The Dangling Conversation. More than a song, a telling Kavanaugh evasiveness that was striking. Outstandingly striking. The FBI needs to lift that rock, entirely so, taking as long as it takes to get things right. The Kamila Harris interrogation made clear, question and answer, that very many watchers of the hearing would conclude Kavanaugh knew exactly what Harris was after and thought he could finesse his way out of a box. And how are we to regard the Sen. Lee interruption, other than as a stall to try to let Kavanaugh off the hook or at least have a break in time to fashion his further responsiveness, such as it was. [UPDATED]

This video.

The man was evasive, no doubt. Believe your eyes. You see what you see. He bullshitted his way through a very direct question. If he was lying by evasion, he is not qualified to be on the bench he sits on, much less the Supreme Court. He's pinned on that, unless there is stonewalling to the FBI.

One may even conclude that any federal appeals court judge who bullshits like that is unfit for anything but bullshit, but opinions can differ.

He says he needed to know a roster of everyone at that law firm. Get real. He knows who Sen. Harris was asking about and wiggled like a worm on a hook with a poised fish eying the situation. If the FBI ducks that responsibility, why have an FBI involvement?

By the way, it is a great song. One often underrated in a body of work. Worth the time of listening.

By the way, there is an online guess of who at that firm Kavanaugh may have spoken with, and there'd be some kind of office log of who visited to have a meeting with whom there. Tangible evidence which could be tampered with, but absent tampering, paper records cannot misrecollect or shade truth.

Visit logs would be a first start at finding Sen. Harris' question answered. Secretaries type things and can be questioned. Something worded a way, typed shortly after a meeting of some kind, could be circumstantial evidence.

If Kavanaugh had any privileged attorney-client relationship with any lawyer at that firm he'd have immediately asserted it when Harris questioned him. He didn't. Saying that in any tardy way has no credibility.

May the FBI come through in a trustworthy and thorough fashion in its time-constrained opportunity. The nation deserves that.

___________UPDATE_____________
Worth note in particular, with regard to the Harris questioning mentioned above, is this item, and how it begins with Sen. Blumenthal's question about a jury instruction.

The ball is in the FBI's court. May they return a killer shot.

__________FURTHER UPDATE_____________
Why have an investigation if it is not a complete and wide-ranging background check, now that questions exist? What's the value of one so constrained that it will yield not even a bigger fig leaf? WaPo. Requests and refusals, if any, to submit to polygraph examinations might be relevant in the court of public opinion.

The Mueller investigation inquiry is on a separate plane from the sexual misbehavior/drunken belligerence question, but this is a job interview for a judicial seat of the highest rank, for life (unless impeached), and such a matter, and evasion over it, is more troubling a concern about the present overarching character and fitness of the appointee for the job. Present testimonial integrity clearly affects qualification for the post. With that anchor fact, what purpose is served by dancing around short of a full investigation? Deflection and deceit are not virtues, nor is constraining those who know best how to do a complete background check once the question of background becomes a key point. The FBI needs a free rein in this instance. If Kavanaugh had a conversation of the kind for which Harris sought an answer, how can that not be relevant to fitness for such a job? It deserves sunshine, whatever diligent inquiry may uncover.

The problem with Mary.

She's Doug Wardlow, different gender, a generation and a half or more older. Sorensen at Bluestem Prairie.

Read the post, note the extensive linking.

The problem is not that Doug Wardlow drank the Koolaid.

The problem is he mixed it, declines to tell you a real thing about what's in it, and disingenuously says, "It's good for you."

The only wonder, in his younger days, who gave him that recipe and got him hooked.

Dad? Kinda like Fred Trump with that other guy? The following generation, unfortunately, following?

Polling proof exists that while memory impairment may show later, judgment can be impaired at 50, perhaps even mid-40's. The best judgment is among the young.

The young, who, unfortunately, need prodding to assure they vote.

This is in Minnesota, not nationwide, and go to the original Strib poll results page to see that those drinking well water, the further north one goes, have some premature and more severe judgment impairment.

__________UPDATE__________
One possibility, the young have hopes for the Democratic Party where getting to see the Clintons, the Podesta brothers, the DCCC and such, becoming jaded sets in. There was the spirit of Lyndon's Great Society, Hubert Humphrey's driving the Dixiecrats out of the Temple, all the things of days past, buried during the Clinton presidency, never mind philandering as a character fault. There is a need for resuscitation, and the push for Single Payer and taxation fairness and fair income/wealth distribution going forward being balanced by fossils alive and well. In the interim between the present faulted state, and Nirvana in the Democratic Party, there are the Republicans needing defeat. Voting regular citizens' best interest still is as it once was, only harder at times. Consider Amy and Tina, and the Republicans on the Judiciary Committee in reaching the decision about better if not best interests. There are Congressional seats that can be regarded as in play, in Minnesota, and they need to be played to the better side of Congressional potential. Even if dissatisfaction sets in, save the Boundary Waters since the threat there is existential. Whatever the young think or know of that Wilderness Area, the earth knows as well as it knows man-made global warming is a real thing. So, bottom line, vote. Vote not only your best interests, but the planet's.

Is it time for the Republicans to put up or shut up, Trump with pardon power in particular? [UPDATED]

Tesla at issue, SEC wanting to punish Elon Musk. Websearch, stories here, here, here and here for detail.

Are Republicans sincere in preaching "Job Creator" dogma, where it is technological innovation or entrepreneurial large-scale risk taking that does lead to movement from an entrenched status quo to a more promised land? It sure appears to not be so.

It appears that entrenched short-sellers and Wall Street gamblers chasing short term quarterly market swings are favored, along with entrenched auto manufacturers here and abroad, over such an entrepreneurial poster child.

What Musk did was tweet notice of a future intent and/or desire to go private so that short-term profit seekers would have less opportunity to torpedo the company he founded and built to where entrenched auto industry types worry.

He believed that in taking such a future step he had a secure financial source, but nobody knows the future with certainty. He gave timely notice of a present intent along with a belief that future implemention was possible/likely, his sole sin being to say "secured" when nothing about any financing is final unless and until papers are signed and funds accordingly transferred. Terms and conditions are the hobgoblins that can queer any deal, up to the very last minute. Cold feed are not uncommon in even small deals. Musk reevaluated and quite promptly backed away from the belief secure financing existed at a level sufficient to go private, now. He did not disavow his belief that going private would be in the best interest of the company, which it is his ultimate duty to protect; not to maximize callous traders' will to turn short term quarterly or more frequent profits on trades, damn the consequences - chips falling where they will, not my fault, etc.

Musk wears the white hat. The dog pack trying each for his own purposes to bring Musk down wear black hats to fit their dark intentions.

Where's Trump?

Cutting more real estate deals with Russian emigree oligarchs, not caring a whit about a sane energy future and wanting to penalize instead of rewarding innovation and entrepreneurship?

Is there any other explanation? Why is Musk being pilloried? Where is the press in not seeking FOIA documents about how the SEC decided to act, emails from whom to whom, all that which would show possible institutional/regulatory powers in bed together to take Musk to the cleaners?

Is "Fleece the Innovators" the new slogan for baseball cap politicking?

UPDATE: Viewpoints may differ. FURTHER.

FURTHER: Sept. 28 N.Y. Times and Sept 29 WaPo show that even the headstrong have good lawyers and other advisers, once they hit the big income thresholds. Yet comparing the two reports, Musk, in a sense, got his way. Stung, will Musk let the lawyers pre-approve any further Twitter usage? Or will headstrong prove to have a degree of stupid to it also? The settlement proves the adage that disputes are better settled than litigated.

The Elihu Root Quotation. (Root was closer to Fred Trump's generation than Donald's and Michael Cohen's, but I digress.)

As a member of the jury, the public watching Kavanaugh testify, I believe he was evasive and lying. [UPDATED]

With the televised testimony, you get to see demeanor, and that guy interrupted, evaded questions, and still looked bad while the Republicans were delivering caviling eulogies. Watching that bunch, their collective Gestalt led me to a far greater appreciation and respect for the two women Minnesota has representing the State in the Senate. The Senate Republicans in that hearing room left an oil slick.

