Let's enjoy the good news on today's BradCast --- and we've got quite a bit of it --- because things may or may not be as bright tomorrow, as returns come in from the U.S. Senate runoff in Georgia and the corrupt rightwing U.S. Supreme Court hears a case they may use to undermine American democracy as we have known it for more than 200 years. [Audio link to full show follow this summary.]

But, for tonight, at least, there is a whole bunch of good news regarding a whole bunch of bad news for our disgraced former President...which is great news for everyone else...

• A New York jury in Manhattan took little more than one day to find the Trump Organization guilty of all criminal state tax fraud charges brought against it --- 17 counts in all. That follows its longtime Chief Financial Officer, Allen Weisselberg's guilty plea on 15 counts of fraud. He's set to receive about five months in prison after his plea and agreement to testify against the company. A company, however, can't be sentenced to prison, so a fine will be levied instead. But the Manhattan D.A.'s office may have other plans for criminal charges against Donald Trump, which we discuss as well today.

• Meanwhile, Trump is now claiming that he didn't say what everybody saw him say, when he called for the "termination" of the U.S. Constitution over the weekend. It was, of course, part of his continuing effort to pretend the 2020 Presidential election that he lost was actually stolen from him. More disturbing, however, is the lack of elected Republican officials who, while pretending to be "Constitutional conservatives", are unable to say whether Trump's comments disqualify him from becoming President again.

• But, back to brighter news as we continue to try and keep track of accountability for at least 56 known criminal violations of law by the former President since he first ran for office. (That doesn't include all of the civil violations, such as the $250 million lawsuit filed by New York Attorney General Letitia James against him, his company and his three oldest children on state tax fraud violations.) The Manhattan D.A.'s office of Alvin Bragg, which successfully prosecuted the criminal tax fraud cases against the Trump Organization, has made a new hire that suggests the office may be eyeing new criminal charges against Trump himself this time. We 'splain.

• Also on Tuesday, the Chair of the bipartisan U.S. House Select Committee investigating the January 6 insurrection and Trump's many failed attempts to steal the 2020 election, said that the panel will be making criminal referrals to the U.S. Dept. of Justice before year's end. That may or may not be bad news for Trump himself and many others in the MAGA Cinematic Universe. But it almost certainly ain't good news for any of them.

• Also also on Tuesday, it is being reported that Jack Smith --- newly tapped by Attorney General Merrick Garland as Special Counsel overseeing the DoJ's federal criminal probes into January 6, the documents stolen by Trump from the White House, and any other matters related to either of those cases --- has issued his first subpoenas since taking his new position. Officials in Wisconsin, Michigan and Arizona according to Washington Post, as well as in Pennsylvania, as confirmed by AP, have all recently received demands from Smith for "any and all communications with Trump, his campaign, and a long list of aides and allies."

It's going to be a very long rest-of-his-life for Donald Trump --- unless he pulls a Ken Lay first. Of course, we wish him nothing but the best.

• And, finally, we finish up today with Desi Doyen and our latest Green News Report, including news on the electric grid attack in North Carolina; Russia targeting energy infrastructure in Ukraine (a war crime); and EV sales now surging in U.S. and across the globe...

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Republicans and corporate media appeared to be shocked on Tuesday night. But it looks like we had it right all along on BradCast regarding this year's midterm elections. And, once again, the corporate media didn't. But, good news for them! As usual, they'll pay no price for being wrong, no matter how many times they ill-serve the nation with their failures. [Audio link to full show follows this summary.]

There was no "red" wave. Conventional wisdom, as we've been advising since early Spring, was to be ignored before this year's midterms in these decidedly UNconventional times. If we could see that data --- sometimes via polling from some of the very same media outlets --- why couldn't the corporate media? Maybe its group think. Maybe its because whatever Republicans tell them they believe to be the truth, or simply report it as such.

In any event, while there was no "red" wave, it is still quite possible that Republicans win majorities in both the U.S. House and the Senate --- if just barely in each case. And while Dems, as we go to air today, have an apparent edge to hold on to their Senate majority, it'll almost certainly require another win in another U.S. Senate runoff in Georgia next month to nail it down. There even remains a long-shot chance that Dems can keep a majority in the House as well, and that, as we explained yesterday, it all may come down to the effect of unusually large downpours on Tuesday's Election Day in both Northern and Southern California.

Either way, for the moment, American democracy, while still on life support, has lived to see another day. For now. In similarly encouraging news, our previous President may even finally face some accountability from his own infuriated party. They were deprived of what should have been a huge and easy win on Tuesday, but for the rightwing loons that Donald Trump helped push into the Party and onto ballots across the nation. Many of them, if not all, lost bigly.

On today's program, we discuss all of the above and, based on what we know as of airtime, run through a ton of critical victories and losses --- including both inspiring surprise wins and several disappointments --- in dozens of states, at both the state and federal level.

As of yesterday's election, anyway, American voters (including many young ones, thankfully!) appear to have held the line for democracy. It is not dead yet. For that, I hope you'll take a minute or two to breathe a small sigh of relief. But not too many minutes. The good fight ain't over yet. Not by a long shot...

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We try (though don't always necessarily succeed) to lighten things up a bit on today's BradCast, on the final day before our critical midterm Election Day on Tuesday and the rare Blood Moon eclipse that heralds its arrival after midnight tonight. [Audio link to full show is posted below this summary.]

After a weekend full of "experts" and TV pundits telling us that Democrats are going to face a bloodbath in both the House and Senate on Tuesday --- they might, though the TV pundits have no actual idea one way or another --- we open the phones to second opinions from listeners.

First, however, some quick items of note...

• PDiddie's latest weekly political toon collection at The BRAD BLOG helps speak for us today when it comes to who you should make damn sure to vote for in the midterms. Hint: Candidates who prefer democracy over autocracy would be a very smart place to start!

• In case you're wondering which candidates those might be, Washington Post offers a few hints today, as they round up some of the key lawsuits filed by Republicans hoping to disenfranchise voters in the critical battlegrounds states of Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin. The suits seek to toss out thousands of perfectly legitimate absentee ballots lawfully cast by legal voters.

• A screw-up admitted by election officials in Cobb County (Atlanta), Georgia resulted in more than 1,000 absentee ballots failing to go out to voters who requested them. A consent decree via a last minute lawsuit may help make up for some of those votes, with the judge allowing those voters to receive ballots by overnight mail and count them as long as they're cast by Election Day and arrive by November 14, as overseas and military voters are already allowed. A similar problem, however, appears to have occurred for some voters in DeKalb County for reasons still unknown. Though its still unclear how many are affected, they may end up being disenfranchised in the critical swing state.

