That Database Failure Is A Texas-Sized Red Herring

-by Michael Wolkowitz

Michael is an old friend and Chairman Emeritus of The Brady Campaign/Center to Prevent Gun Violence.

Sure, the Air Force should have entered Devin Kelley’s name into the National Background Check System. That might well have stopped him from buying traceable guns from registered gun dealers. And after the system stopped him, he could have gone to one or more of the many gun shows in the great State of Texas and bought the very same guns and just as much ammunition without any background checks. The only difference in that case is that it would have been harder or impossible to trace the weapons back to their source. Notice I don’t mention tracing ammunition: you cannot do it.

Tracing those weapons back to their source will have absolutely no effect on the registered gun dealers who sold him the stuff: they behaved perfectly legally. While it would be interesting to trace the stuff back to people who sell without background checks at gun shows in Texas, they are not breaking the law either: private sellers, and the definition is broader than all the barn doors in Texas, are not required to perform background checks, so they would have been law abiding too.

We are so far away from doing anything about gun deaths in this country that is useless to talk about what specific aspects of the latest event might or might not have made a difference. The five worst gun massacres in the U.S. have occurred over the last ten years, four of them over the last 18 months. In descending order (of number killed): Las Vegas NV, 2017, Orlando FL 2016, Virginia Tech VA 2007, Sandy Hook CT, 2012, Sutherland Springs TX, 2017. Four of these mass murders were perpetrated by white males. One (Pulse in Orlando) was perpetrated by an American-born Muslim with Pashtun roots, but remember, his Muslim faith drove him to kill gay people – so it was not really as bad as the other four that killed regular people.

All those white males, including one smart Christian Asian male who might as well have been white VA Tech), have been deemed mentally disturbed by our elected officials and their acts are called “shootings.” Comparable acts (post 9/11/2001) by brown men who are Muslims, deemed sane by our elected officials, like the ones in Boston at The Marathon, the club in Orlando, and that truck the other day in Manhattan, are called “terrorist events” or “Islamic terrorist events.” Oddly enough the mentally sound terrorists have not been nearly as effective in their killing as the mentally deficient guys.

If mentally disturbed white guys are who we need to focus on-- good luck. Going after that population is as politically likely as closing all the barn doors in Texas.

--------------

Derrick Crowe is another old friend. He's running for the Texas congressional seat being abandoned by Science-denier and gun nut Lamar Smith. This week he shared his thoughts about the the horrific shooting in Sutherland Springs with TX-21 voters with the video below below and this letter:

We know we have a problem with senseless gun violence in this country, and Congress is too busy taking NRA money to do anything to save the lives of constituents.

Here's the full chart with the country names added back in, courtesy of Everytown for Gun Safety.

The Sutherland Springs shooter, like most mass shooters, had a history of domestic violence, and under the law, should not have been able to own a firearm. Yet, somehow, he was able to purchase a rifle from a sporting goods store in April 2016.

President Trump has tried to make this tragedy about mental health and not about how easy it is for people who should not have guns to obtain them. Yet, one assumes the countries on the charts above also have citizens who struggle with mental health, and they don't face anywhere near the number of gun murders that we do in the United States.

(And by the way, Trump proposed a budget this year that would gut mental health programs, which makes his feigned concern for mental health something of an unfunny joke.)

The real problem is that in this country, it is far, far too easy for people who shouldn't be able to get a gun to own one. Until we face that fact, and until we confront the NRA's hold on our Congress, we will always be waiting for the next Sutherland Springs.

In solidarity,
Derrick Crowe

Is Señor Trumpanzee As Much The Anti-Semite As He Appears?

This morning we referred and linked to an interview Ryan Lizza did with Alt-Right poster boy Milo Yiannopoulos in the New Yorker. What we didn't get into was Milo's excuse for his anti-Semitism, the old trope that he can't be an anti-Semite because he's partly Jewish.

In one clip, he cavalierly approves of sex with thirteen-year-olds and suggests that he once attended a party at which minors were sexually assaulted. In another, he talks about the “statistical fact” that “Jews own most of the banks” and “completely dominate the media.”

...He also addressed his claim about Jewish control of the media. “My mother is Jewish. I was raised Jewish,” he said. “I said we are proportionally overrepresented in some industries, and I don’t think pointing out that fact is anti-Semitic.”

