Some Things of the Week

With Lisa Murkowski saying she will not vote for Todd Blanche we'll see if he makes it through. My assumption when Susan Collins announced she was a "no" earlier this week was that per usual it was sign that her vote was not needed, and he would be confirmed. And I would still bet that that will be the case. We shall see; apparently Bill Cassidy* will be the deciding vote so I am not holding my breath (I have not otherwise being following it very closely).

Whatever. It's another wonderful and democracy-filled day here in Susan Collins' America.

A couple of quick NYT notes. Yesterday the Times published a piece headlined "Moderate Democrats Prepare for ‘War’ Against an Ascendant Left" **. Overall the article was not as absolutely awful as I was led to expect, but it was basically all built around quotes from a fucking Third Way spokesperson about $15M they want to spend against El-Sayed. But just the latest in a drumbeat of articles in the Times and elsewhere about a Dem civil war.

In contrast, as far as I can tell the Times has yet to mention that Capital One apparently closed out a bunch of Trump-affiliated bank accounts in 2021 due to suspected money-laundering. ABC broke the story*** and sometimes the NYT can be persnickety about things it did not get to first. But you know, like actual news–-a US President who was suspected by a major bank of money laundering. But I guess it does not clear the bar for news about the one special boy. Nothing that needs a frenzy, unlike, say, the fact that the black, female president of Harvard may have been somewhat sloppy in citations in a thesis many years ago...

Oh, ain't that Susan Collins' America, for you and me.

*Apparently he is on the floor right now sounding like he is a yes.

**Gift link, as all NYT articles should be going forward.

***I have seen several other outlets pick it up--NPR for one.