BREAKING: Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton today filed an *election* lawsuit against Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin in the United States Supreme

Texas brought the suit straight to SCOTUS. Key allegations:

1. Unconstitutional changes to election laws
2. Unequal treatment of voters within each state
3. Voting irregularities "consistent with
the unconstitutional relaxation of ballot-integrity
protections."

From the bill of complaint: "These flaws cumulatively preclude knowing who legitimately won the 2020 election and threaten to cloud all future elections."

PDF:

"Our Country stands at an important crossroads. Either the Constitution matters and must be followed, even when some officials consider it inconvenient or out of date, or it is simply a piece of parchment on display at the National Archives.We ask the Court to choose the former."

On the Electoral College deadline: "That deadline ... should not cement a potentially illegitimate election result in the middle of this storm—a storm that is of the Defendant States’ own making by virtue of their own unconstitutional actions."

There needs to be a mass movement of political maturation. People are obviously encouraged to move at the pace which best suits them, but it is concerning, to say the least, that people closer to 40 are still impressed by political pageantry over policy.

Now what pace is that? Progress is all but stalled when you’re more agitated by the truth than the lies you’ve been led to believe and repeat about misleadership in this country.

Perhaps you aren’t interested or invested in an equitable society where the poor and working class represent themselves. But it truly should eat away at you that you’re fine being corralled into repression and subjugation by “your” government.

The emphasis we place on political education is not symbolic or even an attempt to rewrite history. It allows us to see what methods Black revolutionaries used, but also to see how the government subverted and destroyed their movements.

They saying is “history doesn’t repeat, but it rhymes”. Many people were exhibiting their first term Obama jubilation. What we know happened next is the justification for why those pipes in Flint were never fixed, why so many extrajudicial killings of Black people happened etc.

A statement from Met leadership on the Capitol desecration:

"The attack on the United States Capitol was an act of domestic terrorism that violated our nation’s highest values." 1/12

"The actions of these treasonous rioters underscore the threat to democracy in a society where misinformation, racism, and other hateful ideologies are allowed to run rampant." 2/12

"Bringing to justice those responsible for these criminal actions is an essential first step towards healing and reconciliation for a deeply divided nation." 3/12

"Last week’s events at the Capitol were not only an attack on the lawmakers who were there to certify the election but also on the very symbols of our government and this country’s ideals. The Met has a responsibility to speak out on both of these areas." 4/12

"The Capitol building and its treasured art collection were subject to acts of shameful vandalism and desecration, including the spraying of a blood-like substance on statues and the general destruction of art and objects throughout the building." 5/12

Tough choice: @GavinNewsom and @JoeBiden speaking at the same time...

Going w/@GavinNewsom budget talk:

"There's no better investment than #teacher preparation."

You have my attention...

2/

Adding funds for Special Ed, Early Childhood and Preschool- "Historic investments".

Of the $13B in deferrals $9.2B will be paid off- if #CaLeg adopts proposal

$2B to support reopening schools for in-person teaching

Go on... #Budget2021
3/

"We're going to be serious about women re-entering the #workforce" $2B action package for equity
Early childhood support (3 & 4 YOs)
#Preschool PreK/K

Schools will also get federal funds $6.7B to help re-open
4/

Now onto #highereducation
No tuition, fee increases
More student aid
Community College support (hooray!)
Open source text books (smart)

5/

Comparing and Contrasting the 2000 contested election with the 2020 contested election.
According to @SenTedCruz book One Vote Away in 2000 Bush was able to assemble a Legal "Field of Dreams" team. All they had to do was make a call and people showed up to help.
1/

"We will never give up, we will never concede," says President Trump at the rally to overturn the results.

"I hope Mike is gonna do the right thing, I hope so. Because if Mike Pence does the right thing, we win the election," says Trump, even though this is false.

"All Vice President Pence has to do is send it back to the states to recertify...and we become president, and you are the happiest people," says Trump, spreading disinformation and deluding his followers.

