Stone’s events in DC before the insurrection – has become a recurring theme in the Capitol riot court cases. Both the court filings mentioning Stone on Thursday came in the most prominent conspiracy case against several Oath Keeper members.Stone has denied knowing of any plans to storm the Capitol or commit crimes. The glimmers on Thursday about Stone – who received a presidential pardon for lying to Congress in part to protect Trump and became a primary pusher of disinformation about the 2016 and 2020 elections to Trump’s backers – add to a growing list of how he has connected in recent years with pro-Trump extremist groups accused of coordinating the January 6 attack.”

A 19-year-old Louisiana man used Grindr, an app designed to help gay men hook up for sexual flings, to find men he wanted to kill, dismember and eat, but thankfully, his first victim survived, Newsweek reports.

Chance Seneca intended to eat parts of his victims bodies and keep other parts for trophies, a newly unsealed indictment claims.  Seneca chatted with his first prospective victim, 18-year-old Holden White, for about a month on Grindr before meeting him.

During that date, on June 19th, Seneca brought White to a house Seneca claimed was his father’s.  Seneca then strangled White with a cord until White lost consciousness.  White woke up in a bathtub filled with ice as Seneca was trying to sever his hand.  As White regained consciousness, Seneca started stabbing him in the neck. 

The New York State Department of Health website says: “In 2017, New York State expanded Article 13-E of the Public Health Law, also known as the Clean Indoor Air Act (the Act). The Act prohibits smoking and vaping in almost all public and private indoor workplaces, including restaurants and bars, to protect workers and the public from exposure to harmful secondhand tobacco smoke and vaping aerosols. Localities may continue to adopt and enforce local laws regulating smoking and vaping; however, these regulations must be at least as strict as the Act” which means Mr Law and Order asshole was breaking the law and can and probably will be fined for it.

Asian-Americans in the United States aren’t relying on the trite idea of “thoughts and prayers” to help their community heal after six women of Asian descent were slaughtered at Atlanta-area spas by a man who claimed they were the cause of his sex addiction.

According to the Associated Press, leaders of Asian-American churches are urging their members to stand up and act against the violence against their community, which has increased nearly 150% in the past year.

“I’m going to urge people with love and peace that we need to step up and address this issue, so that … our next generation should not be involved in tragic … violence,” the Rev. Byeong Han, the lead pastor at Korean Central Presbyterian Church in Atlanta, said. “That’s what Christians need to do.”

Ever the dramatic types, Trump and pals in MAGA Nation made a number of predictions/warnings over the last year as to what would happen if Joe Biden and Kamala Harris were successful in their campaign. Now, roughly a year after Biden captured the Democratic nomination for president, let’s look back at how many of those prognostications covered by National Zero ended up being true.

Please by all means suggest additions to this list in the comments below. Even tweets from some random MAGA or QAnon asshole could qualify for a Volume II if outrageous and/or funny enough.

The House voted along party lines to keep Eric Swalwell on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence despite histrionics from Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy that Swalwell should be removed because he was once in a relationship with a woman who was discovered to be a Chinese government agent, the Washington Post reports.

In an obvious attempt at revenge for removing fellow Party member Majorie Taylor Greene (Q-GA) from her committee assignments for encourage violence and promoting conspiracy theories, McCarthy averred that Swalwell should be removed from the Intelligence Committee because the Chinese woman could have compromised Swalwell.  McCarthy likely is also acting in retaliation for Swalwell’s vocal advocacy to impeach McCarthy’s political idol, Donald Trump; Swalwell was one of the House impeachment managers during Trump’s unprecedented second impeachment trial.

In a 218 to 200 vote, with three Republicans voting “present,” the House rejected McCarthy’s assertion. 

