Although I didn't reference Adam Schiff's remarks from just two weeks ago during the impeachment trial on the "the normalization of lawlessness," about which he presciently warned "that way madness lies". But, upon reflecting on today's BradCast, it seemed an appropriate headline. It was only one week ago that corrupt and cowardly Senate Republicans had the chance to remove Trump from office, but acquitted him instead with the message to continue breaking the law and shredding the Constitution.It was just one week before that when Schiff warned: "What we have seen over the last couple days is a descent into Constitutional madness." This week has made that madness seem like child's play. [Audio link to show follows below.]

These are dark times. Growing darker by the day. But we can't turn away, as much as we might like to right now. Now is the time to step forward and help ourselves --- help each other --- back into the light. It won't be easy. But we must. And we do what we can, once again, towards that end on today's program. Among the stories covered today...

• An vengeful, bitter, out-of-control Trump turns his ongoing Twitter attacks from federal Justice Department prosecutors working on the case against his friend and convicted felon Roger Stone onto the foreperson of the jury that convicted him;

• A witness in the trial who was threatened by Stone (who was convicted of witness tampering and lying to Congress, among his seven counts), has pleaded for no jail time for the longtime GOP dirty-trickster, but has also now stepped forward to call out Trump's attacks on the four prosecutors who quit the case in protest as a "vile smear job" by the President;

• Trump's former Chief-of-Staff, Marine Corps General John Kelly, calls out Trump for his wrathful firing of decorated Iraq War vet Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman from his post on the National Security Counsel because Vindman dared answer a lawful subpoena to testify truthfully to Congress about Trump's unlawful bribery campaign against Ukraine. Kelly argues Vindman should be respected, not attacked, for refusing to follow "an illegal order" from the President. "We teach them," Kelly said, "‘Don’t follow an illegal order. And if you’re ever given one, you’ll raise it to whoever gives it to you that this is an illegal order, and then tell your boss.'" The legal defense by Nazi soldiers that they were just following orders, whether unlawful or not, failed at the Nuremburg Trials. But perhaps Trump disagrees with that verdict too. In response, Trump attacked Kelly, tweeting that he was "over his head" as CoS, couldn't be fired "fast enough", and that Kelly has a "military and legal obligation" to "keep his mouth shut." The Nazi's defense attorneys would be very proud of this President;

• But how do we get out of this dark mess and reverse the madness? There is only one way left that I'm aware of, which is why I have spent so many years fighting for the right to vote and for publicly overseeable voting systems. After about 10 lonely years warning specifically about the development of the new, 100% unverifiable "VSAP" touchscreen voting system set for first-time use in Los Angeles County in the March 3rd Super Tuesday primary, I've finally received a bit of help in those warnings of late from the corporate media. Last week, it came from an investigative report by CBS-2 Los Angeles (in which I appear). This morning, it came from a new investigative report on L.A.'s dangerous new systems from Cynthia McFadden, as previewed on NBC's Today show. We share that report today, along with advice on how to overcome the dangers presented by the new, $300,000,000 boondoggle of a voting system coming to the nation's most populous jurisdiction, as well as how to do the same in other states and counties (including battlegrounds like Georgia, Philadelphia, parts of Texas and elsewhere) where voters will be forced to vote on similarly unverifiable touchscreen systems at the polls in this year's never-more-critical Presidential election;

• Oh, and we have a few more observations on the New Hampshire primary turnout which we couldn't get to yesterday, but which are still worth taking note of today, as we all move forward to the next primaries and caucuses;

• Finally, Desi Doyen joins us with the latest Green News Report, with some seemingly genuinely good --- and very surprising --- news from a major fossil fuel company, that almost, if not entirely, helps us forget about the much-less-good news in the rest of today's GNR and, for that matter, today's BradCast!...

Download MP3 or listen to complete show online below...

MONTHLY BRAD BLOG SUBSCRIPTION	ONE-TIME DONATION
Choose monthly amount... $10 : $10.00 USD - monthly$20 : $20.00 USD - monthly$50 : $50.00 USD - monthly$100 : $100.00 USD - monthly	(Snail mail support to "Brad Friedman, 7095 Hollywood Blvd., #594 Los Angeles, CA 90028" always welcome too!)

IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Oil giant BP announces major shift to cut its emissions; Sea level rise is accelerating in the U.S., especially on the East Coast; Get used to record-breaking heat, because it's here to stay; PLUS: House Republicans unveil their version of climate legislation... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

Got comments, tips, love letters, hate mail? Drop us a line at GreenNews@BradBlog.com or right here at the comments link below. All GNRs are always archived at GreenNews.BradBlog.com.

IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): Trump’s Biggest Vulnerability Is His Climate Change Denial.; Sea Level Rise Is Accelerating globally, 4 Inches Per Decade (or More) by 2100; Ancient Antarctic ice melt caused extreme sea level rise 129,000 years ago – and it could happen again; The fastest way to cut carbon emissions is a ‘fee’ and a dividend; Cross-State Air Pollution Causes Significant Premature Deaths in the U.S.; Revealed: big oil's profits since 1990 total nearly $2 trillion... PLUS: ‘We Knew They Had Cooked the Books’: The Trump administration’s attempt to kill one of America’s strongest climate policies has been a complete debacle... and much, MUCH more! ...

As usual, we cover far too much on today's BradCast, as New Hampshire voters head to the polls for their first-in-the-nation primary today. Full reported results from NH tomorrow, of course. [Audio link for today's show is posted below.]

