I clearly & categorically condem the violence that we witnessed in the Capitol building in Washington yesterday during the meeting of the Electors. I believe that the election was rigged& Trump was robbed but violence in any shape or form has no place in a democratic setting.1/

THREAD: CCP vs US Military, on home soil.

1. I watched the Executive Orders and I watched the media panic. I watched the MSM lies and I watched the treason. I watched the fake Russia narrative. I watched the calls for impeachment. I watched a stolen election, in full view.

Met a Brazilian-American Lyft driver from San Diego who passionately attacked the racism of Republicans, then switched to passionately defending Bolsonaro.

If I were Thomas Friedman, I could tell you what this means.

Met a Haitian-American in a restaurant who said he'd always vote for Democrats because of the immigration issue, but that he has conservative beliefs too. "I don't want to pay for someone's abortion!", he declared.

Met a Latino Lyft driver from San Jose who said that while he was liberal, California was getting too liberal for him and he was considering moving to San Antonio.

Again, not being Tom Friedman, I am unable to offer any commentary on the political and policy implications of these conversations.

I guess my only thought is that political opinions are pretty complex and multidimensional, out there in the real world.

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(THREAD) The Whitaker scandal is deepening, as it becomes clear that Sessions' Russia recusal was a coordinated sham and his firing an act of obstruction—and that his replacement is a White House plant inside the Mueller probe. I hope you'll retweet and read on for more details.

1/ From 2014-17 Whitaker worked for World Patent Marketing—which during his tenure defrauded consumers out of $26 million and was successfully prosecuted by the feds. His involvement in the scam confirmed he had loose morals and that the feds would never want to employ him again.

2/ Despite the seeming impossibility of a man with Whitaker's background getting a job at Justice ever again—he'd been found to have used his former title as a US attorney to fraudulently threaten consumers with valid complaints with criminal penalties—Whitaker found an opening.

3/ Within 60 days of parachuting out of World Patent Marketing as it was being fined $26 million by the feds, Whitaker was working for CNN and telling a fellow attorney panelist that his purpose in working for CNN was to get noticed by one man—Donald Trump—and thereby get a job.

4/ Whitaker spent his time at CNN making ludicrous statements about the Mueller probe: there was no obstruction or collusion, he said; Mueller had no authority to look into any aspect of Trump's finances or to subpoena him, he said. All the while, he hoped Trump was watching him.

Here's a quick thread on the chronology leading up to today's vote in the Scottish Parliament on whether ministers should go to court to investigate the finances of Donald Trump's Scottish resorts via a legal mechanism known as an Unexplained Wealth Order.👇

Intrigue surrounding the source of Trump's finances here is by no means new. An editorial in @TheScotsman questioned where the money was coming from back in *2008*. But the UWO issue came to prominence last Feb during exchanges in the Scottish Parliament.

The issue returned to parliament last November, when First Minister Nicola Sturgeon said any consideration or application for an UWO were "properly matters for the Crown Office, not for the Scottish ministers."

This argument went against the explicit definition of who is able to apply for a UWO, as set out in the Criminal Finances Act 2017 / Proceeds of Crime Act 2002, which states that "the Court of Session may, on an application made by the Scottish ministers, make an UWO"

The leading advocate, Aidan O'Neill QC, has also said Scottish ministers alone are responsible for decisions around UWOs, and that transferring responsibility to the Crown Office or Lord Advocate "does not and can not" change its legal responsibilities.

The Republican Party is an authoritarian power structure.

For decades, it embraced greedy nihilists in order to win elections.

In the last 10+ years, a well-funded insurgency has infiltrated and captured it.

They are now threatening & purging any remaining opposition.

We can’t address the threat they pose to democracy without addressing the methods by which they maintain popular support.

This requires action across multiple fronts.

In terms of public policy, we are working on the right things:

-Bills to eliminate the GOP’s counter-majorian control (voting security, eliminating vote suppression)

-Exposing dark money networks who are funding them (forcing transparency for anonymous shell companies)

-Addressing the immediate socio-economic pain that places people in anxiety-laden debt traps, makes them feel isolated, and makes them ripe targets for disinformation/authoritarian messaging appeals (fighting Covid with a plan, financial relief, genuinely empathetic leadership)

Biden and the Dem Congress are working on all of these things already.

This is moving us in the right direction, and shows that they get what needs to be done here. This is good.

There are three areas that still concern me, that I have been trying to call attention to...