The debt ceiling

The US is once again going through debt ceiling brinkmanship. The first thing to note is that raising the debt ceiling is entirely the responsibility of the Congress, and has to start with the House of Representatives, The Republican speaker of the House of Representatives Kevin McCarthy, himself a hostage of the extremists in his party, has decided to do some hostage taking on his own, vowing to not raise the ceiling and throw the system into chaos unless President Biden agrees to the Republican budget proposals that would roll back some of Biden’s signature achievements as well harm the less well-to do.

Biden and the Democrats have pointed out, correctly, the raising the debt ceiling does not lead to more spending by itself but is needed to pay for spending that Congress has already authorized. They have also pointed out that Republicans were willing to raise the debt ceiling three times while Trump was president without any conditions but suddenly become budget conscious only when a Democrat is in the White House. They say that raising the debt ceiling is entirely under the control of the Republicans, no one else, and that they therefore must bear sole responsibility for any catastrophe that might ensue if the government should go into default if it is not raised.
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Floating solar panels

I posted recently about the idea of covering large parking lots of stores like Walmart with solar panels. This would provide two benefits. One is that it would provide shade for their customers’ cars, no small benefit in hot areas when going to a car that has been baking in the sun can result in the door handles being too hot to touch and the inside stiflingly hot. The second is that it provides quite a lot of energy that could be used to service their buildings, provide charging stations for electric vehicles, and even sell surplus energy to the grid. I noticed that the parking lot nearby that services the city hall and public library has installed solar panel coverings and has a charging station. It is small in size but the idea seems to be catching on.

Now comes along another idea that also seeks to cover large expanses with solar panels, and this is to put them on floating rafts over large bodies of calm water, like lakes.
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Laughter is the best medicine

That saying has been around for a long time, usually invoked to recommend to people that they laugh off some problem or misfortune rather than letting it get them down. But recent research by a former colleague of mine suggests that there may be actual therapeutical benefits to laughter.

  1. Laughing benefits you neurologically.
  2. Laughing improves your physical health.
  3. Laughing increases your emotional well-being.
  4. Laughing benefits your cognitive function.
  5. Laughing impacts your social health.

This article brought to mind a 1968 hit song We Have Ways of Making You Laugh by Don Partridge that was about the benefits of laughter.

Partridge started out in life as a street performer (known as ‘buskers’ in the UK), a one-man band who played all the instruments with cymbals and tambourine using his elbow, bass drum on his back, guitar, and harmonica and kazoo with his mouth. It gave his music a very distinctive and raw quality. He was ‘discovered’ and then had a series of hit songs. He was well known in the UK and in Sri Lanka where I grew up. I do not know if his reach extended to other countries.

If you want to see how he did all these things by himself, here is a live performance of another of his hits Blue Eyes.

Let’s not forget that other serial liar …

While much media coverage has naturally focused on convicted sex offender Donald Trump, yesterday federal prosecutors criminally charged congressman George Santos. He turned himself in at a federal courthouse in Manhattan this morning and was arrested.

The congressman was probably treated the same as any other criminal defendant, a person familiar with the matter said. That would involve the congressman being fingerprinted and getting his mugshot taken, and sitting for a preliminary interview before being arraigned.
…

The US justice department unsealed a 13-count indictment: seven counts of wire fraud, three counts of money laundering, one count of theft of public money and two counts of making false statements in reports to the House of Representatives.

Santos faces a maximum sentence of 20 years on the top count, the US attorney’s office for the eastern district of New York said. He will not have to relinquish his congressional seat, though members sentenced to at least two years cannot vote or be on committees.

“The allegations in the indictment charge Santos with relying on repeated dishonesty and deception to ascend to the halls of Congress and enrich himself,” the US attorney Breon Peace said in a statement.

The indictment outlined three alleged fraudulent schemes, starting with a political contributions scheme in which Santos and an unnamed Queens-based consultant are alleged to have induced donors to give money to Santos’s company, which he is alleged to have spent on luxury designer goods and to pay debts.

The second alleged scheme involved unemployment benefits fraud during the Covid pandemic, when Santos applied for government assistance though he was employed and receiving a $120,000 salary from an investment firm in Florida.

