Creepy, crazy Robert Kennedy Junior is back in the news. No, it doesn't involve him and another dead animal. No, another of his many affairs hasn't been exposed. Melissa Quinn and Caitlin Yilek (CBS NEWS) report:
The Supreme Court on Friday rejected a bid by independent presidential Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to restore his name to New York's general election ballot.
The unsigned order from the court leaves intact a lower court decision declining to place his name back on New York's ballot ahead of the Nov. 5 contest. Kennedy mounted an unsuccessful independent bid for the White House and, after suspending his campaign last month, is working to have his name removed from ballots in more than a dozen states.
Which is good news. But we need to remember this for the future. Junior was always running a fake campaign. He never should have been on the ballots to begin with. He's no longer pretending he's running for the presidency. Instead of crawling back under his rock and disappearing, he has spent weeks now trying to get on or stay on the ballots of states that he believes Kamala might win in and trying to get off the ballots of states that he feels Donald might be close to carrying if his voters vote for Donald instead.
It's all garbage. Maureen Groppe (USA TODAY) notes:
New York Attorney General Letitia James responded that Kennedy's request is "extraordinary and disruptive."
Tens of thousands of ballots already in voters' hands would have to be invalidated, James told the court, even though "Kennedy is no longer seeking the office for which he insists on the right to appear on the ballot and is imploring his supporters to vote for someone else."
Kennedy's lawyers said he was only asking to put his name on ballots yet to be printed.
Yes, he was just insisting that he be on the ones yet to be printed. Because the legal ploy there is to then challenge New York's election results by insisting it was unfair to voters that he was on some ballots and not others. Donald is expected to lose New York state. Junior saw this as a loophole that could throw the results into question.
He's garbage and he's a nutcase. Emma Specter (VOGUE) observes:
Bizarrely enough, the Olivia Nuzzi scandal is actually perhaps the most normal bit of gossip to emerge about Kennedy since he began his campaign in 2023. This past May, Kennedy attributed the memory loss and brain fog he experienced in 2010 to “a worm that got into my brain and ate a portion of it and then died” (yes, really), and three months later, he confessed to dumping a dead bear cub in Central Park after picking it up from the side of the road upstate with the intent to consume its meat. The same month, a 2012 article resurfaced in which Kennedy’s daughter Kick recounted a story about her father beheading a dead whale and strapping it to the top of his minivan for a five-hour drive. (And then, of course, there are the even more unseemly parts of his story, from sexual-assault allegations to the fact that Kennedy pledged to not “take sides on 9/11.”)
He's insane and he's a national joke striving to become a national threat. Stephanie Mencimer (MOTHER JONES) reports:
MAGA influencer Brandon Straka is still on probation for a criminal charge related to his participation in the mob at the US Capitol on January 6. But on Sunday, he will be back in DC, where he’s slated to appear on the National Mall at the “Rescue the Republic” event, alongside Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Tulsi Gabbard, Russell Brand, a handful of anti-vax doctors, evangelical preachers, plus journalist Matt Taibbi.
The hodgepodge speaker lineup reflects the mishmash of the event’s agenda. The website declares that the United States “is under attack by a conglomerate of industrial complexes,” and calls on Americans to “join the resistance.” It’s the production of the Libertarian Party; a group that fought vaccine mandates during the pandemic; and activists opposed to sending military aid to Ukraine. Gabbard and Kennedy are now officially also surrogates for the Trump campaign.
That's who Junior associates now -- well, insurrectionists and Mike The Pap Smear Papantonio.
Is RING OF FIRE still trying to pretend that they're progressive? They were happy to promote Junior last year and even as late as this year through the spring. The Pap Smear and Junior started the program together, it was one of those forgettable weekend programs on AIR AMERICA RADIO that no one listened to. His biggest audience on AIR AMERICA came right after the election when he appeared on UNFILTERED with hosts Lizz Winstead and Rachel Maddow (the show had a third host, Chuck D, but Chuck wasn't on that day) and Pap Smear -- who got his name that day from Lizz and Rachel (and had a hissy fit after the broadcast ended) -- announced he would be flying to DC to challenge the election results.
Lying.
Not flying. He never did that. Just a big talker who amounts to nothing -- in fact, that should be the title of his memoir MIKE PAPANTONIO: JUST A BIG TALKER WHO AMOUNTS TO NOTHING.
