The case Trump v Wisconsin Elections Commission, regarding “whether the Wisconsin Elections Commission and local election officials violated Article II, Section 1, clause 2 of the Constitution and the 14th Amendment’s guarantee of equal protection during the 2020 presidential election by implementing unauthorized absentee voting practices in disregard of the Wisconsin Legislature’s explicit command that absentee voting must be ‘carefully regulated’ and that absentee ballots cast outside of the legislature’s authorized procedures ‘may not be counted'” among other issues was denied certiorari by the United States Supreme Court on Monday.

“President Joe Biden will sign two executive orders Monday to ensure his administration keeps its promise to promote gender equality, including an order to evaluate the current policy guidelines for Title IX, the federal civil rights law that upholds gender equity in education.”

“Administration officials told reporters on a Sunday night call that Biden plans to sign two executive orders, including one that will establish a Gender Policy Council within the Executive Office of the President. The second order will direct the U.S. Department of Education to review existing Title IX guidelines, which regulate sexual assault investigations on K-12 and college campuses, to “ensure consistency with the Biden-Harris administration’s policy that students be guaranteed education free from sexual violence,” an administration official said. Biden will sign both executive orders on March 8 to coincide with International Women’s Day” – Huffington Post.

Popular Mechanics: “In a surprising new paper, scientists say they’ve nailed down a physical model for a warp drive, which flies in the face of what we’ve long thought about the crazy concept of warp speed travel: that it requires exotic, negative forces. The colloquial term ‘warp drive’ comes from science fiction, most famously Star Trek. The faster-​than-light warp drive of the Federation works by colliding matter and antimatter and converting the explosive energy to propulsion. Star Trek suggests that this extraordinary power alone pushes the ship at faster-than-light speeds.”

“In the report, the APL team unveils the world’s first model for a physical warp drive – one that doesn’t require negative energy. The study is understandably pretty thick, but here’s the gist of the model: Where the existing paradigm uses negative energy – exotic matter that doesn’t exist and can’t be generated within our current understanding of the universe – this new concept uses floating bubbles of spacetime rather than floating ships in spacetime. The physical model uses almost none of the negative energy and capitalizes on the idea that spacetime bubbles can behave almost however they like. And, the APL scientists say, this isn’t even the only other way warp speed could work. Making a model that’s at least physically comprehensible is a big step.”

“The concept in this paper is still in the ‘far future’ zone of possibility, made of ideas that scientists still don’t know how to construct in any sense. ‘While the mass requirements needed for such modifications are still enormous at present,’ the APL scientists write, ‘our work suggests a method of constructing such objects based on fully understood laws of physics.’ But while a physical drive may not be a reality today, tomorrow, or even a century from now – let’s hope it’s not that long – with this exciting new model, warp speed travel is now a lot more likely in a much shorter timespan than we previously thought.”

“Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), America’s ultimate swing voter, told me on ‘Axios on HBO’ that he’ll insist Republicans have more of a voice on President Biden’s next big package than they did on the COVID stimulus. Manchin said he’ll push for tax hikes to pay for Biden’s upcoming infrastructure and climate proposal, and will use his Energy Committee chairmanship to force the GOP to confront climate reality. Manchin, 73, said Biden expects, and understands, the pushback: ‘He’s the first president we’ve had to really, really understand the workings of the Senate since LBJ.'”

“Manchin said that with just a few concessions, it would have been possible to get some Republicans on the COVID relief package that passed the Senate this weekend on a party-line vote. And he said he’ll block Biden’s next big package – $2 trillion to $4 trillion for climate and infrastructure – if Republicans aren’t included. ‘I’m not going to do it through reconciliation,’ which requires only a simple majority, like the COVID stimulus, Manchin said. ‘I am not going to get on a bill that cuts them out completely before we start trying.’ Asked if he believes it’s possible to get 10 Republicans on the infrastructure package, which could yield the 60 votes needed under normal Senate rules, Manchin said: ‘I sure do.’ Manchin said the infrastructure bill can be big – as much as $4 trillion – as long as it’s paid for with tax increases. He said he’ll start his bargaining by requiring the package be 100% paid for” – Axios.

https://twitter.com/BurgerKingUK/status/1368849338596745223

Yeah, that’s how it started.

New York Post: “Former President Donald Trump was spotted outside Trump Tower Sunday night in his first visit back to the Big Apple since leaving office. Trump pulled up to the Midtown skyscraper where he stays while in Manhattan just before 9 p.m. He was seated in a backseat of a black SUV. Upon his arrival, he waved to a lone Trump supporter who was across the street next to the media.”

MacKenzie Scott, the billionaire philanthropist who is the ex-wife of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, married a Seattle-area teacher, it was announced Sunday, CNN reports.

Scott reportedly received $53 billion from her split with Bezos after 25 years of marriage.  The couple had four children, who live with Scott in Seattle.  Her new husband, Dan Jewett, is a high school science teacher.