"They want Rudy Giuliani back in New York," says the president.

Maybe he's referring to the Southern District of New York?

"And Mike Pence is gonna have to come through for us. And if he doesn't, that will be a sad day for our country, because you're sworn to uphold our Constitution," says the president, revving the bus under which he has thrown his vice president.

We're live, talking about the Georgia Senate election results and more with @AmandaBecker, @AndraGillespie and @beckerdavidj.

@AndraGillespie @beckerdavidj "Ossoff did a little worse than Warnock in many counties, and it just seems Warnock picked up a few more votes ... it's really granular," and it will be a while before we can tell why there's a difference, says @AndraGillespie.

@AndraGillespie @beckerdavidj "I don't see how [Trump saying votes don't matter] is a message that will energize your voters to get out there and vote, and I think that hurt Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue," says Amanda

@AndraGillespie @beckerdavidj "We could do a story on voter fraud, but it would be a very short story. It has been investigated extensively... and evidence of voter fraud is very close to zero," says @beckerdavidj.

@AndraGillespie @beckerdavidj Gabriel Sterling, a top Republican GA elections administrator, told CNN that the loss will "fall squarely on the shoulders of President Trump and his actions since Nov. 3rd … When you tell people their vote doesn’t count, they believe that."

A tour of front pages this morning, starting with the Arizona Republic: “AGAIN.” Above the banner: “Donald J. Trump becomes first president in history to be impeached twice, as House charges him with inciting Capitol riot” 1/

LA Times: "TRUMP IMPEACHED FOR A SECOND TIME” 2/

The Washington Post: “Trump impeached again” Subhead 1: “An isolated president has few willing to defend him.” Subhead 2: Senate trial is likely to occur after departure” 3/

Miami Herald: “IMPEACHED AGAIN: House Democrats and 10 Republicans say Trump should be ousted for ‘incitement of insurrection’ but trial is likely to come after he leaves office”

The Times of Gainesville, Ga.: “House votes to impeach Trump: 10 Republicans join in historic 2nd charge over Capitol assault”

If you are still declaring „how could leave voters have been so stupid?” – you are not just part of the problem – you don’t understand your own country.

Brexit & the survival of the English gentleman.

- A Thread –

2/
Imagine for a moment you’re NOT the type of person that watches Newsnight, regularly reads a newspaper or went to Uni. Imagine you’re a busy person with family.

That is, imagine you're in the majority of the population.
& the governing party offer a referendum with 2 choices.

3/

To the average person why would a govt run by a party thats largely ruled the country since a century offer a choice btwn 2 options if one was stupid, self-harming nonsense?

This doesn’t seem a big point point – but its utterly central to Brexit..& one remainers often miss.

4/

The very fact that leave EU was an option gave it…to the average person - a respectability.

Otherwise you have to face the fact that much of the ruling class are idiots..& didnt think things thru.

Now that might be easy to a cynical, Guardian reader – but again 95% aren’t.

5/

Next problem:
Custom unions, trade blocs & economics.

Again 95% of voters don’t understand these - & judging by their comments this 95% includes MPs.

If Nadine Dorries confuses Single mkt with custom areas (her job!) – why do we expect voters to understand these things?

Since I have been highly critical of the manner in which those on the Right are trying to get those in GA to vote for the Republican senators, I feel it is only fair that I set out how I would go about it rather than simply sniping from the sidelines. So here we go.

Given the last few years, to say nothing of the last few decades, it is reasonable for those who lean more towards the conservative side of being a Republican to feel that promises are always made by the GOP but nearly never kept. This does not engender trust by the base.

Likewise, every election is the most important ever and if you do not vote Republican you are assisting in electing Democrats and it will be the end of life as we know it! At a certain point, weariness over such claims is natural. That is one of the lessons of Peter and the Wolf.

