Before our Holiday Hiatus, we wrap up the year on today’s BradCast with a look both back and forward along with one of our favorite regular guests. [Audio link to full show follows this summary.]
But, first up today, I’ve noticed a number of folks from what I describe as the Left’s “Contrarian Industrial Complex” — comprised of some of the same folks who, like most of the Right, also fell for Trump’s cons about Russia, COVID, 2020 election fraud, etc. — now falling for the many new cons and lies being propagated by Latter Day Trump, Elon Musk, on Twitter.
The continuing public prat falls from the world’s previously richest man (at least until he bought Twitter for about $30 billion more than it was worth, began driving it into the ground, along with the stock price of Tesla) are too numerous and ridiculous to detail here tonight. But one of Musk’s latest and greatest scams at his social media site since since taking it over and blowing it all up deserves quick notice today. Specifically, the scam that resulted in Musk’s temporary “permanent suspension” of a number of top journalists late last week, including recent in-studio BradCast guest, Steve Herman of Voice of America.
As you probably know, those suspensions happened as part of the fallout from what Musk described as a stalker incident that threatened him and/or his family. He blamed it on a Twitter account that tracks the whereabouts of his private jet based on publicly available data. He likened the posting of that information as “assassination coordinates” and then banned journalists from Twitter who had simply reported on his original suspension of the @ElonJet account.
As it turns out, however, Washington Post dug into the story over the weekend to report that the original incident appears to have had absolutely nothing to do with that Twitter account. Two of its journalists, both of whom had also been suspended by Musk, report that the incident between the alleged stalker and a member of Musk’s security team actually “took place at a gas station 26 miles from Los Angeles International Airport and 23 hours after the @ElonJet account had last located the jet’s whereabouts.”
Moreover, The Guardian reports today that Musk’s tweet about the “crazy stalker” who supposedly followed a car carrying one of his children, may have been even more misleading than previously known. According to their report of a statement obtained from the South Pasadena Police Department, “a member of Elon Musk’s security team is currently a suspect in the investigation, not a victim.”
The full story — and its subsequent fallout, including Musk holding a poll on his Twitter account on Sunday in which a majority of users voted for him to step down as Chief Twit — is sort of the perfectly insane way to end 2022. Whether at the social media site at year’s end or in the U.S. House of Representatives next month, when the GOP is set to regain a slim majority, “the inmates have literally taken over the asylum,” as our guest notes today.
We’re joined for our final show of the year by old friend, award-winning Salon columnist and Hullabaloo’s OG blogger HEATHER DIGBY PARTON. She’s been with us for post-game analysis following every single one of this year’s ten or so hearings held by the bipartisan House Select Committee investigating the January 6th, 2021 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol and the former President’s many failed attempts to steal the 2020 Presidential election from the American people. She joins us once again today for that and more.
Among the topics of today’s lively discussion…
- The House J6 Committee’s unprecedented referral of a former U.S. President on four criminal charges, including Insurrection, to the U.S. Dept. of Justice at their final hearing on Monday;
- The critical importance to the nation of real accountability for Donald Trump;
- Whether potential criminal charges against him will hurt or help his political fortunes for 2024;
- The extraordinary success of the House J6 Committee as its mission comes to a close along with this session of Congress;
- Whether GOP House leader Kevin McCarthy will actually be able to close the deal this time and win the Speakership in 2023 among his fractured caucus (and what may happen if his caucuses asylum inmates have their way);
- What we should expect from the Democrats’ new leader in the House, Rep. Hakeem Jeffries;
- And how to make any sense at all of Elon Musk and his ever-increasing Twitter madness.
Finally, Desi Doyen delivers what is also our final Green News Report of 2022, with all of the good news and bad (even at holiday time!), that you’ve come to expect from the nation’s preeminent, twice-weekly, six-minute environmental radio news feature.
Please enjoy the show. We’ll see you next year. And here’s to a happy and healthy holiday season for all and perhaps a less insane 2023…though I wouldn’t count on it…
True but sad.