Thu: Cruella DeSantis? MaefiSantis? The Big Bad Govenor?

You're Making Things Up Again, Donald (and Co.)

In response to President Joe Biden’s reelection announcement, the Republican Party provided an official response that was created entirely with artificial intelligence-generated scenes of destruction and fear. As Walter Einenkel reported, everything shown in the GOP ad was a fake.

Which also makes it perfect. Perfect for the current Republican Party, because party leaders have made it clear they have no interest in reality.

This is, after all, the party that has for years insisted that American cities were burning, that blue states had become unlivable, and that antifa buses were prowling the backroads, looking to export some of the violence and chaos to a town near you. The leading Republican presidential candidate is basing his entire campaign around a lie that led to an insurrection in 2021, while warning that without him we’ll have World War III. Fake ads are just right for a fake party.

The AI-generated attack ad was only the latest in a years-long campaign to generate the bad news Republicans want their voters to believe exists.

In 2020, Republicans in small towns across the nation took to the streets with guns because of a hoax spread through social media claiming that “hordes of ravening ‘antifa’ activists, loaded en masse onto buses and intent on wreaking havoc” were headed to rural communities. The entire thing was swallowed so completely that in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, the local chamber of commerce sent out warnings of “buses en route from Fargo for today's march downtown,” and warned businesses to “bring in any furniture, signs, etc. that could possibly be thrown through windows.”

Rumors of “two buses heading this way from Portland, full of ANTIFA members and loaded with bricks” garnered support from the commander of the Oregon Air National Guard’s 173rd Fighter Wing. In Humboldt County, California, it was the sheriff who not only issued warnings and called for backup, but insisted that there were “substantiated, law enforcement reports” of these buses. “These aren’t unsubstantiated stories,” said William Honsel. “This is the reality, and we have to deal with that.” The California Highway Patrol even sent out aircraft to search for one of the reported antifa buses.

There were no buses. There were no law enforcement reports. There’s not even any antifa, at least not in the way the right-wing media machine wants folks to believe. Antifa is anyone who resists right-wing authoritarianism, not some organized group capable of funding and filling a single bus.

Texas Continues to Search for the Bottom

The Texas Legislature is considering House Bill 3614 and Senate Bill 763, which would allow Texas schools to hire chaplains to perform the work of school counselors but without any required certification, training or experience.

The House bill’s sponsor is Rep. Cole Hefner of Mount Pleasant, Texas. Hefner, the father of seven children, is a member of South Jefferson Baptist Church in Lindale. The Senate bill’s sponsor is Sen. Mayes Middleton of Galveston, a proponent of taxpayer-funded vouchers for private Christian schools. Both legislators are conservative Republicans.

The exact language of the bill states: “A school district may employ a chaplain instead of a school counselor to perform the duties required of a school counselor under this title. A chaplain employed under this subsection is not required to be certified by the State Board for Educator Certification.”

Currently, Texas law requires school counselors to pass a school counselor certification exam, to hold at least a 48-hour master’s degree in counseling from an accredited institution of higher education, and to have two creditable years of teaching experience as a classroom teacher.

The People Who Did This Deserve Something Far Worse Than Paying Money

The family of 47-year-old Holly Barlow-Austin, who died after being denied medical care in a for-profit Texas jail, received $7 million to settle a federal civil rights lawsuit.

It is the largest known jail death settlement in Texas history and among the largest nationwide, Erik Heipt, the lead attorney who represented Barlow-Austin’s family, said on Thursday in a statement announcing the settlement.

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Barlow-Austin was arrested for a misdemeanor probation violation and taken to the Bi-State jail in April 2019. At the time, she was on medication to manage her HIV and mental health. Once she was in jail, staff denied her access to her medications, the lawsuit alleged, and she developed an infection that left her blind and unable to walk. Barlow-Austin went long periods of time without eating or drinking because she was unable to see the food and water in her cell, according to the lawsuit.