• We cover a few other items of note today as we go, but as we're hoping to lighten things up for a change today and bring some "joy" before Election Day, we turn to callers to see if they agree with the overwhelming consensus of corporate media of late regarding which party will win majorities in the House and Senate on Tuesday. The professional media have been reporting all weekend long (and, really, for the last two or three weeks or so), that Dems will take a drubbing on Tuesday. They might, of course. But there does seem to be some mitigating evidence to that conclusion, including unusually robust early and absentee voting numbers in critical states. Numbers that outpace 2018, when Dems saw a "blue tsunami". Of course, who knows who those early voters are actually voting for. Callers ring in with their own thoughts in response to the pundits and who they think will end up capturing majorities in the two chambers of Congress on Tuesday. As with professional, highly paid corporate media pundits, there will be absolutely zero consequences for our "caller pundits" if they turn out to be wrong...

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Today on The BradCast, we continue our focus on next Tuesday's critical midterm elections by picking things up, somewhat, from our conversation on yesterday's program. [Audio link to full show is posted below.]

We were joined yesterday by longtime election and voting system expert Eddie Perez to discuss, among other things, what he has been writing about as the "manufactured chaos" that Republicans are creating to wreak havoc in the 2022 elections.

Today, we dive into broader details of that organized, manufactured chaos program that is emerging as a national strategy by the GOP to create enough havoc around the country to allow them a patina of "evidence" with which to challenge results of election outcomes they don't like.

A number of seemingly disparate efforts are actually now emerging as of a piece with a national strategy that you (and the Democrats and the media) need to know about before it all comes crashing down at once amid chaotic smoke and mirrors on Election Day and thereafter.

This is clearly an effort that echoes the less coordinated post-election chaos of 2020. Many of the same players are involved, including corrupt Trump attorneys John Eastman and Cleta Mitchell, as well as his convicted former aide Steve Bannon, the laughable billionaire pillow guy Mike Lindell, not to mention those in the far-right political media set to help execute the strategy as if it is legitimate, from Tucker Carlson on down.

The hope, as Josh Kovensky outlines at TPM today, is to sow the seeds of enough chaos to be able to create court cases and "thousands of sworn affidavits" (sound familiar?) to "credibly" point to (false) claims of "fraud" in virtually any election around the country next week, if and when they don't win it. "The chaos is the point," he writes.

We pull many of these threads together on today's program. One example is the seemingly isolated case of the campaign manager for Maryland's white nationalist Republican candidate for Attorney General who directed supporters at a rally last weekend to vote next Tuesday "as late in the day as possible," explaining that, "If everyone could stand in long, long lines at 6 o’clock, that would actually help us."

Then there are the door-to-door canvassers --- organized in part by folks like Eastman, Bannon, Lindell, Mitchell and others --- who, according to a Reuters report today, have been active in at least 23 states. They are dressing as if they are government officials --- sometimes armed and with badges --- intimidating voters with questions about who lives in their house, what their voting record is, etc. They appear to be collecting information to use to challenge voters on Election Day at the polls and/or in the post-election period, as required to create enough chaos to offer the appearance of fraud and/or uncertainty in the legitimacy of election results. And, yes, Fox "News" and the rest will be standing by to report all of these false accusations as if they are real.

Forewarned is forearmed, as they say. It's important that you --- not to mention the Democratic Party and everyone at legitimate media outlets --- understand what is going on before the fog of chaotic election war overwhelms all of us beginning next Tuesday.

In a not unrelated story today, we noted yesterday that AP has found more than 100 election lawsuits have already been brought this year related to the 2022 elections. Most have been filed by Republicans in efforts to make voting more difficult. We detailed several of those cases yesterday (in Pennsylvania, Arizona and Nevada). Today we discuss one filed in Illinois that seeks to invalidate lawful absentee ballots that are cast on or before Election Day but do not arrive until afterward, in the two week period allowed by state law. A Republican Congressman is suing to block the counting of those votes, even though they are lawfully cast ballots that could include tens of thousands cast by members of the U.S. military stationed overseas. The complaint was originally filed in May of this year. But the Trump-appointed federal judge overseeing the case has yet to rule on it, for some reason, with Election Day less than a week away. Chaos in waiting.

Also, since we quickly waved at these Trump accountability stories at the top of today's show, some links for more deets for ya:

• A judge has appointed an independent monitor to oversee Trump Organization finances in the civil fraud suit filed by NY A.G. Letitia James against Trump, his company and his three oldest kids.
• The NY criminal tax fraud case against the Trump Organization is now under way.
• Top Trump aide Kash Patel has been granted immunity to testify against him before a federal grand jury probing the documents Trump stole upon leaving the White House.
• Trump settled the lawsuit against him for ordering his security goons to beat up protesters in front of Trump Tower in 2015, as jury selection was underway in the case.

Finally, Desi Doyen joins us for our latest Green News Report with a whole bunch of climate related stories both good and bad as winter is coming...

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As another exhausting week wraps up on The BradCast, we've got a number of follow-ups today on several stories we've been covering throughout the week, and a few all-new reasons to be concerned about the critical upcoming midterm elections. [Audio link to full show is posted below this summary.]

Among the stories covered today...

• Newly-released footage from January 6, 2021 reveals then 80-year old Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi saying she wanted to "punch out" Donald Trump after he had sent insurrectionists to attack the U.S. Capitol. Tom Fitton, rightwing operative, conman and Trump henchman, is just outraged by that! Curiously, he is not at all outraged, by yesterday's House J6 Committee revelation that he wrote a speech for then President Trump, days before the 2020 election, instructing him to declare victory on Election Night --- whether he'd actually won or not --- and then demand the counting of all ballots immediately be stopped. "We had an election today, and I won," the memo suggested Trump declare, as detailed by Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-CA) on Thursday. The memo then instructed Trump demand only votes counted by the end of Election Day be allowed. That, of course, would disenfranchise millions of lawful American voters. The disgraceful Fitton serves as President of the far-right Judicial Watch activist nonprofit and reportedly also advised Trump that he was legally allowed to steal thousands of classified documents from the White House upon leaving office.

• Meanwhile, Trump's allies in Congress, lead by Republican Conference Chair Rep. Elise Stefanik of New York, are pretending to be furious that the bipartisan House Select Committee investigating Trump's insurrection and failed attempts to steal the 2020 election voted to subpoena the former President for documents and testimony on Thursday. House Republicans were so eager to demonstrate their clownish fury that they even attacked one of their own employees, as "just another liar and pawn in Pelosi's witch-hunt"...until they realized she worked them, and quickly deleted the tweet.

• Of course, there was Trump's own hilarious, 14-page response [PDF] to the subpoena (which has not actually been issued to him yet). Clearly written for his duped followers who he hopes haven't watched any of the J6 hearings, it offers his usual tired bogus claims and long-ago debunked nonsense to falsely insist (in all-caps, because that makes it extra true): "THE PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION OF 2020 WAS RIGGED AND STOLEN!" Will he actually answer the subpoena and testify under oath before the Committee? The cowardly liar failed to say as much.

