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Butter your popcorn, fasten your safety belts, and hold onto your butts (while gulping popcorn directly out of the bag like a dog): The insurrection hearings are about to begin.
- Rep. David Cicilline (D-RI), a member of the House January 6 Committee, promised the public "disturbing" new evidence, when its hearings get underway Thursday evening. Cicilline told CNN to expect "substantial evidence that really demonstrates the coordination and the planning and the effort, despite the fact that they understood that Donald Trump lost the election."
- The committee's investigation has been the source of a steady drumbeat of leaks for almost a year already, raising the question of whether the public hearings will be a venue for exposing revelations that haven't already appeared in the news. Cicilline, along with Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY), say yes. Cheney promised to detail a conspiracy to steal the election that was (and is) "extremely broad... extremely well-organized."
- It's unclear whether there will be surprise witnesses over the course of the month, but some good new candidates just emerged. The Justice Department informed the committee last week, providing no specific details, that it would not charge former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows or Trump lackey Dan Scavino with criminal contempt of Congress, despite their flagrant contempt of Congress. The committee could haul Attorney General Merrick Garland or another department leader up to the Hill to explain itself, though so far has only said, "We hope the Justice Department provides greater clarity on this matter."
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Meanwhile, what we already know is bonkers, and the revelations keep getting crazier.
- The committee is reportedly in possession of evidence that Trump's coup supporters contemplating seeking direct authorization from Trump "to enlist armed private contractors to seize and inspect voting machines and election data with the assistance of U.S. marshals," according to the Los Angeles Times. That's yet more evidence that people in Trump's orbit openly contemplated armed insurrection.
- And then there's the ongoing insurrection. Michigan law enforcement officials have opened a criminal investigation of Barry County Sheriff Dar Leaf, who has abused his power to conduct a sham audit of the 2020 election, which seemingly resulted in "unauthorized access" of vote-tabulating machinery.
If the January 6 committee really does have bombshell revelations in store, it might be wise of its to pre-empt the GOP's widely advertised plans to lie about and try to counter program the hearings, and decry them as a form of complicity. As we’ve seen in other contexts (like Ukraine) there’s value in publicly anticipating the maneuvers of bad actors, and denying them the opportunity to dishonestly frame their own misconduct.
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Live from Boston, MA! This week's Lovett or Leave It includes special guest Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-MA) who discusses the impending Supreme Court decision on abortion rights and then takes a turn in the hot seat to answer Lovett's toughest questions in Queen For a Day! Then, Jon is joined by Pat Regan, Eugene Mirman, and Lady Bunny for another spicy round of Hot Takes where they are forced to defend the likes of Times Square and Mel Gibson. Listen to new episodes of Lovett or Leave It every Saturday wherever you get your podcasts.
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President Biden has authorized the Department of Energy to use the Defense Production Act to ramp up domestic manufacturing of clean energy and suspended tariffs on solar panels that had indirectly ground the U.S. solar industry to a halt. The tariffs are at the center of a Commerce Department investigation into whether foreign solar manufacturers in Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, and Malaysia have skirted U.S. sanctions on Chinese-manufactured solar panels and cells, which are heavily subsidized by the Chinese government. The threat that these tariffs would be applied retroactively killed or delayed many large solar utility projects and led to abrupt layoffs in the solar industry in recent months.
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Did you know that the US Postal Service is replacing its mail trucks and instead of opting for clean air and going electric, it’s going with a gas-guzzling mail truck that gets an astounding 8.6 miles per gallon? We may as well deliver the mail with Hummers!
If the Postal Service bought 100% electric mail trucks instead, we could:
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Save 110 million gallons of fuel per year
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Create more clean energy jobs
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Reduce air pollution in every community
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Save money on truck maintenance
The Postal Service has an opportunity to reverse course and upgrade to electric vehicles in order to cut dangerous air pollution across the country and help put us on a path to an all-electric future.
Send a letter to the Postal Service for a change and tell them to buy 100% electric mail trucks.
The legal team at Earthjustice is in court to challenge USPS’ failure to consider the environmental justice impacts of buying combustion mail trucks that will deliver pollution to every neighborhood in the country. Take action at Earthjustice.org/crooked and send the message that mail delivery in this country should be electric for our health and for our future.
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European Council President Charles Michel directly confronted Russia's U.N. Ambassador, Vassily Nebenzia, at a United Nations Security Council meeting Monday, accusing the Kremlin of intentionally harming developing countries by blockading Ukrainian grain exports, and prompting Nebenzia to storm out of the room. Unfortunately for Nebenzia and the world, Michel is correct. Last month, Russian President Vladimir Putin offered to end the blockade—but only if Ukrainian allies were to lift sanctions on Russia. That essentially confirmed suspicions that Russia intended to create food shortages and famine in the world's poorest countries—innocent bystanders to the entire war—and higher food prices in wealthy nations in order to extort the west into withdrawing economic consequences it has imposed on Russia for invading its neighbor. It may not be a coincidence that China wants the world to know it has rebuffed Russia's request for economic assistance over the past several months.
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Cereal was one of the best parts of being a kid, but lots of us had to give it up when we realized it was full of sugar and junk that you really shouldn’t eat. Enter Magic Spoon, healthy cereal that honestly tastes too good to be true. Each serving contains zero grams of sugar, 13-14 grams of protein, and only four net grams of carbs.
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Go to magicspoon.com/CROOKED to grab a custom bundle of cereal! And be sure to use our promo code CROOKED at checkout to save five dollars off your order!
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