Boy, talk about a mixed bag. The underhanded, spiteful and constitutionally dubious hijinks continue. Follow along. Dumptrump fired his never should have been hired Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard because, well, we’re not quite sure. Her transparently bullshit reason was to care for her ailing husband, but her “resignation” had more to do with disagreeing with her boss, fighting with the CIA and just basically sucking. I think it was in large part because somebody (or somebodies, see Pam Bondi) had to be fed to the lions and she was the most convenient person, and a woman. Again, see Pam Bondi. In any event, that open gig is a biggie and one that the prez needs to be firmly attached to his stings. Enter Bill Pulte, Director of Federal Housing Finance. Yep, you read that right, and if you think that indicates an astounding lack of qualification or suitability to be DNI you got it in one. You know somebody is a bad choice when Republicans start howling in defiance. Apparently, Pulte’s biggest appeal was his superior sycophancy (which says a lot in this crowd!). That, and his stated intent to use his office to get involved in election interference. I started to go back and rewrite that sentence because it could mean actually interfering in elections instead of investigating said interference, but I was right to begin with. Huh. So Pulte is bad and cannot be confirmed, but since he will be interim and able to work as of Gabbard’s last day this Friday there is some urgency.
Meanwhile, Trump’s SAVE America Act has stalled, maybe for good, in Congress. I get infuriated even considering this travesty of legislation that exists for one, and one reason only: to make it harder to vote. And that should infuriate you, too, as voting should be as easy as humanly possible. That’s kinda the point of democracy, right? The will of the people and all that happy horseshit? Yes! I know, I know, there are obviously many ways in which the will of the people is being thwarted on a systemic level, including the Electoral College, Citizen’s United, gerrymandering, and superPACs, but one disaster at a time. But limiting voting always, always benefits the Right. For lots of reasons, the marginalized segments of our society have at least two things in common: they are most likely the ones with barriers to voting and they tend to vote progressive or liberal. So taking away mail-in ballots, requiring photo ID, and knocking people off voter rolls means fewer voters on the left. There are lots of underlying reasons and hard evidence of all this, but probably all you really need for proof is that Trump said out loud that the SAVE Act would guarantee the midterms and that the Republicans wouldn’t lose a race for 50 years. Talk about rigging elections. And before you bring up election fraud, just know there isn’t any. Or so little as to be utterly meaningless. There is a reason that claim got billed as the Big Lie. I mean for sheer mendacity combined with paucity of evidence this is Flat Earth levels of BS. Back to the story.
Pulte won’t be confirmed so is replaced by Jay Clayton, an attorney from SDNY. Still not qualified (apparently there isn’t a single person with an intelligence background who sucks up enough) but not the stick of TNT that is Pulte. Everyone, but especially the Democrats, are keen to get him confirmed as fast as possible since he can do a ton of damage for as long as he is interim. No worries, hearing scheduled, no significant resistance anticipated, zip zop. Uh-huh. Here comes the aforementioned skulduggery. Trump decides he will stop this hearing, but can’t so instead pulls his nomination. Why in hell would anyone agree to work for this dickhead? He wants it stopped because since there is something the Democrats want – no Pulte – he will hold it hostage to get something HE wants. Re-enter the SAVE Act, as in I’ll only put Clayton back in if you pass what no one wants to pass. You would almost say it was pretty slick, and might have been if he had left it at that. But since the Reps aren’t as invested in avoiding Pulte as the Dems he felt he needed to sweeten (poison) the pot even more, bringing us to FISA 702.
The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act has been routinely renewed by Congress since its inception in 1978. It is theoretically to establish oversight of spying, especially on Americans, by our intelligence agencies. It is divisive, has a checkered history and has blown on the winds of national security vs privacy for decades. Section 702, however, can best be described as a fucking nightmare with regard to privacy, leding to massive “incidental” gathering of Americans’ data that is unconstitutional and illegal. I could go on, but will instead direct you to the Electronic Frontier Foundation for a better explanation. (I do this whenever opportunity presents, but will again encourage you to support the EFF as they do tons of important stuff that we don’t even know we need done surrounding the internet, data, AI, etc. They rock and are cool.) Despite this horror, much of Congress would like to see it passed so Trump went ahead and demanded that it be attached to the SAVE Act and passed before he would save us from Pulte. Got all that? Whew, that is a crazy one. To be sure, there is no way his Orangeness came up with this, but he never relinquishes his social media mic so away we go. On some level I almost have to admire just how diabolical this all is, but it probably won’t quite work because the devil is in the details and this administration cannot be bothered with details.
I began with the idea of a mixed bag, but it feels more like a buffet of horrible choices. Pulte is terrifying, SAVE is evil and 702 is reprehensible. Here are your three shit sandwiches, you are going to eat one of them, would you prefer ketchup or mayo? Governing brought to you by Hobson. Can’t win for losing around here.