• One of the millions of dupes who were dumb and incurious enough to buy into Trump's evidence-free claims that the 2020 election was stolen from him is a woman named Genevieve Peters. She helped encourage J6 protesters to attack the Capitol in D.C. on January 6, participated in other so-called "Stop the Steal" rallies, and hung around with the leader of the Proud Boys, according to social media posts that she has been furiously removing from her own Facebook page. She has now been hired by Macomb County, Michigan, its third most populous, to recruit and train pollworkers for the 2022 midterms.

• More than two weeks after Hurricane Ian made its devastating landfall in Florida, Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis finally issued an Executive Order [PDF] on Thursday expanding early voting and vote-by-mail in the state's three hardest hit counties (Lee, Charlotte and Sarasota). On Monday's BradCast, we discussed the delay in approving the plan sought by Lee County, home of Fort Myers, and others where Ian made landfall, with the now-retired, legendary 30-year Florida election official Ion Sancho, who was very worried about whether many Floridians would be able to vote at all this year. We checked back with Sancho to get his reaction to DeSantis' newly-issued EO. He lauds the plan for granting "the flexibility sought by the election officials in three of the most damaged counties," before noting that "Counties further inland had record flooding," leaving still-displaced citizens completely ignored by DeSantis' order. "The counties granted flexibility are heavily Republican," Sancho told me. "The hurricane hit counties further inland are much more Democratic leaning."

• Finally, Desi Doyen joins us for our latest Green News Report, with her usual mix of bad (more billion-dollar weather disasters than ever and wetter storms than ever) and good (an explosion of investment in renewable energy and EV manufacturing in the U.S., and Joe Biden's first declaration of a new national monument) news...

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IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Climate change is causing more billion-dollar weather disasters in the U.S.; When it rains, it pours more than ever before, new study confirms; Clean energy and EV manufacturers accelerate investment in America; PLUS: Biden establishes first national monument of his presidency... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

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IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): Researchers report staggering decline in wildlife; US law protecting endangered species is hampered by poor resources; Greenland Ice Sheet may be more vulnerable to climate change, study finds; Supreme Court wrestles with case on pigs, cruelty and commerce; Europe turns to Africa in a bid to replace Russian natural gas; New Zealand proposes taxing cow burps to reduce emissions; General Motors launches electric grid division; 'Steam loops' under many cities could be a climate change solution... PLUS: Arizona's clean energy future could swing on governor's race.... and much, MUCH more! ...

On today's BradCast we've got an excellent idea for Democrats, Republicans and everyone else who has any concerns about accurately reported election results in this year's critical midterm elections. [Audio link to full show follows below this summary.]

But, first up, a few thoughts on a Republican Party in dangerous decline and what at least some long-time GOPers are now doing to put country over party.

We start with the sad tale, frankly, of how the GOP is using and/or abusing Georgia's former football hero and clearly unstable U.S. Senate nominee Hershel Walker for grotesquely partisan political purposes, despite the costs to the man who had no business or qualifications being put up as a candidate for U.S. Senate in the first place. In a thoughtful Twitter thread this week, Illinois' Democratic Rep. Sean Casten worries that Walker is on "a trajectory that does not end well." He describes him as "just one in a long, tragic legacy of disposable black men" for the Republican Party. Even now, Casten notes, elected GOP officials who put him up for the job have no interest in his well-being if there is any hope he might defeat GA's incumbent Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock and help the party win a majority in the upper chamber of Congress.

There are some Republicans, however, who are proving to be much better than that. We are happy to laud some of them today, including Rep. Liz Cheney and (gasp!) Bill Kristol. Both are among a growing group of longtime GOPers who are not just calling out their party for the threat they now pose to American democracy itself, but are putting their money where their mouth is by actively supporting and endorsing pro-democracy Democratic candidates for office in battlegrounds like Pennsylvania, Michigan and Arizona --- and even in ruby-red states like Idaho.

"I don't know that I have ever voted for a Democrat, but if I lived in Arizona now, I absolutely would...for Governor and for Secretary of State," Cheney said last week at a McCain Institute event at Arizona State University. She supports the Democratic bids for Governor by Katie Hobbs and for Sec. of State by Adrian Fontes. "We cannot be in a position where we elect people who will not fundamentally uphold the sanctity of elections," Cheney explained, referring to GOP Gubernatorial nominee Kari Lake and SoS hopeful Mark Finchem, both of whom falsely claim the 2020 election was stolen from Donald Trump. If elected, both would be in a position to block state certification of a legitimate Democratic Presidential victory in 2024.

Of course, despite the complete lack of evidence to suggest that the 2020 election was stolen by anybody in any state, the lack of transparency and public oversight of our brittle and vulnerable computerized voting and tabulation systems makes it easy for charlatans to dishonestly claim otherwise.

We have long advised that voters show up to their local polling place at closing time in order to take photos and videos of the cash register-style poll tapes that are printed out by voting machines and optical scanners. They are supposed to be printed and publicly posted there at the end of the night. Public documentation of those records can be very helpful when compared to results eventually reported for those precincts by towns, counties and states.

A new smart phone app called Actual Vote makes that process much easier for voters of all parties or no party at all, promises our guest today, DANIEL WOLF, CEO of AmericaCounts.us, a non-profit tech company that developed the free app.

Wolf has been observing elections since 1984, when he was sent to research election systems in Nicaragua. He explains today how he was struck after the controversial 2004 Presidential election in Ohio when poll tapes from dozens of Counties went missing well before the 22 months they are required to be preserved under federal law. Comparison of contemporaneously printed results at the precinct on those tapes with final results reported later can be helpful in ferreting out fraud (either foreign or domestic) or simple programming errors. As importantly, this sort of oversight, he argues, can also offer confidence to the public that results were tabulated and reported correctly as per voter intent.

"If people took a picture of the [poll] tape in the past, the question was, 'Who do I send it to?," he explains. But Actual Vote, in addition to assisting in the recording of poll tapes, allows the user to press a button to send those videos to a secure public server, where they are posted and where analysts can transcribe their numbers and compare them to final results in key jurisdictions.

"Anything that pops out, we then would go back to the election administrators and say, 'Look, we found a discrepancy. What about it?'," Wolf details. "Most of those discrepancies are going to be resolved. But those that aren't resolved can then be looked at more deeply. And if they cannot resolve that, then it gives the candidate or anybody else who is concerned about that particular race the ability to go into court and say 'I have documented evidence of discrepancies in the results reporting'."