Atlanta Journal-Constitution: “Leading Georgia lawmakers said Thursday that they plan to maintain Sunday voting and no-excuse absentee voting but pursue strict controls on other areas of voter access and ballot counting. Voting rights advocates continued to oppose the legislation during a three-hour hearing, saying it would still create obstacles by limiting drop boxes, setting earlier absentee ballot request deadlines and requiring more ID to vote absentee. A committee vote on the expansive legislation could come as soon as Monday, setting up final decisions on changes to Georgia’s voting laws within days. State Rep. Barry Fleming, the chairman of the Committee on Election Integrity, proposed allowing early voting on as many as four weekend days leading up to an election, including two mandatory Saturdays statewide. That would be an expansion of early voting, where counties now must offer one Saturday and have the option of providing voting on three other weekend days. A previous bill would have limited early voting to one optional Sunday, a proposal that threatened ‘Souls to the Polls’ group voting events organized by Black churches.”

“Fleming also said he doesn’t intend to move forward with a bill passed by the state Senate that would have limited absentee voting to those who are at least 65 years old, have a physical disability or are out of town. Senate Majority Leader Mike Dugan has also said he doesn’t expect an elimination of no-excuse absentee voting to become law. The bill would seek more immediate election results by requiring county election workers to continue counting ballots until they’re finished. Election rules in Georgia would be tightened in many other ways, according to the bill. Most provisional ballots cast outside a voter’s home precinct would be disqualified, voting groups wouldn’t be allowed to send absentee ballot request forms to voters who have already applied for a ballot, and the State Election Board could take over underperforming county election offices.”

Troll conservative propagandist network One America News broadcast the name, email address and phone number of a media reporter for the New York Times Thursday afternoon, claiming that she was “attacking” the neophant network and urging viewers to harass her, the Daily Beast reports.

“One America News is yet again coming under attack by the hate-filled liberal left,” a narrator said during the segment accusing Times reporter Rachael Adams of “harassing current and former” employees of the network while she writing a “hit piece.”

“We’d like to bring attention to the fact that this is the sad state of mainstream media where outlets would rather attack a small family-run company than report on news that matters to Americans. … We encourage the company to address its own issues instead of sourcing disgruntled former OAN employees as a means to lambast OAN,” the narrator said. “Our newsroom is filled with people who report the news in a fair and balanced way, led by a family passionate about the truth.”

One America News is owned by the Herring family, which also owns AWE network, targeting affluent and wannabe-affluent viewers.  (Imagine “Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous” clones rerun 24/7.)  The Herrings are frequent conservative donors; patriarch Robert Herring once offered the husband of Terri Schaivo, a comatose Florida woman, one million dollars to sign over guardianship of his wife.)

Delta County Independent: “Lauren Boebert spoke at the Turn of the Century Monday night to a packed house. It was her first public event in Montrose since she was elected to the House of Representatives representing Colorado’s House District 3. The event lasted just over an hour and Boebert spoke with energy and conviction. The mostly Republican audience ate up every word. She invoked God, country and President Donald Trump throughout her speech. Making it very clear she believes she is doing God’s work with the guidance of Donald Trump and his team… The last question of the night drew a bizarre response from Boebert. ‘Is there any hope for the people that top level government officials when they violate the law… will they ever be held accountable?'”

“’I want to tell you, I heard someone who is in very close contact with President Trump and the ins and outs of the White House under that administration. They talked to the owners of the Epoch Times and they said don’t change anything, you are right over the target. So anyone who tries and tells you that this is a fringe newspaper. Don’t listen to them. I have very good sources that tell me this is very good information. Is it 100%? I don’t know but it’s very good information. We all know that there was information that was declassified just a few days before President Trump left office. I know someone who is involved in declassifying that. This person is getting very tired of waiting on the DOJ to do something about it. And we’ll be hearing about it very, very soon. This is my opinion with that information that I have. I believe we’ll see resignations begin to take place and I think we can take back the majority in the House and the Senate before 2022.’”

With a strong bipartisan majority, the House passed legislation that would provide a system by which agriculture workers can get a green card to temporarily reside in the United States if they have worked in agriculture for 180 days over the last two years, USA Today reports.

