Category: Uncategorized

Mid-Terms: A Referendum… On The Not-So Organized [But Orange] Crime Syndicate’s Control Of The GOP…

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Or, certainly, at least the Tangerine wing of the GOP.

So, as ever, tonight Hinderaker gets it all backwards. Sure there’s inflation. Trump literally made the printer go… bbbrrrr, for four years. And the US economy did indeed need stimulus after the pandemic — a debacle largely exacerbated by… Tangerine fecklessness.

But the midterms aren’t about Mr. Biden’s careful, slow return to a normal economic environment (as opposed to Trump’s “corrupt to the core” / banana republic style of governing for graft — to benefit his biggest donors, and donors only — while mostly skimming large portions directly or indirectly into coffers he controlled).

No, John — the GOP Tangerine wing INTENTIONALLY insists it is about… Trump’s right to steal classified national defense secrets, commit bank and tax fraud, lie about his prior rapes, and generally deny that he lost by over eight million votes in 2020.

Oh — and it will be about telling ALL US women that the GOP’s hard right on the highest court… sees them as mere chattels.

Property of the men who get to decide what they may — and may not — do with their own uterus.

That my friend is the referenda.

Cheers.

In Addition To All Else, Wiretapping Is A Serious Offense, By “Veritas”/O’Keefe…

~ condor ~ 1 Comment

I won’t bother to follow this trial at all (it is a foregone conclusion that O’Keefe is going to lose for wire-tapping private citizens in their private offices in DC, where the post-Watergate statutes are crystal clear in prohibiting such chicanery) — but Project Veritas is likely to lose boxcar damages, here — in the federal courts, in DC.

This may be the death-knell / end / bankruptcy event — for the spying operation, even before the NYT has its turn pummeling them, in New York State court.

And before the ex-employee blows them out of the water, also in NY state court.

Hilarious.

See ‘ya, boys.

How ’bout now, Scottie? Yeah. Riiiiiight.

O U T.

Tangerine, Trapped — By His Own Preposterous Lies. Will Aileen Cannon Rule In Accord With Clearly Controlling Law? We Shall See.

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The US government has just filed a lethal memo of law, on why Cannon was wrong to order a halt, and why she can easily come into compliance with federal law by granting the DoJ a stay of that errant order.

Do go read all 21 pages — but it is hard to see any rational person arguing that Tangerine has a property interest in 101 classified documents. Those are “We the People’s” documents (or our taxpayer funded intel community, more precisely) — not his. Game over — but do read it all:

…As already noted, Plaintiff [Donald Trump] has now filed multiple lengthy submissions with the Court that stop short of asserting that he in fact took any of these actions with respect to any of the seized records, including those at issue in the stay motion. In light of the classification markings, official cover sheets, and other indicia of classification attendant to these materials, see, e.g., D.E. 48-1, Attachment F, such possibilities should not be given weight absent Plaintiff’s putting forward competent evidence.

In any event, even if Plaintiff had declassified any of the approximately 100 seized records bearing classification markings while he was still in office, the government’s “demonstrated, specific need” for those records, United States v. Nixon, 418 U.S. at 713, would easily overcome any asserted claim of privilege. For obvious reasons, the Intelligence Community (“IC”) would have a compelling need to understand which formerly-classified records have now been declassified, why and how they were declassified, and the impact of any such declassification, including on the IC’s protection of its sources and methods and on the classification status of related records or information. The Department of Justice (“DOJ”) and Federal Bureau of Investigation (“FBI”) would also have a compelling need to review any purportedly declassified records as part of the government’s investigation into the adequacy of the response to the May 2022 grand jury subpoena, which sought “[a]ny and all documents or writings in the custody or control of Donald J. Trump and/or the Office of Donald J. Trump bearing classification markings.” D.E. 48-1 Attachment C (emphasis added).

Furthermore, the government would need to consider the records’ prior declassification as relates to the application of 18 U.S.C. § 793. See D.E. 69 at 14 (explaining the relevance of classification status in such matters)….

