Here in The Other Washington’s 3rd CD, the race gets curiouser and curiouser. The local newpaper is on the story. MAGA Candidate Joe Kent, who ousted incumbent Jaime Herrera Beutler because she had the decency to vote to impeach TFG, has run into a wee bit of trouble. It certainly won’t stop his big backers from spending ridiculous amounts of money to elect him, but people are taking note. It seems the tech company he claims to work for, American Enterprise Solutions, couldn’t be verified. Now, Joe is a former Green Beret and CIA employee, so maybe it’s a top secret operation.

The Daily Beast put its staffers on the trail after an anti-Kent website posed the questions. They couldn’t find American Enterprise Solutions in filings for patents, trademarks, licenses, websites or online presence or any government or private wireless contracts. Of course, Joe first blamed the messenger when confronted, claiming the story was “fraudulent” but later reversed course. The tech company changed its name to Advanced Enterprise Solutions. Just a typo. A little mistake. His W-2s for 2020 and 2021, shown as proof, didn’t clear things up as well as he thought they would. Two different names, Advanced Enterprise Solutions of Milford, DE and Advanced Enterprise Solutions LLC of Herndon, VA. Just a little discrepancy in names. But wait, there’s more: The company Federal Employee ID was on one form, but redacted on the second, so who can compare? And neither name matches a registration document filed with the VA State Corporation Commission. That one is Advanced Enterprise Solutions Group LLC, a Delaware Company operating in Virginia.

Oh yeah, in true Trumpian style, that company’s annual registration fee was past due and listed as “pending inactive”…until today, when it was changed to “active”. Just a coincidence, I’m sure. And for a last bit of curious, a DC law firm stated that Kent is “employed by a US company that wishes not to be identified”. Maybe because they don’t know what the heck to call themselves?

Mike Crapo is a US Senator from Idaho.  An actual US Senator.  And he tweeted THIS today:

Clearly, after the Twitterverse erupted, he deleted the tweet and issued a second one.  It’s still factually incorrect since Bradley’s body was actually recovered in 1943, but not identified until recently.

Today, Navy Fireman 2nd Class Carl Bradley returned to rest in Shelley. 80 years ago, he left to serve his country. He was killed in action aboard the USS Oklahoma in Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, & his remains found earlier this year. May we remember his eternal sacrifice. pic.twitter.com/5Un8g8JpQV

— Senator Mike Crapo (@MikeCrapo) June 27, 2021

I’ve enjoyed this immensely on a Sunday afternoon.  LOL.

Yesterday, Eric Swalwell of California was leaving the House floor when he was confronted by a staffer to Marjorie Taylor Greene, yelling at him to take off his mask, saying, “Biden says to take off your mask!”  Swalwell responded appropriately: “You don’t tell me what to fucking do!”

Swalwell doesn’t think his response was explicit enough.  I think it was perfect, especially to Greene or any of the Mini Me fascists who work for her.

I had a mask on as I stepped off the Floor. An aide with @mtgreenee yelled at me to take my mask off. No one should be bullied for wearing a mask. So I told the bully what I thought of his order. Predictably, he went speechless. I regret I wasn’t more explicit. https://t.co/o8j0DXWOBm

— Rep. Eric Swalwell (@RepSwalwell) May 14, 2021

Yesterday, MLB made a terse announcement that the league is moving the All Star game AND the MLB draft out of Atlanta as a response to Georgia Republicans passing its voter suppression bill which included voter suppression tactics like stricter ID requirements and shortened absentee voting periods.  The worst provisions, though, included giving the legislature authority to reject county voting results, removing the Georgia secretary of state from the state elections board voting members, and the cruel criminalizing of giving water and food to voters standing in line.

In a statement, MLB commissioner Rob Manfred said,

“Over the last week, we have engaged in thoughtful conversations with Clubs, former and current players, the Players Association, and The Players Alliance, among others, to listen to their views.  I have decided that the best way to demonstrate our values as a sport is by relocating this year’s All-Star Game and MLB Draft.

“Major League Baseball fundamentally supports voting rights for all Americans and opposes restrictions to the ballot box. In 2020, MLB became the first professional sports league to join the non-partisan Civic Alliance to help build a future in which everyone participates in shaping the United States. We proudly used our platform to encourage baseball fans and communities throughout our country to perform their civic duty and actively participate in the voting process. Fair access to voting continues to have our game’s unwavering support.”

