Open Thread

What’s on your mind?

Comments

[Kazinski]

From the annals of the Epstein Hunters:

Rep. Ro Khanna: .@RepThomasMassie and I forced last night the DOJ to disclose the identities of 6 men:

Salvatore Nuara, Zurab Mikeladze, Leonic Leonov, Nicola Caputo, Sultan Ahmed Bin Sulayem, and billionaire businessman Leslie Wexner.

I share details of what more we learned to hold the Epstein class accountable.

He caught the DOJ improperly redacting those 6 names from the Epstein files:
“If we found six men that they were hiding in two hours, imagine how many men they are covering up for in those 3m files,”

https://x.com/i/status/2021266289910563273

Khanna and Massie are heroes?

However maybe there are a few details left out. Wexner's name has already been released over 200 times unredacted, one redaction was probably an error.

Same with Sultan Ahmed Bin Sulayem who sent Epstein a torture video, he was mentioned literally thousands of times, unredacted.

But who were the other 4 men Khanna outed?

Turns out they never met or corresponded with Epstein. But they looked remotely like him so they were used in a photo lineup by the DOJ to see if Epstein witnesses or victims could identify Epstein out of the lineup.

All 4 completely innocent of a any association with Epstein.

And who did Rep Khanna blame for he choosing to out them on a house floor speech to upend there lives?

"I appreciate @JSweetLI’s reporting confirming today that Salvatore Nuara, Zurab Mikeladze, Leonid Leonov, and Nicola Caputo were just part of a photo line up and are not connected to Epstein's crimes.

I wish DOJ had provided that explanation earlier instead of redacting then unredacting their names. They have failed to protect survivors, created confusion for innocent men, and have protected rich and powerful abusers."

Khanna seems like he is auditioning for a crime hunter podcast.

[Mr. Bumble]

Saved by Speech & Debate!

[Dr. Ed 2]

Well, I’d like to see Trump do is invite the four innocent men to the state of the union message, and publicly state that they are innocent man who representative Khanna defamed, and right there and then call for Congress to censure Khanna for doing it.

[Dr. Ed 2]

It’s time for Trump to play hardball and simply say no money for TSA, no TSA, no airplanes — and simply shut down all US air travel as of Noon on Tuesday, Feb 24th, and this explicitly, including all congressional travel.

The DEMONcrats would have a choice, either risk getting stuck in DC or not being in DC. Either will function, stuck in DC dead vote for a budget, stuck out of DC, there’d be no Senate filibuster. We win.

And make it very, very clear that this was the Democrats that did this. Have the FCC play hardball and start yanking broadcast licenses of people who only interview the Democrats.

[Kazinski]

Not a bad idea, but why not refine it a little and just shut down DC's airports?

[Dr. Ed 2]

Some lawyer would inevitably rule it being discriminatory.
DC is mostly black Montana mostly white QED it’s racist to shut down DC.

[Mr. Bumble]

Happy Valentine's Day and government shut down day.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Gillian Oba has no right to call for the execution of the president of the United States. Any president of the United States.

The dumb Charlie should be in jail or deported.

Send her to that El Salvador prison. I’m sure she would enjoy it.

https://nypost.com/2026/02/12/us-news/ilhan-omar-eviscerated-for-suggesting-trump-is-a-pedophile-and-should-be-executed-keep-her-mouth-shut/

[not guilty]

"Gillian Oba has no right to call for the execution of the president of the United States. Any president of the United States."

Who is Gillian Oba?

As for Rep. Ilhan Omar, the subject of the New York Post article that Dr. Ed 2 links, she has not in fact called for the execution of the president of the United States. https://x.com/IlhanMN/status/2021372148896682175

FWIW, though, she does have the right under the First Amendment to do so, Rankin v. McPherson, 483 U.S. 378, 386-387 (1987), unless her speech rises to the level of a "true threat" under Watts v. United States, 394 U.S. 705 (1969) (per curiam), or amounts to "advocacy directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action and is likely to incite or produce such action." Brandenburg v. Ohio, 395 U.S. 444, 447 (1969).

[Brett Bellmore]

Well, our flock is now much smaller. Coon got into the coop, we were woke by the screaming about a half hour ago.

Not a lot of feathers around, and the birds are a bit big for a coon to handle, so hopefully most of them just ran off through the hole the coon made. That chicken wire rusted through at the bottom.

Well, if they don't come back/show up, I might just process the 3 remaining ones, my wife has been complaining about them doing what chickens do, on the back deck.

[John Mosby]

Wow, you managed a racial slur AND 'chicken thief' stereotype in one comment! CC, JSM

[Mr. Bumble]

Virginia's governor and Johnny Winter lookalike grills road kill.
https://x.com/FukUrFeelnz/status/2022146962280305086

[Dr. Ed 2]

WTF?

https://nypost.com/2026/02/13/us-news/swat-team-descends-on-home-near-nancy-guthries-house-report/

[Stephen Lathrop]

This morning's Guardian published this:

There will be Voter I.D. for the Midterm Elections, whether approved by Congress or not!” Trump posted while onboard Air Force One on Friday afternoon after speaking to troops at Fort Bragg.