Trump and Those Darn Jews
-by Michael Wolkowitz

I have heard a fraction of the speculation and detailed analyses of the basis for and confusion about President T’s purported Anti-Semitism. The manipulative use of his Jewish daughter, the ever-sinister Bannon and Breitbart, his relationships with Israel, the alt-right and white nationalist supporters, and a gazillion other things. While those other topics are interesting and may be relevant in ways, this is mostly just like the rest of his many problems: personal insecurity, jealousy, and resentment. Donald grew up in a Major New York Real Estate Family (note initial caps). Based (now-famously) originally in Queens, founded by his father, and well, not the top of the list, and not just when it came to the family fortune part. Check out what follows and then ask yourself if you are still in any way surprised or confused about that strain of Anti-Semitism running through those purported veins of his. The first on the list is just a reminder that Jews are not the only people he feels inferior to.

A Sampler* of Notable New York’s Real Estate Dynasties ranked in order of wealth. These are all privately held fortunes so the numbers are somewhat speculative but well-substantiated.]**
Except the last one.

Overall notes:

1. Each of these families has buildings, wings, and or entire institutions in the areas of Health and Education named after them.
Except for the last one.

2. Each of these families has members who are current Chairs and Members of Boards of organizations including (but not limited to):

American Museum of Natural History, Columbia University, Cornell-Weill Medical Center, Memorial-Sloan Kettering, The New School for Social Research, The New Victory Theater, Rockefeller University, Smithsonian Institution, The Trust for Public Land. I could make the list double with no trouble at all.
Except for the last one.

3. Each of these families gives at least $5 million a year in miscellaneous philanthropic grants annually and far more (10x annual or more) for capital projects year after year, decade after decade.
Except for the last one.

Name/History-Ethnicity-Religion/Fortune//Samples of Civic Engagement

ROCKEFELLER

Old-ish Money WASP 
Family private fortune: $10 Billion
Foundation value: $3.5 Billion
Civic Leadership: just walk around NYC for a few hours and read the names on the buildings.

RUDIN

JEWISH Immigrants/Turn of the 19th/20th Century
Private Family Fortune: $5.5 Billion
Civic Leadership: Founded Association for Better NY; sponsored NY Marathon, support for NYPD; developments have focused on accessibility etc.
They have streets named for them in Manhattan-- for good reason.

DURST

JEWISH  Immigrants/Turn of the 19th/20th Century
Private Family Fortune: $5 Billion
Civic Leadership: Several enormous buildings that are the most environmentally-green globally; NYC Job and Work  Center; NY Water Taxi.
Leading environmentalism includes largest organic farm in NY State.

MILLSTEIN

JEWISH Immigrants/Turn of the 19th/20th Century
Private Family Fortune: $4.5 Billion
Civic Leaders: NY Blood Center, NYC Commission on the Homeless, Central Park Conservancy, National September 11th Memorial & Museum.

TRUMP

GERMAN Immigrants/Turn of the 19th/20th Century
Private Family Fortune: Good question. $3 Billion? $4 Billion? Half a $Billion?
Family Foundation: out-of-business, never gave much, used other people’s money for the wrong things
Civic Leadership: Fixed a Skating Rink in Central Park once (sort of).
Substantial Giving: Nope.

* There are a several more, all with with similar profiles with greater net worth, civic participation, and philanthropy when compared with the bottom-most on the list, but this should give you the idea.
** Multiple sources including: The Foundation Center, Guidestar, Federal 990s, Forbes Magazine, etc.

Transcripts-- Are They Academic?

-by Michael Wolkowitz



No not Flynn’s conversations with the Russians. Not Manafort’s with the Russian clients in Ukraine. Or anything else from this century.

Remember, earlier this century, when the current President (hereinafter referred to as “T”) took a side-trip from his crusade to prove that the prior President (hereinafter referred to as “0”) was not an American citizen? The one where T pointed out that O first went to Occidental before going to Columbia, and then on to Harvard Law? The trip that implied, in case after case after case, it proved the perverse privilege that is known as affirmative action? You know, the kind black people get?  If T had been able to learn and pronounce Punahou he would have added High School in Hawaii. Remember how T dared O to release his transcripts from Columbia because they would be a bombshell? OK, maybe you did, certainly you do now.

