Signaling that bigotry and hate is the new norm for the Republican party, the TN Senate race on the Republican side has devolved into some sort of liars poker game. Gone is any discussion of real issues or pretense of bringing our state together. The social media operatives for the various GOP factions have fired up the slime machines for anybody who attempts to bring facts or reason into the debate.

"Republican U.S. Senate candidate Bill Hagerty has resigned from the board of R.J. O’Brien & Associates over social media posts sent by the futures brokerage firm voicing support for the African American community and Black Lives Matter."

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More Toons at Juanita's place

And read this if you have time. Dr. Larry Brilliant in the Covid-19 pandemic

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More

Opinion: Will Biden Win Tennessee in November?

It's going to either be real close or a blow out for Biden.

In January Mason Dixon polling had Trump up over 20 points against Joe Biden. At the end of May Trump had lost 11 points but still held a 9 point lead. Then the killing of George Floyd by police came to the forefront. Trump's "law and order" head busting, tear gassing, violations of the right to peaceful protest was roundly criticized by most everybody and his "Let them all die" handling of the covid-19 pandemic made the USA a pariah in international travel as hospital ICU's are being overrun with the critically ill victims of Trump's incompetence and...Yes...meanness.

We need to work harder than ever to defeat the fascist who occupies the White House. We were complacent in 2016 while Vladimir Putin gamed our system and put the deeply corrupt Trump and his flying monkeys in the White House even though a strong majority of Americans opposed him. We can't let that happen again! His followers are either gullible and deceived, ignorant, racist or corrupt in their own right. We have to stay in their faces and call them out nicely as possible.

“You look at the polls and think ‘he can’t win’,” tweeted Bill Kristol, who served in two Republican administrations. “But Trump’s path to victory doesn’t depend on persuading Americans. It depends on voter suppression, mass disinformation, foreign interference, and unabashed use of executive branch power to shape events, and perceptions, this fall.”

Read the full article and be worried enough to save our democracy!

Several more

Only this is real.

Dr. Michael Osterholm, a prominent U.S. epidemiologist, said, “I don’t think we’re going to see one, two and three waves — I think we’re just going to see one very, very difficult forest fire of cases.”

Wear your Damned Mask!

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More Toons

From State Representative Gloria Johnson:

It’s 1:30 am and we are still on the house floor waiting for a bill to come over from the senate that most of my colleagues will vote for. It is too broad and will likely make it difficult for those who have been harmed to get justice.

In the dead of night, they’ve stolen reproductive rights and choices from every woman in the state. The House and Senate disagreed on the budget. In order for the Senate/Gov to get what they wanted, the House said they had to take up the heartbeat bill (which they did not plan to do) and also passed a dangerous bill allowing reversal of the morning after pill.

A medical procedure that has not been approved, as they had to stop the trials because it caused women to hemorrhage. Bill Dunn actually said on the floor that it didn’t matter if it was dangerous for the mom, as it saved the fetus.

I don’t mind the late nights, I’m a night owl. What I mind is our reproductive rights being used as a bargaining chip for a budget about tax breaks for Wall Street and taking $70 million from teachers.

Tennessee Republicans in the state House of Representatives rejected a resolution to memorialize a slain teenager on Tuesday night. Ashanti Harris was a high school athlete who hoped to play basketball at Western Kentucky University. She was openly gay and started a support group for LGBTQ students. She worked two jobs.

On April 9, she was shot and killed. A group of representatives introduced a resolution to honor her, which came before the House after weeks of protests in Nashville and a weekend of demonstrations right outside the Tennessee State Capitol. The resolution had already passed unanimously in the Senate.

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Trump puts American lives at stake for China profits.

Numbers from the U.S. Department of Agriculture show that the industry exported a record amount of pork to China in April, 129,000 tons, even as the industry was wringing its hands over shortages and appealing to the federal government for exemptions to Covid-19 restrictions imposed on the plants at the state and local level.

...the meatpackers, including Smithfield, which China's largest pork producer bought in 2013, did not emphasize, at least not publicly, that keeping the plants open would also protect their long-term investments in exporting to a country that is vital to their growth.

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President Trump on Monday downplayed concerns of a rising number of coronavirus cases in states across the country, indicating that the increase was due to more testing.

"If we stop testing right now, we’d have very few cases, if any,” Trump said during a White House event highlighting administration actions to help senior citizens.

I F'n Don't believe this idiot!

Damn good. What a legacy Prine leaves us.

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Trump has accelerated the process.