Wow. What a pack of idiots Trump has… as his lawyers. But it is usually true that if you are a crook, and you are well-known for stiffing lawyers… and for throwing them under criminal bus-wheels… there are very few who will sign up — who are any good.

Hilarious.

नमस्ते

Not Terribly Material, But Good News From HealthCanada, On Merck’s Keytruda: Freight Train Rolls Onward…

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We had, for about five years, now… stopped covering individual in-country indications/approvals for pembrolizumab… since it seemed to be getting one about every other day, for a stretch there. But now, as the immuno-oncology market has begun to mature… new indications / new approvals come more like once a month. So, we will endeavor to cover them again.

No doubt that this franchise will be a $20 plus billion per year juggernaut well into the early 2030s, unless a category shifting new discovery is made in oncology — which one should never rule out.

After all, pembrolizumab itself was just such a seismic change in standard of care. But this — this therapy — is the central engine of all of Merck’s earnings… and will be so, into the next decade (with some clever patent footwork). So the predictions of a 2026 generic are… actually a little silly.

In any event, here is the latest:

…Health Canada approved Merck’s blockbuster drug Keytruda (pembrolizumab) as an adjuvant therapy for patients 12 years and older with stage IIB or IIC melanoma following complete resection.

The approval was backed by data from a phase 3 trial called KEYNOTE-716, which showed a statistically significant improvement in recurrence-free survival, the company said in a Sept. 13 press release….

Now you know. Onward, grinning — at the very tight corner Tangerine has painted himself into in the federal courts in Florida and DC. Positively… grinning.

नमस्ते

Hinderaker: Life-Long Race-Baiter…

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Hinderaker tonight offers the claim that because BYU says something did not happen… despite at least two people with Duke University saying it did… the good whyte people should simply ignore the testimony of their black and brown brothers and sisters.

Such hog shit, John. Hog shit.

Then he complains because apparently, the New Orleans mayor… flies above her pay grade. Uh-huh.

But John never handed Tangerine one of his Golden Turkey awards, for wasting well over $160 million in taxpayer funds, by spending it on HIS OWN private clubs empire.

Benefiting his own pocketbook directly.

So, yeah John when a tubby old whyte male GOP crook does far worse, over four years than the black woman you are hectoring… it is very fair to call that…

Hinder-RACISM.

Out.

WTH?! Trump Tells Judge Cannon “I Think Your Order Is Disrepsectful.” And Trump Is The One Asking For The Court’s Help Here. Damn.

~ condor ~ 1 Comment

This is preposterous. Trump just said he gets to decide which of the court’s orders… he will sneer, and comply with — and which… he will not.

This is specifically as to Tangerine’s “just-supplemented” notion of “I’ll tell you later if you ask“ — in response to a federal judge’s order that ALREADY asked, explicitly in writing last week. So, one would expect a very stern dressing down, from almost any other sitting federal judge, for such disrespect of the court’s explicit authority.

But given that Cannon’s in the tank for Tangerine… I expect she’ll just cha-cha along.

This would be met with scorching and justifiable anger, as to the rights and privileges of sitting federal judges to order litigants seeking redress from the court, to obey court rulings. But Tangerine writes that “HE” has decided to read her order in a very cramped fashion, thus:

“…Plaintiff [Donald Trump] has construed that Order in a limited fashion….

Plaintiff also submits it is more respectful to the candidates from either party to withhold the bases for opposition from a public, and likely to be widely circulated, pleading. Therefore, Plaintiff asks this Court for permission to specifically express our objections to the Government’s nominees only at such time that the Court specifies a desire to obtain and consider that information….”

[Ed. Note: here Trump tells Judge Cannon, in effect, that she is being disrespectful to the special master candidates by airing this in public — but that is what the courts do — they serve “we, the people” not Trump. Moreover, this is how it is done everyday — in the Florida federal courts, in public view — see the appointment of Barbara Jones in the Estate of Kleiman v. Craig Wright case (a potentially $37 billion lawsuit, with a jury verdict of well over $100 million), here.]

“…Such information could then be provided in camera or pursuant to whatever procedure the Court deems most efficient and appropriate. Consistent with that approach, Plaintiff is willing to provide our specific rationale for supporting our nominees if and when the Court so orders….”