Wolf notes that while "laws vary" from state to state and jurisdiction to jurisdiction regarding the use of cameras at polling places, "once public information is posted in the public" after polls close, "you have a First Amendment right to take a picture of it."

His hope is that while Actual Vote could help surface fraud or simple error, broad use of the app may ultimately add confidence in election results for Republicans and Democrats alike, among whom he hopes to "ignite a war of mutual assured accountability."

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It's another 10-pound show in another 5-pound BradCast today. [Audio link to full show is posted below this summary.]

Among the many stories covered...

• A state police detective in Michigan, according to email obtained by Reuters, recommends criminal charges be brought against Stephanie Scott, a Republican Michigan township clerk, for yet another breach of yet another voting tabulator and for allegedly giving a database of confidential voter data to a fellow 2020 election conspiracist. The media outlet reports there have been at least 18 similar breaches or attempted breaches of voting systems across the country by sore loser election deniers, including 12 in MI alone. Separately, a state Special Prosecutor is currently investigating nine people "for an alleged conspiracy to gain unauthorized access to voting equipment in a case that involves alleged breaches across the state." One of those under investigation is the GOP's Attorney General nominee Matt DePerno.

• Speaking of 2020 election conspiracists, pillow salesman Mike Lindell's petition to the U.S. Supreme Court was rejected on Monday. He was seeking to challenge one of two defamation suits filed against him by a voting machine company, in this case, Dominion, which he baselessly accused of helping to steal the 2020 election from Donald Trump. Lindell had been hoping to change long-standing federal law regarding defamation suits brought by public figures. SCOTUS rejected him. So the previous ruling in the matter, by a Trump-appointed federal District Court judge in D.C., means that Dominion's $1.3 defamation suit against Lindell may now move forward to discovery and trial. (Along with several other defamation lawsuits against a bunch of Lindell's fellow GOP election fraudsters and rightwing media outlets.)

• Speaking of SCOTUS, Monday was the first day of their new term. It included oral argument in a case challenging the EPA's authority to regulate the waters of the United States under the Clean Water Act. It was also the first oral argument to feature the Court's newest member, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson. By all reports and audio evidence, she kicked ass. We detail the case and explain KBJ's awesome first day performance.

• Speaking of asses, Donald Trump filed an emergency request to SCOTUS on Tuesday, seeking their intervention in his dispute over hundreds of pages of stolen documents marked as classified that were retrieved by the FBI from Mar-a-Lago as part of the DoJ's criminal probe into the former President's apparent violations of the Espionage Act and other federal statutes. Trump's filing comes just days after a three-judge panel on the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals (featuring two Trump appointees), dismembered a lower court ruling by another Trump judge who is corruptly attempting to stall the investigation with her appointment of a Special Master to review the documents in question.

• Next up, the pathetic story that broke over the last 24 hours regarding Republican U.S. Senate nominee, former football hero and seemingly mentally unstable liar, Herschel Walker. He is running to unseat incumbent Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock in Georgia next month. On Monday night, The Daily Beast's Roger Sollenberger reported that Walker --- who is running, in no small part, on claims to oppose abortion in every instance, without exceptions for rape, incest or the life of the mother (which he called "excuses") --- paid for a girlfriend to have an abortion in 2009. Sollenberger appears to, literally, have the receipts to prove it. But, even as Walker was flatly denying the charges on Fox "News" on Monday night and vowing to sue The Daily Beast for defamation, one of his adult children lit up a Twitter storm with an astonishing rant, characterizing his father as a liar and hypocrite and anything but a "family man." Christian Walker charged, among many other things, that his father committed "atrocities" against his mom. She charged years ago, on CNN, that Walker held a gun to her head "and said he was gonna blow my brains out." Incredibly enough, prior to the hectic revelations of the last 24 hours, and despite a long list of proven lies told by Walker, the GOP nominee was virtually tied in pre-election polling with Warnock in GA, for reasons that, as we discuss, are difficult to even fathom.

• Finally, Desi Doyen joins us for our latest Green News Report, with updates on Hurricane Ian's catastrophic damage and death toll in Florida; Biden's visit to Puerto Rico in the wake of Hurricane Fiona; and the SCOTUS case heard on Monday challenging the EPA's power to enforce the Clean Water Act...

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On today's BradCast, we try to keep up with the damage caused both by Hurricane Ian and by the former President's team of fraudsters. [Audio link to full show follows below this summary.]

We begin with a quick update on the still-unfolding devastation of Ian in Florida. After having crossed back into the Atlantic, the storm has gained strength and hurricane status again. It is now aiming for another landfall, this time in South Carolina on Friday. After that, we check in with an old friend who rode the storm out this week in the Sunshine State.

We're joined today from southeast Florida by NICOLE SANDLER of The Nicole Sandler Show --- and, too-occasionally, of The BradCast, where she is kind enough to serve as our guest host from time to time. Nicole tells us she "got really lucky" this time, as she lives in one of the few areas of Florida which wasn't pummeled by a direct hit from Ian, though she reports it still got very wet and windy even where she is.

Naturally, in addition to the weather, we discussed the politics --- including the climate change politics (or, more aptly, the climate change denialist politics) --- of Florida Republicans like Gov. Ron DeSantis, who famously voted against federal aid for Superstorm Sandy when he first arrived as a freshman Congressman in 2013 "before Donald Trump plucked him from the back-bench of Congress where he wallowed in obscurity." What impact will Ian have on DeSantis' re-election hopes against his Democratic challenger this year, former Gov. Charlie Crist? It's too early to say, she notes, but "at least he's not bad-mouthing the President as he takes the money that President Biden has been so freely offering."

And what of Rep. Val Demings' challenge for Florida's U.S. Senate seat currently occupied by Marco Rubio? There is, of course, much to discuss with our old friend today, including the seven Republican U.S. House Members and one U.S. Senator from Florida who have, collectively, accepted more than a million dollars from fossil fuel industry donors, as they try to block the Securities and Exchange Commission from requiring public companies to reveal the financial risks that our climate crisis now poses to their businesses. DeSantis himself, whose own re-election campaign has taken more than $800,000 from the industry, has even gone so far, according to The Lever today, to "spearhead an initiative to bar his state from considering environmental factors such as climate risks in its investment of billions of dollars of retirement savings of teachers, firefighters, and other government workers."

Will this week's climate change-intensified storm change those politics in any way?

Then, from keeping up with Ian, we try to keep up with the attempts at legal accountability for Donald Trump's merry band of GOP "voter fraud" fraudsters. Among our related stories on that today...

