Monday Reading

As always, please go to the links for the full article/ op eds.

Paul Krugman takes a look at how the Republicans are already framing Democrats as "socialists" (with the help of the usual enablers), and what label comes closer for Republicans:

Leading Republicans, however, routinely describe Democrats, even those on the right of their party, as socialists. Indeed, all indications are that denunciations of Democrats’ “socialist” agenda will be front and center in the general election campaign. And everyone in the news media accepts this as the normal state of affairs.

Which goes to show the extent to which Republican extremism has been accepted simply as a fact of life, barely worth mentioning.

To see what I mean, imagine the media firestorm, the screams about lost civility, we’d experience if any prominent Democrat described Republicans as a party of fascists, let alone if Democrats made that claim the centerpiece of their national campaign. And such an accusation would indeed be somewhat over the top — but it would be a lot closer to the truth than calling Democrats socialists. 

In the meantime, Democrats can keep reminding voters of those unpopular "socialist" programs they gave us like Social Security, Medicare, etc., etc., that Republicans have been fighting against since long before Ronnie Raygun was shilling for General Electric. 

It should come as no surprise that the treason caucus is planning to disrupt the testimony by Robert Mueller on July 17:

Republican lawmakers plan to derail the highly anticipated hearing where special counsel Robert Mueller will testify on his investigation of President Donald Trump.

The president’s GOP allies in the U.S. House of Representatives are signaling that they intend to undermine Mueller’s credibility and seek to portray him as a biased operative leading a “coup” against Trump, reported Politico.

Hold on.  Now, check out this piece of gaslighting from arguably the dumbest bag of rocks in Congress, who's speaking about Mueller and not about Putin's puppet:

“He’s done some irreparable damage to some things and he’s got to answer for them,” said Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX), who will take part in back-to-back hearings of the House Intelligence and Judiciary Committees.

The Texas Republican said the special counsel’s report did not change his long-held negative opinion of the FBI director.

“It reinforced the anal opening that I believe Mueller to be,” Gohmert said, using an apparent euphemism to slur Mueller.

Well, he's one to know about assholes.

Picking up on the category of "it takes one to know one," there's this:

The highest-ranking North Korean defector in decades told me Kim Jong UN likes President Trump because he’s not “moral,” and doesn't judge."All previous US presidents so far have been very moral and they paid great attention on the America’s moral image," he said of Trump.

— Richard Engel (@RichardEngel) June 30, 2019

Not judging this guy, for instance:

When you realize you probably didn’t need to murder the guys who set up the last summit pic.twitter.com/fnjm2SDx8n

— Molly Jong-Fast (@MollyJongFast) June 30, 2019

"Not moral," indeed.  That's something the world has known for some time now.

Meanwhile, the hometown newspaper of Otto Warmbier had this to report, as his name trended on Twitter:

President Donald Trump's visit to North Korea has started more calls of outrage against the president, who some feel has forgotten about Otto Warmbier.

On Sunday, Trump became the first U.S. president to set foot in North Korea during a meeting in the Demilitarized Zone with Kim Jong Un.

"It's just an honor to be with you and it was an honor that you asked me to step over that line," Trump told the North Korean leader. "And I was proud to step over that line."

Trump added that it was "a great day for the world."

But many were outraged by the meeting due to North Korea's treatment of Otto Warmbier, a 21-year-old college student from the Cincinnati suburb of Wyoming, who died shortly after being returned to his family after 15 months in captivity in North Korea.

"Trump just cited return of US hostages as a sign of goodwill from North Korea, seeming to forget Otto Warmbier was returned brain damaged and near death," said CNN host Jim Sciutto.

The #unwantedivanka hashtag is trending on Twitter, rightfully mocking the First Shady's attempts to crash meetings of serious people at the G-20 and in Korea.

Finally, in another tour de force, Infidel 753 has assembled a round- up of links to interesting posts, etc.,  where you can be sure to find many topics to engage with.  Check it out!