Among those too many things covered today...

• We start with some common sense news out of Nevada, where state Democrats, after the Iowa Caucus disaster, have decided to use hand-marked paper ballots for early voting in the state's upcoming February 22nd caucuses. However, they will still be relying on a vulnerable, online iPad tool to record sign-ins (albeit with paper backup, so there's that);

• On Monday night, the eve of the New Hampshire primary, Donald Trump rallied in the Granite State by lying to supporters about voter fraud there, and by taking a small page from the disgraced Chris Christie's New Jersey "BridgeGate" scandal. Trump's Secret Service detail, according to campaign officials, made it difficult for Democratic candidates and their supporters to get around the state's largest city. Given that Republican Senators recently gave a thumbs up for Trump to cheat in the 2020 election with their "not guilty" votes at the end of last week's Impeachment Trial, nobody should be surprised he is now doing so;

• But there was some very good news for Bernie Sanders from a national Quinnipiac poll on Monday night, revealing the Vermont Senator vaulting into first place ahead of Joe Biden for the first time. We also review a number of other interesting findings for the survey suggesting good news for Sanders, along with a warning that those are national numbers, in a nation that runs state-by-state elections instead. Just ask Hillary Clinton;

• As he gains momentum, Sanders is also being forced to defend his identity as a "democratic socialist" and his support for programs such as Medicare for All and the Green New Deal. Republicans (and even some Democrats) are hoping to disparage Sanders with those charges, from which he does not shy away;

• At the same time, Trump and friends and family are attempting to sow discord among Democrats by claiming that the DNC is rigging the election against Sanders, hoping they'll convince Sanders' supporters to sit out 2020 if he is not the nominee;

• At the same time, Republicans in South Carolina are reportedly urging their own supporters to vote for Sanders in the state's upcoming February 29 primary, since the state GOP cancelled their own primary there as a gift to Donald Trump. The theory, also floated publicly by Trump himself, is that they'd love to run against Sanders this November because, they'd like you to believe he will be easy to beat;

• And, just to the north, a mysterious group calling themselves the "Faith and Power PAC" is playing a similar game, by spending nearly $2.5 million to support a progressive state Senator for the Democratic U.S. Senate nomination in North Carolina's March 3rd Super Tuesday primary. The new group appears to be tied to Republicans and the candidate they are running ads for, state Senator Erica D. Smith [pictured above right], is currently running behind the centrist D.C. Dem-supported Cal Cunningham in the contest to win the Dem Senate nomination to run against vulnerable Republican incumbent Sen. Thom Tillis this fall. The TV spot purporting to be on behalf of Smith, highlights her support for Medicare for All, the Green New Deal, and other progressive policies making her "one of us", as the ad claims. (We interviewed Smith on The BradCast late last year, as she was demanding hand-marked paper ballots for North Carolina);

• We're joined today by North Carolina's DR. WILLIAM BUSA of the progressive political data consulting firm EQV Analytics to discuss all of the dirty tricks in the Carolinas. Busa, who previously worked for state Senator Smith and writes as "DocDawg" at DailyKos, suggests this mysterious group of Republicans may have made a miscalculation in their attempt to monkey-wrench the Democratic Senate primary race in his state. He also explains how they may have committed fraud in their FEC filing. He shares his insight on the curious NC ad buy and the question of whether Republicans are really interested in running against progressives like Sanders and Smith because they believe they will be easy to beat this November, or because they want Democratic voters to BELIEVE progressives will be easy to beat. "Is this eleventy-dimensional chess or is this Tic-Tac-Toe that they're playing?," Busa asks. "I'm not entirely sure which it is, but I don't think it's eleventy-dimensional chess." We've got a lot to unpack in that conversation today!

• Finally, Desi Doyen joins us for our latest Green News Report, with good news and bad Down Under, unquestionably bad news for bumblebees and Antarctica (and, by extension, for all of us) and the interesting way that Democrats raised the issue of climate change during last Friday's Presidential Debate in New Hampshire...

See? Told you we covered too much! Enjoy!...

Download MP3 or listen to complete show online below...

MONTHLY BRAD BLOG SUBSCRIPTION	ONE-TIME DONATION
Choose monthly amount... $10 : $10.00 USD - monthly$20 : $20.00 USD - monthly$50 : $50.00 USD - monthly$100 : $100.00 USD - monthly	(Snail mail support to "Brad Friedman, 7095 Hollywood Blvd., #594 Los Angeles, CA 90028" always welcome too!)

IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Good news and bad news in Australia, as destructive storms extinguish catastrophic wildfires; Bumblebees are disappearing, because of climate change; Antarctica hits record 65 degrees; PLUS: Climate change through the lens of trade, at the latest 2020 Democratic debate... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

Got comments, tips, love letters, hate mail? Drop us a line at GreenNews@BradBlog.com or right here at the comments link below. All GNRs are always archived at GreenNews.BradBlog.com.

IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): Climate is on the ballot in New Hampshire; Trump is blowing up a national monument in AZ to make way for his border wall; Trump proposes deep energy, environmental cuts; So-called ‘negative emissions’ might actually work, at least in California; Police arrest 33 indigenous protesters opposing Canada gas pipeline; CNBC's Jim Cramer: Fossil Fuels aren’t a very good investment; Tropical forests losing ability to absorb CO2, study says; Get used to record-breaking heat because it’s here to stay... PLUS: Aridification is Australia's new normal... and much, MUCH more! ...