Some people think Mike is more than a talker. In 2003, for example, on CNN, James Carville called him an "ambulance chaser." Well he has to do something, right? RT is no more. So he can't count on RUSSIA TODAY money. Maybe that explains the video RING OF FIRE did today where they trash a retired politician from the Democratic Party and rush to defend Russia? It can't be because of fact checking.
It they were interested in facts or fact checking, they would have called out Junior long ago.
Remember, by the way, when Pap Smear got media push back for hiding professional relationships?
Me too. And all the above? Somehow missing from his WIKIPEDIA page. Maybe go back to this 2003 ROLL CALL report and work on improving his CRAPAPEDIA page which reads like an infomercial because it ignores all of his questionable activities.
Back to the MOTHER JONES article:
The self-proclaimed influencer’s lack of meaningful influence doesn’t seem to have stopped a few rich donors from keeping his organization afloat since his arrest. For instance, IRS records show that between November 2021 and October 2023, his foundation received $220,000 from the Bell Charitable Foundation, the philanthropic arm of Kathleen Bell Flynn, heir to the Taco Bell fortune.
Did not know that. First off, that explains the grifters, doesn't it? The Glenneth Greenwalds and the Matt Taibbis and all the rest of the paid whores. A piece of garbage with no real audience or followers, can get $220,000 from the fright-wing.
Back home, I mainly go to Tacos Del Barrio for street tacos and throughout the state I'll go to Del Taco. I don't go to Taco Bell and now that I know that KBF is funding people who committed treason, I won't be going to Taco Bell ever.
Back home? I'm on the road, I'm pouring every bit of time I've got into campaigning for Kamala Harris. So I'm mainly eating Birds Eye frozen vegetables that I pop in the microwave. I mentioned Birds Eye frozen vegetables recently here or at THIRD and an e-mail came expressing disbelief. On the road, I can't eat fast food -- which will make me sick and sluggish. We usually do lunch, 30 to 45 minutes, where we go to a sit-down restaurant in whatever town we're in. Breakfast is usually yogurt and oatmeal -- a piece of fruit maybe -- in whatever hotel we're staying at. Then by the end of the day, when we get back to the hotel, I pop a Birds Eye into the microwave. Yes, I do eat Birds Eye. I have no idea why that's so surprising. I have to eat healthy and I'm on the road and I know the taste of Birds Eye as opposed to what some regional frozen food might be available. Again, I have no idea why that's so surprising but someone e-mailed the public account (common_ills@yahoo.com) with a 17K e-mail calling me a liar at length for claiming to eat Birds Eye.
Am I missing something there? I get e-mails all the time -- many complaining about something -- but no one's ever accused me of lying about eating a frozen food.
On e-mails, Friday's snapshot included this:
Klippenstein, who formerly worked at The Intercept, said on his paid Substack Thursday that his X account was suspended for violating the platform's ban on posting private information.
"I know that it is general practice to delete 'private' information from leaks and classified documents, but in this case, not only is Vance an elected official and vice presidential candidate, but the information is readily available for anyone to buy," he wrote. Vance is also the junior U.S. senator from Ohio.
Klippenstein continued:
We should be honest about so-called private information contained in the dossier and "private" information in general. It is readily available to anyone who can buy it. The campaign purchased this information from commercial information brokers. Those dealers make huge profits from selling this data. And the media knows it, because they buy the data for reporting purposes, just like the campaign. They don't like to mention that though.
According to Klippenstein, the corporate media has "been sitting on" the dossier since June, "declining to publish in fear of finding itself at odds with the government's campaign against 'foreign malign influence.'"
"If the document had been hacked by some 'Anonymous'-like hacker group, the news media would be all over it," he contended. "I'm just not a believer of the news media as an arm of the government, doing its work combatting foreign influence. Nor should it be a gatekeeper of what the public should know."
Klippenstein shared a general overview of the contents of the dossier,
which he described as "a 271-page research paper the Trump campaign
prepared to vet" Vance, pulling out select quotes from the document:
- "Vance has been one of the chief obstructionists to U.S. efforts to providing [sic] assistance to Ukraine."
- "Vance criticized public health experts and elected officials for supporting Black Lives Matter protests while condemning anti-lockdown [Covid] protests."
- "Vance 'embraced non-interventionism."
- "In 2020, Vance criticized President Trump's airstrike killing Iranian General Qasem Soleimani, worrying it would continue to bog down America in the Middle East to the advantage of China."
- "Vance suggested that the country had been entangled in wars in the Middle East so 'financial elites' could profit from the rise of China."