Day by day, Cannon here absolutely confirms the judgment of the American Bar Association — in rating her “not qualified” for the federal bench.

Y I K E S….

Another Nice (If Still Early) Study Result For A Keytruda® Combo… This Time, In A Subset Of Urothelial Cancers…

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Not Earth shaking, but good news, just the same — to be sure.

And with each positive top-line study result, the odds shorten — that Merck will ultimately be willing to pay perhaps $38 billion in cash to acquire Seagen, lock, stock and barrel. We shall see, but here is the latest, on Monday morning:

…Astellas Pharma, Seagen and Merck said Padcev and Keytruda showed a 64.5% confirmed objective response rate (ORR) in patients with a specified type of urothelial cancer.

The companies presented data from a phase 1b/2 trial, dubbed EV-103 (also known as KEYNOTE-869), Cohort K evaluating Padcev (enfortumab vedotin-ejfv) in combination with Merck’s Keytruda (pembrolizumab) and Padcev alone as first-line treatment in patients with unresectable locally advanced or metastatic urothelial cancer (la/mUC) who are ineligible to receive cisplatin-based chemotherapy, at the 2022 European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO) Congress….

Now you know… as the weather here now cools, we keep reflecting on moments of each passing day, in this month — all of exactly a decade ago, now… grinning ear to ear. Some things change — but some… never do.

नमस्ते

This Is All Laughably… Sad. A Decrepit Former CoC Saying The Government Is Maligning… HIM.

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Well… Tangerine hurriedly flew into DC last night, still wearing his golf cleats, fresh off the 18th at his New Jersey club. My hunch is he did so, in such a hurry, to weigh in / pressure some of his lawyers “in person”… to make a filing that is unsupported by the law (or even a good faith extension of existing law) or even the facts as admitted in exhibits, by Team Trump itself.

That would mean that each of these lawyers is a high risk of disciplinary actions, at the close of this sordid matter. And many a newspaper had by Sunday already covered the “prisoner’s dilemma” each lawyer now faces.

Most of them have seen his other lawyers: Rudy, John Eastman and even Mr. Cohen… face these same consequences for getting tangled up in his crime sprees.

But the filing came in this morning, signed by the lawyers, anyway.

It is clearly pitched to the “unqualified” (as rated by the ABA, at the time Trump appointed her) Judge Cannon, as an audience of one.

It will fail, certainly, on appeal.

But we may never need that particular appeal.

UPDATED — As EmptyWheel so gracefully intones, here at mid-morning Monday:

…[T]he entire 21-page argument about classification (which also concedes that neither he nor Judge Cannon has any authority to review these documents for classification status) is not just gaslighting, but also a serial confession that, Yes, Donald Trump obstructed this investigation.

And that confession is — irrespective of the actual classification status of those documents — an admission that because each of those 103 documents is evidence that Trump obstructed an investigation, they belong in the hands of the FBI to continue their investigation of why Trump obstructed their investigation….

Do stay tuned.

Grinning — ear to ear. Perhaps… Mr. Biden told Tangerine that if he’d accept service of the indictment in secret, in DC today… he might let Trump ride on Air Force One with all the other former presidents attending the Queen’s funeral, next week on the 19th.

Maybe. /snark. [Actually, we know that King Charles III has only invited Mr. Biden, as the current President. But Harry, William or Kate may have already invited the Obamas, Clintons and/or even… the Bushes… to sit with them.] Excluding the Trumps. How very… droll.

Cheers.

What To Say — About A Whining, Snivelling, Entitled Idiot? [And I Don’t Mean Her Newborn Baby Girl.]

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Well. Isn’t this… just… precious?

The arch conservative rag of London, The Daily Mail claims a “lifestyle” exclusive.

About a woman of essentially no account — an ocean away, to boot — and her wealthy hubs (once a conservative scion of Parliament).

But they live in Tennessee, now — having left LA (too liberal, they say!)… about two years ago. Tennessee — while ruby red outside Nashville, remains liberal / blue inside it.