“She spent the last week of her confinement in a so-called ‘medical observation’ cell—isolated and alone, in constant pain, blindly crawling around her cell, dehydrated and malnourished, living in filthy and inhumane conditions, decompensating—with no medical help,” Heipt wrote in the Thursday statement.

Video footage of Barlow-Austin’s last 48 hours in the jail shows her struggling to move, using her hands to feel her way around the cell. By the time she was taken to a hospital on June 11, it was too late to save her life, according to the lawsuit.

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“If the assumption is that everyone’s faking it, then less people get medical treatment and care … less people getting medical treatment and care means fewer costs and higher corporate profits.”

Largest Known Jail Death Settlement In Texas History Awarded To Family Of Woman Who Died In ‘Constant Pain’

Cruella DeSantis?  MaefiSantis?  The Big Bad Governor?  DeSantis Vader?

Disney just cast Ron DeSantis as the villain in a story of good versus evil.

After more than a year-long battle with the bombastic Florida governor, the entertainment behemoth filed a blistering lawsuit in federal court, not mincing words as it alleged that it had been the victim of a “targeted campaign of government retaliation” for having the gall to speak out against the so-called “Don’t Say Gay” bill.

“Disney regrets that it has come to this,” the company said in its lawsuit, arguing that it found itself in the “regrettable position” because it “expressed a viewpoint the governor and his allies did not like.” Disney added, “In America, the government cannot punish you for speaking your mind.”

The lawsuit, the culmination of ever-growing hostilities between the Magic Kingdom and Sunshine State, was filed moments after a DeSantis-appointed board moved to recover power it had lost over Disney’s special taxing district. Earlier this year, Disney quietly outmaneuvered the board and struck a decades-long deal to ensure it retained authority over the land around its sprawling Orlando-area theme parks.

DeathSentence is Currently Touring Europe to Promote How Buiness Friendly Florida Is?

The Florida governor’s battle with Disney has become a flashpoint in the early stages of the 2024 Republican presidential primary. Former President Donald Trump and a slew of other candidates and potential rivals, including former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, have lambasted DeSantis for his actions, characterizing them as anti-business.

After a hearing in which several business owners, including those who run restaurants and bars at Disney World locations, urged the board to work with Disney, Garcia said the board would seek to raise taxes to pay for its legal fees in evaluating and combatting what he called “eleventh hour agreements.”

“Because that’s going to cost us money, we’re going to have to raise taxes to pay for that,” Garcia said.

And THey Are Going to Raise Taxes

Ther's Nothing Like Open and Free Debate. --- Montana Has Nothing Like Open and Free Debate.

Rep. Zooey Zephyr began her first day in legislative exile Thursday with renewed confidence that Republican lawmakers’ unprecedented vote to silence her has only amplified her message to constituents at home and others watching across the nation.

“There are many more eyes on Montana now,” Zephyr said in an interview with The Associated Press. "But you do the same thing you’ve always done. You stand up in defense of your community and you ... stand for the principles that they elected you to stand for.”

But lawmakers were not making it easy for her. Shortly after she set up her computer, on a couch across from a public snack bar just outside the main chamber of the House, House Speaker Mark Regier approached her and told her that she wasn’t permitted to work there. Zephyr did not move, however, and others who wandered by to get a cup of coffee or enter the chamber greeted her cordially. At one point, the sergeant-at-arms threatened to move the couch.

Zephyr was thrust into the national spotlight last week when she was prevented from speaking in the House after telling lawmakers backing a bill to ban gender-affirming medical care for minors that they would have blood on their hands.

The Republican response to her comments, and her refusal to apologize for them as demanded, have transformed the lawmaker into a prominent figure in the nationwide battle for transgender rights and placed her at the center of the ongoing debate over the muffling of dissent in statehouses.

The attention is a new phenomenon for Zephyr, a 34-year-old serving her first term representing a western Montana college town after being elected in November. The Republican majority on Wednesday voted to bar her from the House floor for the rest of the session.