"While the news media has paraphrased some of the contents of the dossier, what they haven't done is provide the American people with the underlying document, in the language in which it appeared, so they can decide for themselves what they think," Klippenstein said. "You decide for yourself."
An X spokesperson toldZeteo's Justin Baragona that "Ken Klippenstein was temporarily suspended for violating our rules on posting unredacted private personal information, specifically Sen. Vance's physical addresses and the majority of his Social Security number."
Some e-mails express disbelief that I didn't know about this. I really didn't -- and really don't. I don't pretend to know everything. I honestly had not been following that. After the Iraq snapshot is dictated -- wait. I get up in the morning and I work out. While working out, I'm dictating the snapshot. I then hop in the shower. I then eat breakfast and we hit the road where -- except for lunch and traveling to different sites -- I'm speaking to one group after another about the importance of the election until around nine p.m. at night. This topic is not one that's come up in any group I've spoken with. It's more 'insider baseball' than an actual issue on people's minds.
If I don't know about something, I'm not weighing in. I've noted that here from the start. I've repeatedly praised former BOSTON GLOBE columnist Ellen Goodman over the years at this site for refusing to continue on the chat and chews where you jawbone on every topic in the world. She rightly noted that she cannot be an expert on everything.
I don't have a lot of respect for people who think they can -- especially when they then open their mouths and, for instance, credit Bernie Sanders with creating Medicare For All. Yeah, I saw that live stream -- neither the woman hosting it nor the two Disney Kids she had on posted it so I ignored it but, yes, those two men are idiots. Try opening a book, Zac and Cody (you know who I mean) and learning about FDR. And from there, you can learn about the movement for Medicare For All -- a movement that began long before not only Bernie's two runs for the Democratic Party's presidential nomination, but also before Bernie was in the Senate and also before Bernie was in the House and also before . . .
Zac and Cody's stupidity does serve a purpose. It always let's me know the level of stupidity out there. On the topic of the censorship or 'censorship,' their nonsense weigh in was all I needed.
Because I don't just avoid writing about a topic if I know nothing about it, I also have to have a way in, an entry point, to cover something. Zac and Cody were fanboying again on air and they're stupid. Their stupidity showed me how I could cover it here -- or at THIRD -- if I choose to. Again, Zac and Cody never know basic facts. The first half has them attacking Matt Taibbi -- but not knowing how to attack him on it -- do they ever do any research? -- and then the second had them fanboying over Glenneth Greenwald. Both of those men are being hypocrites on this topic. Matt especially,
Do Zac and Cody not know how to listen? Matt's hypocrisy is so obvious on this issue but either they didn't pay attention to the Tweets they read on air or they don't know enough to weigh in. Their weak sauce critique of Matt was a waste of time because they don't what they're talking about. If they knew the basics, they could have brought the hammer down immediately. Maybe they were too busy rushing to defend Glenneth?
They'd do well to grow the hell up.
Which is another issue. Thursday's snapshot called out that bad DEMOCRACY NOW! interview with the hideous Jill Stein. This resulted in e-mails to the public account asking if DN! is cancelled here? No. We'll continue to note when it's applies to what we're covering. And, in that same snapshot, we drop back to a segment DN! did last year.
Any outlet -- well any with even 1% of integrity (that leaves out FOX "NEWS") -- can do journalism worth applauding. And I'm not Zac and Cody. I hope they grow out of their nonsense phase.
Glenneth is a grifter. But the world doesn't exist for Zac and Cody until 2016. So they don't realize that he was one of the Iraq War cheerleaders or that when he realized it was hugely unpopular that he refashioned himself and then pretended for years that he had never supported the Iraq War. He hung out with a hag who was useless and garbage but promoted herself as the left's queen online. Those of us in the industry knew she was trash and a menace to women. She's largely forgotten today but she was Glenn's roll dog long after her brief career in the entertainment industry imploded. She's forgotten today in the industry and, for that matter, she's forgotten as an online activist.
(For those late to the party, hag is not Laura Poitras. Laura makes great documentaries. Hag had a tiny role in feature film production. Am I afraid to note her by name? Not at all. I'm just glad she's forgotten and want her to stay that way.)
Let's leave the parenthetical but stay with that thought. Sam Seder did a good segment on a fright-wing crazy. It didn't go up here. It wasn't a reflection on the segment. It's a reflection on something I struggle with.
