It’s May 13, 2019 and it’s time to review five of the most outrageous, infuriating,
or just plain baffling things that have happened lately.
It’s your Facepalm Five.
Let’s count ‘em up!
1.
Trump administration digs in its heels against Congress.
While Democratic leadership still insists impeachment isn’t the way to go, the Trump
administration has been taking steps these last couple of weeks to fortify itself against
the Democrats in Congress who do have enough spine to try to hold it accountable for its
crimes and corruption.
Attorney General Bill Barr testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee week before
last.
The committee is controlled by Republicans, but the Democratic members managed to get
their shots in, particularly Mazie Hirono, who accused Barr of misleading the public
and called for his resignation, and Kamala Harris, who reduced Barr to a sputtering series
of excuses and evasions by asking a few simple, direct questions like “Did you examine the
evidence behind the Mueller report before deciding not to charge the president?” (to
which Barr answered “No”) and “Did the president ever ask you to investigate anyone?”
(to which Barr answered “ah-bah-bahbahbah . . .!”) There was also a truly remarkable
exchange between Barr and Dick Blumenthal at that hearing where Blumenthal asked if
the committee could see notes that were taken by Barr’s staff recording a phone call between
Barr and Robert Mueller following Barr’s misleading statements ahead of the release
of the Mueller report.
“No,” Barr said matter-of-factly.
When Blumenthal asked why he wouldn’t turn over the notes to the committee, Barr responded,
“Why should you have them?”
I don’t know, to see if you’re lying?!
Blumenthal didn’t say that, but I wish he had.
Anyway, after the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, Trump decided he wasn’t going to
play with those mean Democrats anymore.
Barr ignored a subpoena to testify before the Democrat-controlled House Judiciary Committee,
which subsequently voted to hold him in contempt; Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin refused
to turn over Trump’s tax returns to the House Ways and Means Committee; and Trump
asserted executive privilege over the Mueller report.
That last move is designed to keep Congress from examining the unredacted report and its
underlying evidence – a report which, according to Trump, is the product of a witch hunt and
hoax conducted by angry Democrats and is therefore not to be trusted, but which also totally
exonerates him of any wrongdoing – that chain of reasoning has a few gaps in it, huh?
These standoffs between the White House and Congress are likely to wind up in court, perhaps
eventually finding their ways before the U.S. Supreme Court, where Trump presumably hopes
the right-leaning justices, including two he appointed himself, will side with him.
“Take it to the Supreme Court and hope our buddies there have our backs” is becoming
a common Republican strategy.
It plays in to the next story, as well.
2.
Georgia one-ups Ohio by enacting even worse anti-abortion law.
About a month ago I told you about the so-called heartbeat bill enacted in Ohio, which bans
abortions after a fetal heartbeat is detectable, which often occurs before a person even knows
they’re pregnant.
Ohio’s law is bad enough, but legislators in Georgia apparently took it as a challenge
to come up with something even more draconian in their state.
Sadly, they succeeded.
Last week, Georgia governor Brian Kemp signed into law a version of the heartbeat bill that
not only bans abortion in similar fashion to the Ohio law, it also imposes serious criminal
penalties on those who terminate their pregnancies.
The law recognizes a fetus as a person, with all the applicable legal rights and protections.
That means that someone who terminates their pregnancy could conceivably be prosecuted
for murder, a crime which carries a penalty of life imprisonment or death in the state
of Georgia.
That’s not all – people who travel out-of-state to obtain legal abortions could be prosecuted
in Georgia for conspiracy to commit murder.
Medical professionals who perform abortions could also be prosecuted for murder.
And someone who miscarries could be prosecuted for second-degree murder if their conduct
is found to have caused the miscarriage.
All of this is obviously unconstitutional, in flagrant violation of the Roe v. Wade decision
which established that people have the right to terminate their pregnancies.
But of course, that’s the point.
The Republicans who pass and enact these laws know they’ll be taken to court.
The whole idea is to provoke a court challenge, appeal all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court,
and hope the conservative majority rules to overturn Roe v. Wade.