Also, the People of our Country are insisting on Citizenship, and No Mail-In Ballots, with exceptions for Military, Disability, Illness, or Travel,” the president added, falsely, since there is no popular majority for banning vote by mail

Unless the Supreme Court immediately begins to take election-related cases, to dispose of them on an expedited schedule, Trump will deploy one administrative branch abuse after another to turn the mid-term elections into a fiasco. That could not be more obvious.

Of course, no one yet has any proof that the erstwhile sluggard Roberts Court even has capacity to reach decisions about elections. The Court must in some appropriate case rule soon that the federal administration has zero constitutional role to play in elections. If the Roberts Court fails in that duty, expect a nationally destabilizing crisis to ensue, probably with an onset well before Election Day. To trigger crisis, Trump needs only to order more untoward election interference, to add to the recent Georgia election materials seizure.

Trump is apparently counting on the typical slowness of judicial process—along with a combination of partisan opportunism and cowardice on the Roberts Court—to enable him to get away with criminal interference in the mid-term elections. Will the Court stop Trump, or let it happen?

The nation will probably find out when Trump goes to court with some interrogatory delaying tactic, in support of a case about self-evidently lawless executive branch election interference. In such a situation, a Court which does not reject all delays out of hand will be announcing it intends to dodge every duty it has to defend the election process.

[Brett Bellmore]

I agree that Trump clearly does NOT have the authority to impose this on his own, without Congressional legislation.

However, it's still rather striking just how fanatically opposed Democrats have become to any sort of election security measure, even popular ones.

I swear, if Trump advocated breathing, you'd all hold your breaths until you passed out.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Bellmore — Do you think legislation—either state of federal—could properly authorize a president to imposel controls on elections?

[Kazinski]

Absolutely.

Article I, Section 4, Clause 1:
The Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any time by Law make or alter such Regulations, except as to the Places of chusing Senators.

If Congress passes such a law then the President is charged with faithfully executing it.

[Stephen Lathrop]

So Kazinski, do you concede that in the absence of such Congressional action, there is no room in what you cited for an executive order to regulate elections? You get that a president enforcing rules made by Congress is different than a president making up the rules and enforcing them too, right?

Note that the latter is Trump['s explicitly stated intention, according to the quote from the Guardian.

[Brett Bellmore]

Federal elections? Sure. "Time, place, and manner" are the words, I'm sure you've read them.

State elections? I'd personally say "no", but the Supreme court has a very weak spot for federal claims of authority, and I sure wouldn't bet on the Court not rationalizing it somehow.

[The Margrave of Azilia]

Happy Valentine's Day!

On this date in 1989, Atatollah Khomeni issued his ruling against Salman Rushdie's *Satanic Verses.*

https://thehill.com/homenews/3598309-what-you-need-to-know-about-salman-rushdie-and-the-fatwa-against-him/

And in 1929, there was the St. Valentine's Day Massacre in Chicago.

https://www.history.com/articles/saint-valentines-day-massacre

[not guilty]

The Supreme Court of Virginia has allowed a referendum that could pave the way for a new congressional map that heavily favors Democrats to appear on the ballot on April 21. https://www.democracydocket.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/2026-02-13-Order-.pdf A challenge to the validity of the legislature's calling for the referendum will proceed in the meantime.

That makes sense to me. If the referendum fails, the lawsuit will become moot. If it succeeds, there will still be time to litigate its validity.

That having been said, I dislike redistricting during the middle of the decade. Donald Trump and his Texas cronies, however, have sowed the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind. Hosea 8:7. If. Rep. Hakeem Jeffries is elected Speaker of the House in January, the schadenfreude will be sweet.

[Brett Bellmore]

"Donald Trump and his Texas cronies, however, have sowed the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind."

Pretty much. Trump has done some dumb stuff before, but kicking off this gerrymandering fight will probably go down in history as the dumbest. He may have almost single handedly guaranteed that the GOP loses the House this fall.

[Dr. Ed 2]

If Treasonous Jeffrieries is elected speaker, the third US Civil War will begin.

The schadenfreude will involve watching the legal judicial establishment being ousted from power. It’s quite clear that it took so it took one side in debate and the price of doing that is making it the enemy of the other. I’m not the only one who noticed that judges prevented redistricting in Republican states, but said nothing when the Democrat states wanted to do it, and no one is saying anything about how the 2020 census screwed the red states.

Hopefully, there are enough people starting to realize just how freaking crazy the Democrats have become — how much Obama circa 2012 would sound like a republican today — I will vote against having a Civil War. This could be another 1994 election.

[Aladdin's Carpet]

Start a new job in 2 weeks, was gonna put in my two weeks notice anyway but Amazon laid me off before I did so.

So it works out, I’ll collect severance and new salary, double income for a bit, not *thrilled* about the new jobs salary but I do like the job.

I don’t know what it is though, most things worked out on my end (not all, interviewed at higher salary places but didn’t get those), I was gonna leave anyway, and financially I’m fine but … I’ve been unemployed for a week and it’s depressing.