Let’s flash back to those days in the ‘60s when our T was going to college. He was a mere handful of years ahead of me and I remember. We can skip the part when some would ask: if he went to New York Military Academy and graduated, bone spurs and all, why wasn’t he a ROTC guy in college? Let’s go straight to Freshman and Sophomore Years. At Fordham. Yep, just like O, the current President did not start at an Ivy League school. While a fine university, Fordham was no Occidental. T did not start at the undergraduate program of the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School until he was a junior. That Ivy League education of his was only two years long. By the way, the Fordham University of today, unlike Occidental, does not like to be known as a school that was attended by a President of the United States; darn Jesuits!

Back then, the undergraduate school at Wharton was no Columbia. No Columbia? I distinctly remember kids in those days needing more than anything to go to an Ivy, any Ivy. When 100% of the envelopes were rejections, they raced to the guidance counselor’s office (at my privileged public school in a privileged NY suburb). Here was the advice they got and mostly it worked:  there are two other places we can still try to get you into (yes it was April but I told you we were privileged). The School of Industrial and Labor Relations at Cornell-- no it’s not the College of Arts and Sciences but the diploma says “Cornell” or the Wharton School of Economics, no, it’s not the College of Arts and Sciences but the diploma says “University of Pennsylvania.”

Fordham and Wharton. Not Occidental and Columbia let alone Harvard Law and its Review. All the more reason for the biggest genius in the world to:

SHOW US THE TRANSCRIPTS. Will it change anything, no. But it could be fun! And by mistake maybe they will send the tax returns . . .

UPDATE from Howie

Trump planted stories-- I mean #Alt-Facts-- as early as 1973 that he graduated first in his class. Records show that he wasn't even on the honor roll nor the recipient of any graduating honors. He couldn't have graduated "first in his class" when 15 of his classmates graduated cum laude from Wharton (1968), 4 magna cum laude and 2 summa cum laude, unlike Trump who... graduated... from something. What he graduated from was always in question. After left-- possibly flunked out of-- Fordham, his father bribed Wharton into taking his unqualified son into a "special" real estate program that apparently didn't even exist except for him. He made no impression on anyone for anything and has carefully hidden his academic records and prohibited Wharton from allowing anyone to see them after he was repeatedly caught lying about being a top student.


UPDATE II: The Organization Man

A note from a long-time DWT reader included the page from William H. Whyte's 1956 classic, The Organization Man. Whyte quoted a very interesting passage from the Daily Pennsylvanian about the less than salutary effects of Wharton on intellectual life at Penn.

Are We Prepared For The Kind Of Catastrophic Disruption That Will Inevitably Lead To A Trump-Bannon Take Over?

-by Michael Wolkowitz

My old friend Michael Wolkowitz tells people he was formed in the late ‘60s. He's a dissident producer, a Social Democrat, and former board member of many progressive organizations, including a stint as the Chair of the Progressive Congress PAC. He put this post together after the Progressive Caucus Summit in Baltimore over the weekend.

I was not able to attend last weekend’s Progressive Congress Summit. I did, however, receive a thought provoking report of remarks made by Representative Pramila Jayapal (D-WA) during a panel discussion. The essence of the report was this:

"What happens if the country is confronted by a security crisis such as 9/11 or something else, no matter what the circumstances are or who is the instigator? We know that the administration will treat this as a political power opportunity the same way Bush did. We (Progressives/Dems/Both or Other) need to think about doing a better job of responding and not letting he-who-must-not-be-named get away with trying to legitimize either himself, his presidency, or his agenda over a inflicted or self-inflicted national security crisis. She bolstered her argument by referring to the falsely created environment in the 2002 and 2004 elections. She did this quite credibly, bypassing the usual conspiracy discussion that often goes with making any point around 9/11. Conspiracy or not, 9/11 became a political strategy."

I agree with Rep. Jayapal and have been concerned about this very issue. Especially as both a Diasporan Jew and a student of 20th Century Revolutions and Regime Changes. I also believe that in addition to Rep. Jayapal's reminders of the reverberations and manipulations that stemmed from 9/11, it is also worth considering that:

Sadly, we are still on that same duplicitous  post-9/11 war footing.

See: Billions of dollars of off-budget (“PayGo” - HA) on-going war expenditures.

See: Violence, death, destruction, displacement, pain and hardship in Afghanistan/Pakistan/Libya/Syria/Iraq/...