It’s a solid, if ruthless and morally repugnant, strategy.
Ultimately, the only way to stop things like this from happening is to stop electing anti-abortion
extremists (also known as Republicans) to public office at all levels of government.
But that would mean more Americans would have to stop voting for candidates who pander to
their irrational fears and prejudices.
Which is why it’s such a solid strategy.
3.
Former priest accused of sexual misconduct allowed to keep job as middle school teacher.
Last month an arbitrator ruled that Joseph DeShan, a teacher at Cinnaminson Middle School
in Burlington County, New Jersey, could keep his job after being accused of making inappropriate
comments to a 12-year-old girl who is a student at the school.
The Cinnaminson Board of Education moved to dismiss DeShan after he allegedly said to
the girl, “Look at me.
Let me see your pretty green eyes,” in what is described as a “creepy voice.”
The motion to dismiss DeShan also cited his past conduct, and by “past conduct” I
mean he’s a former priest who began a sexual relationship with a teenage girl when he was
28 and she was 14, and had a child with that same girl two years later when she was 16.
According to the New York Post, DeShan’s name is on a list of priests who were credibly
accused of sexual abuse, but he was never prosecuted and he left the priesthood voluntarily,
four years after his child with the teenage girl was born.
The school district apparently didn’t know about any of this until 2002.
DeShan was suspended for three weeks, but was then allowed to return to work and faced
no further discipline.
That was a bad decision then, and it’s an especially bad decision now, because the arbitrator
cited that 2002 decision in his ruling that the board of education couldn’t get rid
of DeShan this time.
The arbitrator wasn’t persuaded of the seriousness of the alleged creepy remarks about the 12-year-old
girl’s eyes, because I guess that’s the sort of thing a teacher should be allowed
to say to a student, and said the board couldn’t fire him for the other stuff because they
found out about it 17 years ago and were okay with it up to now.
It would be nice if we could all agree that a child’s right to feel safe at their school
is more important than a predator’s right to have a given job, but hey, at least the
board of education tried to shitcan the guy.
Even if they had succeeded, it would have been too little, too late, but then again
that’s how we usually deal with cases like this.
To wit:
4.
Pope takes further ineffective action against church sex abuse.
Last week Pope Francis issued new rules requiring all Catholic dioceses to establish systems
to report sexual abuse to church authorities.
Okay.
Good, I guess?
Mostly, this story just reminds me that, despite clergy sex abuse being pervasive in the Catholic
Church for centuries, this wasn’t a rule before!
And what kind of a system needs to be established to report sex crimes committed by priests?
I’ve got a system: call the cops!
Granted, civil authorities don’t have a great record when it comes to investigating
and prosecuting sex crimes, either, but they’re better than the Catholic Church.
“Better at responding to sex abuse than the Catholic Church” – is that the ultimate
example of damning with faint praise or what?
Anyway, these new rules address how allegations of sexual abuse are to be handled by the church
internally.
The Vatican is still insisting that it can manage this in-house.
But why is that even an option?
This is like finding out that sexual assault has been rampant at Wal-Mart for decades,
only for the CEO to send out a memo to all employees saying “Remember, if you see a
stock clerk raping someone in the back, be sure to tell your supervisor.”
Is that handling the problem?
No, it is not!
It’s not even in the same universe as handling the problem.
Handling the problem happens in a whole different plane of existence.
Despite these belated and incremental reforms, the fact that the Catholic Church is still
insisting that it has the right to respond to sexual abuse committed by members of its
clergy itself, without immediately involving civil authorities, shows that the church hasn’t
really learned anything.
The arrogance and the appeal to imaginary authority that allowed clergy sex abuse in
the Catholic Church to go unaddressed for hundreds of years is still in place.
No institution, religious or otherwise, should be above the law.
Shame on us if we see these new rules as anything other than what they are: just the latest
attempt by church leaders to protect abusers and escape their own accountability.
Speaking of people who think they’re above the law:
Now it’s time for the segment devoted to some of the other things Donald Trump has
done recently to disgrace the presidency and embarrass and/or endanger the United States
and the rest of the world:
5.