This is not blind believe the "victim" - believe the accuser being the better terminology as more neutral at the start. It is looking at the man and wondering how strings were pulled to get him to where he is, apart from where dark forces want to send him.

How did someone coming across as so mediocre and mendacious get to a seat on a federal appeals court? Link.

______________UPDATE_______________
EmptyWheel. [FURTHER: EmptyWheel Homepage]

_________FURTHER UPDATE___________
WaPo, linking to other WaPo item, and NYT item.

MPR online, about a profession in short supply in Minnesota's legislative houses.

Not lawyers. Not real estate agents. Not insurance salespeople. Not some of the leadership people without outside jobs.

This link.

With MN Progressive Project experiencing technical difficulties, Dan Burns has been posting using Blogger.

It appears a temporary step, perhaps not, but the link is:

https://mnppannex.blogspot.com/

He is posting about some local Minnesota legislative races, which should interest readers of Crabgrass.

Work by Burns on Blogger formatting capabilities and difficulties seems to be at a point where the formatting does not get in the way of the content, and Dan's always had things to write, written compactly. That being a trait which is desirable these days.

"Deja vu, all over again." About skulldugery. Which newbies? You be the judge.

Hat tip, Yogi Berra for the headline quote.

Beyond that, a post which is a deja vu exercise. A 1994 N.Y. Times LTE text excerpt follows, for you to identify an "If the shoe fits let him wear it," individual currently making news.

Let Us Count Spoons

[...] The correct quotation is, "The louder he talked of his honor, the faster we counted our spoons," and it was Ralph Waldo Emerson who said it.

What Dr. Johnson said was, "If he does really think that there is no distinction between virtue and vice, why, sir, when he leaves our houses let us count our spoons."

But then what would a supporter of a man who subverted the Constitution, broke the law and lied to Congress know of honor, let alone of the distinction between virtue and vice?

[bolding added]

Now guess. The man who is discussed? The "supporter" of that man. THEN and NOW.
get both sets correct to earn your gold star


_____ANSWER, DON'T PEEK UNTIL YOU'VE GUESSED_______

The original was posited about Oliver L. North, testifying before a Congressional committee; the "supporter" then, William Kristol.

Current events substitute, the man at issue - who else but Brett Kavanaugh, likewise testifying.

And for "supporter" name any of the bunch of obsequious Senate Judicial Committee Republicans, or pluralize it to "supporters" and name them all.

A Wikipedia entry in need of updating.

Wikipedia. Updating.

UPDATE: Well, reading carefully, just now, it is updated. It goes to show.

FURTHER UPDATE:
Proud of each other's rectitude, piety:

PublicSeminar per: Office of VP - Wikimedia Commons

Deliberately unmatched ties. K lacking a lapel pin.

An ode to what Doug Wardlow is, and if you cannot square that up with the linked item, please read elsewhere.

This link.

Wrestling with a contention, it being the assertion from a very decent and sound DFL person that Ellison should have resigned because his staying could hurt his party down-ticket, up-ticket, and that he is all about Kieth Ellison first and not party and allies first, with winning paramount because without that the power to govern wisely will be foresaken.

Party altruism is the concept, that more harm could result - a similar stone as was thrown at Bernie Sanders in 2016.

There is sound cause to think that way, as an electorate could irrationally react that way, while the counterargument is Ellison is correct to stand his ground it having a purpose, and that the party should change, not Ellison, and in a unified voice publicly stand that Wardlow is a threat and that Ellison stands between the threat and it happening, and that the aim of good people of conscience should be to elevate the electorate's understanding. Loudly. In the context of an enlightening Atlantic item noted online by an independent mind we in Minnesota should value, the Atlantic, here, saying in small part:

The end of the Reconstruction era was not an inevitable outcome. It was a political choice. Republicans might have committed themselves to arming and organizing black citizens to resist the campaign of terrorism that ended Reconstruction. But the Republican Party was not as committed to pluralism as the Democrats were to white supremacy. White Republicans such as Louisiana Governor Henry Clay Warmoth saw their role as not just resisting the violence and despotism of the Democratic Party but also preventing the newly emancipated from attempting to, in Warmoth’s words, “Africanize the state.”

Or, as Ted Tunnell writes, “Reconstruction failed on the lower Mississippi mainly because Louisiana whites believed more devoutly in white supremacy than the Radicals believed in the rights of man.” It is hard to look at the leaders of today’s Democratic Party and avoid a similar conclusion: that the intensity of their commitment to fighting the president’s agenda is not equal to the passion of those who carry the banner of Trumpism.

After Trump intimidated the NFL into banning protests against police brutality during the national anthem, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi could not even muster a defense of the players’ right to protest the murder of their countrymen by agents of the state. “I love the national anthem. I love the flag, and I love the First Amendment, and I'll just leave it at that,” Pelosi said at a CNN town hall in May. During a month in which the Trump administration’s horrifying policy of shattering undocumented families and placing children in cages was revealed, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer took to the floor to denounce Representative Maxine Waters for calling on Americans to protest Cabinet officials when they see them in public. Steny Hoyer, the second-highest-ranking Democrat in the House, condemned as “inappropriate” his Latino colleagues’ protest of the president when he visited Congress. Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, the leader of the party’s left flank, rebuked a restaurateur in Virginia for refusing to serve White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders. The leadership of the opposition party is moved to shock, embarrassment, and even anger when its lower-ranking members are mildly intemperate in their opposition.

While the leaders of the Democratic Party do not share the Trump-era Republican enthusiasm for a white man’s government, their unwillingness to fight fiercely for the constituencies threatened by Trumpism suggests a reluctance to take the necessary measures to win the political battle ahead of them, because unlike those constituencies, the stakes for them are not existential.

There is hope for the Democratic Party in its base. The black and brown workers intimately acquainted with the two-faced nature of American liberty, the rebellious teachers whose surprise strikes brought red-state politicians to heel, the young leftists whose cold-eyed understanding of power mirrors that of their Republican opponents, and the feminists who flooded the streets after Trump’s inauguration forced the nation to reckon with the ascension of predatory men to the highest levels of culture, clergy, and state. But they will have to contend with a party establishment that is so divorced from the lives of those the Trump administration has put in peril that it cannot comprehend what will be required to defeat Trumpism. Democracy is a fight, and the Democratic Party’s leadership has yet to show that it can even wrap its hands.

“Punishment is not how this place works,” Schumer told The Washington Post in late July, explaining his reasons for not pressuring red-state Democrats to oppose Kavanaugh. The Democratic leadership is allowing Trump to solidify his hold on the federal judiciary and offering token opposition to the Supreme Court nominee of a president under at least two federal investigations whom half the country wants impeached, while castigating its own lower-ranking party members for protesting Trump officials.

Americans have an unfortunate tendency to see U.S. history as an epic, sweeping narrative with a Hollywood-style happy ending. That false promise of the final triumph of the forces of good is one reason why America’s struggles with racism remain so persistent, and why Americans seem so surprised when what they see as a distant, shameful history emerges in the present.

That false promise has also manifested in an unfortunate tendency to imagine the Trump administration in retrospect from some hypothetical future in which its worst excesses—its corruption, discriminatory agenda, and reckless policies—are held to account.

[italics added] Ellison wants the fight to upgrade the outlook of an electorate, not to make a peace that would comfort some who are not as much under the bootheel as others, and the question of easing the bootheel and discrediting it has no easy answer. Is the answer to sacrifice the Boundary Waters to risk of five hundred years of devastation because to oppose mining interests might result in an election loss, with a consequent loss of the ability to do some good in other ways? Or is there a stand that is right, compromise aside, which should be taken?

Read the entire Atlantic item because it is about much more than is excerpted, but saying that, please do not fail to take the excerpt to heart. It defines an impediment toward positive action in judgment, among those knowing better.

"But I hope it is clear that neither Doug Wardlow nor Michelle MacDonald ought to be let within a hundred miles of a public legal job in Minnesota." You need not be the one who said it first, to agree.

Timmer most recently, this link.

Are Big Sky Values ones you share?

