On today’s BradCast, we take up the President’s charge to stand “in defense of democracy”. [Audio link to full show follows below this summary.]
Among our coverage today…
- During President Biden‘s solemn, somber and historic prime time Oval Office address to the nation on Wednesday evening (transcript here), to explain his Sunday decision to drop out of the 2024 Presidential race and endorse Vice President Kamala Harris for the top of the ticket, he focused in no small part on the need to defend democracy against wannabe “kings and dictators,” while he charged that “the cause of American democracy itself” is now at stake. “We must unite to protect it,” he implored. We discuss and continue to join that fight.
- Meanwhile, as the U.S. House on Wednesday voted 417 to 0 to create a special task force to probe what happened during the July 13 assassination attempt on Donald Trump in Pennsylvania, FBI Director Christopher Wray testified on Wednesday that, in fact, nearly two weeks since the shooting, we have no idea “whether or not it’s a bullet or shrapnel” that wounded Trump’s ear. In fact, to date, no medical expert or law enforcement official has ever offered an official public accounting of what actually happened to the former President that day, even as mainstream corporate media have simply taken the social media claim by Trump, an inveterate liar, that a “bullet…pierced the upper part of my right ear” as fact. Ever since, Trump has exploited the event to claim at his convention, in rally speeches and on social media, that he “took a bullet for democracy.”
As we detail today, however, all available evidence suggests that is simply a lie. The man who, himself, has become the greatest threat to American democracy in modern history is now using the near miss for stolen valor to pretend to be a defender of democracy.
As Ernie Canning explains at The BRAD BLOG this week, whether Trump “took a bullet” or not, it was not “for democracy,” as investigators have reportedly found no evidence to suggest the shooting was politically motivated. And, as TPM’s Josh Marshall has been reporting for some time, evidence suggests it was more likely some sort of flying shrapnel that grazed Trump’s ear, along with causing similar minor injuries to several local cops who were near the stage that day. In any event, the media’s failure to even ask the Trump Campaign about these details — as one rally goer was actually killed and two others critically wounded that day — for apparent fear of angering the former President, is “bizarre” and “a total journalistic failure” to the American people and to history. It also, as we note, underscores tyranny expert and author Timothy Snyder‘s repeated warnings about giving up power to would-be autocrats by “obeying in advance.” Much more on all of this on today’s show.
- We’ve got more details today on the DNC‘s plan to begin a virtual roll-call vote on August 1st next week — well in advance of their August 19 convention in Chicago — in order to finalize the party’s Presidential and Vice-Presidential nominees no later than August 7th. Why are they doing this? No, it’s not to ensure there are no challengers to presumptive nominee Kamala Harris. Rather, it is thanks to a story we’ve been covering since the beginning of the year about the failure by Republican state lawmakers to change the statutory deadline for submitting certified party nominees for the Buckeye State ballot by August 7th, as they’ve done for many years, as needed, when Republicans hold their national conventions late in the summer. Yes, state lawmakers, in a late special session, finally changed the statutory deadline. But the new law doesn’t take effect until September 1, opening opening up Democrats to a potential legal challenge by Republicans as to whether their nominee can lawfully be on the state’s ballot at all this November. Tune in for more details.
- More news “in defense of democracy” out of Ohio this week. A ballot measure for a state constitutional amendment that would create an independent redistricting committee has qualified for the November ballot! If adopted by voters, it could end the state GOP’s wildly gerrymandered Congressional and state legislative maps for 2026. Otherwise, Republican Buckeye State politicians will continue to be allowed to choose their own voters, rather than vice versa, until at least 2030.
- And still more good news “in defense of democracy” from the Buckeye State today! A federal judge has struck down part of a sweeping election reform package adopted by Ohio Republicans last year that makes it a felony for disabled voters to allow caregivers, roommates, in-laws or even grandchildren to help them cast their absentee ballot by mail or drop box. The voter suppression law threatened to charge anyone but immediate family members (which apparently doesn’t include grandchildren!) with felonies for helping those voters in need to cast their ballot. That, as the CDC finds that people with disabilities make up more than a quarter of the U.S. adult population.
- Finally, Desi Doyen joins us for our latest Green News Report, with news on explosive wildfires in the U.S. and Canadian west; the two hottest days ever recorded on Planet Earth (this past Sunday and Monday); and a focus on the Republicans’ shocking Project 2025 plans to gut federal science agencies — such as the EPA and National Weather Service — along with climate science and many if not most environmental protections and climate change initiatives…
(Snail mail support to “Brad Friedman, 7095 Hollywood Blvd., #594 Los Angeles, CA 90028” always welcome too!)
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“It also, as we note, underscores tyranny expert and author Timothy Snyder’s repeated warnings about giving up power to would-be autocrats by ‘obeying in advance.'” – Brad
Indeed. One aspect of the cure is to disobey in advance (The Shapeshifters of Bullshitistan – 2).
Hi,
Several days ago, in a discussion on this topic, it was pointed out to me that the NYT photographer(Doug Mills) had captured what appeared to be a “a projectile passing by Donald J Trump” during the rally at Butler, PA. https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/14/us/politics/photo-path-trump-assassination.html
Just something else to fold in, it seems.
Best,
Fiona
The FBI made a statement that Trump was hit by a fragment of a bullet, which sounds like BS to me.
Others nearby the podium were hit with fragments from the teleprompter or another object, that was struck by a bullet.
AR15s fire either NATO .556 or Remington .223 rounds, which tend to flatten out (if hollow-tipped) at the high velocity with which they are propelled.
Tiny wounds from these types of rounds are exceedingly rare.
If Trump were even grazed by a .556 or .223, his ear would torn up like raw meat.
That FBI report seems to be in support of Trump’s talking points (“I got shot”; “I Took a bullet” etc).
Sounds like Trump has friends in the FBI, no?
Maga infiltration?
In defense of democracy, I think this is an important article of the history of the same people who have been working for decades against democracy, voters’ rights, gay rights and womens’ rights toward a theocracy by which they would control us.
Dear Brad and Kamala Harris, I am so glad you all are strong fighters for democracy. We all need to be.
Quoting:
https://www.mind-war.com/p/catholic-coup-jd-vance-paypal-mafia
Catholic Coup: JD Vance, PayPal Mafia, Opus Dei & Knights of Malta
Jim Stewartson
Last month, Pope Francis, who seems to be zeroing in on this group of radical fascists in the Vatican, took the highly unusual step of of excommunicating the former top Catholic in the United States Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano, for schism. This means the Pope found that Vigano was no longer a follower of the Catholic Church but someone who wanted to destroy it.
In 2020, according to Mike Flynn, Vigano became Flynn’s “personal priest.†A week before the election that year, both Flynn and “Q†posted a pro-Trump letter from Vigano almost simultaneously. Ever since, Vigano has become more and more radical, including a recent “sermon†that included “Pizzagate†references. He is also a blatant Russian agent, including being a speaker at “Russophile†conferences with Aleksandr Dugin in Moscow.
Theocracy is a Tool of Fascists
Peter Thiel and JD Vance’s adoption of René Girard as a rationale for playing God and attempting to impose radical Christian theocracy on the world “for our own good,†is the consequence of a world in which psychopathy and messianic narcissism are lavishly rewarded. The “PayPal Mafia,†of which Vance is effectively the mascot, believe they are so much more intelligent and powerful than everyone else they are entitled to destroy the world in order to rebuild it in their own images.
The problem is not with religion, or Christianity, or Catholicism. It’s with people who use the beliefs of others to hoax them into self-destruction.
We should not be afraid to call out the difference. And we’d better soon, because this Catholic Coup is nearing completion.