On today's BradCast: With media reports on Thursday that online "Trump trolls" were making hundreds of calls to tie up the Iowa Democratic Party's results hotline after Monday's Caucuses in order to hold up results and embarrass Democrats, we're joined for an exclusive interview today with stakiomeone who knows a thing or two about such plots. [Audio link to show is posted below.]

In 2002, ALLEN RAYMOND, a then decade-long Republican operative and owner of a GOP phone-bank company, was hired to lead a scheme to tie up the Democratic Get Out the Vote phone lines during that year's very tight New Hampshire U.S. Senate race between Republican John Sununu and the state's then-Governor, Democrat Jeanne Shaheen. The now-infamous scandal, which included thousands of automated phone calls to prevent Dems from carrying out their GOTV phone-banking effort, ended with a narrow win by Sununu that year. But the scheme was uncovered and four GOP operatives, were eventually convicted of, or pleaded guilty to, taking part in the RNC-funded effort. Raymond was one of them. He pleaded guilty and ended up serving 3 months in federal prison. In 2008, the contrite former operative published a book about that exploit and others during his time as a senior consultant to the Party called How to Rig an Election: Confessions of a Republican Operative.

Raymond joins us today to discuss the 2002 plot in NH, how it came about, and what was behind it, as well as to offer his thoughts about what we should know regarding whatever may have happened to the Democratic Party's hotline on Monday night in Iowa. He is skeptical about whether a few "trolls" on a popular rightwing Internet message board could effectively tie up enough lines to create the kind of chaos that ensued in Iowa, suggesting that its possible the scheme may be larger than currently reported.

"That takes a fairly sustained, collaborated, concerted effort," he explains. "So the question it raises in my mind is, can that happen organically?" Without making any allegations, he is calling for an immediate law enforcement investigation which he says should be able to quickly uncover the source of the phone harassment, the same felony for which he pleaded guilty to years ago in the RNC's NH scheme. "It raises enough suspicion of a coordinated effort that it's worth looking at."

It wouldn't be the first time in even recent months that an emboldened RNC has carried out a similar phone scheme against Democrats. As the New York Times reported last November, Republicans attempted to swamp Congressional Democratic phone lines with thousands of automated calls during the early stages of Donald Trump's impeachment inquiry.

Raymond also shares his thoughts on what has become of the Republican Party in recent years since he was thrown under the bus when the NH plot was uncovered (he is now a registered Democrat); how he and other political operatives justify such dirty tricks and/or illegalities when taking these kind of unsavory and/or unlawful actions in order to win elections; and what American voters should be concerned about as the 2020 election progresses under a Republican Party headed by a vengeful, recently-impeached President.

"This phone disruption effort occurring in the very first contest of the presidential nominating process leading up to November's general election, should be reason enough" to be concerned, he tells me. "If it's happening on the first one, and nothing's done, we're sending a signal that this is the new norm, it's okay, that you will not be punished or prosecuted for this kind of conduct. That's why, at minimum, an aggressive investigation should occur to determine what exactly happened, for the purposes of protecting against the same conduct in the future. Because by not prosecuting, by not investigating, the signal is being sent: 'Hey, we all agree that that stinks but that's okay, go ahead and do it because law enforcement is not going to come knocking on your door.'"

"A republic's center of gravity is its electoral process," Raymond warns. "And if our electoral process is compromised --- whether it be from domestic actors or foreign actors --- that's reason enough to do whatever you can to protect it."

Please tune in for this full, fascinating conversation with someone who has quite a bit of insight on many aspects of all of these matters.

Also on today's show: With the New Hampshire primary days away, AP announces that the chaotic results of Monday in Iowa will prevent them from calling a winner in the Democratic Caucuses, but that doesn't stop us from doing so; Antarctica hits an all-time record 65 degrees, underscoring, yet again, the need to replace a President who is a menace not only to the country's future, but to the entire planet's; Trump fires patriotic Iraq War vet and National Security Counsel Ukraine expert Lt. Col. Alex Vindman and his million-dollar donor EU Ambassador Gordon Sondland for testifying truthfully during the U.S. House Impeachment inquiry; and Steven Colbert has a few thoughts about Sen. Mitt Romney (R-UT)'s courage and unprecedented vote against Trump in this past week's Senate Impeachment trial...

Download MP3 or listen to complete show online below...

MONTHLY BRAD BLOG SUBSCRIPTION	ONE-TIME DONATION
Choose monthly amount... $10 : $10.00 USD - monthly$20 : $20.00 USD - monthly$50 : $50.00 USD - monthly$100 : $100.00 USD - monthly	(Snail mail support to "Brad Friedman, 7095 Hollywood Blvd., #594 Los Angeles, CA 90028" always welcome too!)

On today's BradCast: We dispatch with the dark, ugly post-impeachment bitterness of our completely unfit and totally guilty President as quickly as possible at the top of today's show, along with a word or two about Mitt Romney's commendable, historic courage. Then it's on to looking forward to how Americans must remove this dangerous man from office, even as we all must surmount seemingly impossible odds with our nation's terrible, dangerous, nontransparent voting systems in 2020. [Audio link to show follows below.]