Steve Bullock, Montana Governor, and his supporters appear to have launched the BIG SKY VALUES site. Please, for now bookmark the site and consider contributing. Surely there are elections pending where money would help, but long term reaches and goes beyond 2020.

https://www.ourbigskyvalues.org/about/

Related links of interest:

https://www.fec.gov/data/committee/C00650754/

https://duckduckgo.com/html?q=steve%20bullock%20net%20neutrality

http://mtpeoplesvoice.com/2018/01/19/gov-bullock-files-brief-in-janus-v-afscme/
(see: https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/16/16-1466/28298/20180118150303534_16-1466%20Amicus%20Brief%20Steve%20Bullock.pdf)

https://duckduckgo.com/html?q=steve%20bullock%20iowa

https://duckduckgo.com/html?q=steve%20bullock%20new%20hampshire

-------------------

Big Sky Values PAC Contribution Page

Steve Bullock was NOT one of the persons who prematurely jumped all over Al Franken for their own agendas/purposes, i.e., NOT saying to DC or other news sources whether Al should leave the Senate without a full, prior airing of facts.

Those were others.

ALSO: Unlike voting, you can contribute early and OFTEN. So, please consider it.

FINALLY: Just as executive order power can help advance Net Neutrality despite the Trump FCC, it perhaps could do something to quell zombie phone calls, (those jiggered-number solicition/scam phone calls which we all know and suffer), by similarly incentivizing phone companies as was started by Bullock with the Internet service providers. It would help our shared Big Sky by clearing the the Sky's airwaves of garbage, state by state, by executive order power over state purse-strings. Someone should initiate that effort.

________________UPDATE________________
There is more:

https://duckduckgo.com/html?q=steve%20bullock%20public%20lands


Governor Steve Bullock on Money in Politics

21st Century Democrats

Montana Post:

Steve Bullock for President? - by Nathan Kosted - February 7, 2018 7:45 am

I’ve worked on three presidential campaigns and in my experience it definitely looks like Steve Bullock is taking the initial steps that a potential candidate takes to position themselves for the nomination.

Here’s the evidence:

1. He’s started a national PAC(Big Sky Values PAC) and raised around half a million dollars and is touring the country visiting important states that are necessary to win a Democratic nomination.
2. Governor Bullock spoke at a Center for American Progress(CAP) event in 2017. CAP is a leading organization involved in presidential candidate preparation and vetting.
3. One of the most telling facts is that Governor Bullock spoke at a very exclusive event held by one of Hillary Clinton’s most controversial advisors. When reached out to for comment a spokesperson for the Governor said Steve Bullock is “interested in being a part of the conversation about the future of the country and the future of the Democratic Party.”
4. As well as this quote from Governor Bullock to the New York Times:

“I believe the time is right to lend my voice, the voice of someone that after getting elected has been able to govern in what’s viewed as a red state. Some of the things that I’ve been able to do in Montana can also translate beyond just the state’s border.”

Any of these things by themselves could be dismissed, but combine the four pieces of evidence and the only conclusion is that Steve Bullock is considering running and talking to people who are preparing him for a run.

I’m one of the few people who can say they’ve supported Steve Bullock since he ran in the Democratic primary for Attorney General. Those of us who supported him then built an argument that he was the best candidate suited to represent progressives in the long run. He had already proven himself in 2006 by running the “Raise the Wage” campaign that successfully raised the minimum wage in Montana and tied wage increases to inflation so that currently Montana still has a higher minimum wage than the national minimum wage.

[multiple links in original omitted] Nathan Kosted wrote of Bullock as Presidential, in Montana.

This post writes of Bullock as Presidential, in Minnesota.

The band wagon starts its movement early, but stay with it for the finish. This is Real. This is Fresh. And promising.

Kamala Harris might be good on the second spot of a ticket. To balance things population-wise, and making it coastal buttressing Heartland.

However, there are a host of people who could balance a ticket from Heartland, while such a ticket would need proven momentum first before any second spot guessing would be relevant.

BOTTOM LINE: Keep the person, the name Bullock, in mind.

____________FURTHER UPDATE____________
In the Kosted - MontanaPost item quoted above, link checking found a dead link, (item 3 in that quote). The best guess is David Brock is the "controversial" person, and readers may try links here and here [p.4, luncheon speaking panel]. With Holder and Bullock speaking together, is a suggestion a Holder-Bullock ticket; or better yet, a Bullock-Holder one? Speculation is more fun than a Doug Wardlow speech (yet dental work is also more fun than a Doug Wardlow speech, i.e., a better analogy might apply).

____________FURTHER UPDATE____________
East coast and Heartland: Elizabeth Warren - Steven Bullock, and there the second spot would not be Warren. Another: Steven Bullock - Tulsi Gabbard, Heartland and the Islands. This could go on and on.

Billings Gazette.

Beltway/DC insiders take notice.

Lest anyone think Bullock is lukewarm on the Medicare/Medicaid necessities, there is a clearly worded petition effort you can join. With every added name a likely voter, the hope is some level of traction attaches to a greater number of petitioners. Consider signing. Yet be on notice, it does lead to a survey ending with a contribution solicitation. I passed that up because a check already is in the mail.

Readers can add their name to the petition and pass up the survey or fill it out, as they choose. The number of petitioners is what matters most.

Russian opposition to net neutrality in our nation? FCC is sued by N.Y. Times over a stonewalled FOIA request. Not news - federal agency stonewalling FOIA requests instead of complying. The NYT complaint IS news.

Ars reports, and posts the NYT complaint. Ajit Pai is a piece of work. Trump appointed him, ergo...

Steve Timmer is better at finding interesting video links than I am. The aim is the same, yet he's the better shot. [UPDATED]

Wardlow, of course. This link. Ted Cruz and Doug Wardlow remind me of the Mexican Flag, Cruz the eagle. Fly united.

_____________UPDATED_____________
A Strib op-ed on comparison of the Kavanaugh attempted rape allegation against the Ellison break-up of the relationship story of Monahan.

It omits one key point. Kavanaugh is not running against anyone. Ellison is running against a dangerous man, if allowed near the Attorney General's office, never mind the chance of that dangerous person becoming agency boss.

It is time to compare Tina Smith and Doug Wardlow. Smith represented Planned Parenthood at one time. It is a live and let live operation. It forces itself upon no one and does not do anything but provide a Constitutionally valid medical service which some oppose, along with a spectrum of other medical service and advice to willing patients who proactively seek it out for help. It is attacked, but attacks nobody. Wardlow has an agenda which is proactive and to many, vile. No one is ever saying Wardlow must practice his faith in any particular way, or that his faith has to be of a particular flavor. How Wardlow lives, who he cohabits with, as long as he avoids being a public nuisance or criminal, are not an issue within a live and let live perspective. He, in turn, disparages gay and transgender people in a way that would stigmatize and demean their living their lives without wanting any input from Doug Wardlow. In effect, Wardlow wants others to measure up to his view of faith. Tina Smith, as well as Kieth Ellison seek election based on secular policy views of what is best for a state and nation. Now and into the future. They oppose scapegoating in principle and by policy advocacy. If the function of the Attorney General's office were to police religion of the State's people, as Wardlow would like it to be, we'd be in a pickle.  And that is why he should be viewed as a Ted Cruz clone without as obnoxious a demeanor and persona but with the identical agenda. We can live and let live without having to suffer Ted Cruz directly, here in Minnesota. Wardlow is active and near and Ellison is all that stands between Wardlow and devastation of the Attorney General's office as we know and appreciate it. And Steve Timmer well appreciates the situation in writing of it. It is the same motivation felt here. There is no mystery to -

Live and let live. And to anyone who'd elevate the concept of an embryo being the same as an actual living coping human - do something for the homeless instead of getting into other people's face about their behavior choices and reproductive decision making. Be useful instead of a bigot and a scold.

The Prague meeting. Make that the "alleged Prague meeting."

WaPo about one of the dossier allegations:

The documents allege that Cohen stepped into the role of primary liaison with Russia in August 2016 after Paul Manafort resigned from the campaign following new reports about his relationship with a pro-Russian politician in Ukraine. Cohen, a report from October reads, “was heavily engaged in a cover up and damage limitation operation in the attempt to prevent the full details of [Trump’s] relationship with Russia being exposed.”