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Wearing a mask prevents the wearer from spreading covid to others more than it protects the wearer. "I protect you and you protect me" and we can stop this thing.

Don't be stupid!

Wearing a mask of any sort whatsoever improves your chances of avoiding Covid-19 somewhat. A lot depends on the quality of the mask. The ones that Gov Lee bought are somewhat better than worthless and may poison you. Homemade masks can be effective at preventing the wearer from spreading Covid but not as much at preventing covid from getting to the wearer. A mask and eye shield is very good at protecting the wearer and is now the standard for medical personnel.

Trump's America is killing its citizens by studied ignorance and mean spirited stupidity.

Masks work if we all wear them.

A few weeks ago right after Missouri relaxed its COVID restrictions two hair stylists at a salon in Springfield, Missouri came down with COVID. Contact tracing revealed they had potentially exposed about 140 clients and six coworkers. The key data point is that all staff and customers at the salon were wearing masks during the period in question.

Of those 140 clients, 46 came forward to take COVID tests. They were all negative. The rest were quarantined during their possible incubation period. None of them developed the disease.

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Here is the straight skinny from a non political source..

3 months ago, COVID-19 was not even in the top 75 causes of death in this country. Much of the last month, it was the #1 cause of death in this country. This is more remarkable than the 1918 Flu pandemic.

There is no scientific indication Covid-19 will disappear of its own accord.

If you’re under age 55, obesity is the #1 risk factor. So, eating the right diet, getting physical activity, and managing stress are some of the most important things you can do to protect yourself from the disease.

One of the best things we can do for our aging parents is to get them out into the fresh air, while maintaining physical (not social) distancing.

Wearing a cloth mask does not protect you much if you’re in close contact with someone who is COVID-19 contagious. It may give you 10 minutes, instead of five, to avoid contracting the disease.

We can expect COVID-19 to infect 60% – 70% of Americans. That’s around 200 million Americans.

We can expect between 800,000 and 1.6 million Americans to die in the next 18 months if we don’t have a successful vaccine.

There is no guarantee of an effective vaccination and even if we find one, it may only give short term protection.

Speeding a vaccination into production carries its own risks.

The darkest days are still ahead of us. We need moral leadership, the command leadership that doesn’t minimize what’s before us but allows everyone to see that we’re going to get through it.

The full article

The short version is in spite of White House denials peaceful protesters were attacked with pepper ball guns, batons, sheilds, flash explosives and tear gas and the Park Police were mobilized under false pretenses. William Barr is an even bigger scumbag than Trump.

If authorities want to de-escalate this problem they can stop lying to America as a first step.

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So then there's this:

Plaintiffs in absentee voting case file contempt motion against state

The plaintiffs in a lawsuit over Tennessee's absentee voting law have filed a contempt motion against the state for alleged violations of the judge's order to immediately begin supplying mail-in ballots to anyone who asks for one.

Following last week's ruling, State Election Coordinator Mark Goins sent an email to local ...

View the entire post:

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Trump needs Russian interference in the USA election to remain in the White House. CNN poll shows him losing by 15 to points to whomever is running against him. Trump has already given three US military bases in Syria to Russia. What else will he promise?

We have a NAZI infiltrated anti Black Lives Matter protest on the steps of the Roane County Courthouse after violence threats caused cancellation of the BLM march.

Covid cases in TN are on a steady increase. Roane County is up from 14 cases last week to 21 confirmed cases today. That is a 50% increase in one week. Around 10% of everyone over the age of sixty died.

The Attorney General of the United States turns out to be almost as big a liar as Trump, claiming pepper spray is not a chemical so it's OK to use on peaceful protesters.

Trump has built a wall, this time with razor wire, around the White House. Mexico will not pay for this one either.

Gee...Is it Friday already?

More toons at Juanita's

It's coming. Are you ready? (Sounds like one of those "Get Right with Jeebus" signs that used to be nailed to every tree on the road to Grandma's house)

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Specialized Investigations Division detectives & SWAT officers moments ago arrested Wesley Somers, 25, on charges of felony arson, vandalism, & disorderly conduct for setting fire to Nashville's Historic Courthouse Saturday night.

Hmmm?

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OK, friends who actually know Bill Lee, I accept that he is a religious whack job. But this is self identifying weird...

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According to information published on the KCHD website, Knox County must report a stable or decreased number of COVID-19 cases in the county over a 14-day period.

Knox County has reported an increase of 16% and an active case increase of 40% cases since last Friday.

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