See: Guantanamo Bay.

See: Unconsitutional domestic surveillance.

See: Thousands of undisclosed drone and special ops attacks that kill and maim thousands of innocent people.

See: The acceptance of “The Homeland” as a way of referring to our nation (American is bad enough considering the rest of the Americas).

See:  etc. etc. etc.

I mention these continuing and nightmarish issues merely because the current state of affairs requires that our imagination reach beyond 9/11. We must:

• Remember the Reichstag fire and Kristallnacht. 
• Remember overthrowing Mossadegh and installing the Shah. [Quite a list of these... Lumumba, Allende, et ALL].
• Remember Bolsheviks screwing Menshiviks (see: Bannon).
• Imagine Ivanka as Evita (sorry, always need a tee hee factor).
• Mostly, remember the Empires that have fallen. Which ones? Doesn’t matter. Other than our own current reign, they have all fallen since the dawn of recorded history. It’s just a matter of how messy, how many dead people, how much and what kind of pillaging, and who’s turn comes next.

I do not know whose Empire will come next. I do know that we must understand the entire global (animal, vegetable and mineral) context of the threats hovering and opportunities lurking if we are to survive. We must consider the history of homo sapiens who have lived and are living right now throughout the entire planet. There is a slim but real chance that what President Vaclav Havel used to say could happen: "Truth and Love must prevail over Lies and Hatred."

Was The DCCC Pestering You With Spam All Weekend?

As you know, tomorrow (June 30) marks the end of the FEC's arbitrary reporting quarter. Candidates are hysterical and following DCCC suggestions to burn their lists with a constant barrage of requests for contributions. If you're ever signed a DCCC online petition you've probably had dozens of content-free requests since Friday, including multiple pleas from Debbie Wasserman Schultz and Steve Israel, neither of whom seems to have thought it was relevant to tell Democrats that each had just voted with the Republicans against Tom Massie's amendment to end unconstitutional domestic spying by the NSA and, again, with most Republicans, against Barbara Lee's amendment to prevent another war in Iraq.

One of my friends, formerly a very major Democratic donor, Michael Wolkowitz, feels like almost everyone I've talked to about this barrage of e-mails. He sent this response to the DCCC when they consistently refused to remove his name from their spam files:

"Sorry!" does not come even close to making up for your incompetence, lack of integrity, and dishonesty. I have tried multiple times to unsubscribe from your list and the lists of the candidates you share it with. Self-evidently, it does not work. I am not giving money to you or any individual candidates for the House this year. Sadly, electronic mail is free so I cannot tell you to stop wasting your money. I will, sometime soon, use my small Huffington Post bully pulpit to talk about how sneaky and soulless your committee is. Please please stop sending me mail.

When I asked Michael if I could use his e-mail today, I said I could leave his name out for the sake on anonymity. I loved his response: "If you think it would be a plus feel free to name me. I am sick of the assault by the committees that don’t actually deserve to use the word Democratic, I am sick of the corporatist dominance of that party, I am sick of that party’s vast majority on Capitol Hill blanket support of the Department of War because they are so risk averse they would never dare be perceived as anything but hawks, I am sick of their risk aversion to ever taking a stand on an issue that either:  a) is not pre-guaranteed to pass AND b) not hurt them in a general election, c) and get 60 votes in the Senate. These motherfuckers won’t even get a highway appropriations bill passed let alone allow debate on climate change, immigration, the poor starving yearning to breathe free who happen to be U.S. citizens. I think you can write my next thirty paragraphs for me so I will leave it there. I feel like I have wasted a whole lot of money time effort energy and emotion over the last 10-15 years trying my best to work “within the system.” I am back to where I was after Humphrey was nominated. Outside, trying to look away instead of In. fuck ‘em."

One of the worst of the freshmen, New Dem Patrick Murphy, has been among the most abusive of the e-mail fanatics this weekend. I just got another one from his annoying finance director, Mandi Karp: "Did you see this? Patrick's is THE race in Florida. We need to make sure that we have the strongest showing yet at this FEC deadline. Give now and your gift will be DOUBLE MATCHED - but only until midnight!" That's followed by a false claim from Debbie Wasserman Schultz that Murphy is Boehner's top target. He isn't. JUst moments atom he followed the Mandi e-mail up with a "personal" one: "Sorry to bother you on a Sunday, but Mandi and I were going through our database of our biggest supporters and making sure that they were in before our biggest Federal Elections Commission (FEC) deadline of the year on Monday. If you've already given and our emails were wrong, I apologize for bothering you, but if you haven’t, I would be humbled if you would consider making a contribution before our June 30th deadline."