Per “a Kremlin insider” who spoke with Steele, Cohen met with “Kremlin representatives” in August or September of that year in Prague. That alleged meeting may have taken place at Rossotrudnichestvo, a Russian center for science and culture in the city. Attendees may have included Konstantin Kosachev, a member of the upper chamber of Russia’s legislature, and Oleg Solodukhin, who works for Rossotrudnichestvo. Steele’s reports indicate that the meeting was originally supposed to be in Moscow, but that was judged too risky.

August 2016 emphasized. Also, August 2016, PeopleMag:

Pals Ivanka Trump and Wendi Deng Murdoch Go Sightseeing in Croatia - By Stephanie Petit - August 14, 2016 01:15 PM

Ivanka Trump is taking a break from the campaign trail to vacation with friends.

The daughter of GOP nominee Donald Trump shared a scenic snap with Wendi Deng Murdoch, the ex-wife of billionaire media mogul Rupert Murdoch, from Dubrovnik, Croatia.

Trump, 34, was spotted with husband Jared Kushner in the city’s old town, seemingly taking a couple’s vacation without their three children – Arabella, 5, Joseph, 2, and Theodore, 4 months.

Images, here and here. Mistaken identity? Mistaken location? How far is Dubrovnik from Prague; how easy the travel?

Entry requirements, short business/tourist stay, Prague, Dubrovnik.

Trump tower June 2016 meeting with Russians timeline/particpants. A theory is only a theory, but what footprints would be showing were the Prague meeting with Kushner, not Cohen? August, 2016, coincidence or more, OR, Cohen a red herring, deliberately posted elsewhere with an alibi, Jarad in Prague for a meeting, diverting briefly from the reported Jarad-Ivanka "holiday?" Cohen reached a plea. Manafort reached a plea. Jarad, no plea. Donald Jr., no plea. So far.

UPDATE: How to get to Dubrovnik? What if by yacht?

Last item, this image, captioned, "Geffen is close friends with supermodel Karlie Kloss (above on his yacht in June) who dates Jared's brother Joshua."

Fun in the sun with the rich and famous. Prague side-trip? Who's to say? 

FURTHER: It did not even have to cost that much, round trip, although the big fish, big pond dimension makes cost no object.  Not like a migrant boat from Africa. But just the sun glasses, mix with the ordinary folks in coach, nothing extraordinary to draw attention, a business trip on the side and back to the yacht.

It appears that Minnesota Senate seats are not up for election except for Minnesota Senate District 13 (special election).

Strib, May 25, 2018 (seat becomes open).

Wikipedia, current as of date of this post.

St. Cloud Times, Sept. 16.

DLCC, current as of date of this post.

Perske campaign site:

https://www.perskeforsenate.com/

From there readers can link to an "about" page, a "values" page, and this "donate" page:

https://www.perskeforsenate.com/donate.html

That page presents online donation, and gives mailing info for sending a check.

The Perske home page has a "Get Active" submission form for residents in SD 13 to complete. Out of district contributors would use the "donate" page. With only that Senate District contested along with all the House districts in this election cycle, Perske will be facing a strongly financed challenge.

UPDATE: With the Chinese trade war retaliation tariffs there may be an impact within the district. Readers in the district or knowing people there might want to ask whether trade issues might be expected to be an election factor, or not. Status of the tariff contest by election day could change. Early voting began yesterday. If candidate forum or debate plans exist the Perske campaign should be able to provide information. The St. Cloud Times appears to have not endorsed early. Whether there now exists publicly available early polling is not known here.

Interesting email. Joe Radinovich says the obvious, but it's not being said enough, by enough Democrats, who may worry about blowback.

If it is your party and you are comfortable with DC consultancies making money, big buck donors, and middle of the road policies that Wall Street likes, blowback from soliciting votes from the wrong people can be a pain, or threaten pain via reduced voice in the small band of elite grand poobahs.

Despite that reticence basis for some, Joe Radinovich is not planted like a tree in any such camp.

My proof? Joe Radinovich's campaign today emailed:

I had a special opportunity yesterday that I wanted to tell you about. I was excited to speak with a high school civics class in Cloquet (thanks to Mr. Swanson for letting me try out teaching!) about government and politics -- and I want to spread the message far and wide that young people like Cloquet High students are the future of our political system.

If young people turn out to vote in these midterm elections, we can change Washington. But in our last midterms, fewer than 20% of eligible voters under 30 went to the polls.

That’s why we want everyone reading this to pledge to vote in November.

Sign on here >> [link with tracking code omitted; don't you wish they would not put tracking suffixes into email links? a plaintext cut/paste option or a vanilla link not loaded to track would be nice.]

There are more young people eligible to vote than any other age group. If the newest generation of voters doesn’t get out, there will be no representation of their values and priorities in Congress. Those values, like understanding that healthcare is a human right and government should serve people instead of special interests, are shared by so many of us. That’s why we need everyone to show up to the polls in November.

We can turn this country around, friend, but only if our young people vote.

PLEDGE TO VOTE
My best,
Joe

[bolding emphasis added] Aside from criticism via the added italic opinion, the email resonates. The idea is so obvious, but no other solicitation emails seek that, instead saying blah, blah, contribute [various amounts listed, tracking email you can toggle to part with cash]. This one not only has an idea, it has none of that donate/contribute stuff this time.

Yes, those young men and women should be incensed at student debt and only a tepid support level for the modest proposal of a fifteen buck minimum wage. They should see and want change of a pattern of their parents and extended family having modest means and Congress hell-bent to assure an even bigger slice of the pie for big money entrenched interests. But, there is friction in the machine; the DCCC and DNC are glacially changing, at best, to admit they need a shot of adrenaline to keep a pulse and fog a mirror. They are moribund while being set in comfortable ways.

Joe rocks that boat, by saying the obvious - if the young stay home the likelihood of that Blue Wave drops precipitously.

So, Dem politicos and poobahs, offer young women and men of voting age something up front and appealing please. With emphasis. Including offering an honest ongoing real voice in things. If they do not come to the party, in droves or in lesser waves, the party must reach out to recruit. That or move toward irrelevance. One Dylan song line, those not busy being born are busy dying. Think it over.

A shout out: Any reader in CD8 leaning Democrat this cycle, please think of four young voting age people you know, and pull on their sleeves. That is what recruitment means, at a minimum. And Radinovich in stating the case deserves that response.

UPDATE: There should be a chorus of political symbiosis - the young need us and we need the young. Not a hard soundbite to comprehend, but it needs to be heard.

Taking the Taxpayers' court records out from behind a paywall is overdue, and at least one Republican believes so.

Ars, initial paragraphs:

Judicial records are public documents that are supposed to be freely available to the public. But for two decades, online access has been hobbled by a paywall on the judiciary's website, called PACER (Public Access to Court Electronic Records), which charges as much as 10 cents per page. Now Rep. Doug Collins (R-Ga.) has introduced legislation that would require that the courts make PACER documents available for download free of charge.

The PACER system has been on the Web since the late 1990s. To avoid using taxpayer funds to develop the system, Congress authorized the courts to charge users for it instead. Given the plunging cost of bandwidth and storage, you might have expected these fees to decline over time. Instead, the judiciary has actually raised fees over time—from 7 cents per page in 1998 to 10 cents per page today. Even search results incur fees. The result has been a massive windfall for the judiciary—$150 million in 2016 alone.

Critics like the legal scholar Stephen Schultze point out that this is not what Congress had in mind. In 2002, Congress required that the courts collect fees "only to the extent necessary" to fund the system. It obviously doesn't cost $150 million per year to run a website with a bunch of PDFs on it. Despite that, federal courts have used PACER revenues as a slush fund to finance other court activities. For example, one judge bragged at a 2010 conference about using PACER funds to install flatscreen monitors and state-of-the-art sound systems in court rooms.

[links in original omitted] "Only to the extent necessary," should include capacity to pay; i.e., the big law firm IP addresses can pay the freight for the you and me citizens being able to have cost free access to court documents. The paywall, besides being used as a cash cow, is a nuisance filter - as in saying, think of the traffic if it is free. Well other sites are free, government site, and there is no bandwidth irresponsibility. The courts should, like all else, be funded out of general funds. If no fee is imposed, great. If big high-bandwidth users are charged, great also. If little time-or-two a month users are kept out, not great.