Joining Atlanta based Delta Airlines and Coca Cola, along with other companies, MLB is ratcheting up the pressure on the GOP to stop its massive voter suppression efforts in a desperate effort to cling to power as its demographic shrinks.   It worked in Indiana years ago when then governor Mike Pence signed the anti-gay bill that explicitly allowed private businesses to refuse service to people they didn’t like under the guise of “religious choice”.  After massive backlash against businesses and sports in Indiana, the state legislature “clarified” the bill by adding that, notwithstanding why the bill was written in the first place, it couldn’t be used to deny service to anyone.

That’s not good enough for Georgia, though.  The GOP must be stopped in its tracks in Georgia because it’s doing the same thing in 42 other states.  If companies, sports leagues, activists, and Americans stand against this anti-democratic and anti-American effort to consolidate power, this effort can be stopped.

“I took her love at seventeen

A little late these days it seems
But they said heaven is well worth waiting for.”– Robert Plant/Jimmy Page

Those of you that have been paying attention to the news have undoubtedly heard about the controversy surrounding Matt Gaetz. The embattled Florida congressman always seems to find himself in the center of some controversy. A lot of this is self-inflicted. The details are a bit circumspect at this point, but I’ll do the best I can.

At the center of it all is a report that he had a sexual encounter with a 17 year old girl (thus the Led Zeppelin reference). Gaetz is currently in his late thirties, but I’m not sure when this sexual encounter supposedly happened. Unless it happened when he was 18, he is in the same hot water politically. Legally, it might be a whole other matter.

Meanwhile, Gaetz is spinning yarns about a blackmail scheme that is at the heart of it all. He is defending himself of charges that haven’t even been levied. I’m sure the psychologists among us will opine about what that fact means. I have had some psychology training, but I’m going to leave that nugget to the professionals among us.

Oddly enough, I find all of this to be a huge Rorschach test. For those unfamiliar with the term, it refers to those nebulous ink blots that we are supposed to interpret for the therapist. Supposedly, our answers say a whole lot about us. In this case, I think they say more about our particular feelings for these individuals than it does about us specifically.

Gaetz is a polarizing figure. Conservatives love him and everyone else seems to hate him. So, it makes perfect sense that those particular groups would handle these allegations differently. When I look at Matt Gaetz I see a jackass. So, it isn’t that difficult for me to imagine him doing anything like this. The fact that he is awkwardly defending himself tends to be icing on the cake. Still, there is always the possibility that everything he is saying is true.

We can see no greater contrast than looking at the situation Andrew Cuomo is in right now. We could throw in the likes of Al Franken as well. The level of sympathy we feel for any of these guys is directly proportional to the level of animus we felt for them before their controversies. In plain English, if we like them we tend to believe them. If we hate them we already see them as guilty.

Make no mistake. Matt Gaetz is a jackass. I’m sure in a proud moment he would admit to that. He might not use that exact word, but he has made his bones acting in an obnoxious fashion. Maybe he would call himself spirited or a gadfly. Then again, he might not be smart enough to get the gadfly reference. Either way, he already has one foot in the jail cell for many Americans. It will be hard to resist the temptation to push him in. However, we must do it if we ever expect anyone we like to be given the same consideration.

Wow.  Twice in one day we talk about Matt Gaetz; first this morning when we talked about him accurately calling “Big Dan” Rodimer a fake Texan.  Now, Axios is reporting that Gaetz is toying with leaving Congress to join Newsmax as a manure shoveler on television.  It fits.  Usually politicians don’t leave a cush job on Capitol Hill unless there is some problem.  What’s Gaetz problem?  Well, as I write this, news is breaking that Gaetz is being investigated in Florida for a sexual relationship with a 17 year old girl.  The investigation is part of a larger investigation into Gaetz pal Joel Greenberg who’s being investigated for sex trafficking of minors.  Well, being Trump allies, that all fits.  The interesting thing is that the investigation was opened months ago while Bill Barr was still AG.  Funny how Barr didn’t trumpet that one like he did the one into how the FBI conducted investigations of Trump before the 2016 election.

There’s been a lot of speculation about Gaetz over the years, especially when he revealed last year that he “adopted” a 12 year old boy from Cuba 6 years ago when he was 32 years old himself.  He kept that relationship secret until last summer when he revealed it in a surprise announcement.  Until then, he had called the boy his “helper” and a congressional page.

Newsmax, being super Trumpist, doesn’t seem to have any problem with pedophilia, but I’m curious if that the offer is going to come through now.