The legislation, the Farm Workforce Modernization Act, garnered a 247-174 vote, with 34 Republicans voting with all Democrats to pass the bill.  Republican leadership did not whip votes against the legislation as they did with the American Dream and Promise Act, which passed the chamber earlier Thursday.  It’s expected that this will pass the Senate.

The bill provides temporary resident status for agricultural workers, their spouses and their families provided the worker can prove he/she worked in agriculture in the US for 180 days over the past two years.  The bill also eases the process to apply for a H2-B visa, available for agricultural workers.

Despite the hew and cry from conservatives that they would never watch an NFL game again, the league has entered into $110 billion ten-year agreements with CBS, NBC, Fox, ESPN/ABC and Amazon for broadcast rights, ESPN reports.

The agreements more than double the value of the last set of broadcast agreements for the league.  In 2020, the average viewership for a game was 14.9 million, by far the most of any ad-driven show or sports program.  It had dropped from 16.5 million in 2019.

Like many other events, the NFL was plagued by cancellations and rescheduling due to the coronavirus pandemic in 2020, which caused about a dozen games to be rescheduled.  The NFL also traditionally sees a viewership drop in election years, with analysts thinking political advertisements shown during the games turn off fans.

With a bipartisan majority, the House passed the Dream and Promise Act, legislation that would create a pathway to citizenship for millions of undocumented people brought into the country when they were children, NBC News reports.  By a 227 to 198 vote, with nine Republicans joining all House Democrats, the legislation passed and will now head to the Senate.

Republicans have made the border a centerpoint of their anti-Biden public relations strategy, pointing to an influx of immigrants at the southern border as a sign that Biden is soft on national security.  Without evidence, Republicans have claimed that members of ISIS have been sneaking across the border, a claim they also made throughout the Obama administration.

In 2013, the Senate passed a similar bill, the Border Security, Economic Opportunity, and Immigration Modernization Act, with a strong bipartisan majority, 68-32.  Even though the legislation would have passed the House, the bill, however, was never taken up by the John Boehner-led House out of fear of giving President Barack Obama a policy victory, and it died in a drawer in the Speaker’s office. 

“LOL This would be fun to see.”

– The current top comment on the Gateway Pundit article “Vladimir Putin Ups the Ante, Challenges Joe Biden to a Live, Public Debate: ‘Without Any Delays’“, posted Thursday evening.

The Orlando Sentinel announced that it has filed a lawsuit against the Florida Department of Health for hiding data on the spread of coronavirus variants around the state, an action the newspaper alleges violates the state constitution.

The Sentinel filed a request with the state 57 days ago for information on the spread and location of emerging coronavirus strains throughout Florida.  The DeSantis administration has not responded to the request, prompting the newspaper to take the case to court.  This is the second time the Sentinel has taken the DeSantis administration to court over failure to provide records on the coronavirus pandemic in the state; the earlier case was settled.

“Regrettably we have to sue the state again to receive critical public health information that should be readily available for all to examine,” said the Sentinel’s editor-in-chief Julie Anderson. “We have been more than patient in waiting for the Department of Health to fulfill a basic request for information — 57 days and counting — with no explanation as to why this information should remain secret. Floridians deserve to see the data so they can make informed decisions about their health.”

“San Antonio doesn’t have Donald Trump to push around – and claw – anymore. At least not for the time being. Louis Tussaud’s Waxworks on Alamo Plaza moved the wax figure of the former president to a storage room because a few museum visitors – with intense feelings and a lack of self-restraint – kept pummeling him. They punched and scratched the figure, inflicting so much damage that management had it pulled from public view, said Clay Stewart, regional manager for Ripley Entertainment, which owns the wax museum.”