The Further Misadventures of Lord Dampnut.
Please keep in mind as always: the following is not a complete list.
He sued to block two Congressional committees from obtaining his financial records.
Then, when the New York Times ran a story reporting on ten years of Trump’s tax information
it had obtained which showed he had largely avoided paying taxes and lost over a billion
dollars during the ten-year span examined by the Times, Trump responded by tweeting,
essentially, “I meant to do that!”
He said the losses the Times discovered were the result of depreciation, that claiming
losses to avoid paying taxes was just something real estate developers did back then, that
“it was sport,” and also the story is fake news, anyway, so just forget all that
stuff he just said about depreciation and tax write-offs, I guess?
Again, his logic is not exactly sound.
Besides, the Times story makes it clear that the losses were not due primarily to depreciation
and other tax-avoidance strategies, but to the fact that Trump’s businesses were failing
and he was an incompetent manager of his money.
He issued a memo ordering changes to American policy regarding the granting of asylum, including
requiring those who come to this country seeking asylum to pay a fee.
Just like it says on the Statue of Liberty: “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled
masses yearning to breathe free, payment due upon arrival, cash or credit, no personal
checks.”
He spent part of a weekend retweeting a series of far-right extremists, including QAnon account
Deep State Exposed, white supremacist blogger Lauren Southern, racist Fox News anchor Laura
Ingraham, and conspiracy theorist Paul Joseph Watson who was recently banned from Facebook.
Trump also tweeted that he was continuing to monitor the censorship of AMERICAN CITIZENS
social media, because the free market is the highest authority until it results in people
who Trump likes facing the consequences of their actions.
Free speech means the president telling private social media companies what users and content
they have to host.
Again, with the logic, not so much.
He also retweeted Jerry Falwell Jr. saying that Trump should have two years added to
his term of office to make up for the Mueller investigation, or as Falwell calls it (and
Trump has called it, too), a “corrupt failed coup.”
But that’s no big deal, Falwell was just joking, and Trump only retweeted him because
he likes jokes!
Like last week when he was at a rally in Panama City, Florida, talking about immigration,
and he said, referring to people crossing the border with Mexico, “how do you stop
these people?” and one of his supporters called out “Shoot them!”
Which Trump must have thought was a good joke, because he chuckled and said “Only in the
panhandle!”
Ha!
Yeah.
People who vote for me shout about shooting immigrants at the border!
What a bunch of characters.
Oh, we have fun.
What else: he announced a new set of so-called religious protections for health care workers
that essentially legalize discrimination as long as you can hang a religious motivation
on it.
He welcomed the World Series Champion Boston Red Sox to the White House – you might have
seen folks chuckling over the fact that the official White House website misspelled the
team’s name, ha ha, they spelled it like clothes – but I’m much more interested
in the fact that every person of color on the team except J.D. Martinez refused Trump’s
invitation, while every white player on the team accepted it.
As Boston Herald columnist Steve Buckley observed, really, it was the white Sox who visited Trump.
Something tells me Trump was okay with that.
He probably didn’t even notice.
The Washington Post reported that the Trump administration pushed to remove references
to climate change from a non-binding declaration of principles by the Arctic Council.
And finally, after lying about the amount of disaster relief that has been provided
to Puerto Rico following Hurricane Maria, Trump urged Republicans to vote against a
disaster relief bill that included an additional $3 billion to Puerto Rico, along with billions
more in federal aid designated for other regions of the country still recovering after tornadoes,
floods, and wildfires.
According to the Washington Post, Trump’s opposition to the disaster relief bill was
mostly about the additional aid to Puerto Rico.
Now, why would he be okay spending money to help out people affected by natural disasters
in the south, midwest, and west, but not Puerto Rico?
Gosh, I can’t figure it out.
Do you think it has something to do with why the black and brown players on the Red Sox
refused to meet with him?
As Trump himself might say, “Nobody knows!”
Which means: everybody knows.
Because it couldn’t be more obvious.
That’s five.
Speak out, act out, resist, look after each other.