“I am married to one of the most generous and kind people I know — and joining her in a commitment to pass on an enormous financial wealth to serve others,” Jewett wrote on the couple’s page on the Giving Pledge. “I look forward to the growth and learning I have ahead as a part of this undertaking with MacKenzie.”

https://youtu.be/eAKznbZYjL8

At least three SWAT officers from the Boulder Police Department were injured after officers tried to break up a party near the University of Colorado Boulder that attracted hundreds of people who were not social distance, who did not wear masks, and who spilled into the street disturbing neighbors, CNN reports.

Partygoers flipped over a car and shot fireworks at officers who were called to the residence around 8:30 p.m. local time Saturday.  They used the loudspeaker on their vehicles to tell people to disperse or risk arrest, teargas and use of force.

Concerned that their fledgling all-news network is trying to make itself into a mini-Fox News after it was disclosed that former Fox executive Bill Shine had been working as a consultant there for more seven months, NewsNation is facing a revolt, with two senior staffers resigning since February 1st, the New York Times reports.

Shine was forced out of Fox News after it was revealed that he enabled the network’s culture of sexual harassment and abuse to flourish, protecting the perpetrators and punishing accusers.  After exiting Fox News, Shine joined the Trump Administration as Deputy White House Chief of Staff, a position he held for nine months.

NewsNation, the rebranded WGN America, announced September 1, 2020, that it was going to an all-news format, leveraging the 80 million households to which the Chicago-based network was broadcast. 

“Sen. Lindsey Graham told ‘Axios on HBO’ that Donald Trump has a ‘dark side’ but he tries to ‘harness the magic’ because he succeeded where Republican candidates like John McCain and Mitt Romney failed. The South Carolina Republican gyrates between support and criticism of the former president, even after Trump harshly criticized McCain – Graham’s longtime friend – and helped spark the Capitol insurrection. ‘What I’m tryin’ to do is just harness the magic,’ Graham told Axios’ Jonathan Swan. ‘To me, Donald Trump is sort of a cross between Jesse Helms, Ronald Reagan and P.T. Barnum.’ ‘He could make the Republican Party something that nobody else I know can make it. He can make it bigger. He can make it stronger. He can make it more diverse. And he also could destroy it,’ Graham said.”

“‘Donald Trump was my friend before the riot. And I’m trying to keep a relationship with him after the riot. I still consider him a friend. What happened was a dark day in American history, and we’re going to move forward.’ ‘I want us to continue the policies that I think will make America strong. I believe the best way for the Republican Party to do that is with Trump, not without Trump.’ ‘Mitt Romney didn’t do it. John McCain didn’t do it. There’s something about Trump. There’s a dark side and there’s some magic there'” – Axios.

The Democratic majority leader of the New York State Senate called on Democratic Governor Andrew Cuomo to resign after a fourth woman came forward with allegations of impropriety and reports of bullying within his office, USA Today reports.

The governor’s office is also facing investigations into how it accounted for coronavirus deaths in the state’s nursing homes, further damaging Cuomo’s administration.

“We have allegations about sexual harassment, a toxic work environment, the loss of credibility surrounding the Covid-19 nursing home data and questions about the construction of a major infrastructure project,” Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins said hours after Cuomo said during a conference call with reporters that there’s “no way [he resigns].”

https://youtu.be/OTqk4NJO-w4

In a scene reminiscent of 1930s Germany, parents encouraged their children to burn facemasks in protests to public health regulations in Idaho put in place to stem the spread of the coronavirus.  At one point, a young child can be heard yelling, “Destroy them!” as she echoes one of the supposed adults.

An anti-choice protester at a Raleigh, North Carolina women’s health clinic yesterday morning shot himself in the leg with his own gun, which he was carrying in the pocket of his pants, local police told WNCN CBS-17.

The man, who was unidentified, had the gun discharge while he was attending a protest at the women’s clinic.  Police said he was the only person involved in the shooting.  He was charged with unlawfully carrying a gun to a protest.

Ipsos: “A new ABC News/Ipsos poll finds that even as American concern about the coronavirus wanes, most believe public health restrictions, like mask mandates or limits on public gatherings, are being loosened too quickly. However, opinions on re-opening schools and businesses are more mixed, reflecting the public’s desire to return to a semblance of normalcy. As the country navigates the hoped-for end of the pandemic, two-thirds of the American public continue to approve of the way Joe Biden is handling the coronavirus response.”

“Two-thirds (68%) of Americans approve of Biden’s handling of the pandemic. Support for Biden breaks clearly along partisan lines with virtually all Democrats (98%) approving compared to only a third (35%) of Republicans. However, that compares favorably to the last ABC/Ipsos poll asking about former President Trump’s handling of the pandemic when 79% Republicans approved compared to only 4% of Democrats.”

For a while now I’ve been seeing a lot of folks get annoyed by certain MAGA media figures using the phrase “Democrat Party” – when the proper term is the “Democratic Party” – which I’m guessing is meant as a sign of disrespect to Dems, often successfully. Indeed there’s a whole article on Wikipedia on the history of “Democrat Party” as a slur that goes back decades.

