Misinformation, bigotry and conspiracism acted as battering rams, radically reshaping rightwing politics.
Tucker Carlson may well have been booted from Fox News , but what victory does it represent? The brand of conspiratorial demagoguery he belongs to has succeeded in drastically reshaping rightwing politics. The “paranoid style” that was once identified as a dangerous trend in conservatism is now its main operating system. The consequence? Democracy as we understand it is imperilled in the US and beyond. The likes of Tucker Carlson played their role, but this political catastrophe would never have happened without those who retained ill-deserved reputations for moderation while throwing open the door for the most radical extremism.
excepted from April 26/23 THE GUARDIAN article by Owen Jones
Tucker Carlson has lost his job – but the far right has won the battle for the mainstreamOwen Jones
Thank our lucky stars the creeping ‘paranoid style’ of conservatism would never take hold in our Great Dominion politics.
House suspends after bill that recognizes Canadian artists fails to get a sponsor
Manitoba Sen. Patricia Bovey’s bill was supposed to be sponsored in the House of Commons by Liberal MP Jim Carr, who died in December.
Published Apr 25, 2023 at 8:37am
OTTAWA — The House of Commons took an unplanned break Monday morning after no member of Parliament came forward to sponsor the legislation it was set to debate.
The House was scheduled to tackle a bill that would have recognized the critical role artists and the arts play in every dimension of Canadian life.
“This will be the foundation for developing the necessary policies for the arts, museums and performance halls, art galleries, workshops, publishing houses and more,” said Manitoba Sen. Patricia Bovey, the bill’s sponsor, during a final debate last year. SenatorBovey is a Canadian art historian and former director of the Art Gallery of Victoria and the Winnipeg Art Gallery .
Senator Pat Bovey’s sponsored arts bill fails to get House of Commons sponsor
The Senate passed the bill in October.
It was intended to be the platform for “much-needed policy revisions, updates and parameters for the creative sector in this country, which is the third-largest employer in our nation and yet one whose creators comprise the largest percentage of workers living below the poverty line,” Bovey said.
Bovey’s bill was supposed to be sponsored in the House of Commons by Liberal MP Jim Carr.
But Carr died in December and no MP had been found to take his place on the legislation before it came up on the House schedule on Monday.
Speaker Anthony Rota was forced to suspend the proceedings for an hour until MPs were ready to take up the next item on the agenda.
A spokesperson for government House leader Mark Holland says it’s up to MPs themselves to come forward to sponsor a non-government bill, and the government has no role in determining who sponsors them.
More than 600 people were involved in Bovey’s consultations prior to her bill being tabled in the Senate.
Bovey, who is soon turning 75, is set to retire from the Senate on May 15.
Court Painter seen with thank you portrait of Senator Pat Bovey for her support of the arts!
A person in the know and on deep background revealed Rex Murphy is applying for Tucker Carlson’s now vacant 8pm ET time slot on Fox Nation.
Murphy would not comment because we didn’t ask him.
When told this news Lord Black of Backwater who is also a media type and author of A President Like No Other: Donald J. Trump and the Restoring of America was more than excited at anticipating seeing irascible Rex on TV again since the big bad Great Dominion government funded CBC dropped him like a hot potato way back when.
Mike Pence offered some insights into what he plans to tell Special Counsel Jack Smith about former President Donald Trump’s conduct before the January 6th Capitol riot. The former vice president gave an interview to CBS’ Robert Costa that aired on Sunday April 23/23 for Face The Nation. The conversation dealt in part with January 6th, so Costa turned to the fact that Pence will have to testify before a federal grand jury about his conversations with Trump in the build-up to the storming of the U.S. Capitol. Pence decided earlier this month not to appeal the court order compelling his testimony,
In the past, the former vice president has displayed notable reluctance to testify against Trump, even with all of the president’s setbacks for his claims to executive privilege.
Excerpted from The New Republic article Alex Shephard / June 22, 2022
Mike Pense is Useless
The former vice president’s refusal to address his former boss’s attempted coup somehow manages to straddle the line between cowardice and opportunism.
“He’s a coward and an opportunist, and he sees only one way forward: kissing Donald Trump’s ass while, every now and then, lightly calling out the fact that Trump tried to get him to steal the election (if not killed). This only adds to the increasingly tragic career of Mike Pence. He has the opportunity to salvage his reputation—at least somewhat—and perhaps take Trump down. Because he naïvely believes he still might be president, he chooses not to. He will emerge from this gaining neither the things he wants nor the things he needs.”
Excerpted from Ideas Atlantic article by David Frum The Man Who Pretended Not to Notice A fly landed on Mike Pence’s head. And he did nothing. October 8, 2020
The Man Who Pretended Not to Notice
“We saw a weird moment when a fly landed on Pence’s snow-white hair—and the vice president did not react at all. No doubt, it’s a conundrum, what to do in such a situation. If Pence had shooed the fly and the fly had refused to shoo, that would have been bad. So he did nothing. And that doing nothing somehow in one powerful visual moment concentrated everything. It symbolized the whole Pence vice presidency, the determined, willful refusal to acknowledge the most blaring and glaring negative realities. Through all of the scandals and the crimes and the disasters of the past four years, Mike Pence was the man who pretended not to notice. And now there was a fly on his head, and he pretended not to notice that too.”
Click Links for previous Court Painter posts featuring Mike Pense
Court Painter is very disturbed at the quick settlement between Fox News and Dominion Voting Systems. Court Painter, Press Attache AHM and accompanying unpaid studio interns had set up shop outside the court to capture the guilty countenances of Rupert Murdoch, Tucker Carlson and Sean Hannity. Seems these pinocchio grifters can just go on their merry millionaire ways as Court Painter misses huge portrait and fridge magnet sales opportunities . Meanwhile democratic justice was also denied a further opportunity to place Fox and it’s fabulist enablers under intense scrutiny on the stand .
The settlement between Fox News and Dominion Voting Systems totals $787,500,000, according to Dominion attorney Justin Nelson.
The settlement represents “vindication and accountability,” Nelson said in a news conference Tuesday afternoon.
“Lies have consequences,” Nelson said.
“Over two years ago, a torrent of lies swept Dominion and election officials across America into an alternative universe of conspiracy theories, causing grievous harm,” he added.
Court Painter includes some previous images of key characters in this saga which alas are not as fresh as was anticipated!
Court Painter reluctantly painted pictures for the Anti Woke Folk Club clubhouse
The use of the term “woke” in a political context originates with Black activists in the United States in the early- to mid-20th century and used as a term of vigilance, calling for greater public awareness of racial discrimination.The term has been used within Black communities in North America for decades, it gained prominence in the wider public discourse during the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement.In the years following, people started applying the term more broadly to awareness of other social issues, such as sexism, poverty and the challenges facing LGBTQ + people.
Pierre Poilievre and Marjorie Taylor Green are proud members of the Anti Woke FolkClub
Pierre Poilievre the Great Dominion’s aspiring prime minister, leader of the federal Conservative party and devoted anti progressive took to the podium at the local ANTI WOKE FOLK CLUB and was quoted as saying.
“Woke is designed to divide people by race, by gender, by ethnicity, by religion, by vaccine status, and any other way they can divide people into groups.Then you can justify having a government that can control all those groups. We need freedom.”
Pierre Poilievre and many on the political right apply the term woke as a pejorative and are proud Anti Woke Folk Club members.
Pierre Poilievre and Marjorie Taylor Green reach across the border to find common agreement on establishing an Anti Woke Folk Club
Marjorie Taylor Green and Pierre Poilievre conducting an anti woke puppet play
So if you thought the nuclear arms threat, severe climate events ,human /animal inequities, political stupidity and continual wars were enough to make you keep your head down…how about adding the looming Artificial Intelligence Armageddon recklessness to the mix…
You’re welcome!
Pause Giant AI Experiments: An Open Letter
We call on all AI labs to immediately pause for at least 6 months the training of AI systems more powerful than GPT-4.
