Category: Uncategorized

• “I would not run (in 2024) if President Trump ran, and I would talk to him about it.”—Nikki Haley, former U.N. Ambassador and ex-governor of South Carolina.
• Former Vice President Mike Pence has apparently weathered the “Hang Mike Pence!” threats of Jan. 6—and has found a self-serving focus. No, he hasn’t decried the “Stop the Steal” movement. To the contrary, he’s now dismissive in accusing the media of “demeaning” Trump supporters. Including, presumably, those who wanted to throw him an old-fashioned necktie party. “They want to use that one day to try and demean the character and intentions of 74 million Americans who believed we could be strong again and prosperous again and supported our administration in 2016 and 2020,” said Pence, with that implacably straight face, on Fox News. Pence also accuses the media of trying to distract attention from “the Biden administration’s failed agenda by focusing on one day in January.” More to the point, Pence is also trying to salvage some hope for his own political orbit by not unnecessarily disparaging the Trump base. Hang in there, Mike.
• “The whole (GOP) charade involves Republican officials—many of them educated at the nation’s top schools—betting that their constituents are too dumb to know they’re being lied to.”—Eugene Robinson, Washington Post.
• “In attempting to enlist DOJ for personal, political purposes in an effort to maintain his hold on the White House, Trump grossly abused the power of the presidency.”—Outtake from a report by the Senate Judiciary Committee.
• Sen. Lindsey Graham was booed and heckled at a South Carolina country club when he suggested folks “ought to think about getting (the vaccine).” Yes, that basket of self-defining deplorables is still there.

• “For too long, China’s lack of adherence to global trading norms has undercut the prosperity of Americans and others around the world. We continue to have serious concerns with China’s state-centered and nonmarket trade practices.”–U.S. trade representative Katherine Tai.
• “General (Mark) Milley should be praised, not condemned, for seeking to avoid a nuclear holocaust.”—Former Defense Secretary William J. Perry.
• “We have a vaccinated economy, and we have an unvaccinated economy.”—PNC Financial Services Group senior economic adviser Stuart Hoffman.
• “A failure to raise the debt ceiling would probably cause a recession and could even result in a financial crisis.”—Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen.
• “Threats against public servants are not only illegal, they run counter to our nation’s core values.”—Attorney General Merrick Garland, who has ordered the FBI to work with local leaders nationwide to help address what he has called a “disturbing spike in harassment, intimidation and threats of violence” against educators and school board members over politicized issues such as mask mandates and critical race theory.
• “If homeowners can’t afford flood insurance, they won’t buy it. This will leave families unprotected from flood damage and put the federal government—and the taxpayer—on the hook for post-disaster costs.”—U.S. Rep. Charlie Crist, D-St. Petersburg.
• “I’m thrilled that the Rays are committed to Ybor City for this next ballpark. We … are currently evaluating the necessary access and infrastructure needs associated with this location.”—Hillsborough County Commissioner Ken Hagan, on news that the Rays are interested in a former Kforce headquarters site on E. Palm Avenue across from Hillsborough Community College.
• “We’ve had our eyes on the rapidly transforming NoDo (North of Downtown) market and are very excited to acquire one of Tampa’s most storied treasures, the Floridan Palace.”—Alex Galewicz, a principal of South Florida investment firm 1754 Properties, which bought the 212-room hotel with major plans for revitalization.
• “When it comes to where a candidate stands, we care how they vote. … People evolve, and I’m happy when they do.”—Equality Florida Executive Director Nadine Smith. 

We’re all too familiar with the usual rationales of those who forego COVID vaccinations. It’s the God-given right to misappropriate “freedom” and “liberty.” It’s feeling free to choose that which imperils public health. It’s also a wrongful right to keep looking at online quackery and “My Pillowisms” until something validates your position. “American exceptionalism” was never intended to look like this. This is an unheard-of road to herd immunity—with 70 million eligible people in the U.S. who have yet to get a vaccination shot.

