DL Open Thread: Saturday, May 14, 2022

Filed in Featured, Open Thread by on May 14, 2022

Still recovering from producing a great show by Shamarr Allen & The Underdawgs last night.  If you ever get a chance to see them, go see them.   Thankfully, my Bionic Booty held up well.  Even did the Freddie on the dance floor:

But, I digress. (Maybe someday I’ll do an entire open thread of digressions…)

Clarence Thomas Whines That Roe Leak Has ‘Eroded Trust’ At The Supreme Court.  Which, to him, is more important than the eroding public trust in the Supreme Court:

The leak of a draft opinion regarding abortion has turned the Supreme Court into a place “where you look over your shoulder,” Justice Clarence Thomas said Friday night, and it may have irreparably sundered trust at the institution.

“What happened at the court was tremendously bad,” Thomas said in a conversation with a former law clerk at a conference of conservative and libertarian thinkers in Dallas. “I wonder how long we’re going to have these institutions at the rate we’re undermining them. And then I wonder when they’re gone or destabilized, what we’re going to have as a country.”

This man is totally without irony.  Still trying to recall, who screwed up the Thomas confirmation hearings?

Could DeJoy FINALLY Be On His Way Out Of The Postal Service?  Biden gets two more nominees approved.

Don’t Think This Musk/Twitter Deal Will Ever Make It To The Finish Line.  Since it’s been announced, all of the principals to the deal have lost beaucoups bucks:

Why would Musk want to back out now, so soon after initiating this deal? It might have something to do with the reaction on Wall Street to his plans. Musk’s offer for Twitter was $54.00 per share. On April 14, when he announced his intentions, Twitter was trading at about $45.00 per share. Since then it has dropped to about $41.00, or about 12%. And it’s down more than 40% from its recent high eight months ago. The fact that the market isn’t willing to pay the offer price of $54.00 is a pretty good indicator that they don’t think the deal will ever go through.

What’s more, the price of Tesla has also declined precipitously. It was trading at about $985.00 when Musk revealed his interest in Twitter in April. It’s down to about $780 now, a drop of about 20%. And it’s down more than 42% from its recent high three months ago. Since Musk is using his Tesla stock to finance the Twitter acquisition, and Tesla’s stock has dropped substantially, the Twitter purchase price becomes much greater for Musk. Which is further evidence that he may be trying to ditch the deal.

Trump Judge Follows The Law (!?), Issues Injunction Against ‘Bama Anti-Trans Bill:

A federal judge in Alabama issued a preliminary injunction Friday blocking most provisions of a controversial new state law criminalizing gender-affirming health care for minors.

The court ruled that the ban on measures such as hormone therapy and puberty blockers appears to be discriminatory and violates the constitutional rights of both parents and children.

“Parent Plaintiffs have a fundamental right to direct the medical care of their children,” said the ruling by U.S. District Judge Liles C. Burke of the Middle District of Alabama, Northern Division. “This right includes the more specific right to treat their children with transitioning medications subject to medically accepted standards. The Act infringes on that right.”

Citing legal precedents, Burke, who was appointed by Donald Trump, noted that “a parent’s right to ‘make decisions concerning the care, custody and control of their children’ is one of the ‘oldest of fundamental liberty interests’ recognized by the Supreme Court.”

‘Pro-Life’ Rethugs Support The Starving Of Immigrant Babies:

“While mothers and fathers stare at empty grocery store shelves in a panic, the Biden Administration is happy to provide a baby formula to illegal immigrants coming across our southern border,” Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said in a statement Thursday, blasting the government providing baby formula to immigrant holding facilities.

“American families, there’s a shortage, but if you’re a migrant, don’t worry, because Uncle Sam has a stash of that,” Fox News host Steve Doocy said in a recent segment. “Joe Biden continues to put America LAST by shipping pallets of baby formula to the southern border as American families face empty shelves,” Rep. Elise Stefanik tweeted.

That Republicans have seized on a legitimate crisis to launch a cruel campaign on some of the most vulnerable—literal babies—is a natural fit for a party that subsists on fury over their supposed places in line getting taken by those they deem less worthy. It’s a grievance that fuels so much of the GOP’s rhetoric and policy agenda, from social welfare to immigration. But it’s hard to miss the glaring hypocrisy in these cries, as the so-called family values party targets actual babies weeks before they might win a decades-long fight to overturn Roe v. Wade.

But behind the cruelty of suggesting that some babies are more deserving of starvation also rests a stunning stupidity on two fronts. As my colleague Fernanda Echavarri notes, many of the images Republicans are circulating to claim that the Biden administration is sending pallets of baby formula to detention centers don’t even include the baby formula that has vanished from stores.

Yes, Trump And Meatpacking Companies Conspired To Kill Line Workers:

So began a high-pressure lobbying campaign by the meat industry, according to a report released Thursday by congressional investigators, leading to one of the most consequential moments in the nation’s COVID-19 response: a presidential order that effectively thwarted efforts by local health officials to shut plants down and slow the spread of COVID-19.

Emails released by the subcommittee now show that the proposed order was drafted by Tyson’s legal department. The goal, according to Tyson’s vice president of government relations, was to shield the company from legal liability.

What do you want to talk about?

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