The other lesson of Peter and the Wolf, the one that is usually brushed away, is that the wolf always comes. Peter was sent to watch for the wolf for a reason. And right now, given the Democrats' public statements as to their goals, it is fair to say the wolf is at the door.

As of now, the Democrats control the House, where money is appropriated, and likely will hold the Presidency, which controls the administrative branch (to the extent it can be controlled and that is a different rant) and the judiciary. The Senate is the only firewall left.

Hello folks, Today I got a map of the Milwaukee Metropolitan area. We are going to be looking at Scott Walker's 3rd and 4th Election.

Walker has always been a polarizing figure in Wisconsin politics. He's been pretty much hated by Liberals and loved by Conservatives ever since he ending collective bargaining for public employees. He managed survive 2 very close re-elections (2012 recall, 2014 General)

However, his luck ran out in the 2018 Blue wave. Support for Walker fell pretty much everywhere. He did worse in pretty everywhere with a sizable population . The only place ,he really gained from 2014, was the small towns in Northern Wisconsin.

Walker went from winning the Milwaukee metro by 6 to losing it by 2.4 . Him doing worse in the Metro can be attributed by losing support virtually everywhere.

Ironically, the only place where Walker did slightly better was in the heavily African American wards of Milwaukee. Turnout went down pretty badly in this area, so most of his gains were likely due to population loss .

1/ Moderate Republicans are the most important people in the world right now. More comments on the #ElectoralCollegelRiot from a political sociologist.

2/ Right now, we have a severe problem: as long as you can gather up a critical number of primary voters, you can do some very horrible things, like incite a riot that gets 2 police officers killed.

3/ So what can be done? Part of the solution is relatively easy: criminal charges. We need a bright line. Free speech is ok, riots should be met with prison sentences every time.

4/ But part of the solution is much harder. Getting moderate Republican politicians and voters to punish people. They have more power to fix the situation than any other group right now.

5/ We've seen some honorable exceptions, like Corker and Schwarzenegger, and that is promising. But we've seen a suprising level of silence from the groups that are important moderate parts of the GOP coalition.

Good afternoon all!! ☕️☕️☕️

I got delayed this morning due to lack of access to 17 drops across all platforms. What a coincidence 😏

I N D I V I D U A L M A N D A T E N O T = 212

(thread ⬇️)

Alright, so let's do a thread on what the fuck just happened in Georgia tonight. Unless something changes, it sure looks like Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff will be Georgia's senators in the 117th Congress. With that in mind, let's litigate this disaster.

Before saying anything else, we should state that Raphael Warnock, Jon Ossoff, David Perdue, and Kelly Loeffler are all horrendous candidates. I will explain below.

Raphael Warnock is a radical leftist and a vicious antisemite. A healthy body politic would never let him get near the levers of power.

Jon Ossoff is a trust-fund bozo who has never accomplished anything in his 33 years of life and is not remotely qualified to be a senator.

Irish folks, this problem isn't just "over there" - w/ the 45% of Republican voters who were OK with this, a president and elected reps who called for it, police who facilitated it and media who are busy spinning it.

The far right is here too.

There are lots votes in Ireland for anti-Traveller candidates, airtime and column inches for far-right and fundamentalist pundits (and Steve Bannon), Guards who treat black and left protestors v differently to the far right. And Trump fans.

Many of the worst Republicans (and many of the cops) in the States are Irish. And US right-wing money pours into our own Youtube etc. grifters and anti-abortion fundis.

And Co. Clare holds a particular place in Trump's heart (and US military transport).

We are this.

Most importantly: here as there, anti-racists and anti-fascists have spent years telling you: these ppl are dangerous.

They have convictions for violence, they work w/ loyalists, UK and Euro fascists, they assault ppl and call for violence.

But you don't listen.

"Both sides" are a problem seemingly. Protesting fascists is as bad as being a fascist. The marketplace of ideas will solve all this. The Guards are impartial and there are bound to be reasons for ... whatever.

Anything rather than listen to ppl who actually know about it.