Now add scapegoats. According to a recent Kaiser Family Foundation poll, more than a third of Americans believe immigrants and tourists are a major source of the COVID spread in the U.S. Dr. Anthony Fauci, the go-to infectious disease specialist, provides context and common sense. “If you just look at the data and look at the people who have gotten infected, look at the people who are in the hospital, look at the people who died—this is not driven by immigrants,” he stated.   

• A recent Pew Research Center poll found that 86 percent of Democratic voters had received at least one vaccine shot. For Republican voters, it was 60 percent.
• “Okay, (President Biden) wants everything including the kitchen sink. And that’s what the nation needs after four decades of trickle-down economics that created massive inequality and allowed the nation’s physical infrastructure and human infrastructure to fall behind.”—Eugene Robinson, Washington Post.
• “I’ve never been a liberal in any way, shape or form.”—West Virginia Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin, in a blunt message aimed at House progressives.
• “The absence of pragmatism among Democrats is as troubling as the absence of principle among Republicans.”—Congressman Dean Phillips, D-Minn.
• “The era of big government is over.”—What President Bill Clinton declared in 1996. Ironic.
• In November, the Biden Administration will lift travel restrictions for foreigners who are fully vaccinated. That means a halt to the 18-month ban on travel from 33 countries, including members of the European Union, China, Iran, South Africa, Brazil and India. A bottom-line upshot: a rejuvenating boost to the U.S. tourism industry.
• Fox Business host—and former director of the National Economic Council under Trump—Larry Kudlow has praised Democratic Sens. Joe Manchin, W.V., and Krysten Sinema, Ariz., for “fighting back” on the budget deal. Even for “centrists,” shout-outs from a Fox/Trump toadie can’t be helpful.
• A new poll by the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research shows a 50 percent approval rate for President Joe Biden. In August, it was 54 percent approval.

• Russia has Europe’s highest death toll from the pandemic—approximately 210,000. Only 28 percent of the people are fully vaccinated.
• A British clinical trial found no sign of danger in getting a flu shot and a second dose of a COVID vaccine at the same time. The study supports the advice of U.S. health authorities.
• COVID cases are dropping in the vast majority of states—even as the U.S. passed the milestone of 700,000 COVID deaths.
• For Pfizer and Moderna, the booster shots could be more profitable than the original doses because they won’t come with the research and development costs the companies incurred to get the vaccines on the market in the first place.
• Drugmaker Merck says that its experimental pill for those sick with COVID reduces hospitalizations and deaths by half. If cleared by regulators, it would be the first pill shown to treat COVID.
• The United States’ full-vaccination rate: 55 percent.
• Less than one third of expectant mothers are vaccinated against COVID. But pregnant women are 70 percent more likely to die from COVID—compared to those who are not pregnant.
• Twenty-two pregnant patients in the U.S. died of COVID in August, the highest number in a single month since the pandemic started.
• California is the first state to require COVID vaccinations for children to attend public and private schools in person.
• More than a third of Florida’s COVID-19 deaths overall have been among long-term care residents.
• It speaks gubernatorial volumes that Florida—with half the population of California—has three times as many COVID deaths.
• Hillsborough public schools recorded 327 COVID cases the past week; that’s a fraction of the number recorded in late August. It’s hardly happenstance that Hillsborough maintains the area’s strictest masking order.
• According to a report by the Florida Hospital Association and the Safety Net Hospital Alliance of Florida, the state is projected to be short nearly 60,000 nurses by 2035.
• Among those impacted by COVID side effects: oenologists. That’s because of anosmia—the loss of the sense of smell.
• George Washington ordered the inoculation of his troops in 1777 against smallpox.

• “With vaccinations and quarantining and masking, students are able to have uninterrupted learning. So now you throw politics into the mix and you see sadly that in Florida there are more children in hospitals, the spread is greater, in many areas it doesn’t seem contained.”—Education Secretary Miguel Cardona.
• The Chicago-based John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation recently announced the 25 recipients for its “genius grants.” Among them: Desmond Meade, one of the primary architects of Amendment 4, which granted voting rights to former felons. Each grant is worth $625,000.

