Superman the Immigrant Would Have Saved Texas

The dying toll from the flooding in Texas has climbed to at the very least 120 individuals as of this writing. That quantity consists of at the very least 36 kids who had been campers at Camp Mystic, in Kerr County, Texas, which we now know was constructed on a harmful flood plain. We additionally know that native officers had been properly conscious of the hazards, and did nothing. Reviews point out that an early-warning system for floods would have value Kerr County round $1 million—and when it didn’t get a grant for that cash, the hassle stalled. In the meantime, the Texas Legislature didn’t pass a bill this spring that may have supported grants for native disaster-warning methods.

Texas has spent $11 billion on “border safety” since 2021 as a part of “Operation Lonestar” (I’ve written about that unconstitutional stupidity here). Nevertheless it wouldn’t direct funds to the city to assist maintain kids protected.

If Kerr County had requested for $1,000,000 to booby-trap the river with alligators and different sadistic death traps to drown immigrants who tried to swim throughout it, Governor Greg Abbott would have discovered the cash. However holding kids protected from preventable disasters just isn’t Abbott’s precedence.

Or America’s.

The Dangerous and The Ugly

• Disaster actor and Secretary of Homeland Safety Kristi Noem has criticized the “sluggish” response of the Federal Emergency Administration Company (FEMA) to the flooding. She’s utilizing the catastrophe to resume her calls to eradicate the company. However that sluggish response is a direct results of a FEMA coverage instituted by Noem herself. Any FEMA contract costing over $100,000 now requires Noem’s private, written approval. If FEMA is sluggish, it’s as a result of Noem is just too busy selecting out her subsequent canine for goal observe to do her precise job.
• Talking of issues which might be a direct menace to kids that this nation does nothing to cease, a brand new report tells us that the main supply of stolen weapons is… parked cars. These weapons then go on for use disproportionately in crimes. So not solely is the proverbial “good man with a gun” truly ineffective in stopping crime; it seems that the great man most likely left his gun in his automotive, which was then stolen by the dangerous man.
• The trial over Trump’s assaults on international college students at Harvard got underway this week. I might be ignoring this for some time. Finally there might be a verdict, which Trump will lose; then that verdict might be appealed, and the Supreme Courtroom will discover some approach to make Trump win. I’ll concentrate once more then.
• I’m not being flip about what’s going to occur within the Harvard trial. That is what occurs on a regular basis now. A new report reveals that, in Could and June, Trump misplaced in district court docket 94.3 p.c of the time. However when circumstances went to the Supreme Courtroom on this previous time period, Trump gained 93.7 p.c of the time.
• Talking of this yr’s Supreme Courtroom time period, Adam Feldman has written up a year-end statistical analysis of all of the court docket’s circumstances on Empirical SCOTUS. He finds that what’s emerged is a “structural majority” the place the six Republicans persistently outvote the three liberals on important partisan points, although this yr the liberals occurred to win greater than typical. There’s no extra “swing” vote on the bench. I didn’t want to drag out my calculator to inform you that, however in case you like numbers, Adam’s might be compelling.

Impressed Takes

• David Dickson and Mark Hertsgaard clarify in The Nation that the kids in Texas did not have to die.
• Paramount proves but once more that company income are extra vital for media conglomerates than democracy. In The Nation, Victor Pickard explains that we have to wean our media off company possession.

Worst Argument of the Week

North Carolina Senator Thom Tillis is retiring. Apparently, meaning now, and solely now, he’s in a position to find a backbone. Tillis voted towards Trump’s spending invoice. In an announcement saying his retirement, he said, “I look ahead to having the pure freedom to name the balls and strikes as I see match and representing the nice individuals of North Carolina to the perfect of my capability.”

I freaking hate this. Tillis has been a senator since 2015. He’s had the “pure freedom” to “name balls and strikes” this entire rattling time. Certainly, it’s been his job to characterize the individuals of North Carolina “to the perfect of [his] capability” ever since he was elected. The concept he can solely totally carry out this job when he has one foot out of the door is infuriating.