The third alleged scheme involved Santos misleading the House about his financial situation, overstating a source of income without disclosing his salary in May 2020, during his first, unsuccessful run for Congress, then making false statements in September 2022 during his victorious run.

The false information prosecutors say Santos included in his second financial disclosure appears particularly notable because of the significant amounts of money at stake and the bizarre circumstances in which they were recorded.

Prosecutors alleged that Santos certified that he earned a $750,000 salary and between $1m and $5m in dividends from his company, the Devolder Organization, and claimed to have $100,000 to $250,000 in a checking account and between $1m and $5m in a savings account – none of which was true.

All in all, this has been a bad week for liars and sex abusers. And it’s only Wednesday.

What next for convicted sex offender Donald Trump?

I must admit I was surprised at how quickly the jury came to its verdict that Donald Trump had sexually assaulted E. Jean Carroll and defamed her by accusing her of perpetrating a hoax. I had predicted that he might get off simply because he was an ex-president and am glad to have been proven wrong. The fact that they took less than three hours to bring in their verdict means that they had no doubts or major disagreements about their decision on the actual charges. Most of their time was likely spent on deciding what the size of the financial penalties should be.

This case shows that convicted sex offender Trump’s constant lying has finally caught up with him. In cases like this where there is no physical evidence and adjudication depends on which side the jury finds more credible, the indisputable fact that convicted sex offender Trump has not only boasted of sexually assaulting women but also lies shamelessly had to have swung the jury in Carroll’s favor.

Convicted sex offender Trump will of course appeal, if only because he has to, to try and save face. It will be interesting to see on what grounds he will appeal. The strategy to do so on the basis that he was denied the chance to testify got torpedoed when the judge allowed him to apply at the last minute to testify but he failed to do so. His lawyers may try to argue that the judge made biased decisions against them. They may also try to argue that some kinds of evidence (such as the infamous Access Hollywood tape) should not have been allowed. They may also object to the fact that women who were not part of the case were allowed to testify about convicted sex offender Trump assaulting them in order to show a pattern of behavior by him.
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Trump found guilty of sexual assault and defamation

After a very short deliberation of less than three hours, the jury found Donald Trump guilty of sexual assault and defamation but not guilty of rape of E. Jean Carroll.

A New York jury has found that Donald Trump sexually abused the advice columnist E Jean Carroll in a New York department store 27 years ago.

The verdict for the first time legally brands a former US president as a sexual predator. But as it is the result of a civil and not criminal case, the only legal sanction Trump will face is financial.

The jury awarded Carroll more than $2 million on the charge of assault and about $3 million on the defamation charge.

Trump issues yet another lie

After jury deliberations began in the battery and defamation charges brought against him by E. Jean Carroll, Trump brazenly lied yet again, saying via his social media:

Waiting for a jury decision on a False Accusation where I, despite being a current political candidate and leading all others in both parties, am not allowed to speak or defend myself, even as hard nosed reporters scream questions about this case at me. In the meantime, the other side has a book falsely accusing me of Rape, & is working with the press. I will therefore not speak until after the trial, but will appeal the Unconstitutional silencing of me, as a candidate, no matter the outcome! (My bolding-MS]

This is a flat-out lie. No one was stopping him from testifying. As I posted earlier today, Trump’s strategy all along was to avoid testifying to avoid being cross-examined, wait until it was too late to testify in person by getting on the witness list, say at the last minute that he wanted to testify while expecting to be denied, and then claim that he was not allowed because the judge was biased against him and use that as a basis for appeal.

The judge checkmated him by giving him a window of time to apply to testify, which he did not use. But he now goes ahead anyway and says that he was denied the chance to speak.

This ploy might work with his devoted supporters but an appeals court will summarily reject that argument should he be found guilty.

The possible verdicts that the jury can return, as told to them by the judge:

The jury can return one of several verdicts.

It can find that Trump raped Carroll, who was in the front row of the court on Tuesday. Alternatively, if it does not believe the evidence proves rape, it can find he is responsible for sexual abuse, meaning forcible sexual contact without consent.