“The scratches to Trump’s face were deep. ‘When it’s a highly political figure, attacks can be a problem,’ Stewart said. It’s unclear when the wax museum will repair Trump and put him back on display. Stewart said it likely won’t happen until after the museum receives a wax figure of President Joe Biden, currently in the works at Ripley Entertainment’s headquarters in Orlando, Fla. Visitors’ attacks on the wax Trump increased as the 2020 presidential campaign heated up early in the summer, according to Stewart. Not even moving Trump to the lobby, where ticket attendants could keep an eye out for attackers, stopped them from taking shots at the statue.’We’ve always had trouble with the presidential section because no matter what president it was – Bush, Obama or Trump – they’ve all had people beat them,’ Stewart said. ‘The ears were torn off Obama six times. And then Bush’s nose was punched in.’ He was referring to President George W. Bush, not his father, the late George H.W. Bush” – San Antonio Express-News.

In the first major policy announcement since his confirmation, Education Secretary Miguel Cardona stated that the federal government will cancel any outstanding debt owed for federal loans taken out by students who were defrauded by their universities, the Washington Post reported.

Cardona’s predecessor, Betsy DeVos, refused to forgive the questionable debt incurred when colleges, typically for-profit businesses, illegally or fraudulently encouraged students to take out more loans to pay for education.  DeVos insisted that students be liable for some, if not all, of the debt incurred.

“Borrowers deserve a simplified and fair path to relief when they have been harmed by their institution’s misconduct,” Cardona said in a statement. “A close review of these claims and the associated evidence showed these borrowers have been harmed and we will grant them a fresh start from their debt.”

Putin just challenged Joe Biden to an unscripted live debate.

The whole world knows that we have no leadership at the top just an empty suit with a teleprompter (and he can’t even get that right).

They look at America’s weakness right now and are salivating.

— Donald Trump Jr. (@DonaldJTrumpJr) March 18, 2021

Right Wing Watch: “Sidney Powell – the pro-Trump attorney who became a heroine in the far-right QAnon movement for pushing fantastical “Kraken” election-fraud lawsuits – will headline a ‘Make American Free Again’ virtual summit later this week. The event, which takes place on Sunday, March 21, will bring together a group of so-called ‘patriots’ to discuss the ‘imminent threat to our very freedoms and way of life.’ The list of speakers includes Richard Mack, a former sheriff of Graham County, Arizona and a founder of the Oath Keepers far-right militia; Jeff Brain, the CEO of Clouthub, an alternative social media platform that panders to the far right, religious right activist Christine Hutcherson, who founded the Women Fighting for America organization to ‘bring back morality, biblical foundation, Constitution, and freedom into this nation.'”

“In this virtual summit, you will hear from state and national leaders who are on the forefront, restoring our republic and fighting for our rights at the grassroots level,’ reads the event summary on Eventbrite. ‘You will learn what you can and must do to help save the America that our founding fathers established more than 200 years ago. No one is coming to save us. WE are the people we have been waiting for. It is up to We the People now.’ The most recognizable name on the list is Powell, a popular figure within conspiratorial underbelly of the internet. Much of her clout comes from her longstanding allegiance to QAnon, as well as influential figures in the far-right movement like former Gen. Michael Flynn and attorney Lin Wood.”

“The Biden admin is starting the lengthy process of rewriting rules for the #TitleX family planning program, undoing Trump admin rules that banned clinics from referring patients for abortions. The new rule will be out by April and in place by the fall” reports Politico’s Alice Miranda Ollstein.

After President Joe Biden said in an interview that Russian President Vladimir Putin was a “murderer” who has “no soul,” Putin suggested to Russian media that he would welcome a chance to debate Biden one-on-one, ABC News reports.

“I’ve just thought of this now,” Putin told a Russian state television reporter. “I want to propose to President Biden to continue our discussion, but on the condition that we do it basically live, as it’s called. Without any delays and directly in an open, direct discussion. It seems to me that would be interesting for the people of Russia and for the people of the United States.”

After Biden called Putin a murderer during an interview with ABC News correspondent George Stephanopoulos, the Russian government recalled their ambassador to the US.  When asked about Biden’s comment, Putin responded with a playground insult, “I know you are, but what am I.”