Bless the Georgia man's proposal, it is as sane and genuine as McCain's repeated effort to get cable franchisees to unbundle the base collection of a few wanted and a host of garbage channels, with desirable alternatives being pay-extra. Such an attitude toward consumers is why government needs to fund meaningful consumer protection on an ongoing and sufficient basis, and to not be distracted by anti-consumer forces and agendas.

Curiosity finds itself a question.

This link, from March, 2014; this image which poses the question:

With Porn-Freaks and Lukewarm Christians castigated as needing judgment, this brand of folks, how do they justify hush money to porn participants; paid by a lukewarm Christian for a pre-election hush? And that "DRUNKARDS" thing, Kavanaugh and prep school chum Judge? Ah. Reformed drunkards are okay.

Rationalization, as in we get our judges, is not justification, it is sophistry and evasion and lacks candor.

Oh, wait - overlooked FORNICATORS. While Melania was delivering Barron no less.

Hate the sin but love the sinner?

I judge stupidity, God not needed to know it when I see it.

UPDATE: Stupidity and hypocrisy can be judged in one fell swoop.

Bullock of Montana is good on net neutrality, was good in the amici filings in Janus.

This link re Janus. This websearch re net neutrality. Said here early in things, the man seems presidential.

Make America Great Again - one step toward that, modestly suggested:

Amend the federal constitution:

Corporations are fictional persons created by state statutes; and do not have rights of humans such as voting or influencing elections by spending money or otherwise. Nor can any corporation have a religion. Collective bargaining via unions is necessary for proper interstate and international commerce, including an absolute right of a bargaining unit to negotiate exclusion of non-union coworkers, to strike, and to hold secondary boycotts. Sites with multiple bargaining units, possibly of different unions may, by negotiation, reach an agreement with each union to coordinate strikes and other activity. This Amemdment imposes no negotiation duty or requirement upon unions, and state so-called right to work laws, however worded, are void as against public policy. Any spending by any collective or aggregation of money shall have to identify every contributor and amount of contribution in a publicly filed document open to public viewing. Citizenship is not a requirement for membership in a union. Federal and state law may reasonably regulate union pension funds for fiscal responsibly, but shall otherwise not interfere in union leadership and rank and file governance except for breach of criminal law or beach of safety or non-discrumination workplace regulatory law. Unions may not in concert with employers bargain to breach environmental protection law. Public and private sector workforces have equal union rights. Except as stated in this Amendment, no activity is exempt from union organization. Assertions of "national security" shall not be raised to inhibit freedom of action of unions. Upon passage of this Amendment all contrary existing law is void.

That's a start. Others more adept at saying the same thing more compactly and/or tying up loose ends should do their thing.

More reach may be advisable, but again, this is a first cut.

I want to join Doug Wardlow's church. I want to do that so I can not pay one damned penny, but get my salvation benefits, for free.

Why say that about the pious man?

Well, he wants his kind of worker to be freeloading off unions. So sauce for goose is sauce for gander and I should freeload off his Jesus outlet. It is not worth quoting bill text since union leaders and rank-and-file can read. Links:

HF 2140, back then. HF 3009, back then. HF 2140 had Senate companion bill SF 1705 (Senate spoonsors: Thompson; Chamberlain; Gazelka; Parry; Lillie).

Sponsors of HF 2140: Drazkowski; Lohmer; Downey; Holberg; Quam; Benson, M.; Gruenhagen; Hancock; Wardlow; Scott; Anderson, B.; Franson; Leidiger; McDonald; Gottwalt; Kiffmeyer; Erickson; Bills; Myhra; Runbeck; Doepke.

Sponsors of HF 3009; (Wardlow rides again): Wardlow; Hancock; Quam; Leidiger; Drazkowski; Buesgens; Franson; Bills.

No Senate companion measure for the Wardlow second bite at the apple. Just that few never-quit batch of illustrious mischief makers in the House. (If unfamiliar with legislative sites; to read the bill text, as proposed, the links are given in opening text of the linked items. E.g., HF 2140 text; Hf 3009 text; showing that Wardlow did the hard work of taking existing text and reformatting. Likely working up a sweat. A sweat of rabid enthusiasm if nothing else.)

Bottom line: Wardlow wants to weaken union power and cohesion by enacting law favoring freeloaders off working folks' security and solidarity.

Timmer links to the video of Wardlow's moving for consideration of the HF 2140 measure, with a long and telling pause for failure to gain a second, with the thing he was pushing being like finding earthworms wiggling in the punchbowl.

It appears that after the videotaped experience the guy goes off and writes another worm pack for the punchbowl, i.e., the HF 3009 thing. Persistence in the face of rejection being a mark of the Wardlow persona, so give it to him. Reject his audacious bid to become Attorney General and monkey up the office outrageously. Rejected hubris being for Wardlow, its own reward.

Understand: The motive for the Jesus jockeys going after workers is so they can get an attaboy from the Koch brother wing of Republicans. An attaboy for working on the team. Getting the ticket punched by the adults in the room.

Give him his attaboy by voting Ellison.

As in, attaboy, now shut up and go away to pray against trans and gay folks, and tithe youself to the max while reviling taxes. You hate union workers. You pose, but are a willing Koch tool.

If the meek are going to inherit anything they have to learn what "vote your best pocketbook interest" means. It is not rocket science, but distractions about pious needs in the populace can delude the unwary. And dark money propaganda is a tide, so be smart, and be a skeptic.

Every union man and woman in the state, and every non-union worker who would like a fifteen buck minimum wage as advocated by the unions should hop aboard the Ellison train, and feel the Ellison necessity. Wardlow is after your livelihood, and you can be damned certain of that.

So, back to the headline: If Wardlow wants freeloading off the backs of union effort; I want into that sanctuary to freeload off his congregation. Fair is fair. A mirror reflects.

Yes. I can be a Wardlow too. Just meet the criteria of the song. (Hat tip to Timmer on that too.) This pious man, Wardlow, can roll around the floor and talk in tongues and bark like a pit bull, I don't care a rat's ass how he meets his Jesus, but don't fuck with the unions.

One term can be enough to establish an MO, and to lose an election once true colors are shown. False Prophets have been a problem with his religion, and you cannot get more false in the hearts of those working to live.

Wardlow wants to foster leeches off the work of organized membership.

The song fits him.



Is there anything in this post union members do not understand?

_____________UPDATE______________
Young voting age McDonalds workers; Walmart labor; in SD 35, note Peggy Scott wants union busting too, from her seat in HD 35B. Michelle Benson, SD 31. You know that a vote is a broom, don't you?

Timmer posts again about Doug Wardlow.

Using video and text Timmer publishes an integrated post, which speaks for itself. Read it. No quote here, no commentary about it here. If you care about the contest you have the link.

All those Republican Senate lawyers want no part of a careful analysis of Kavanaugh attempted rape allegations. Some even looking for escape hatches, e.g., Orrin Hatch. Lawyers usually claim to have affection for evidence, how it preponderates, what doubts are countered by testimony, that stuff.

VanityFair:

Lindsey Graham, who did not call for a delay, released a statement on Wednesday accusing Democrats and Ford’s team of dragging their feet: “Requiring an F.B.I. investigation of a 36-year-old allegation . . . before Professor Ford will appear before the Judiciary Committee is not about finding the truth, but delaying the process until after the midterm elections,” he said. “It is imperative the Judiciary Committee move forward on the Kavanaugh nomination and a committee vote be taken as soon as possible.”

Good faith, it seems, goes only so far. Already, as The New York Times reported Tuesday, Republicans have landed on an argument to discredit Ford: that she was indeed assaulted at a party Kavanaugh attended, but was “mistaken,” as Senator Orrin Hatch put it, as to her assailant’s identity.

There's no "imperative" to quick and dirty when thorough and level-headed makes all the sense needed. Lindsey Graham is dissembling, and we can guess the reason.

Same outlet, different item:

According to sources, several factors are at play. White House advisers are worried that more damaging information about Kavanaugh could come out. Two sources told me the White House has heard rumors that Ford’s account will be verified by women who say she told it to them contemporaneously.

Partisan committee staff cannot credibly say they'll investigate; the professional investigators in DC are in the FBI. We all know that.