If the jurors do not believe either of those findings are applicable, then they can return a verdict of forcible touching, or they can clear Trump. If they find Trump is responsible for sexual abuse in any form, the jurors will also have to assess damages.

It appears that I was mistaken when I said earlier that a civil case requires just a 5/6th majority which in a jury of nine people would require eight to bring in a verdict of guilty. That seems to apply only in New York state courts. It seems that because this is in a federal court, the verdict must be unanimous, which improves Trump’s chances.

Trump lies to the bitter end

The jury in the civil battery and defamation case brought by E. Jean Carroll against Donald Trump is scheduled to retire to consider the verdict today.

Last Thursday, while on a golf trip to Ireland, Trump said that he would be cutting short his trip and returning to the US so as to ‘confront’ his rape accuser at his trial, even though he had not been on the original witness list.

Trump told reporters last week he would “probably attend” the trial.

“I’m going back to New York. I was falsely accused by this woman, I have no idea who she is – it’s ridiculous,” he claimed. “I’ll be going back early because a woman made a claim that is totally false, it’s fake,” he added.

Trump also called the case a “political attack” and claimed the judge was “extremely hostile” and “doesn’t like me very much.”

But shortly after that, his lawyer Joe Tacopina said in court that they were resting their case and usually that closes the door to any more witnesses. I think Trump made his statement as an act of bravado, never intending to carry it out, but designed to show his confidence and also so that when the judge refused to allow him to testify, he could once again claim that the judge was biased against him.

But US district judge Lewis Kaplan judge called his bluff and said that he would leave the window open until Sunday evening for Tacopina to file a request for Trump to appear. But of course Trump chickened out, no such request was made, and he did not testify.
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Backlash to ‘thoughts and prayers’

Politicians who have opposed any gun control measures whatsoever are the ones who are quickest to send out ‘thoughts and prayers’ messages after yet another mass shooting and people are increasingly fed up with that meaningless piety that is never backed up by any concrete action.

Texas US senator Ted Cruz’s comment that he was “praying” for families of the eight victims killed in a shooting at a shopping mall in his state has sparked outrage as many critics say the Republican should advocate for meaningful gun control rather than repeatedly invoke prayer after mass, deadly violence.

The backlash came as President Joe Biden called on Congress to pass gun control bills in the wake of Saturday’s attack, in which the gunman was also killed, in Allen, Texas.

Cruz and other fellow Texas Republicans have faced similar backlash for citing general emotional support, thoughts, prayers or a combination thereof after the Texas slayings.
…

Shannon Watts, founder of gun safety group Moms Demand Action, said on Twitter: “YOU helped arm him with guns, ammo and tactical gear. He did exactly what you knew he’d do. Spare us your prayers and talk of justice for a gunman who is … dead.

“The only accountability we can hope for is that gun extremists like you are thrown into the ash heap of history.”

Star Trek actor George Takei added: “You’re worse than useless.”

Another Twitter user said thoughts and prayers “are nothing but blasphemy and evil”. Yet another quipped: “Have you tried turning the prayer machine off and back on again.”
…

Cruz has received more than $442,000 from organization which support keeping guns as accessible as possible, according to Axios and Open Secrets. He has used language referring to thought and prayers rather than restrictions on guns in reaction to other previous mass shootings in his state.

(Curtis)

The problem with horse racing

As a spectator sport, the appeal of horse racing mystifies me. A race lasts just a few minutes and unless one is gambling on the outcome, it is not clear why one should care about which horse wins. There does not seem to be that much skill involved as far as I can tell, apart from the way that jockeys position and pace their horses during the race. It is the horses that do most of the work. The fact that jockeys beat the horses with a crop to make them go faster bothers me since it seems so cruel. But it is clear that horse racing has great appeal for many people who will go to considerable trouble and expense to attend events in person.

My ignorance of the appeal of horse racing is irrelevant since people find engaging all manner of activities that others find mystifying. What really bothers me are the deaths of horses at these events. I knew that horses sometimes fall during a race or during practice and injure their legs and then are euthanized. But I had not known how common that was until I saw this news item that said that seven horses had to be euthanized in the last few days during the lead up to the Kentucky Derby yesterday.
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