On that score, first up, CBS-2 in Los Angeles ran an investigative report this week, featuring yours truly, on the County's new, unverifiable, $300,000,000 touchscreen voting system. We share the report from CBS-LA's David Goldstein in full, along with some additional thoughts, including the eerie similarities between comments in the CBS report from L.A. County's Registrar Dean Logan, who developed the new VSAP ("Voting Solutions for All People") system, on his strong confidence in the first-time use of this new system before the March 3rd Super Tuesday primary, and those from an interview with the Iowa Democratic Party Chair Tom Price on the night before the Iowa Caucuses about his own confidence in the party's new, secretly-developed smartphone app that failed so disastrously the next day.

Then, speaking of Iowa, several reports on Thursday confirm that there was an apparent effort by Trump supporting trolls to jam the phone lines used as the backup for precinct officials to phone in caucus results when the IDP's smartphone app had failed. That element of the story is eerily similar to the 2002 GOP phone-jamming scandal during a U.S. Senate election in New Hampshire that year. Four Republican operatives hired by the party were convicted in a criminal scheme and the party had to pay NH Dems $125,000 in damages afterward. How does that tie to what happened in Iowa? We hope to report more on that on tomorrow's BradCast. But for now, we hope it serves as a reminder that Russia is not the only threat to the integrity of U.S. elections. Not by a long shot.

Today we've got more new, and still-partial (97%), results out of Iowa, showing Pete Buttigieg and Bernie Sanders in a virtual tie, with Buttigieg barely leading in state delegates at the moment (3 out of several thousand divvied up between candidates) and Sanders winning in the raw vote counts in both the first and final rounds of voting on Caucus night. Controversy around the reported numbers, as chaotic and error-ridden as it has been, is actually a good thing, as we explain, given that publicly-witnessed, precinct-based counts (with hand-marked paper ballots to boot) are available from all 1,765 caucus sites. That means, when incorrect numbers have been posted to date, the public has been able to scrutinize and force corrections to those numbers, as has been the case in several instances across the state.

It should also be noted that, despite claims from supporters of some candidates, there is no evidence so far to suggest that any of the errors in reporting were meant to help or harm any particular candidate. As the NYTimes reports tonight, "Some of these inconsistencies may prove to be innocuous, and they do not indicate an intentional effort to compromise or rig the result. There is no apparent bias in favor of the leaders Pete Buttigieg or Bernie Sanders, meaning the overall effect on the winner’s margin may be small."

We go over some of those claims as well today. While some are viewing all of this as chaos and failure, we see it as a victory for PUBLIC OVERSIGHT OF ELECTION RESULTS. Public oversight is generally missing in jurisdictions where computers tally votes (which is to say, in all 50 states) leaving the public often entirely unable to verify results of their own elections. Similar errors occur in virtually every election, but due to the nature of secret counting in most locations, the public rarely learns about or notices them and erroneous results are rarely corrected. That, of course, was what we shamefully saw (or, rather, didn't) in Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania after the stunning reported end to the 2016 Presidential election.

Now, ironically enough, a furious National Democratic Pary chair is demanding a recanvass of results in Iowa. But where were those same Dems after 2016 when they decided to not challenge or scrutinize any of the dubious numbers from the most surprising Presidential election results in U.S. history?

Finally, we close with Desi Doyen and our latest Green News Report, with more debunkery of Trump's lies about energy at this week's SOTU, some bad news about January's record heat, and some very good news about the scheduled ban on gasoline-powered cars in Great Britain!...

Download MP3 or listen to complete show online below...

MONTHLY BRAD BLOG SUBSCRIPTION	ONE-TIME DONATION
Choose monthly amount... $10 : $10.00 USD - monthly$20 : $20.00 USD - monthly$50 : $50.00 USD - monthly$100 : $100.00 USD - monthly	(Snail mail support to "Brad Friedman, 7095 Hollywood Blvd., #594 Los Angeles, CA 90028" always welcome too!)

IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Trump misleads again on U.S. energy in his State of the Union address; Democrats focus on rebuilding the country in their response; Congratulations! You just lived through the hottest January on record!; PLUS: Britain accelerates its ban on gasoline cars... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

Got comments, tips, love letters, hate mail? Drop us a line at GreenNews@BradBlog.com or right here at the comments link below. All GNRs are always archived at GreenNews.BradBlog.com.

IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): New conservative climate plans are neither conservative nor climate plans.They are mainly designed to protect fossil fuels; Benzene emissions of ten refineries exceed EPA limits; U.S. House Democrats propose nationwide EV charging network; Canadian court clears the way for Trans-Mountain pipeline expansion; Japan races to build new coal plants, despite climate; VA lawmakers vote to ban offshore drilling... PLUS: A remedy for toxic algal blooms? Scientist thinks he's found one... and much, MUCH more! ...

Day two --- the final day --- of the Questions phase in the Senate Impeachment Trial of Donald John Trump was perhaps best characterized by lead House Manager Adam Schiff on Thursday, when he described the new defenses offered by the White House Counsel's team as "a descent into Constitutional madness" and "the normalization of lawlessness." Those comments were echoed by the former chair of the Federal Election Commission, who joins us on today's BradCast. She called Trump's new line of defense as "insane". [Audio link to show is posted at bottom of article.]