If there are contemporaneous corroborating witnesses, common sense says that for a fair hearing they need to be heard. Yet before rushing to judgment, reports conflict, WaPo writing:

Ford said she has not spoken with Kavanaugh since that night. And she told no one at the time what had happened to her. She was terrified, she said, that she would be in trouble if her parents realized she had been at a party where teenagers were drinking, and she worried they might figure it out even if she did not tell them.

However you parse things if Senators are to credibly judge a situation, shouldn't they know facts? FBI inquiry could pin detail of corroborating testimony, if any, in a credible and definitive way. If tangible evidence is lacking, contemporaneous corroborative testimony is of cardinal importance. This is not Alice facing the Red Queen's meanderings in Wonderland. These are lawyers. Trained on norms of evidence. It's fundamental.

Here is food for thought, about Judge, the second man said to be in the room watching and laughing as Kavanaugh was said to be the one assaulting Ford:

Both men have denied the accusation, which Christine Blasey Ford went public with this week in The Washington Post. A lawyer for Judge said in a letter to the Senate Judiciary Committee that he has “no memory of this alleged incident.” Judge previously told the New York Times that such behavior would be wildly out of character for the Catholic-raised-and-educated boys who went to Georgetown Prep in the early ’80s.

What Judge has written in his career as a journalist and author is another matter.

In two memoirs, Judge depicted his high school as a nest of debauchery where students attended “masturbation class,” “lusted after girls” from nearby Catholic schools and drank themselves into stupors at parties.

So, in authoring generic background of interest this Judge, via his lawyer, issues no categorial "It did not happen," instead, "no memory of this alleged incident." Uncertainty of memory differs from something more emphatic and definite. He would make an interesting witness.

Here is a good one:

Kavanaugh on Monday issued a fresh denial of the allegations, which have roiled his confirmation process.

“I have never done anything like what the accuser describes — to her or to anyone,” he said in a statement. “Because this never happened, I had no idea who was making this accusation until she identified herself yesterday.”

Yet his denials only prompted further questions. Sen. Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah), a member of the Judiciary Committee, said that Kavanaugh had told him that he was not present at the party in question — which prompted some to wonder how Kavanaugh could make such a claim given that Ford had never specified the exact date or location of the gathering.

But, you know, "that party" "never there" "nope" "never ever." Some 'splaining is due from the Judge, and sidekick Judge.

This needs more fleshing out:

But while Ford’s lawyers await Grassley’s official response to their request for an F.B.I. probe, Republicans’ maneuvering is increasingly transparent. “[If] ‘Grassley’s staff offered Dr. Ford multiple dates’ what were the other dates,” tweeted Josh Barro. “And if she hadn’t responded yet, how did they settle on Monday?”

BOTTOM LINE: It sounds like skeletons might be rattling away, so let the FBI open the door and look in the closet. It should not take long.

UPDATE: BIGGER BOTTOM LINE: The Republicans have the votes they need. Pence likely in his inner persona is loving the idea of being needed and able to cast a deciding vote as with DeVos, but being bound by appearances being a big part of who Pence is, he'd shy away to continue being Uriah Heap. Like Wardlow. Twin sons of different mothers. In that sense Wardlow has more Pence in him than Cruz. At least as to appearances.

Not being in the believer camp, I ask: Did Jesus die on the cross so some narcissist rich guy could noodle a porn actress and pay multiple hush money hither and yon with blind-eye Pence toadying in tow?

Just wondering. It begins and ends there? Anything can be rationalized, tithe thyself being the sole key teaching?

Blessed be the excuse makers? Does the scripture really go like that? Which mount was that sermon on? Can you give me chapter and verse?

Jeff. Doug. Are you there? Help is needed.

I thought "prosperity gospel" meant something else.

Minnesota AG contest has early but interesting polling reported - A Strib/MPR poll.

Report with some analysis, online here.

Poll detail, here. Putting "young" voters into a bloc ranging 18 to 34 years is a large aggregation, but it can be said those holding the future strongly favor Ellison. Beyond that, polarization along party lines holds.

Other than saying that, readers are urged to take the time to check both pages. This post is kept short to encourage such a step. Time studying the data would be best for those short of time but wanting to follow at least one link.

The choice-hating Nanny State.

The Nanny.

The State.

Having a hard time wrapping my mind around the Alex Jones censorship "controversy."

Doing a vanilla websearch = Alex Jones

It really is not as if clicking that linked search demonstrates total censorship of the mind and mouth of Mr. Jones. He has a perspective. It is online:

https://www.infowars.com/

While admitting to not investing much study upon site content, one item seized the day. It begins:

Big Tech: We Won’t Display Alex Jones Content, but We Will Work with Chinese Government -- Google claims to believe in freedom of speech, but they are now engaging in domestic censorship, and helping to design a censored search engine in China -- By David Unsworth | panampost.com - September 18, 2018

Google has a major hypocrisy problem. Apparently, as the new moral guardians of what we are allowed to see and hear, it is their duty to ban the content of Alex Jones and his Infowars site. YouTube, which is owned by Google and is a major platform for viewing all types of media content, has removed Jones and content from all of his affiliated channels.

However, recent reports suggest that Google has no qualms about working with the Chinese Communist government, which is by a lightyear, the greatest abuser of human rights in the world today. Specifically, Google is helping to design a search engine that will meet the ideologically restrictive demands of the totalitarian regime in Beijing.

Just as the Beijing regime, and its dictator-for-life “president” Xi Jinping, seek to infiltrate the academic world under the auspices of the Confucius Institute, now they seek to infiltrate the tech world by partnering with the world’s leading technology company so that they force-feed Communist lies down the throats of their 1.3 billion citizens.

We can only imagine what such a search engine might look like: Looking for information about Tibet, the Dalai Lama, and its Buddhist population?

Tibet has always been part of China, the Dalai Lama is a fraud and a counter-revolutionary, and Buddhists are not good Communists.

[...]

[bolding and link in original] That seems not a muffled, silenced voice. Of note, the footer to the article:

- click image to enlarge and read -

Screen capture images do not carry over live links, so trust me or verify, clicking that Google Store App thingy goes here.

Poor Alex being censored so abruptly. The heavy boot upon his throat. Storm troopers at his door. About to be imprisoned or disappeared.

Right-wing reaching. And Tulsi Gabbard, "Gasp! She's a Hindu."

Oh my! Tulsi gotta get straight with Jesus. It will be hell on earth and John's Revelations fulfilled in the flesh once the nation has its first Hindu female president . . .

But now, wait a minute. One has to cut slack for the right people. Say one born in Bamberg, SC, to Sikh immigrants, she being okay with the right people. With ones who'd never want as foreigners to weigh into choices in a U.S. election.

Knowing when a special prosecutor is needed for foreign thumbs on the scale is a fine art, but one practiced DC insiders are skilled enough to handle. Don't ask.

The Hindu. The Tulsi.

So, wrap it up about right wing tongue clucking; Gasp! The lady has a photo shoot, the outlet handling the photo prep. Don't ask.

Women have a way to go in politics. And of course they know it and push as is possible for level playing. People don't even talk about Trump Ties anymore; but female? Clothes are an issue? Or is it just that in any dimension FOX talking heads cannot wrap their minds around anything other than FOX?

Stuffed shirts holding up suits.

Getty images - uncropped from original

Two self-identify as Magi, obviously being adults in the room for their cohorts, while the other has a striped tie. For the Magi, and cohorts, Pussy Riot foresees Kavanaugh jurisprudence - a great choice, again.

Noam.

Have a nice day.

The Ellison necessity. And related thought.

Keeping the AG office in DFL hands is not the goal. Keeping it out of the hands of Doug Wardlow is the goal. That is what the Ellison necessity is all about.

If Mohanhan has a video and drops it as an October surprise for whatever motives apply, vote Ellison anyway. Take advantage of early voting and be free of any cause to pay any attention to the soon to be ceaseless political propaganda sound-bite ads. Protect your head that way.

Wardlow is a worry because he appears to have an agenda that he declines to lay out in his campaigning, one of Dominionism as strong as that of Ted Cruz - being Ted without the swagger and offending demeanor.

Ted at heart. Better manners.