• The election worker in Michigan who was charged this week with tampering with voting equipment after he was seen inserting a USB drive into an electronic pollbook system at the polls during the state's August primary.
• Disgraced trump attorney Sidney Powell saw her counter-suit against Dominion Voting Systems tossed by a Trump-appointed federal judge on Wednesday. Dominion is suing Powell in a $1.3 billion defamation suit. The company's complaint is moving forward. Powell's counter-complaint, as of Wednesday, is not.
• And, a federal judge (in this case, one appointed by Ronald Reagan), ruled that a defamation lawsuit against Fox "News" and its former host Lou Dobbs may move forward to the discovery phase. This week, the judge rejected a motion by Fox and Dobbs to toss the case filed against them by a Venezuelan businessman who Dobbs had accused of executing an "electoral 9/11" in 2020, falsely charging the man was somehow linked to Hezbollah and somehow rigged voting systems from both Smartmatic and Dominion to steal the election from Trump.

Next, Desi Doyen joins us for our latest Green News Report, with more on the widespread damage and records smashed by the climate change-fueled Hurricane Ian; a legislative crash and burn for Sen. Joe Manchin this week; a new criminal probe for CA's largest and most corrupt power utility; and the mysterious breaches of the Russian natural gas pipelines to Germany.

Finally, as if that's all not enough, some breaking news at the end of today's show. The wildly corrupt Trump-appointed judge overseeing the former President's attempt to quash the DoJ's criminal probe investigating thousands of documents he stole from the White House and stored at Mar-a-Lago, issued another insane ruling in Trump's favor. This time, she overruled the Special Master --- the chosen by Trump and appointed by her --- who had ordered Trump's attorneys to offer evidence to back up Trump's claims that documents were planted by the FBI and/or declassified by Trump before he took them from the White House. Judge Aileen Cannon also pushed back the deadline for Special Master Raymond Dearie to complete his work until mid-December, despite Dearie's plan to complete his review of the documents in question by mid-October...

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Apologies in advance for all of the encouraging news on today's BradCast! I'm sure things will be terrible and outrageous tomorrow. [Audio link to full show is below this summary.]

Among the many stories covered today, however...

• Joe Biden's approval rating spikes nearly 10 points in new AP/NORC polling.
• Retail sales grew yet again in August as unemployment falls yet again, finds new federal data.
• Biden Administration hashes out last minute deal between rail workers and companies to avert crippling rail strike.
• New York A.G. Letitia James reportedly rejects Trump's attempt to settle a fraud lawsuit against him, his company and maybe one of his kids (that she has yet to file.)
• Pillow magnate and election denier Mike Lindell's phone is confiscated by FBI in federal grand jury probe of unlawful Colorado voting system breach.
• Special Prosecutor is named to investigate Republican state Attorney General nominee Matt DePerno (and several other top GOPers) involvement in unlawful Michigan voting system breach.
• Instead of committing election fraud crimes after the 2020 election, under the guise of looking for them, Republicans might have looked a bit closer to home. Rensselear County, New York's Republican Election Commissioner is the latest GOP official to be arrested and charged for absentee ballot voting fraud in a sweeping federal probe.
• Finally, Desi Doyen joins us for our latest Green News Report, including a new U.N. warning that we are entering "uncharged climate territory"; Summer 2022 clocks in as the hottest ever recorded; Transitioning quickly to clean energy could save the world $12 trillion; and President Biden touts his historic climate bill and our new national EV charging network...

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Since I kept my whining about the endless heat wave out here in Southern California to a minimum for a change on today's BradCast, I'll do so here instead. The record heat continues. And with no air conditioning at BRAD BLOG World News Headquarters, I only have the strength to muster up some quick links to some of the many stories covered on today's show. Tune in for details! [Audio link to full show follows this summary.]

• Britain's longest reigning monarch, Queen Elizabeth II, is dead at age 96 after her 70-year reign.

• A new Reuters poll find a large majority of Americans (nearly 60%) regard Trump's MAGA movement as a threat to the nation's democratic foundations. But only about 25% of Republicans agree.

• Trump's sleazy former advisor, MAGA swami, and convicted federal criminal Steve Bannon is indicted on 6 criminal counts in New York for money laundering, conspiracy and fraud related to siphoning hundreds of thousands of dollars from the nonprofit "We Build the Wall" campaign. The campaign was supposedly created to construct some border wall between the U.S. and Mexico. Bannon and the group's founders promised they wouldn't take a penny. They lied. Bannon was pardoned by Trump on his last day in office for similar charges at the federal level brought by Trump's own Department of Justice.

• The federal grand jury investigating the January 6, 2021 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol has now reportedly widened its probe to include Trump's scammy Save America PAC. While the political action committee has raised more than $130 million from its duped donors, theoretically to contest the results of the 2020 election, most of the money has gone unspent or, apparently, into the pockets of Trump and his family.

• The same federal grand jury has also now subpoenaed Trump's 31-year old personal aide, William Russell, who worked with him at the White House and has continued to do so since the disgraced former President left office. He is very close to Trump. He likely knows a lot of stuff.

• CNN's investigative unit on Wednesday published a detailed, lengthy story on GOP leaders in Wayne County (Detroit), Michigan caught on video tape teaching pollworkers how to break the rules on behalf of Republicans. We share the version of the story from CNN's Drew Griffin which ran last night on the cable net.

• BREAKING mid-show: Michigan's Supreme Court will allow an initiative on this year's midterm ballot for a state Constitutional amendment that would protect abortion rights in the state. Republican members of the state canvassing board had blocked the proposal --- which had been supported by a record 750,000 signatures --- from the November ballot because, they claimed, there wasn't enough spacing between words on the petition. Seriously. That, after Republicans pretended to believe, following the corrupt Republican U.S. Supreme Court majority overturning Roe v. Wade earlier this summer, that reproductive rights should be decided by the people of the states.

• Finally, Desi Doyen joins us for our latest Green News Report, with news on the historic heat wave in the U.S. West; new threats by Russia to shut off energy exports to Europe; a massive climate change-fueled humanitarian crisis in Pakistan amid record flooding; and more...

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We were on this story very early. Happily, more and more of the corporate media are finally covering it. But they still do not seem to be fully grasping --- or, at least, reporting on --- what now appears to be Georgia's Republican Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger clearly covering up election related crimes carried out by Team Trump and the MAGA crowd. We've got new evidence to support that charge on today's BradCast, as Raffensperger runs against Democrat Bee Nguyen for re-election this fall, hoping to win the MAGA vote after previously refusing to help them steal the 2020 Presidential election. [Audio link to full show is posted below this summary.]

But first today, an update on the record heat wave still lashing much of the U.S. West for a second week. On Tuesday, amid record temps (the state's capital city topped out at 116 degrees!) electricity demand surged along with the possibility of blackouts in California. But, following a cell phone warning from public officials, state residents answered the call to reduce usage. Demand reportedly plunged in response. Blackouts averted. For now.