On Wednesday, the first day of written Questions from the U.S. Senators, as read to both legal teams by the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, Trump's defense attorney Alan Dershowitz made an extraordinary argument: "If a President does something which he believes will help him get elected, in the public interest, that cannot be the kind of quid pro quo that results in impeachment." He went on to offer an analogy. "If a hypothetical President of the United States said to a hypothetical leader of a foreign country, 'unless you build a hotel with my name on it, and unless you give me a million dollar kickback, I will withhold the funds'." That, he said, would be an "easy case" and "purely corrupt". However, he continued, a more complex case was one where a President says: "I want to be elected. I think I'm a great President. I think I'm the greatest President there ever was and if I'm not elected the national interest will suffer greatly. That cannot be an impeachable offense."

In other words, he seemed to argue, it's just fine for a President to solicit a foreign power for help in an election (which is a violation of the law), so long as he or she believed it was in the best national interest for him or her to be elected. Dershowitz has spent a lot of time since those remarks, on Twitter and elsewhere, attempting to defend himself by saying that he did not say what he said. But he absolutely did say it, and so we share audio of some of his extended argument saying as much today, so you can hear it for yourself.

It wasn't the only way in which Trump's team of defense counselors moved the goal posts to accommodate his well-documented Abuse of Power, the basis for the first Article of Impeachment against him. Deputy White House Counsel Patrick Philbin on Wednesday astonishingly charged that "mere information" about a political opponent, even from a foreign source, "is not something that would violate the campaign finance laws."

“Apparently it’s okay for the President to get information from foreign governments in an election," House Impeachment Manager Zoe Lofgren responded with alarm. The California Democrat who worked on the Judiciary Committee during the Nixon Impeachment added, "That's news to me!" The new lines of argument from the President's team is what led Schiff to charge Trump's defense has become "a descent into Constitutional madness," adding "that way madness lies," before citing a similar, then-rejected defense from Richard Nixon who claimed "when a President does it, it's not illegal," before he eventually resigned the Presidency in disgrace. "Have we learned nothing in the last half century?," asked Schiff in response to Dershowitz today.

We share all of those assertions and counter-assertions today, before we turn to someone with no small amount of authority on all of this, ANN RAVEL, who served four years on the Federal Election Commission and as its Chair for two years before leaving her post in 2017. Prior to that, she chaired a similar state commission overseeing campaign finance matters in California.

"There are so many things wrong with [Dershowitz'] argument it's hard to know where to start," she tells me, charging that the claim that a quid pro quo is "somehow justified because it's important for the nation is ridiculous. It would be like saying, for any elected public official, that because it's so important for them to be re-elected that they can commit any criminal act. That's not what the framers of the Constitution intended with regard to the Presidency, and it's exactly why they have the laws relating to impeachment procedures."

"The law does not have an exception for people who think they are so important, that their worth is necessary for the whole country and therefore they can act with illegality and with impunity," she opines, before similarly torching Philbin's argument that there is nothing unlawful about soliciting a thing of value from a foreign power --- an express violation of campaign finance law.

Ravel, who is currently running for office herself in the California State Senate, laments the fact that "there is no FEC in existence now" with only three members currently seated on the six-person panel, and at least four required for a quorum to vote on enforcement of federal law. Similarly, she warns that Trump's Attorney General Bill Barr, responsible for overseeing criminal violations of campaign finance regulations, "is not acting as an Attorney General who would act with integrity to enforce the laws fairly and evenly. Instead, he seems to be biased in favor of assuring that he supports this President, so he remains in office I presume. As a result, we do not have any enforcement whatsoever of campaign finance laws."

Ravel offers alarming insight and a grim assessment as voting in the critical 2020 Presidential election begins just days from now in Iowa. "This is like sending a flare up indicating it's open season for illegality in our electoral process," she warns, along with many other thoughts, including on what she has come to learn about elections now that she is on the other side of the issue as a candidate herself. Running for office, Ravel tells me, has led her to be believe that "more constraints" are needed on electoral campaign finance, not less. She would like to see publicly financed elections in the future.

Finally today, we're joined by Desi Doyen for our latest Green News Report, with a few encouraging signs (though not nearly enough) on how some institutions are attempting to step up and deal with our worsening climate crisis, both in the U.S. and around the globe...

Download MP3 or listen to complete show online below...

MONTHLY BRAD BLOG SUBSCRIPTION	ONE-TIME DONATION
Choose monthly amount... $10 : $10.00 USD - monthly$20 : $20.00 USD - monthly$50 : $50.00 USD - monthly$100 : $100.00 USD - monthly	(Snail mail support to "Brad Friedman, 7095 Hollywood Blvd., #594 Los Angeles, CA 90028" always welcome too!)

IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Climate change could blow up the global economy, and the world's banks aren't ready; U.S. banking system isn't ready for climate change, either; 'Coronavirus' dampening global demand for oil; New Jersey requires developers to design for climate impacts; PLUS: House Democrats roll out massive climate change legislation... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

Got comments, tips, love letters, hate mail? Drop us a line at GreenNews@BradBlog.com or right here at the comments link below. All GNRs are always archived at GreenNews.BradBlog.com.

IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): The climate crisis is about right and wrong; How the environmental lawyer who won a massive judgment against Chevron lost everything; Trump Administration moves to ease rules against killing birds; Indiana bill would make it harder to close coal plants; Is banning fossil fuel ads really the fix activists think it is?; 14 states sue EPA over chemical safety regulations rollback; U.S. carbon emissions will fall just 4 percent By 2050: EIA... PLUS: Missing Monarch Butterfly Activist Found Dead In Mexico... and much, MUCH more! ...