Surely such a view might be wrong. The problem is the likelihood it is not wrong is close to 100%, i.e., as spot-on correct as one can guess about the future.

It would be best if Ellison had invested more care in his personal life, whatever the video situation may turn out to show or not show. But the urgency is great because Ellison's candidacy is the only thing between Wardlow and the AG office, with the entire situation being unfortunate.

All of that has been written here before. There is no Chicken Little sky falling belief to suggest if Wardlow were somehow to win the seat. In time he could be voted out. Or he might prove capable beyond expectations. But the truth seems to be as Timmer wrote it back in 2011, and there is little else to add.

Use of a catch-the-fire logo on the Wardlow website is something of an insult to the majority of voters who need to know what it stands for and hence what Wardlow himself stands for.

The simplest way to characterize that, is to note that Ted Cruz used a comparable catch-the-fire logo in running in 2016, while father Rafael Cruz preaches that stuff.

Just as a nation rejected Ted, a state can reject Wardlow.

Back to Ellison: Not having had a video produced the early voting here is strongly pro-Ellison; and should a video surface at an awkward time the early vote will also ring the not-Wardlow bell here too; so it's win-win with the hope others weigh the situation identically.

Before Mohanhan had her adult son spring the thing enthusiasm here was strongest for Ellison because of his policy being progressive and his record matching the policy. Not vanilla middle of the road stuff as with Klobuchar, Smith, and Walz. After Tina Liebling failed to generate sufficient support and folded early, Erin Murphy, having about the same policy belief set as Liebling, became the favored candidate here, with the endorsement being a cheerful outcome showing parallel thinking.

When the primary voting was done, Walz stood as the candidate and he clearly has integrity and experience and policy positions more progressive than Johnson can envision; and Walz would make a fine governor.

The lightweight Republican Senate challengers are a lock-down cause to vote for the two incumbents to secure at least the middle of the road and not any abrupt right turn nonsense.

The GOP money dump is in CD3. Which is happening because Paulsen has nothing to recommend him based on time in office and voting the Trump-Pence-Ryan party line without waiver. So watch how the steady tide of hostile sound-bite attack upon Dean Phillips will unfold.

Necessary debunking of the worse of the present CD3 mud-slinging GOP propaganda has been done by Channel KARE 11, in fine fashion - this link.

Seeing how the half-truth lying shakes out per the KARE 11 debunking should anger many voters who want the nutshell version of truth and not lies to help their voting. May many CD3 voters be justly turned off by the GOP stuff, rather than believing the misguiding junk-ads of those afraid of losing the seat to the better candidate.

Similarly, once CD2 voters accept Angie Craig is in a stable loving lesbian marriage with children, they can then look beyond any bias they may have over that and see Craig is intelligent and well motivated and not the posturing talk-radio jackass presently occupying the seat. Craig should win by a good but not resounding margin.

The Iron Range will vote, we have no idea how and early polling seems absent.

CD1 was the Walz seat with a Walz-like DFL candidate there.

My CD6 expectation - where I live and vote - Emmer takes it without the GOP having to spend much mud-slinging money there, with Emmer better over two years than I ever would have expected. CD4 and CD5 are not really in play, going DFL with a likelihood comparable to Emmer in CD6. Collin Peterson will win, and he does vote with Democrats in House organizing matters.

BOTTOM LINE: The Republicans are really scared in CD3, and the mud-slinging will be as incessant as it is false.

BOTTOM LINE: The Ellison necessity - is necessary. Wardlow is scary.

Ass backwards.

The Federalist makes the argument, Kavanaugh is being castigated by Dems while Ellison and Beto O’Rourke are not, Kavanaugh and O'Rourke from actions at a young age, Ellison for an action more recent but less serious; with denials and uncertainty mixed in to boot. The Ellison accuser speaks out again, as currently reported.

So, what is the difference, or is there none with each man to be scrap-heaped?

The argument has superficial appeal. However, in two instances, voters will decide and any error can be undone in a subsequent election.

In the other a man intent upon undoing Roe v. Wade is seeking a life-time appointment by a bunch of politicized supporters. Politicians of questionable merit in two separate camps seem figuratively at one-another's throat over the nomination and over Trump. Where Trump is the issue, the question will again face an electorate. Kavanaugh never has been elected to anything whatsoever over his lifetime, yet, to the detriment of the nation, he stands to step into a lifetime of mischief opportunity. Apples and oranges, which is why The Federalist argument disingenuously ignores the key difference.

The opposition party choices against O'Rourke and Ellison are so distastefully Dominionist that any alternative to Ted Cruz and to Doug Wardlow appeals to rational secular humanist minds. To see Cruz voted out, Wardlow soundly rejected by public vote, would be great. It might not shake out that way, but it would be possible.

This Kavanaugh Kabuki theater stuff is offensive because the public has no voice; none whatsoever. It is watch and cringe. Something is wrong with that. Conservatives might disagree, since they really in truth distrust the popular vote and spend greatly to propagandize the public their way and to propose disenfranchisement hurdles.

That too great a public segment falls for the propaganda barrage is a fault of individuals in aggregation, but it is a better system than the Senators we have in DC dancing their thing. It would make as much sense to decide the Kavanaugh appointment by Feinstein and Grassley having a best of three games bowling match. As things stand, if, as is likely from Senate nose counting, Kavanaugh gets elevated above his competence level, there exists only one sound political option for those in favor of reproductive choice and overturning of Hobby Lobby and Citizens United. That option would require election outcomes over a spectrum of venues, outcomes which are highly unlikely, since multiple offices would need to be changed.

The Dominionists want their three guys. They need to be frustrated, for the good of continuing to have a decent nation where far, far, far too many do not want a Christian Soldier turn to "biblical law" or any other such gross stupidity, and they will at least have their vote.

I hold as much a vote on Kavanaugh as I had on the other dreadful bastards, Gorsuch, Alito, Thomas, and the biggest snake, the Citizens United boffo himself, Mr. Justice Roberts. That is a major difference, so let us for a change be honest about things.

Bottom line, there is wisdom to imposing a mandatory single ten year term for Supreme Court Justices, Thomas having been there too long and being the poster child on for-life appointments being unwise. The security to judge would be identical but for a fixed term. To avoid any argument that Justices could be turned out to endure poverty and scorn, let them have the same salary for life but get their seats into play in some staggered way that new blood can be a factor without having to wait for old blood to choose to step down or to croak.

It would require a Constitutional Amendment to change the judiciary, [UPDATE: as to tenure, not as to number] but just think how dangerously young Roberts is dissembles in stitching lies, and then cringe.

Last, demonizing Anita Hill was wrong, the likelihood that Christine Blasey Ford will be dragged over the rocks is a near certainty, and Karen Monahan apparently is not having a joyous time these days. That is wrong. "Believe the accuser," that is extreme and most folks see it as that, but accordomg the accuser a right to state a claim describing a situation without uncivil consequences must be the rule; else the coming forward with valid claims will be stifled as has been the case over most of the past. There needs to be an openness to things being sounded out in a civil non-recriminatory manner. Even when emotionally charged factors are at play.

Catch the fire - catch the fire bug - a burning logo, with a story, perhaps. A story of: Cults are as cults do.

There is a lot of web stuff, chaff not wheat, so start with Wikipedia; Catch the Fire disambiguating to here:

Catch the Fire Toronto, previously known as Toronto Airport Vineyard and Toronto Airport Christian Fellowship (TACF) is a non-denominational neocharismatic Christian church in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is the flagship church of the Catch The Fire movement, and is also affiliated with the Partners in Harvest group of churches. The church the birthplace and center of the Toronto Blessing, a prominent religious revival and phenomenon in charismatic Christianity during the 1990s.

[...]

History
In 2010, Toronto Airport Christian Fellowship changed its name to Catch The Fire Toronto, to go along with its new international church planting vision.

Pastors John Arnott and Carol Arnott founded the church around 1988. The church later joined John Wimber's Vineyard movement and was known as Toronto Airport Vineyard Church. It met in various rented locations throughout Toronto until the early 1990s when the church found a more permanent home near the Lester B. Pearson Airport.