It may take a hurricane to end this seemingly endless heat wave (it's also of record duration) by week's end, even as "extremely critical" warnings of wildfire risks are issued in almost a dozen states from the U.S. Northwest to the upper Great Plains. Record temps and wind gusts of up to 60 miles per hour could slam several states this week amid tinder-dry conditions that could spark uncontrollable new fires. Some 54 million people are currently under heat warnings and advisories as our climate emergency worsens in late summer.

Meanwhile...on the other side of the nation, Massachusetts' Democratic Attorney General Maura Healey will face Trump-backed, election denying, abortion opponent Geoff Diehl in this November's race for Governor, as moderate Republican Gov. Charlie Baker has opted against seeking a third term in the otherwise very liberal state. That's one of several general election contests determined by voters during Tuesday's primaries in the commonwealth. Tune in for more noteworthy results ahead of next week's final primaries of the season in Delaware, New Hampshire and Rhode Island.

Then, yup, we're going back to Georgia...

Back in May, we broke the story of what appeared to be a very serious breach of voting system security in Georgia's rural, Republican-leaning Coffee County. The news was based on a recorded phone call from one of the participants in the breach, seemingly confessing to the crime or bragging about funding the scheme to make unlawful copies of Dominion Voting System's sensitive Election Management Software following the 2020 election. The call, from Atlanta businessman Scott Hall, was recorded by the plaintiff in a long-running lawsuit against GA Sec. of State Brad Raffensperger, seeking to force the state to move from 100% unverifiable touchscreen voting systems to verifiable hand-marked paper ballots.

That plaintiff was MARILYN MARKS, our guest once again today. She is a longtime election integrity champion and founder of the nonpartisan, nonprofit Coalition for Good Governance. After sharing that recorded phone call in May, she also joined us in June, after claims by Raffensperger that his office had been investigating the security breach at the Coffee County Board of Elections. In fact, as Marks noted at the time, she had been able to find no evidence whatsoever of an official probe by the Secretary's office into what we have now learned was part of a multi-state coordinated effort shepherded by Trump attorney Sidney Powell to make copies of voting systems software in Georgia, Michigan, Colorado and Nevada.

In at least the first three of those states, we now have evidence of MAGA sympathizers unlawfully creating hard drive images of voting systems, which were later released in various, dangerous ways to the public. As Marks points out today, law enforcement officials and Democratic Secretaries of State in Michigan and Colorado are carrying out serious criminal probes into the matter. Tina Peters, a Republican County Clerk in Mesa, Colorado, for example, has already been indicted on 10 criminal counts related to illegal hard drive copies. In Georgia, however, Raffensperger's office has either lied about their investigation or otherwise covered-up the entire matter.

That cover-up has now become considerably more difficult for Raffensperger, thanks to security camera surveillance footage subpoenaed by Marks in her federal lawsuit. On Wednesday, Washington Post, CNN and AP all ran detailed investigative stories on the Team Trump characters seen on video tape entering the Coffee County Board of Elections office on January 7, 2021 (the day after the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol), to scan and image hard drives and ballots. That, after several of those folks --- including the Chairs of both the Board of Elections and the County Republican Party --- appear to have lied about their involvement in the scheme during depositions in Marks' lawsuit.

Also discovered from that footage: Doug Logan, the CEO of the now-defunct Cyber Ninjas --- the outfit that ran the phony "audit" in Maricopa County, Arizona after the 2020 election, ultimately confirming that Joe Biden defeated Donald Trump in the state --- is seen entering the Coffee County Board of Elections over several different days, for hours at a time, for reasons still unknown.

Raffensperger's office, of course, could have obtained that security camera footage themselves at any time over the past year and a half, if they were really investigating this very serious breach. (Marks explains on today's show why it's so serious in advance of both 2022 and 2024!) And, while AP recently reported that Ryan Germany, the general counsel for the Secretary of State's office, claimed the office had opened an investigation into the matter in March this year, Raffensperger's top deputy, Gabe Sterling, appeared on a "Restoring Confidence in American Elections" panel at the Carter Center in Atlanta in April and denied anything happened in Coffee at all!

"We have claims, even recently, there was people saying 'We went to Coffee County and we imaged everything,'" Sterling said. "There's no evidence of that. It didn't happen."

Well, thanks to the newly obtained surveillance footage, we know Sterling was wrong. It did happen. And, surely Sterling would have known that by April, given that his office claimed to have begun their investigation a month earlier. Was he lying? Or did Raffensperger's top lieutenant just not know? "We do know he was not telling the truth," Marks politely notes today.

As to whether Raffensperger is carrying out a cover-up, she tells us, "It certainly doesn't look like a sincere effort to have a diligent investigation." She compares the situation to what's going on in Michigan and Colorado. "The Attorneys General and the state election officials went after the perpetrators who did that," Marks explains. "There's a special prosecutor with nine targets [in Michigan,] five of them are involved in Georgia. But none of them have been interviewed in Georgia." She charges that in Georgia, Raffensperger "does not seem to want to know --- the Secretary and the State Election Board --- neither seem to be terribly interested."

Oh, and at least one more critical point today: Raffensperger's office has finally opened some sort of investigation. How do we know? Because they have issued at least one subpoena in the matter...to Marilyn Marks!

She explains that and much more in our conversation today as the Coffee County Cover-Up continues to be uncovered, thanks to her.

Finally today, a step or two closer to at least some real accountability for Team Trump. Last week, former Trump aide Steve Bannon's motion for a new trial, after being convicted of two counts of Contempt of Congress, for failing to respond to a lawful subpoena from the House J6 Committee, was rejected by the judge. His sentencing is now scheduled for October 21.

And, more bad news for Bannon. On Wednesday, several media outlets are reporting that he has been indicted on fraud charges in New York, related to stealing at least a million dollars from the "We Build the Wall" scheme, which raised $25 million to build a bit of barrier on the U.S./Mexico border. He was charged federally for the same crime before being pardoned for it by Trump. He will reportedly turned himself over to authorities in Manhattan on Thursday, as the indictment is unsealed...

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On today's BradCast: Given the unprecedented breadth of the late-breaking news on Monday, we know remarkably little so far about what actually happened at Donald Trump's Florida estate and why it happened. Not that that has prevented anyone in these United States from speculating about it since then. [Audio link to full show is posted below this summary.]

The news of the FBI's Monday search of Mar-a-Lago literally broke about one second after we signed off from Monday's show and, like the rest of the nation, we've been trying to make sense of it ever since. But, before we get there today, a few other news items of note that are being buried under all of the rest of the news items of note.

Today was primary election day in Connecticut, Minnesota, Vermont and Wisconsin. Happily, so far, we've heard few reports of problems for voters at the polls. As usual, we'll have noteworthy results on tomorrow's show.