On today's BradCast: The President's defense team wrapped up their Opening (and, they hope, Closing) Argument in the Senate Impeachment Trial of Donald J. Trump on Tuesday, even as we are now less than one week away from the official start of the 2020 Election season with worries about the integrity of the Iowa Caucuses, set for Monday night, February 3rd, now looming. [Audio link to show follows below.]

We break away momentarily, for the first half of today's program, from our ongoing coverage of the Impeachment Trial to cover some issues of concern for some, regarding the Iowa Caucuses and an arguably more troubling development regarding an election that is now underway in Washington state. First to Iowa, where Bernie Sanders is now said to have taken a slight lead, according to most of the recent polling in the Hawkeye State, over his nearest competitors, Joe Biden, Pete Buttigieg and Elizabeth Warren. At the same time, a number of listeners have written to express concerns about a smartphone app developed by the state Democratic Party to help report results quickly to Party headquarters on Caucus night.

We discuss the way Democrats caucus in Iowa, what this app --- developed by the state Party in secret --- is supposedly designed to do to assist in the otherwise-open Democratic caucus process, and the worries that some have about the possibility of this new app being hacked to report inaccurate caucus results on Monday night. (Misreporting of Caucus night results has caused problems in the past, at least for Republicans.)

Of far greater concern, however, is an election underway right now in the Seattle area where more than a million voters are eligible to cast their vote via the Internet for the first time on either a computer or smart phone. The first-of-its-kind online election will fill a vacancy on the board of the obscure King Conservation District, responsible for managing natural resources in King County, Washington. The online voting is being carried out in partnership between the County's Board of Elections and a nonprofit named Tusk Philanthropies, headed up by a venture capitalist and Democratic political strategist by the name of Bradley Tusk.

The landmark pilot election comes despite a years-long, nearly-unanimous consensus from cybsersecurity experts (we've interviewed tons of them over the years on The BradCast) that the Internet is nowhere near secure enough for public elections. It also comes in the wake of last Summer's bipartisan U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee's report finding all 50 states were targeted by Russia during the 2016 election, and the panel's recommendation that "States should resist pushes for online voting".

While she has no oversight of this particular election, Washington's top election official, Secretary of State Kim Wyman, a Republican, opposes the King County effort and hopes to roll back the use of electronic ballots in the state, charging (correctly!) that the Internet is "too risky for voting". Nonetheless, Tusk, King County Elections Director Julie Wise, and a Seattle company named Democracy Live are barreling ahead with this disturbing experiment that is set to further poison the all-too-quickly disappearing idea of publicly overseeable elections in the U.S.

You have been warned. Again.

Then, its back to impeachment today, at the end of Tuesday's brief, two-hour wrap up of the President's case in the Senate. Trump's attorneys argued largely that the President did nothing wrong, and even if he did, it's not impeachable, because the dispute boils down to little more than a "policy disagreement" between Democrats and the White House. Impeachment over such matters, Trump's bombastic TV/radio lawyer Jay Sekulow and White House Counsel Pat Cipollone argued, sets a dangerous precedent by lowering the bar on future Presidential impeachments.

But the biggest looming question over the U.S. Senate at the moment is whether four or more Republican Senators will agree to call for witnesses when they vote again on the matter later in the week, following two days of written questions for the attorneys on both side. The issue that has turned the Republicans' previous plans for a quick acquittal on its head is the reported bombshell claims by Trump's former National Security Advisor John Bolton, in the manuscript of his still-unpublished new book, that Trump did exactly what he is being accused of in the first of the two Articles of Impeachment. That Article charges Abuse of Power by Trump for withholding nearly $400 million in military assistance to Ukraine in order to force them to help Trump in his reelection bid by announcing an investigation of Joe Biden and other Democrats.

Bolton's explosive disclosure, first reported on Sunday night by the New York Times, has reverberated ever since, with Trump's former Chief of Staff, General John Kelly, asserting on Monday night that he believes Bolton and agrees he should be called in as a witness for the trial against his old boss. The shake-up also comes as a new national poll out on Tuesday afternoon from Quinnipiac finds that registered voters by an astounding margin of 75 to 20 percent, agree that witnesses should be allowed to testify. The tally includes nearly half of Republicans and an astonishing 75 percent of Independent voters. According to the new survey, more than half of those polled believe Trump "is not telling the truth about his actions involving Ukraine"; should "provide more details" about it; has "abused his power" in the matter; has "obstructed Congress" in the bargain; and that the "withholding of U.S. aid to Ukraine was not justified". All of which has left Republicans reeling in a panic to find the votes needed to block witnesses in the trial. But they're still trying, and will likely have until Friday to pull it off.

Finally, Desi Doyen joins us for our latest Green News Report, filled with several ongoing plagues, catastrophes and warnings of nearly biblical proportion...

Download MP3 or listen to complete show online below...

MONTHLY BRAD BLOG SUBSCRIPTION	ONE-TIME DONATION
Choose monthly amount... $10 : $10.00 USD - monthly$20 : $20.00 USD - monthly$50 : $50.00 USD - monthly$100 : $100.00 USD - monthly	(Snail mail support to "Brad Friedman, 7095 Hollywood Blvd., #594 Los Angeles, CA 90028" always welcome too!)

IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Doomsday Clock inches closer to midnight, thanks to climate change; Trump further weakens pollution standards for streams and wetlands; China announces national ban on single-use plastics; PLUS: Massive locust swarm threatens food security in Eastern Africa... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

Got comments, tips, love letters, hate mail? Drop us a line at GreenNews@BradBlog.com or right here at the comments link below. All GNRs are always archived at GreenNews.BradBlog.com.

IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): Gulf shrimpers fight for their livelihoods in a fertilizer-fueled dead zone; Court battles, 2020 election loom over Trump WOTUS rule; New emails reveal the Trump Admin manipulated wildfire science to promote logging; U.S. Southeast struggles with climate change; Bankrupt coal company's environmental violations could cost KY millions to fix; Amazon workers defy rules to protest company's climate failures... PLUS: A Rewilding Triumph: Wolves Help To Reverse Yellowstone Degradation... and much, MUCH more! ...

Our special BradCast coverage of the Impeachment Trial of Donald John Trump continues on Day 2 of the Democratic House Managers' opening argument --- which could well be their closing argument as well, if Republicans continue to block subpoenas for contemporaneous documentation and first-hand eye-witnesses like Trump's former National Security Advisor John Bolton and Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney. [Audio link to show follows summary below.]

Before we get to our impeachment coverage today, however, some less-than-fantastic news from the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, who have, for the first time in the more than 70 year history of their infamous "Doomsday Clock", moved its minute hand inside the two-minute mark (where it was set in 2018 and at the height of the Cold War) before "midnight." We are now, according to the Bulletin's board of advisers, just 100 symbolic seconds from "midnight", thanks to growing threats of nuclear weapons following the dissolution of landmark arms control pacts and the ever-increasing acceleration of our climate crisis. "We are now expressing how close the world is to catastrophe in seconds --- not hours, or even minutes," according to Rachel Bronson, the Bulletin's president and CEO. "We now face a true emergency --- an absolutely unacceptable state of world affairs that has eliminated any margin for error or further delay." The Bulletin also cited the increasing threat of cyberattacks in their explanation as one of "multiple existential threats."

Meanwhile, one of world's greatest threats, Donald Trump, stands trial for removal from office in the U.S. Senate. Not that many who watch Fox "News" would understand exactly why, given that the pretend "news" outlet has, unlike CNN and MSNBC, been cutting away from their exceedingly truncated live coverage of the proceedings to carry their regular programming, on which they are lying about what is happening in the actual trial. What their viewers have not heard was the detailed, granular evidence revealing how Trump abused the power of his office to withhold nearly $400 million in military assistance from Ukraine in hopes of extorting the war-torn nation to agree to announce an investigation of Joe Biden and an evidence-free, Russia-generated claim that Ukraine interfered in the 2016 election on behalf of Hillary Clinton. It was done in hopes of cheating in the 2020 election.

The chronology of those events was expertly detailed by lead House Manager Adam Schiff on Wednesday, along with the other House Managers. At key moments in their presentations, each pointed out how existing documentation and eye-witness testimony is currently unavailable to the trial, being withheld at the orders of the President, and how that information should and could be made available now, if Republican Senators agree to do so. If not, Schiff warned, "the truth will come out" eventually anyway.

But GOP Senators have clearly calculated that, for most of them, it will be better to have that damning information come out later, after they have voted to acquit, rather than before they cast such a vote. All of this, ironically (or hypocritically) enough, as a number of Republican Senators have been complaining to Fox "News" (where viewers have no clue what's actually going on) and elsewhere, that they have not learned anything new from the Democrats' presentation.

On Thursday, Democrats detailed the legal and Constitutional underpinnings of the first Article of Impeachment against Trump for Abuse of Power, with House Manager Jerrold Nadler describing the allegations as "overwhelmingly supported by the evidenced amassed by the House" and "among the most serious charges ever brought against a President." The Chair of the Judiciary Committee went on to detail how the President's conduct in attempting to pressure a foreign nation to help him cheat in an American election is without precedent since the nation's founding and is "wrong, dangerous and captures the worst fears of our founders and the Constitution." Nadler characterized Trump's extortion scheme as one that "puts even President Nixon to shame," as the President and his defenders offer the "terrifying" argument that they see "no limits on his power or on his ability to use his public office for private gain."

He also played clips of Trump's own impeachment attorney, Alan Dershowitz, from before the Bill Clinton impeachment in 1998, when he argued that a violation of a statutory crime is not necessary before bringing charges of High Crimes and Misdemeanors and then-Representative, now-Senator Lindsey Graham making a similar case during his own presentation against Clinton while serving as a House Manager during that 1999 Impeachment Trial.

That's just some of our special coverage --- and debunkery --- in today's packed program, which ends with Desi Doyen and our latest Green News Report as Big Oil tries to rebrand itself as an opponent of climate change (hold your laughter); Trump beclowns himself again at Davos; a new study finds far worse drinking water contamination in the U.S. than previously estimated; and teen climate action superstar Greta Thunberg dresses down the elites at the World Economic Conference in Davos by telling them to end their investments in fossil fuels and start behaving as if they actually love their own children...

Download MP3 or listen to complete show online below...

MONTHLY BRAD BLOG SUBSCRIPTION	ONE-TIME DONATION
Choose monthly amount... $10 : $10.00 USD - monthly$20 : $20.00 USD - monthly$50 : $50.00 USD - monthly$100 : $100.00 USD - monthly	(Snail mail support to "Brad Friedman, 7095 Hollywood Blvd., #594 Los Angeles, CA 90028" always welcome too!)

IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: The oil industry is rebranding itself as a leader in climate action (Seriously.); Trump DOJ working with Big Oil to quash climate liability lawsuits; U.S. drinking water more widely contaminated than previously known; PLUS: A dose of climate reality from Greta Thunberg for the elites at the World Economic Forum in Davos... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

Got comments, tips, love letters, hate mail? Drop us a line at GreenNews@BradBlog.com or right here at the comments link below. All GNRs are always archived at GreenNews.BradBlog.com.

IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): Trump removes pollution controls on streams and wetlands; America’s radioactive secret: fracking wastewater; Meet America's new superpolluters: Plastic plants; What’s in Republicans’ new climate-change push; California giant sequoias are dying 500 years before they are supposed to... PLUS: The freshwater giants are dying... and much, MUCH more! ...

"Can I get a witness?" That appears to be the big question, at the moment, for Democrats in the historic U.S. Senate Impeachment Trial of President Donald John Trump. On today's BradCast, we offer special coverage of the beginning of the trial, which, at least for today, is turning out to be a trial about whether there will be a real trial or not, with evidence, documents and witnesses, as Republican Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and his caucus seem prepared to do everything in their power to ensure there will not be such an actual trial. [Audio link to show is posted below.]

Before we get to today's action in the Senate, we bring you up to date on the holiday weekend's pre-trial briefs presented by the Democratic U.S. House Managers, who are serving as prosecutors for Trump's two Articles of Impeachment on Abuse of Power and Obstruction of Congress, and the brief responses filed by the White House defense team.

Newly added to to Trump's legal team is hypocritical TV attorney Alan Dershowitz, who spent his weekend arguing on the Sunday news shows that the Articles were invalid because they did not include a specific crime. "You need proof of an actual crime," he argued. That, by way of contrast with Alan Dershowitz in 1998 during the Bill Clinton impeachment when he argued, literally, "it certainly doesn't have to be a crime" that qualifies a President for impeachment.

Trump's 6-page response to the Impeachment Managers 111-page brief describes the Impeachment as a "brazen and unlawful attempt to overturn the results of the 2016 election and interfere with the 2020 election" (which is what he is actually accused of doing in the Articles for which he is being impeached), and as "nothing more than a dangerous attack on the American people themselves and their fundamental right to vote." That's right. Donald Trump is now pretending to be concerned with the "fundamental right to vote." That, in the middle of an impeachment trial where he is accused of attempting to cheat in his 2020 reelection contest by withholding hundreds of millions of dollars in Congressionally-allocated military aid for war-torn Ukraine in hopes of forcing them to create dirt he can use against Joe Biden and other Democrats.

Tuesday's opening agenda was on the adoption of McConnell's proposed rules for the trial that would postpone votes on whether to include witnesses and documents previously blocked by the White House during the House's initial impeachment inquiry (the basis of Article 2's Obstruction of Congress charges) and even evidence gathered during the House Inquiry itself. Under McConnell's resolution, both sides would spend days in opening statements, and then take as many as 16 hours of written questions from Senators before they even vote on whether to allow witnesses or not. Legal observers have noted that is the opposite of how actual trials are carried out.

We share audio from today's terse opening statement by White House Counsel Pat Cipollone, followed by an extended excerpt from lead House Manager Adam Schiff on the unprecedented attempt to exclude all witnesses and documents from a Senate impeachment. No trial in the upper chamber of Congress has lacked witnesses since the founding of our nation.

As we went to air for today's BradCast (and as we write tonight), all Democratic amendments to McConnell's resolution, attempting to subpoena documents from the White House, the State Dept. and elsewhere, and for witness testimony, have been rejected along strict party line votes with all 53 Republicans voting to table the amendments, and all 47 Democrats voting to move forward with the subpoenas.

Also today, a few quick points of news elsewhere regarding the public fight to stop the controversial certification of new, 100% unverifiable touchscreen voting systems in Los Angeles County and the massive gun rights demonstration (over nothing) held on the Martin Luther King Day holiday in Virginia.

Finally, Desi Doyen joins us for the latest Green News Report, with exceedingly disturbing news about ocean warming, slightly more encouraging news about Wall Street beginning to wake up to worries about our climate crisis, and a big loss (for now) in the federal climate change lawsuit filed by a group of kids in California...

Download MP3 or listen to complete show online below...

MONTHLY BRAD BLOG SUBSCRIPTION	ONE-TIME DONATION
Choose monthly amount... $10 : $10.00 USD - monthly$20 : $20.00 USD - monthly$50 : $50.00 USD - monthly$100 : $100.00 USD - monthly	(Snail mail support to "Brad Friedman, 7095 Hollywood Blvd., #594 Los Angeles, CA 90028" always welcome too!)

IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: World's oceans hottest ever recorded in 2019; Climate change a growing concern for Wall Street and banks; PLUS: Federal appeals court dismisses climate kids' lawsuit... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

Got comments, tips, love letters, hate mail? Drop us a line at GreenNews@BradBlog.com or right here at the comments link below. All GNRs are always archived at GreenNews.BradBlog.com.

IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): Greta Thunberg’s message at Davos Forum: ‘Our house is still on fire'; ’Transmission hamstrings push for 100% clean electricity; Humans risk living in an empty world, warns UN biodiversity chief; UN rules that climate refugees fleeing disaster cannot be sent back home; Mayfly numbers dro by half since 2012, threatening food chain; China to ban single-use plastic bags and other items... PLUS: Plastic bags have lobbyists. They're winning.... and much, MUCH more! ...