In January 1994, Randy Clark, a Vineyard pastor, was invited to preach. John Arnott heard that Clark had attended a conference with Rodney Howard-Browne and had been greatly impacted by Howard-Browne's ministry. The revival started during Clark's two-month visit but continued after he left. Some religious leaders criticized the church and revival because of the teachings and manifestations that occurred. Wimber initially defended the Airport Vineyard saying "Nearly everything we've seen—falling, weeping, laughing, shaking—has been seen before, not only in our own memory, but in revivals all over the world."[1]

Nevertheless, the church withdrew or was expelled, according to some, from the Vineyard.[2] Wimber explained the circumstances surrounding the split in a Christianity Today interview, saying that the revival at Toronto was "changing our definition of renewal in Vineyard" and that "[the Vineyard's] decision was to withdraw endorsement; [TACF's] decision was to resign".[3]

After the break with Wimber and the Vineyard in 1995, the church was renamed Toronto Airport Christian Fellowship. It founded Partners in Harvest, a group of churches that shared similar beliefs. In 2006, the Arnotts resigned as senior pastors to pursue a new ministry, Catch the Fire. They were succeeded by Steve and Sandra Long.

The Arnotts now hold the position of Founding Pastors, and the church was renamed in 2010 as Catch the Fire-Toronto, to reflect the "fire" of God spreading to other congregations around the world, unifying them.

Beliefs and practices
At TACF revival services, worshippers have exhibited unusual behaviours that they attribute to an encounter with God and the presence of the Holy Spirit. The most common described behaviours include laughter (often referred to as "holy laughter"), weeping, deep bowing, shaking, "drunkenness" (a reference to Acts 2:13-15 and Ephesians 5:18), slain in the Spirit and speaking in tongues. Other less common behaviours include producing sounds that resemble animals, such as roaring like lions.

The TACF website described it thus:

"The Toronto Blessing is a transferable anointing. In its most visible form it overcomes worshippers with outbreaks of laughter, weeping, groaning, shaking, falling, 'drunkenness,' and even behaviours that have been described as a 'cross between a jungle and a farmyard.'"

The church is also the site where the prophecy of the golden sword was given.

The statement of faith of Toronto Airport Christian Fellowship can be found on their main website.

[links/footnotes omitted] Not your ordinary Lutheran faith. Not Roman Catholic. Not Unitarian. Of its own chrisma. Your's or not, bark like a dog and roll on the floor at a Lutheran sermon, and you will be considered greatly ill-behaved.

There is a split to two websites:
http://ctftoronto.com/
https://catchthefire.com/

And, should you wonder about that "Golden Sword Prophecy" bit, apologetics.org gives insight:

When Randy Clark announced his sermon title, "The Making of a Warrior," the Spirit fell powerfully on many people and especially on Carol Arnott. For about twenty minutes, while on the floor, she was slashing violently with a two handed sword in her hands (her hands together as if holding a sword). After Randy finished his message, she got up and powerfully delivered the following prophecy:

"This is My sword, this is not man's sword, this is My golden sword. The ways you have been using My weapons, the methods that you have been using in the past, you are to throw them away because I am giving you My sword now and the old ways of doing things will not do. The old methods will not be acceptable to Me anymore because I am doing a new thing. Do not look to the yesterdays but look to the future because I am doing a new thing and this new way is not the old. This new way is new and you must throw away the old ways of doing things and take up My sword because My sword is made of pure gold and is purer and is mighty. If you wield it the captives will be set free, the chains will be broken and the healings will be manifest because it will not be by might, nor by power, but by My wonderful Holy Spirit. It is by Him, it is by Him that this new wave will be brought forth, it is by Him that the King of Kings and Lord of Lords will ride again. In this next wave I am requiring those who take up this golden sword to be refined, to be pure, to have all the dross refined in the fire because if you take this sword and there is secret sin in your life this sword will kill you. This next wave is no joke. It is not a laughing matter. All those who do not want to give up their sin and are fearful, like Gideon's men, stand back, because I am calling men and women in these next days that will allow me to refine them, that will allow me to chasten, but not with anger because I am a loving God. I am a God full of mercy but I am serious as the time is short. The bridegroom is most anxious for His bride, so those of you that will, let Me refine you and come and take up that golden sword for I will use you in ways, I will use you in ways that you can't imagine, but I must purify you first."

... old ways not acceptable - new thing, so forget the great schism, it's yesterday's news ... if you buy into it what, take up the sword, and do what? Joseph Smith with Moroni's help deciphered golden scrolls, symbolizing learnings, not sword work, so this is NEW.

The "fire bug" - burning logo part of a registered catchthefire.com copyrighted trademark; see: left side of the image for the logo:

Keep it in mind. Trinity flaming or otherwise, it repeats, web-wise. Places where it may say more than the website itself says about site owner self description, orientation and/or Gestalt.

Some dissenters exist online, one example:

John the Apostle warned, “Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world” (1 John 4:1). This warning is particularly relevant today, as Christianity is undergoing a paradigm shift of major proportions — a shift from faith to feelings; from fact to fantasy; and from reason to esoteric revelation. This paradigm shift is what I call the Counterfeit Revival.

Prophets of the Counterfeit Revival claim that a bloody civil war is going to polarize the entire Christian community. On one side will be those who embrace new revelations. On the other will be those who obstinately cling to reason. One “prophet” went so far as to say, “God is going to renovate the entire understanding of what Christianity is in the nations of the Earth….In twenty years there will be a totally different understanding of Christianity as we know it.”

Some of the most recognizable names in the Christian community are endorsing this paradigm shift with little or no reservation. The appeal is so staggering that churches on every continent are now inviting their people to “experience” God in a brand new way. It is now estimated that seven thousand churches in England alone have embraced the Counterfeit Revival. And with each passing day the numbers are escalating dramatically.

Sardonic laughter, spasmodic jerks, signs and wonders, super apostles and prophets, and being “slain in the spirit” are pointed to as empirical evidence of the power and presence of the Holy Spirit. The form and function of the church are being so radically rearranged that even the secular world has taken note.

Time magazine, in an article titled “Laughing for the Lord,” pointed out that Anglican parishes across England today bear a greater resemblance to “rock concerts” and “rugby matches” than to Christian worship. The article says that sanctuaries throughout the world are littered with bodies as “supplicants sob, shake, roar like lions and strangest of all, laugh uncontrollably.” Newsweek, in an article titled “The Giggles Are for God,” reported that people in churches worldwide were jerking spasmodically, dancing ecstatically, and acting like animals. The article reported that this behavior by Christians has already spread from Canada to “roughly 7,000 congregations in Hong Kong, Norway, South Africa, and Australia, plus scores of churches in the United States.”

Newspapers from the Orlando Sentinel to the Dallas Morning News have written stories on what is termed the “fastest-growing trend within Christianity.” According to The New York Times, this trend promotes an “experiential” Christianity that “promises an emotional encounter with God” manifested by “shaking, screaming, fainting and falling into trances.”

However, there is this. Make what you will of it. And of course, this:

Okay.

Moving on - here is a variant of the catch the fire logo [duality, not trinity]:

In an effort to keep a long story short, proof without links of more of the same:

There is GOD TV. Music.

There are articles of various stripes, some down playing any threat, others less so; here, here, here, here touching the NAR (and note the variation on the trinity/flame motif). [update - inadvertently omitted links, here, here and here - the latter item mentioning this pious Andy Parrish]

Where the stench is heavy, is with the Golden Sword of political intrigue, and with newly declared today's Appostles and Prophets however dressed and presented, we worry about any part of NAR extremism among cult dimensions, with suggestions of an oleaginous provocateur as part of that fold. (same item, separate link)

So, what is the point? Is there a point? In short, the answer is yes, the point is know who you are dealing with even if a message is encased in a vanilla-looking web page with badging for the knowing initiates, specifically, this (yes, burning brightly - the upper left logo-&-name joinder, not notice of anything particular to the unknowing, but there for those a part of the cult-movement, or being disclosed through research of those who question and learn):

Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail.

Opinions differ, but John in Revelations never described the mark of the Beast. But Beast being a question; there is this:

THAT is loathing and LOATHING! And that little fire bug - again, low key, but telling. Let the flame be your guiding light to vote Ellison.

LAST: Smiles are inexpensive, trust in Ellison and what he's stood for, priceless.