We settle for this warped logic on a regular basis, particularly from Republicans. One way or the other, we’ve absorbed the concept a US senator, elected to a huge six-year time period (which is the longest time period of workplace for any elected official within the nation), is in some way “not free” to do what they consider to be proper so long as they want to search reelection. Solely upon saying retirement can we even dare to hope that Republicans may place themselves within the service of the individuals of this nation, as an alternative of Donald Trump.

Even then, nevertheless, that hope is usually dashed anyway. Tillis can have many alternatives to frustrate the Trump administration in terms of judicial appointments, as an example. He sits on the judiciary committee, and Trump’s nominees are universally terrible. However will he?

Courtroom Accountability’s Alex Aronson predicts that Tillis may change into like former Nevada senator Jeff Flake: an individual who talks an excellent recreation however votes for Trump’s nominees at any time when the chips are down. Individuals may keep in mind that Flake famously referred to as for an investigation into tried rape prices towards Trump’s Supreme Courtroom nominee Brett Kavanaugh, after a constituent yelled at him in an elevator and adjusted his thoughts on the problem. However individuals ought to always remember that Flake did, finally, vote to substantiate Kavanaugh, although no severe investigation ever befell.

I count on Tillis will take the identical route. He’ll obtain a Susan Collins stage of “concern” after which go proper again to attaining a Susan Collins stage of complicity.

A senator who feels free to “vote their conscience” solely after they now not need to be in politics shouldn’t have gotten into politics within the first place.

What I Wrote

Nothing from me this week digitally, as I’ve been engaged on a print piece. Additionally, I’m recovering from the top of the Supreme Courtroom time period. I’ve been taking part in a number of No Man’s Sky with my kids.

In Information Unrelated to the Present Chaos

There’s a brand new Superman film out. Superman just isn’t my favourite comedian e-book hero: He’s too highly effective, which implies that many of the tales about him should invent dumb methods to make him much less highly effective so as to add rigidity, drama, and stakes. However, no matter, I’ll most likely watch it.

Apparently, after I go see it, I can’t should take care of any Republicans within the theater. The white wing has turned on the Man of Metal due to a remark made by the film’s director, James Gunn.

Gunn said: “Superman is the story of America. An immigrant that got here from different locations and populated the nation, however for me it’s principally a narrative that claims fundamental human kindness is a worth and is one thing we now have misplaced.”

Can you determine how that assertion angered bigots? For many who don’t communicate Republican, the issue is that Gunn referred to as Supes an “immigrant”—and “immigrants” are dangerous, in keeping with Republicans.

The white-wing outrage machine went into overdrive, with varied white tradition warriors vowing to boycott the film. Former Superman TV actor and infamous MAGA pinhead Dean Cain said that the brand new film is “too woke.” Nonetheless, my favourite hysterics come from Stephen L. Miller (the white-wing journalist Miller, not the Trump deputy chief of ghoulishness Miller). He said, “Superman isn’t an immigrant. He’s an orphan. The truth that they will spend $300 million on a movie and may’t get this very fundamental idea proper is one thing.”

The truth that Stephen Miller will get paid to publish phrases for a dwelling is absolutely one thing.

Superman is, in fact, an immigrant—he’s not from America, and even Sol 3 (Earth), but he lives right here—and he’s an orphan. As typical, Republicans have hassle with ideas that require a number of issues to be true on the similar time. He’s additionally an “unlawful” immigrant, in keeping with MAGA logic, as a result of he was despatched right here with out correct documentation, and by no means went again to Krypton to “wait in line” behind all the opposite area aliens who got here to Earth “the best method.” And he’s a “refugee.” His residence planet was actually destroyed, and he’s right here searching for asylum within the vastness of area.

Nonetheless, however Miller’s demonstrable ignorance of Kal-El’s backstory—or, for that matter, Kal-El’s creators’ backstory—I welcome his newfound care and respect for orphans. I can solely assume that Miller will now welcome, with open arms, the entire “not immigrants” from Gaza who’ve been orphaned by Israel’s bombing. Welcome to the progressive wing, Steve.

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