• Gov. Ron DeSantis has made it officially official. He will be—as he has been for the last two years–running for re-election. He obviously can’t envision a 2024 presidential run unless he’s a re-elected incumbent. He made the formal announcement, of course, at his favorite formal-announcement forum: Fox News.
• TikTok, according to the research firm Kantar, is the least trusted major social media platform—behind Instagram, YouTube, Google and Facebook.
• According to Yahoo Finance, fugitive-leaker Edward Snowden was paid $35,000 by Iowa State University to make a digital appearance earlier this year.
• “Facebook knows the destructive consequences that Instagram’s design and algorithms are having on our young people and our society, but it has routinely prioritized its own rapid growth over basic safety for our children.”—Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn. His consumer protection subcommittee is looking into Wall Street Journal reports that Facebook’s own internal research found that teen girls reported that Instagram made their body image issues worse.

• “What good shall I do this day?” No, that wasn’t a rhetorical question posed by Benjamin Franklin.
• A tattoo-removal service in Denver: “What Were You Inking?” A therapeutic massage business in Aiken, South Carolina: “My Aiken Body.” A plumbing company in Ithaca, N.Y.: “The Drain Brain.”
• Sign on a dog at the St. Petersburg women’s rights march: “Pro-nap, pro-treat, pro-choice.”

• National Labor Relations Board: College athletes who earn millions for their schools are “employees” not “student-athletes.” NCAA: “College athletes are students who compete against other students. Not employees who compete against other employees.” Reality: There are “student-athletes” and there are athletic mercenaries.
• Rays and their fans: Ready for TROPtober.
• Rays hitting coach Chad Mottola was the fifth overall draft pick in 1992—by Cincinnati. That was one spot ahead of Derek Jeter.
• “You know, nothing gets you going like some ‘F you, Fleming’ chants when you’re in the bullpen.”—Rays pitcher Josh Fleming’s reaction to home-team chants aimed at the opposition at Yankee Stadium.

• She’s still there. Yes, Pam Bondi is still doubling down in her odious fealty to Trump. She will now be running his super PAC, Make America Great Again Action Inc. She takes over for the fired Corey Lewandowski.
• At the GOPsters-only Capitol Hill Club, former Trump adviser Steve Bannon advocated for pre-trained teams ready to jump into federal agencies when the next Republican president takes office. “If you’re going to take over the administrative state and deconstruct it, then you have to have shock troops prepared to take over immediately.”
• Trump’s third enabling press secretary, Stephanie Grisham, has–no surprise–a book out: “I’ll Take Your Questions Now.” Among her revelations: the reason why she never held a press conference to take said questions. “(I) knew that sooner or later the president would want me to tell the public something that was not true or that would make me sound like a lunatic.” Her descriptive take on Melania Trump was a riff on Marie Antoinette. She was like “The doomed French Queen. Dismissive. Defeated. Detached.” As for Jared Kushner: “Rasputin in a slim-fitting suit.”
• “The motto of these last years might as well have been “Make Bigotry Great Again,” because that’s what the GOP did.”—Leonard Pitts Jr., Miami Herald.
• “Should I resign?” That was Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, in asking advice after his embarrassing accompaniment of Trump through Lafayette Square that blatantly politicized the military. His question was directed at former Secretary of State Colin Powell, who had chaired the Joint Chiefs under President George H.W. Bush. Powell’s response, according to the account in “Peril,”: “I told you never to take the job. Trump’s a f****ing maniac.”
• One more locker room quote from “Peril.” This was Sen. Mitch McConnell, after the State Department strongly denied that Secretary of State Rex Tillerson had called Trump a “moron.” “Do you know why Tillerson was able to say he didn’t call the president a ‘moron’? Because he called him a ‘f***ing moron.’”