There are, however, several important results from last week's primaries in several states that were "called" by the media over the weekend, and some that are still too close to call. Most noteworthy is the weekend call for the GOP Gubernatorial nomination in Arizona, where far-right, Trump-endorsed 2020 election denialist and former TV news anchor Kari Lake was declared the winner. She'll now face off with Democratic nominee, Sec. of State Katie Hobbs in November. Like AZ's Republican nominee for Sec. of State, Mark Finchem --- and despite all counts and recounts confirming Joe Biden's victory there in 2020 --- Lake has said she wouldn't have certified the state's electors in 2020 for the guy who voters actually chose. That makes both her race for Governor and Finchem's for SoS among the most critical contests in the nation this November, in advance of the 2024 Presidential election. (Finchem will face the Democratic nominee, former Maricopa County Recorder Adrian Fontes in the SoS contest in the fall.)

The entire top of the ticket in Michigan is similarly perilous this year, with Republicans having nominated Trump-endorsed 2020 election deniers and conspiracy loons to take on all three Democratic incumbents for Governor, Attorney General and Secretary of State. Reuters, however, broke the exclusive news this week that the state's GOP Attorney General nominee, Matthew DePerno, "led a team that gained unauthorized access to voting equipment while hunting for evidence to support former President Donald Trump’s false election-fraud claims." That now places DePerno --- seeking to become the state's chief law enforcement officer --- squarely at the center of Democratic Attorney General Dana Nessel's criminal probe of several such incidents in MI following the 2020 election, as based on criminal referrals by Sec. of State Jocelyn Benson. It also means Nessel will now likely need to recuse herself and her office from probing her own November challenger. Over the weekend, at a CPAC rally in Dallas, Trump praised DePerno, ironically vowing that "he's going to make sure that you are going to have law and order and fair elections."

The reported unlawful breach of sensitive voting system software by DePerno is now added to a growing list of similar incidents across the country, such as Mesa County, Colorado Clerk, Tina Peters (who has been charged with 7 felonies and 3 misdemeanors related to her own election fraud related breach of her county's voting system software) and the GOP Board of Elections in Coffee County, Georgia (who allegedly allowed a similar breach of the voting system there, followed by an apparent cover-up of the incident by Georgia's Republican Sec. of State Brad Raffensperger.)

Then, we get to Trump's no good, very very bad week, as news broke this afternoon that a three-judge federal appeals court panel in D.C. decided unanimously that, yes, the U.S. House Ways and Means Committee may indeed have access to Trump's tax returns. This is part of a years-long legal battle, where Trump now has just two appeals options left.

But that problem likely pales in comparison for the disgraced former President to what happened at Trump's South Florida home on Monday, while he was in New York to give a sworn deposition to the state Attorney General, Letitia James, who is investigating him, his kids and his Trump Organization for tax, bank and insurance fraud.

As you've heard by now, the FBI, headed by Trump-appointee Christopher Wray, executed a warrant from a federal judge to search Mar-a-Lago. For what? We do not actually know, though there has been much reporting that it is related to Trump taking at least 15 boxes of Presidential Records, much of them reportedly highly classified, with him to Florida after leaving office.

Most of what we know about what happened Monday comes from either Trump himself or "sources" most likely very close to him, likely describing the matter in the best possible light for him. Trump himself was among the first to confirm the news of the search, misleadingly describing it as a "raid" and declaring Mar-a-Lago "under siege", thanks to "prosecutorial misconduct" and "the weaponization of the Justice System."

"Such an assault," he wrote in his lengthy statement, "could only take place in broken, Third-World Countries. Sadly, America has now become one of those Countries, corrupt at a level not seen before." Naturally, the entirety of the rightwing media and elected Republicans simply took his word for it, vowing to exact revenge on Attorney General Merrick Garland, Joe Biden and Democrats in general. Fox "News" headlined some of its fair and balanced coverage this way: "Raid on Trump's Mar-a-Lago home by Biden's politicized FBI means US now a third world country".

Today, we try to break down what is actually known and mostly still unknown about what happened; what kind of trouble Trump could potentially be in, based on the few known facts; and how he could easily prove his (clearly false) claims about it all by simply releasing the search warrant that he would now have, showing why law enforcement was able to obtain the warrant, what they were looking for, and what criminal laws there is "probable cause" to believe he has committed.

What we absolutely do know: This is either a blunder of historic proportions or, far more likely, a matter of monumental criminal importance. Investigators would have had to demonstrate serious probable cause evidence of a very serious crime under way or about to happen --- otherwise Wray, Garland and a federal judge would not all have signed off on the unprecedented action of issuing a warrant to execute a search of the home of a former President of the United States.

What we also now know (as we've been trying to tell you for some time): Garland appears to be doing his job and the walls are continuing to close in on our indescribably corrupt and criminal former President.

Finally, Desi Doyen joins us today for our latest Green News Report, with special coverage of the other biggest story of the week (now largely big-footed by the "siege" at Mar-a-Lago), Senate Democrats' long-overdue, unified passage of historic climate change legislation...

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Look at the faces in that photo. Those are the faces of people grappling to understand a profound truth that they simply had no idea about prior to Tuesday night. Those faces should serve as inspiration for every Democrat and/or progressive on the ballot in every race in all 50 states between today and November 8. And as a warning for every Republican.

On today's BradCast, selective, noteworthy, curated results --- or what is known about them, unofficial, incomplete or otherwise --- from Tuesday's primary elections in six states, Arizona, Kansas, Michigan, Missouri, Washington and Ohio. (And several problems for voters in Pinal County, AZ.) [Audio link to full show is posted below this summary.]

Of course, the biggest news from Tuesday, hands down, was the stunning landslide rejection of a state constitutional amendment in Kansas that would have allowed the state's Republicans to restrict and/or ban abortion rights. (That's what the folks in that photo were just learning about.) It was the first statewide vote on the matter anywhere in the nation since the newly extremist, far-right, radical, activist, corrupt, Republican U.S. Supreme Court majority overturned 50-years of Constitutionally protected rights and freedoms by striking down 1973's Roe v. Wade decision.

Even in the theoretically "conservative" state of KS, voters soundly rejected that proposed Amendment with their "NO" votes by a stunning 18 points over "YES" as of airtime. The "NO" vote did well in large and small, rural and urban, Democratic and Republican counties alike. Turnout, thanks to this measure --- in a midterm primary where Republicans assumed few would notice --- was enormous and at levels normally seen in Presidential primaries or even mid-term general elections in the recent past.