I'm all for calling out and warning people about con artis like Naomi Wolf or John Stauber who were for a moment or two on the left. I feel we need to do that on the left. We promoted John Stauber, for example. So now that he's become a freak who rallies against the LGBTQ+ community and promotes Libs of Tik Tok and other hate outlets -- Naomi Wolf does the same thing -- as does morbidly obese Tara Reade -- I feel we on the left are obligated to note these grifters.
But LL whom Sam was rightly calling out? If I'm noting that or someone else that they call out on THE HUMANIST, am I promoting that person?
Marjorie Taylor Greene is disgusting and needs to be called out. She is a member of Congress which gives her power. So no problem posting videos where someone's calling her out.
But I always struggle when it comes to the no-names trying to make a buck off hatred. I try to be careful about my actions and how this space is used. And I don't want to play a part in promoting undeserving people who are nothing but hate merchants.
That's not me making a judgment on Sam, THE HUMANIST or anyone who does tackle this -- not even Zac and Cody. They need to use their platforms as they see fit. But I do struggle with this -- is this person (whomever it is at any given moment) worth calling out by name or not -- meaning calling them out by name -- and if I do that am I increasing the talk about them and therefore offering publicity to them and advancing their hatred.
That's what I struggle with.
Back to Friday's snapshot. "ADDED" now appears at the end of Kamala's speech and ahead of "The following sites updated." I don't do that very often but there were enough e-mails that I heard about when I sat down for lunch on Friday. Martha and Shirley are kind enough to brief me on the e-mails -- and they and a few others are kind enough to do any replies that go out from the public account. "Holy war" needed to be addressed. I hadn't realized that there was an expectation that it would be addressed by me in the Friday snapshot so that's what I did. I also addressed the expectations with regards to two music videos.
Normally, there's not anything added to a snapshot regarding e-mail reactions to that snapshot but when there is, it will always say "ADDED" to note that it wasn't there originally.
A few e-mails to the public account expressed disappointment that I had -- in the words of one -- "a strong week" up until Friday's snapshot. He wasn't the only one expressing that opinion.
Don't know what to tell you there.
I'll refund your money? Oh, wait, you don't pay a dime for this site. I'm not a grifter.
Except for one week when I was in the hospital (diabetic coma), I post daily something I've written or co-written here. And have done that for far too long. It's twenty years in November.
What you're reading is a private conversation in a public square. I write for this community -- that's why I put priority on community e-mails unless it's something to the public account pointing out an error or asking about bias -- sincerely asking or just trying to work the ref.
I feel answerable to the community that built up around this site.
So if you're critique is I wasted your time on Friday and you wanted something harder hitting, are you a community member? I can't imagine anyone who was a community member actually criticizing me for something that minor and stupid. I've wanted to be done online since 2008.
From the early days, we have done "talking entries." And they start out with one thing and then cover other things. (I'm not referring to dictating snapshots, I'm referring to an entry I type that covers a variety of topics -- usually pulling from community e-mails.)
So what the ones objecting to? That feature of working up to something is actually long built into this site with the "talking entries."
So the ones objecting are objecting because we open by calling out a film review.
That's so minor!!!
First off, it's not minor. ROSEMARY'S BABY is not a film about a pregnant woman learning she's carrying the devil's baby. That doesn't happen until the last scenes of the film when Rosemary finds out her baby's not dead and she sees it. And since it happens when she sees her baby, she's not pregnant when she finds out it's the devil's baby -- or do you, like Donald Trump with abortion -- not understand how pregnancy actually works?
Second, Rebecca knows p.r. That was her profession. I've often noted here when someone's insulted her over the years -- she does a great website (disclosure to those late to the party, Rebecca, Elaine and I are friends dating back to college) -- that she knows what she's doing.
It's amazing isn't it, how when a woman does something, it requires a lot of criticism and a lot of people telling her how to do it. We saw that with COMMON DREAMS and their string of articles about what Kamala Harris needed to do in the debate ahead of the debate.
Rebecca knows how to run her own site. That is the pig boyz first mistake, thinking that women are sitting around saying, "I wish some man would come along and tell me how to run my website."
So they'd whine in an e-mail to me that we have serious issues and Rebecca wrote about DYNASTY! or some other topic.
Like now they complain about ROSEMARY'S BABY being in Friday's snapshot.
That snapshot was heavily accessed (hits and clicks don't measure reading, just how many people clicked on it). And that's because of ROSEMARY'S BABY.
I'm trying to get Kamala Harris elected -- I'm doing that online and offline. My goal is not to speak with the same group of people -- online or offline -- over and over but to reach out to new ones who hopefully will get behind Kamala.