And not insignificantly, Nashville is the hub for several very large and powerful for-profit hospital systems, due to generally lax local anti-competition enforcement (and pro- upcharging / business regimes, pioneered there by the Frist family). So, Nashville is also the hub for Ascension Health, the largest non-profit hospital conglomerate in the US (which is run ultimately and controlled by… the Roman Catholic Church).

But back to Ms. Owens-Farmer: she claims she was “tortured” for 48 hours in this very fancy hospital of her choosing… because the provider team wanted standard blood work, to rule out that the baby would be at risk of a premature death, if discharged (to “unsafe” parents) in 48 hours. The whole Catholic “right to life” thing, but now aimed against… Candace.

Yes, that is likely upcharging. But yes, she CHOSE this hospital. And the team — I am certain — only wanted to minimize the risk of death, since the US is now about 48th in the world, on infant mortality in the opening weeks of life outside the womb. [Far higher, as to UNVACCINATED mothers who deliver, and ignore medical advice.]

But to hear Candace tell it, the goal was to torture her. In a room that more closely resembles the penthouse at the Ritz in New York, than a hospital ward.

Tortured her, by waking her and the baby — to be sure neither was dying of a respiratory infection. Infections like COVID, and SARS, known to wreak havoc in hospitals… among the UN-vaccinated.

And yes, Candace and her two babies, and hubs… are wholly unvaccinated against COVID, SARS, polio and other dread diseases. Yet we know polio is present in the waste water outside all of Nashville’s larger hospitals. Like St. Thomas.

Yikes. According to this feckless dim-wit, it is torture… for the staff to do what is medically-prudent to protect the dim-wit Candace, from herself. And to protect her newborn… from her awful, ignorant choices.

Yep — this is the height of sophistry: she chose a doctor, talked to the doctor about her wishes… and he or she still discharged the oath: “First, do no harm“. Especially to an unvaccinated newborn girl. All because Owens did some reading on the inter-webs, she feels she should endanger her two babies, neither even three years of age yet.

So — she is arguably now actually guilty of a Class A misdemeanor, under her own local law in Tennessee, for ignoring medical advice and thus endangering her newborn, under T.C.A. § 39-13-103, as amended. Damn.

What a fecklessly… malevolent idiot — all to hype an outrage podcast / Tee-Vee show on the DailyWire. Ugly.

I am very sad for these kids — and the messed up life they will inexorably lead, under the thumbs of these two attention seeking chuckleheads.

Out.

And, A Perhaps Unpopular Opinion… It’s Been 21 Long Years.

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We live in a world wildly different than the feckless, clueless, largely care-free and frankly mean spirited time that preceded 9/11. Bush and Cheney were glibly claiming a new mandate to take away safety net programs from people of limited means, restrict asylum seekers and rip off ordinary Americans, for oil and mineral profits.

Since then, we’ve seen two wars in the middle east, a pandemic, and now Russia getting its ass handed to it in Ukraine. The world has… moved on.

But the airlines still charge what they call a “9/11 fee”, 21 years on. The pandemic nearly ended commercial air travel in the US for over a year.

There is no “COVID-19 fee”, listed in my ticket price.

It is time to let it go, Scott. You choose to immortalize the privileged few — the Dartmouth alums. [Not a single janitor’s — or secretary’s — life has ever. . . been mentioned on your 21 years of pages at Powerline. Never. That speaks volumes, in its mute testament to who you think… matters.]

Sure. Never forget those who perished, including my friends at Cantor Fitzgerald. But… the world has moved on. The total death count (~3,000) was about equal to two Titanics.

OTOH, over a million in the USA are gone now — from COVID-19. [Yet many of the same people who say all of the Muslim world attacked the US on 9/11… say COVID was a fake virus — manufactured to “control” them. They also are the same people who mostly deny the outcome of the 2020 elections. Right. Nuts.]

We need to completely accept (and thus move on; ask forgiveness of neighbors we slighted, intentionally or otherwise) that the vast majority of people of Muslim faith wanted, and still want, nothing to do with the radical violence that led to 9/11.

It is well-past time to move on.

This is the last time I’ll post a remembrance of the 9/11 victims here.