Day 41: Let down by the media

Today's coverage was overshadowed by Trump's speech last night. Because he demonstrated he was capable of reading a speech that somebody else wrote from a teleprompter, mainstream media fell over itself to declare him "presidential", and I refuse to link to such articles. This was despite the fact that his speech presented largely unchanged shallow policies that severely lacked in detail, was full of xenophobic dogwhistles, and was grossly misleading if not flat-out wrong on almost every detail. I was particularly unimpressed by taking political advantage of a grieving widow whose husband died in a raid Trump refuses to take responsibility for.

• Here is my favorite analytic coverage.
• Here is an annotated transcript of the speech.
• Here are a bunch of lies, discussed. I like the first one: claiming that he had already begun to "drain the swamp" almost made me literally vomit. In creating the richest cabinet in American history, for every bucket of water removed from the swamp, he's added a swimming pool.
• Here is a scathing retort of the mainstream media.
• Here is a list of as many lies as fact-checkers could find during the speech, complete with citations.
• Here is a detailed analysis of Trump's absurd claim regarding the labor force.

Regardless, people apparently have an attention span of mere days, and think that when Trump puts on a vaguely passable performance, that all is right in the world again (warning: this one will make your blood boil). As Jezebel puts it: "If his address to Congress was a historic moment, it will be historic because it was the moment Trump’s bigotry became “presidential” and the American people stopped resisting." If you need any reminder of just how awful this President has been, just look through the archives of this blog.

In other news:

• Remember how Conway got in trouble for violating federal law? The White house has determined that she shouldn't get anything more than a slap on the wrist.
• After investigating the legality of asking for papers after a domestic flight, lawyers come up empty-handed. ICE and CBP have no way of circumventing the 4th amendment, and you are well within your rights to refuse a request for ID in such situations.
• Session's DOJ believes that police can do no harm, and as such is rolling back investigations into police misconduct. Because being killed for being black is apparently perfectly ok to him.
• The Senate has confirmed Ryan Zink as Interior Secretary. Another climate change denier, put in charge of 20% of the land in the country.
• Trump has complained that his nominations are being held up. Of the 549 vacancies, 15 have been confirmed, 18 have been nominated and await confirmation, and the rest haven't been nominated. Now who's being obstructionist?
• The administration is trying to make the State Department irrelevant. For what is possibly the most important agency in the government, this seems extraordinarily short-sighted.
• More stories of ICE arrests. These continue to be dehumanizing and frankly, really fucking terrifying. ICE is going to continue deporting whomever they like without any concern for the lives it is ruining until something is done (and I have no idea what can be done).

Update:

• Our esteemed Attorney General has been caught lying under oath regarding communications with Russia. And yet he still won't recuse himself from any investigation into Russia. Shady? I'll let you decide.
• More evidence of Russian collusion. Pay close attention to the second paragraph. Yikes.