We were putting Kamala's entire economic speech in Friday's snapshot. We'd already covered it in another snapshot. I assume most people interested only in politics had already heard of it or seen it and certainly we had already covered it. ROSEMARY'S BABY added a new element that brought in people who don't normally stop by this site.
I've noted that repeatedly regarding Rebecca's site. If I do a snapshot she thinks people especially need to read, she's going to do a post about sex or a popular TV show or anything that she thinks will get eyeballs on her post with the hope that they'll continue on to the snapshot that she reposts in full.
Stan. Okay, that's another issue. I noted Stan noting Rebecca in a snapshot this week and there were drive-bys to the public e-mail account about how it wasn't necessary to note Stan noting Rebecca. It was absolutely necessary. First, I'd meant to note Rebecca the day before but we ran out of time and space. (Her post -- as with all community posts -- was noted in "The following sites updated" section but I meant that I had planned to quote from it.) So Stan's post actually reminded me of that. Second, Stan's a community member and I don't need you or anyone questioning my right to quote from the community sites. No, Stan doesn't usually write about politics. He noted not long ago that he doesn't feel like he's good at it. He is very good at it but I understand why he doubts himself -- it has to do with the way the internet has treated African-Americans who write about politics. It's gotten better in the last 20 years but it's still out there. Third, his focus is entertainment. He created his community site to help get the word out on Iraq. That's true of all of the sites in the community including this one. Now, for the community newsletters, Stan's happy to tackle politics. But his site focuses on entertainment. And he does a great job on it. But there aren't a lot of times when he gets included in a snapshot. He's covering entertainment so if we're covering the political race here, I don't have as much reason to include -- link to and quote from -- his posts. I love Stan's site, I love Stan's work and I love Stan. I link to everything he does in "The following sites" but I will include him -- quoting something he's written -- anytime I want and I won't apologize.
By focusing on entertainment, he's created his own audience and some of those people reading him for his writing continue to read on to the snapshot that he reposts every time there's a snapshot.
I love it when men rush into offer 'helpful' advice that no one asked them for.
Reminds me, in fact, of Jane Fonda. 9 TO 5 is a film classic. It contains great performances from Jane, Lily Tomlin, Dolly Parton and Dabney Coleman.
But when the film came out, some leftist men used their columns to trash it and to trash Jane. One male newspaper columnist (again, there are people who I don't want to promote, so we'll leave him nameless) was especially condemning insisting that Jane had blown it.
9 TO 5, he insisted, was a nothing movie and not important like THE CHINA SYNDROME or COMING HOME!!!!
Well, first off, it became the second biggest film in the US of its year in terms of ticket sales. It was one of the first comedies to rake in over $100 million in ticket sales in the US. It was the first one starring women to make over $100 million in ticket sales -- and that's true not just of comedy but of any genre film that starred women (plural). It remains Jane Fonda's biggest hit.
But it was a comedy and she blew her credibility!!!!!
She didn't blow her credibility but I think today we'd read that kind of nonsense and we'd grasp what was actually going on: Women aren't important and therefore their rights aren't important.
That is what was behind the slams. The film deals with issue of equal pay for equal work, deals with sexism in the work force, deals with the double-shifts that effect many women (and some men -- back then as well but it's true even more today) and so much more.
She didn't blow her credibility. She produced a huge film -- huge at the box office and huge in the minds of America -- to this day, this film is still being viewed and embraced.
We need to wrap up. I told myself I'd actually get some sleep tonight. But Amy and Juan. No, they aren't cancelled. I love Juan, he's a great person who's done a life's work that is impressive and outstanding and I love him and remain in awe of him. But that interview with Jill Stein was awful.
We'll continue to highlight DEMOCRACY NOW! as needed. And that's the lesson that Zac and Cody refuse to learn. Stop thinking like a fan boy. They worship Glenn Greenwald who doesn't deserve worship -- probably no one does but Glenn certainly doesn't. They attack Matt now but were worshipping him until a year or so ago. They attack Bri-Bri today while having worshipped her until a few months ago. They fan boy over and over.
That's not helping us. It doesn't make for critical thinkers. DEMOCRACY NOW! does a lot of good work. We'll continue to take from it what we can use. And if I feel it or anything else needs to be called out, I'll do so.
I'm sure I left out 800 things I meant to address. I get four hours a sleep a night on the road. I'm tired and I'm going to sleep now. Any drive-bys that need refunds for something I've written that just wasn't up to code for them, send the complaints to common_ills@yahoo.com.
The following sites updated: