Crooked Media - Sub-Standard Procedure

- Markwayne Mullin, explaining why Rep. Matt Gaetz is such a giant dick.

We’ve been so distracted by the fractured Republican party this week that we’ve barely had time to think about the great unifier, McDonald Trump. Let’s take a look at the current fallout from his (400? 500? There are a lot of them.) trials going on in the country.

• One revelation this week from Trump’s classified file fiasco in Mar-a-Lago is that he allegedly disclosed specific operational capabilities of  US nuclear submarines to a foreign national after leaving the White House. The man he spilled the secrets to is an Australian billionaire named Anthony Pratt who, in return, shared the classified info with at least 45 other people. (45? As in the 45th President? Go nuts, conspiracy theorists.) Members of the 45 club included 6 journalists and three former Australian Prime Ministers.
   
• Oh, and his wife is also getting a raise. Woman Who Has Never Once Looked Happy to Be Here Melania Trump has renegotiated her prenup once again, protecting herself in case Trump’s legal woes cause him to lose all of his money. In return, Donald gets his wife to come back out in public and help him campaign. Melania last renegotiated her prenup in 2016, presumably as Donald tried to coax her to finally move to the White House months after he took office.
   
• It’s not clear whether all of his legal woes are impeding his ability to be the new House speaker, but he has indicated that the job is not for him. Today, he endorsed his gym buddy Jim Jordan (R-OH). Not a big surprise but it sure helps Jordan’s chances of being voted through, and is a further slap in the face to sexual abuse victims everywhere. 

And what about the current reckoning for his decades of wildly inflating his assets?
 

• In his civil trial in New York on Thursday, Trump’s corporate executives admitted to boosting the estimated worth of his penthouse in Trump Tower by $20 million, in part, because of the “value of his celebrity.” They also added another $100 million to the estimate based on a single email from a real estate broker who had never visited the triplex, and had been told the unit was three times its actual size. The judge in the case, Arthur Engoron, has blocked Trump from secretly moving any of his money to hide his assets.
   
• One Democrat has possibly the single most brilliant response to Trump’s claim that Mar-a-Lago is worth at least 56 times its official valuation. Florida Representative Jared Moskowitz floated the idea that if Trump wants to value his property at a billion dollars, maybe we can just tax Trump at his own valuation. A true mic drop moment from Mr. Moskowitz. 
   

After all these years, Donald Trump is still delivering entertainment at a Tyler Perry pace. He’s gonna be President again, isn’t he? (No.)

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Since 1972, Iowa has been on the front line of the Democratic primaries. In the 2024 Presidential nomination cycle, Iowa will be pushed back to Super Tuesday, greatly reducing its importance. The state was split with 26% each for Pete Buttigieg and Bernie Sanders in 2020, and a meager 16% for future President Biden. Iowa Democrats unveiled their new mail-in caucus rules, which will be implemented next year and will replace the in-person theatrics of the classic caucus rules. 

South Carolina, the fourth primary in the 2020 cycle, was the first to hand Biden a win and will go first next year, possibly as a thank-you for turning the tide last time, and it could set the tone in Biden’s favor in the 2024 cycle if he faces a serious primary challenge. Of course, nobody has yet decided to primary Biden and stick with it. 

Indigenous communities and climate groups feel “stabbed in the back” by Biden’s acceptance of the new Texas border wall. The groups argue that building the wall doesn’t address the real issues that are driving migration (i.e. climate change) and threatens many endangered species of animals and plant in the region. 

The dream of businesses operating without human workers is not looking good these days as major retailers rethink suddenly ubiquitous self-checkout kiosks. Apparently, no matter how many times they try to make employees out of their customers, they still need people to check id’s, assist with self-checkout, check receipts, and thwart theft. Sorry, giant companies, you’re still gonna have to pay people to milk your cash cows. 

The Grace Hopper Celebration, a conference for women and nonbinary tech workers, was overrun by men who made up 40% of this year’s attendance. Speculation had been that males would make up less than 1% of attendees but a cutthroat job market drew men to the event in droves, and organizers apparently just let it happen, since tickets to the event started at $649. 

Music world quakes as Drake takes break due to aches he can’t shake. 

Construction has begun on new Tesla Diner/charging station in Hollywood, CA. The restaurant will be two stories with a dining area on the roof and will feature 30 charging stations and a movie screen so the diner can double as a drive-in movie theater. But it will be stationary and thus unable to crash into anything, so is it really a Tesla?

Scientists confirm that humans arrived in the Americas far earlier than they thought. Happy early Indigenous People’s Day, btw. 

GOP Speaker candidates have pulled out of a Fox News forum after fierce blowback from Republicans trying to salvage a modicum of the party’s dignity in private rather than sacrifice what remains of it on the national stage. 

Three Bears snuck into a Japanese floor mat factory and holed up there for almost a full day before being captured and killed by authorities. Reports indicate that many of the mats the bears found inside were too big, some were too small, but they eventually landed on mats that were just right. 

Employers have been losing the battle to get remote workers back in the office. Even with mandatory in-office requirements, some workers have been finding workarounds. Most workers, it seems. And the culture of these workarounds has inspired new language that we all need to know if we’re gonna be able to resume our Zoom lives. A full 66% of office workers have been ordered back to the office full time, but only 22% say they prefer going to the office over a more flexible work-from-home scenario. Those looking to get credit for showing up but still work from home have a new trend, called “coffee badging.” The term refers to an employee who shows up to the office just to swipe their badge and drink a cup of coffee in full view of their coworkers before quickly returning home to do their work from the comfort of their couch. 

While 58% of workers admit to coffee badging, employers have been looking for different ways to combat the trend. In response, employers have created their own trend called  “office peacocking,” where they try to give their workers extra incentive to show up in person by redesigning offices to make the prospect more attractive. New offices have more of a flashy WeWork feel than the old cubicle farms. 

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Jailed Iranian activist and woman’s rights Narges Mohammadi, who is currently serving a 12-year prison sentence for “spreading propaganda against the state,” among other charges, won this year’s Nobel Peace prize

Last year Kentucky made all childcare employees eligible for free child care, regardless of household income and the move has been paying dividends.