4.18.2025

It's Friday -- Let's Get Out of Here

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Random Friday Morning Thoughts




Oh, the simpler days of Liberally Lean. 

  • Add Florida State to the list. "Police said the gunman has been identified as 20-year-old Phoenix Ikner, an FSU student who is the son of a Leon County deputy sheriff." At least one cell phone video caught the shooter in action.


  • The defendant's parents in the Frisco School Stabbing case held a press conference yesterday.  That whole case is going to snowball into a major national flashpoint. And it's certainly not a good time for any national flashpoint. 

    • And this isn't helping.  Edit: Good lord, Fox News is playing this clip this morning.  

    • Nor this. 

  • New this morning: The Secretary of State just said that America is almost done with trying to help end the Russian/Ukraine war. Didn't someone promise us that he would end the war "in one day"?


  • Last night, El Salvador took Kilmar Abrego García out their notorious prison and let him meet with a Democratic U.S. senator at a hotel.  The government then took a few photos of the event and immediately released them. The Senator then used those photos in a social media post.  Seem a little weird for El Salvador to allow this? Well . . . 


    • . . . The senator just got played. There is no question that Trump Administration, which was 100% involved in this stunt, will now say, "The Democrats would rather sit down at a hotel bar with a deported illegal immigrant MS-13 gang member than helping us get the rest of them out of America. And for the hand-wringing about how he was being treated, Garcia looks like he is doing just fine."   
    • Heck, we won't even have to wait for Trump to say it. I just saw this from the Murdoch's New York Post: 

    • Ted Cruz has joined in as well as he tweeted this as he referenced the photo above: 
    • And now, after this orchestrated event, Garcia gets sent back to that insane prison, and the propaganda will be eaten up by the American public. No one cares about due process until it impacts them. The Nazis would have been jealous over what just happened. 
  • Meanwhile, the Trump Administration failed in its appeal in the case over whether they are doing anything to "facilitate" Garcia's release.   Yesterday's opinion from the U.S. Court of Appeals, authored by a Reagan appointed judge, in essence said that if the Trump Administration continues to defy court orders, democracy is over. Chillingly, he ended it by begging Trump to do the right thing and cooperate "while there is still time." That's a red alert message to the country from the courts.


    • But I disagree with "while there's still time."  There is no time left. It's over. 
  • More proof that "It's over": The head of the FCC threatening Comcast with their license because of the way they are covering the news of the day. It's Authoritarianism 101.


  • Great moments in the Oval Office yesterday. Video.

  • Legal news: As predicted, a Texas appellate court struck down yesterday a city's attempt to legalize marijuana within its city limits. You can't do that. 
  • Lauren Whitener Clock: 5 years and 290 days.

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4.17.2025

Random Thursday Morning Thoughts




It was just a sign from above to change their name. 
  • After five failed attempts to pass school vouchers last session, including four specials sessions, the Texas House passed it last night by a vote of 85-63 with only two Republicans voting against it. 



    • But "some rural conservatives" did not include Wise County's representative Andy Hopper who voted to sell out our public schools. But we knew that was coming ever since we found out his campaign was primarily funded by the West Texas Oilmen PAC.

    • Flashback: So why has Greg Abbott been so hell-bent on getting vouchers passed? Follow the money. $10 million to be exact.


    • Best proposed amendment that failed.

    • Two Republican lawmakers yuking it up during the school voucher debates late last night.

  • Chairman of the Federal Reserve yesterday: 


    • You knew this was coming:


  • In the case where Trump rounded up 238 people, claimed they were gang members, bypassed the courts, and then flew them to the El Salvadorian prison, a judge is moving towards contempt proceedings.    


    • But there's a big problem: The Justice Department is in charge of prosecuting criminal contempt and Trump controls the Justice Department. So when the DOJ declines to prosecute, the judge has the right to appoint an independent attorney to serve as the prosecutor. (But who wants that job?) And even if an independent prosecutor pursued the contempt and secured a conviction and prison sentence, it's the U.S. Marshals who have to execute that sentence and, guess what, they are part of the DOJ. And Trump would pardon whoever was convicted anyway. It's over. 
  • In the case of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, Trump's government tried to justify his wrongful deportation to the El Salvadorian concentration prison by releasing what little "bad" history he had, and by ramping up the rhetoric (and lies) against him. This is not normal. And so what? I don't care if he's Charles Manson. That's that whole point of having laws and rules which apply to everyone. It is at the very heart of due process. 


  • More authoritarianism. It is here.  

  • Oh, my.
     

  • "Pastor" Robert Jeffress is still at it.

  • Messenger - Above the Fold

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4.16.2025

Random Wednesday Morning Thoughts



The former New England Patriot would then be sentenced to life in prison without parole. He would kill himself in prison two years later. 

  • Another school shooting. 


  • Texas School Voucher update: It's on the House floor today.  But there's a proposal floating around to let the voters decide on whether school vouchers should become law. I like that idea. 

  • It's pretty clear if you haven't even asked the President of El Salvador to return the man that you aren't doing anything to "facilitate" his return. But we are all learning that courts have no power if the Executive Branch wishes to ignore them. 

    • If everything would have been done correctly, the worst that could have happened to the man is that a judge would have ordered him to be deported.  That is, ship him to another country and tell him to go live his life there. Instead, he was taken off the street, the courts were bypassed, and he was moved to a hard core prison.  And the Trump Administration doesn't care.
      That's him.

    • And if he had instead been a person who Trump deemed an "undesirable" American citizen, it would be him in that photograph and he would be in in the same legal hellhole.  And that's coming. Maybe not to that particular prison, but it's coming. 
  • Nothing like the beauty of Big Ben being accented with U.S. Troops.

  • Expect more and more and more of these type of prosecutions. "I am your retribution."

    • The referral is based on what?

  • Wise County Rep. Andy Hopper has made the news.   

  • You can tell Cornyn is running for re-election since he has joined this Islamophobia bandwagon about a community in Collin County that is only a patch of dirt right now. 

  • Impressive.


  • I don't understand this controversy at all.



  • In Wise County, a framed copy of the Constitution fell off the wall over the weekend in one of the prosecutor's offices common areas. 

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