PUBLISHED By Future of Life Institute
March 22, 2023
Powerful AI systems should be developed only once we are confident that their effects will be positive and their risks will be manageable.
AI systems with human-competitive intelligence can pose profound risks to society and humanity, as shown by extensive research[1] and acknowledged by top AI labs.[2] As stated in the widely-endorsed Asilomar AI Principles, Advanced AI could represent a profound change in the history of life on Earth, and should be planned for and managed with commensurate care and resources. Unfortunately, this level of planning and management is not happening, even though recent months have seen AI labs locked in an out-of-control race to develop and deploy ever more powerful digital minds that no one – not even their creators – can understand, predict, or reliably control.
New York AG Letitia James has said she’s prepared to seize Donald Trump’s buildings if he can’t pay his $454 MILLION civil fraud fine. It could mean that the Trump International Tower & Hotel presently in the midst of a planned rebranding to become the Crowbar Hotel could be seized.
In a story circulating among the venture capitalist crowd, an experienced and successful New York hotelier is rumoured to be in negotiations with justice authorities to rebrand his Trump International Hotel & Tower to the Crowbar Hotel & Tower in an anticipated plea deal to keep him out of Rikers.
It is already being hailed as an American justice outcome at its finest !
The Crowbar Hotel & Tower, the only Forbes Five-Star hotel with a Five-Star penal style cafeteria in New York, will be an icon delivering the highest level of Big House service, clink tray style, and exclusivity for those seeking an incarcerated experience. The impressive steel bars architectural entrance and lobby features distinguish the 52-story New York City hotel just off Central Park, right at the juncture of Columbus Circle and Broadway. The Crowbar Hotel is superbly located on the Upper West Side.
Inside, no dark money has been spared to create an impeccable penal style, spectacular communal cafeteria service, The Behind Bars Bar and a sense of slammer intrigue define the experience.The Crowbar Hotel guests enjoy a higher level of penal luxury with unrivalled jug hospitality and detail oriented prison amenities, including a bar of Trump monogrammed soap and one roll of T stamped toilet paper per guest plus a personal Guard Service exclusive to those doing hard time, not for a long time but for a good time! Big burley screws watch over 167 magnificent cells featuring fully equipped sink, bunk, toilet, and floor-to-ceiling barred windows showcasing unparalleled views of Central Park and the City. A single bare lightbulb will lend romantic allure. Burnished steel bars with great big locks and authentic 24 hour unrelenting prison sounds will add glamorous pokey touches, along with one reproduction of a Court Painter original , depicting President 45 surrounded by sumptuous velvet draperies and opulent silk accent walls. For photos and more details on the upcoming calaboose rebranding write to The Donald USA.
OTTAWA — The Opposition Conservatives are asking Twitter to apply a “government-funded” label on accounts associated with the CBC, even as other broadcasters decry the tag for not making clear their editorial independence.
On Tuesday, Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre tweeted a copy of a letter addressed to the company making the request.
In the letter, Poilievre asked that the label be applied to CBC’s English “news-related” accounts. But he did not mention Radio-Canada, the broadcaster’s French-language arm.
The social-media giant currently defines “government-funded” media as outlets that “may have varying degrees of government involvement over editorial content.”
Poilievre said he believes that applies to CBC.
But CBC said in a statement on Wednesday that is “clearly not the case,” adding that it cannot comment on the motives behind Poilievre’s letter.
“As every Canadian knows, CBC/Radio-Canada is publicly funded. Its editorial independence is protected in law in the Broadcasting Act,” a spokesperson for the broadcaster said.
The office of Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez said the way the broadcaster’s public funding works, members of Parliament only vote on the sum of money it receives — they don’t guide its editorial decisions.
“It is an independent, arms-length Crown corporation,” said Laura Scaffidi, Rodriguez’s press secretary.
She called Poilievre’s comments an “attack on journalists.”
Other media outlets have raised concerns about the difference between phrases such as “government-funded” and “publicly funded” and what each implies.