So far Murphy has raised $2,814,416 this cycle, only 6% from small donors-- most of the rest from special interests who admire Murphy's conservative politics. A crowded field of 4th-rate Republican opponents fighting it out among themselves haven't raised enough to make any of them real competition:

• Carl Domino- $578,305 ($429,527 with a check he wrote to himself)
• Brian Lara- $113,997 ($100,087 with a check he wrote to himself)
• Alan Schlesinger- $99,789 ($75,000 with a check he wrote to himself)
• Ellen Andel- $51,233 (every cent of which she has already spent)
• Beverly Hires- $36,770 ($36,000 with a check she wrote to herself)
• Calvin Turnquest- $21,751
• Frank Lynch- $10,000 (100% which he self-financed)
• Nick Wukoson- zero

This is not shaping up to be a competitive race and certainly not one that Boehner is targeting. Wasserman Schultz, as usual, is lying-- in her eagerness to see her fellow slimy New Dem get in position to run for higher office. Paying attention to e-mail from her and Israel, or from any of the Blue Dogs or New Dems from the Republican wing of the Democratic Party grappling to take control of the House Democratic caucus, will do two things: guarantee another catastrophic election year for the Democrats and help cement conservative power inside the caucus.

Allowing Israel, Wasserman Schultz and Hoyer to determine who will be-- and who won't be-- the funded Democratic candidates can only end in catastrophe on numerous levels. Short of assigning that function to MoveOn, PCCC, DFA or Blue America, a better-- or at least more entertaining-- method would be to let Bill Maher do it. As we first reported in January, he has a fun game going called Flip A District and the first step towards congressional change ended on Friday with the addition of Dave Reichert (WA-08) and Scott Desjarlais (TN-04). Maher now has 16 Republicans to target-- or at least have some fun abusing:

• Mike Coffman (CO-06)- D+1 Andrew Romanoff
• Steve Southerland (FL-02)- R+6 Gwen Graham
• Ted Yoho (FL-03)- R+14 Marihelen Wheeler
• Jackie Walorski (IN-06)- R+6 Joe Bock
• Steve King (IA-04)- R+5 Jim Mowrer
• Dan Benishek (MI-01)- R+5 Jerry Cannon
• Tim Walberg (MI-07)- R+3 Pam Byrnes
• Kerry Bentivolio (MI-11)- R+4 July 17 primary
• John Kline (MN-02)- R+2 Mike Obermueller
• Scott Garrett (NJ-05)- R+4 Roy Cho
• Michael "Mikey Suits" Grimm (NY-11)- R+2 Domenic Recchia
• Renee Ellmers (NC-02) R+10 Clay Aiken
• Scott DesJarlais (TN-04)- R+18 Lenda Sherrell
• Blake Farenthold (TX-27)- R+13 Wesley Reed
• Dave Reichert (WA-08)- R+1 Jason Ritchie
• Paul Ryan (WI-01)- R+3 Rob Zerban

Ten of the 16-- Coffman, Southerland, Walorski, King, Bentivolio, Walberg, Benishek, Kline, Grimm, Ellmers-- are DCCC targets or semi-targets and I'm guessing that 4-- Southerland, Walorski, Walberg, and Benishek-- of those are on the list simply because the DCCC tampered with the process. Most of these contests are very uphill for the Democrats but the underlined one are candidates who have exactly the same chance of winning that you do. Some of the others have an ever so slightly better chance of winning than you do. And some of the best shots, like against Paul Ryan and Dave Reichert, are bing studiously ignored (or worse) by the DCCC because the Democrats running are progressives. Maher missed out of the two best shots to really flip a district away from pure unadulterated evil. One has an R+1 PVI (Fred Upton in Michigan) and one that has an EVEN PVI (Steve Israel in New York). In fact, if I could contribute to just one House candidate this cycle, it would be to the Democrat running against Upton, Paul Clements. You can contribute to Paul's campaign here-- and keep in mind, everyone on this page has been carefully vetted as a progressive worth investing in.