The question now is whether Democrats will finally have the confidence and courage to run on this issue, following the overturning of Roe in June, in every state in the country and for virtually every office on the ballot from Governor to Attorney General to District Attorney to County Sheriff to state Judge to state Supreme Court Justice. And, whether Democrats will be able to capitalize on Josh Marshall's "Roe and Reform" campaign that he's been pushing hard at Talking Points Memo, calling for a very specific promise to voters from Democrats on the federal level: Let us hold our House majority and give us two more seats in the Senate and we vow, come January 2023, to reform the Senate filibuster to codify the protections of Roe into federal law, guaranteeing privacy rights and reproductive freedom in all 50 states.

Nothing short of that very specific "You give us that, we'll give you this" promise will do, as Josh has smartly been explaining for weeks now. We have long argued ourselves that candidates must give voters something very clear and specific to vote for. When they do, as proven on Tuesday in Kansas --- where the stakes were crystal clear, and voters knew exactly what they would get from their one single vote --- they will respond in large numbers.

Of course, all of this also further underscores the argument I've been making for months that Democrats and progressives must ignore the "conventional wisdom" from so-called political professionals about the historical odds of impending doom this November. These are decidedly UNconventional times, proven once again in KS yesterday.

Beyond that very encouraging news on Tuesday, there was still more good news in both the Secretary of State and Attorney General races in KS; Somewhat disappointing news in the MO race to fill the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by retiring Republican Sen. Roy Blunt; Potentially concerning news out of MI's Republican gubernatorial contest, where a well funded, Trump-backed loon will run against the state's popular Democratic Governor; And wildly troubling news out of AZ on the Republican side in the contests for the Gubernatorial and Sec. of State nominations, in what could turn out to be two of the most critical races in the nation this November.

All of that and many other races covered and explained, with context, on today's busy show.

Finally, we close with some tragic news on the death this afternoon of Indiana's 58-year old Republican Congresswoman Jackie Walorski and two of her young staffers in an automobile accident. And, some pleasant thoughts following the passing on Tuesday night of Hall of Fame broadcasting legend Vin Scully at age 94. He served as the inimitable and nationally recognized voice of Dodger baseball --- in both Brooklyn and Los Angeles --- for 67 incomparable years...

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In our opinion, on today's BradCast, the scaled back, surprise "Build Back Better" spending bill compromise (now renamed the "Inflation Reduction Act" to help win over West Virginia's rightwing Democratic Senator) comes not a moment too soon. And, even "scaled back", it's still chocked full of so much stuff that if each of its provisions were passed in separate bills over the past 18 months, we'd likely be discussing Joe Biden as having one of the most successful first two years of any President in history. That said, the bill has not yet been passed, and it could still be a very bumpy ride in the coming days to see it through to the President's signature. [Audio link to full show is posted below this summary.]

Before we get to that today --- and some callers on same --- a few other headlines covered on today's show...

• Minutes before airtime, news broke that the U.S. killed Al-Qaeda leader Ayman Al-Zawahiri in Afghanistan over the weekend in a successful drone strike, in which no civilians are said to have been killed. President Biden was to give remarks about what happened on Monday evening.

• Speaking of Biden, he tested positive for COVID again over the weekend, in what White House officials are describing as a "rare rebound" case after finishing his 5-day course of the anti-viral drug called Paxlovid. Well, it can't be ALL that rare, because last week, when the White House announced Biden had tested negative and was cleared to leave isolation, we warned about the possibility of such a rebound, as many Paxlovid users have experienced same. The Pfizer drug has very good results at preventing serious cases and hospitalization, but many patients have experienced a second --- non-fatal --- COVID infection shortly after using it. That is, apparently, the case with Biden. His White House doctor says he has few if any symptoms and will likely be fine, despite needing to isolate again.

• Deadly flash flooding continues in parts of Kentucky today, and warnings for more of the same have been issued for the next several days from Tennessee to Kentucky to West Virginia to Virginia and North Carolina. 37 have so far been confirmed to have died from the horrific flooding in Eastern Kentucky. Governor Andy Beshear believes that toll will continue to rise, as hundreds are still unaccounted for in a number of Appalachian mountain towns after recent, and ongoing, deluges. That, as our climate emergency continues with record heat predicted again this week from the Dakotas to the East Coast.

• On Tuesday, voters will head to the polls in six states: Ohio, Arizona, Kansas, Michigan, Missouri and Washington state for primary elections. And there are a lot of 2020 election deniers (and worse) on the GOP ballots. We quickly preview just a few of those insane races today and will have noteworthy reported results, of course, on Wednesday's program.

Then, it's on to the so-called Inflation Reduction Act --- a scaled down version of the Build Back Better Act that Democratic Senators Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema killed last year. If successfully adopted this time, it would increase federal revenue by some $750 billion over the next ten years, allowing for some $450 billion in spending on a bunch of several long-overdue programs. Most of them have been progressive priorities for years.

Only Democrats in the U.S. Senate will be needed to pass it under Senate reconciliation rules, but all 50 will have to be there (not out with COVID) and vote yes. Sinema has yet to comment on the measure, even as Manchin has been taking to media over the weekend to try and sell her on it.

If passed, the 725-page measure [PDF] will: Allow Medicare to negotiate with pharmaceutical companies for lower drug prices; Cap out-of-pocket spending on prescription drugs for seniors at $2,000 per year; Expand federal subsidies for premiums for individuals who purchase health insurance on the federal Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) exchanges; Set a minimum 15% tax for corporations who make more than $1 billion in profits per year; Increase policing of tax cheats; and, perhaps most critically, invest some $369 billion in climate and energy projects to cut deadly greenhouse gas emissions by 40% by 2030 through investments that hasten the nation's move from dirty fossil fuels to clean, renewable energy.

What the bill won't do is raise taxes on anyone making less than $400,000 a year, as Biden has long promised. That, despite blatant lies from Republicans such as Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn (R-TX) who, when announcing he tested positive for COVID today, lied about the bill, declaring on Twitter that he will "continue to fight Chuck Schumer and Joe Manchin's massive tax increase on working families." That is a lie. There is no "massive tax increase on working families" in the bill. Republicans hope you are dumb enough to be duped to the contrary.

In order to win over Manchin, whose family and campaign have long been propped up by fossil fuel interests, the bill does mandate oil and gas lease sales on federal lands be auctioned off in exchange for the approval of on- and off-shore wind and solar projects. Even there, however, oil and gas companies will be required to pay higher royalties on whatever they extract, and will be fined for failing to prevent methane leaks that exacerbate global warming. So, yeah. Art of the compromise. But, according to most climate experts we've read, heard from or spoken with, it's a compromise well worth taking..and comes not a moment too soon, as our climate emergency worsens by the day.

We've got much more on all of the above on today's show, and we open up the phone lines to callers to get some of their thoughts on the "Inflation Reduction Act" as the world melts down, and the 2022 primary general election is now less than 100 days away...

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