Coming at it as a relatively recent “Democrat” voter, I don’t really get it though, because in my mind members of the Republican Party are Republicans. Members of the Libertarian Party are Libertarians. Members of the Nazi Party are Nazis. Liberals get involved with Liberal causes. Conservatives donate to Conservative think tanks. So on and so forth. Those words are interchangeably used as proper nouns, common nouns, and adjectives so there’s no reason why “Democrat” can’t be used interchangeably as well. Losing two letters and one syllable does not constitute an insult. Insults should be immediately self-evident to the recipient. It shouldn’t take a 2,000-words long Wikipedia article to explain why it should be taken as an insult.

Let it go. Language evolves all the time. If National Zero can toss around completely made-up bullshit words like “MAGApocalypse”, “MAGAfication”, “MAGAverse”, etc, then “Democrat Party” shouldn’t be that big of a deal coming from the other side. And if it still bugs you, you can always respond to them with “GQP”. That one should sting a bit more than “Democrat Party”.

Wall Street Journal: “Russian intelligence agencies have mounted a campaign to undermine confidence in Pfizer Inc.’s and other Western vaccines, using online publications that in recent months have questioned the vaccines’ development and safety, U.S. officials said. An official with the State Department’s Global Engagement Center, which monitors foreign disinformation efforts, identified four publications that he said have served as fronts for Russian intelligence. The websites played up the vaccines’ risk of side effects, questioned their efficacy, and said the U.S. had rushed the Pfizer vaccine through the approval process, among other false or misleading claims.”

“Though the outlets’ readership is small, U.S. officials say they inject false narratives that can be amplified by other Russian and international media. ‘We can say these outlets are directly linked to Russian intelligence services,’ the Global Engagement Center official said of the sites behind the disinformation campaign. ‘They’re all foreign-owned, based outside of the United States. They vary a lot in their reach, their tone, their audience, but they’re all part of the Russian propaganda and disinformation ecosystem.’ In addition, Russian state media and Russian government Twitter accounts have made overt efforts to raise concerns about the cost and safety of the Pfizer vaccine in what experts outside the U.S. government say is an effort to promote the sale of Russia’s rival Sputnik V vaccine.”

On Saturday and Sunday #BlueAnon began trending on Twitter. Describing it is pretty simple: a play on “Blue” and “QAnon” as a catchall term to dismiss center-left allegations of criminal acts committed by Trump and his minions as wacky conspiracy theories on par with those of QAnon.

A now-deleted Urban Dictionary post – pretty obviously written by some MAGA dipshit – defines Blue Anon more propagandistically as “A loosely organized network of Democrat voters, politicians and media personalities who spread left-wing conspiracy theories such as the Russia Hoax, Jussie Smollett hoax, Ukraine hoax, Covington Kids hoax, and Brett Kavanaugh hoax. Blue Anon adherents fervently believe that right-wing extremists are going to storm Capitol Hill any day now and ‘remove’ lawmakers from office, hence the need for the deployment of thousands of National Guard stationed at the U.S. Capitol.”

This is plainly a bunch of gaslighting bullshit. The “Russia Hoax” is a shit ton of unanswered questions and unexplained incidents – like why Don Jr and Jared Kushner met with agents of the Russian government in 2016, why a Russian bank server kept contacting a Trump organization server around the same time, why Trump told Russia to find Hillary’s emails, so on and so forth.

Just an example of the sickness and derangement by #maga #Trump supporters and loyalists! pic.twitter.com/44BTvGUzZL

— Michael Cohen (@MichaelCohen212) March 7, 2021

“The billionaire accused of running the biggest tax fraud scheme in U.S. history was a prolific donor to Republican groups and causes. The leaders of those organizations have kept quiet on the federal charges against him. Robert Brockman, former CEO of Ohio-based software company Reynolds & Reynolds, was charged in October with running a $2 billion tax fraud scheme. Department of Justice officials said at the time that the businessman had hidden capital gains income for more than 20 years through various offshore entities in Bermuda and Nevis and secret bank accounts. Brockman has pleaded not guilty to the alleged crimes.”

“Brockman’s most recent contributions to Republican committees came in 2017, ahead of the congressional midterm elections the following year, according to Federal Election Commission records. Representatives of the organizations that are still active did not respond when asked whether they plan to refund or give the total amount of contributions away to charity in the wake of the allegations. The 2017 contributions had yet to be reported in the media. In 2017, Brockman donated more than $80,000 to the National Republican Congressional Committee, the political campaign organization for House Republicans. The GOP went on to lose the House to the Democrats, with Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., becoming speaker. Brockman also gave more than $100,000 to entities linked to former Republican House Speaker Paul Ryan, including a six-figure check to the Wisconsin lawmaker’s now-defunct joint fundraising committee. The Brockman NRCC donations were attributed on the filings to Ryan’s joint fundraising committee, which at the time was helping raise money for the Republican campaign arm” – CNBC.