There were massive protests in Israel this weekend.

Tens of thousands of people across Israel joined the families of hostages this weekend to protest against the government and call for the removal of Benjamin Netanyahu, as the Israeli prime minister grappled with one of the most serious threats yet to his coalition.

The protesters in Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, Haifa, Be’er Sheva, Caesarea and other cities on Saturday – and at a further demonstration outside the Knesset in Jerusalem on Sunday – demanded the release of those still held captive in Gaza after close to six months, and labelled Netanyahu an “obstacle to the deal”, vowing to persist until he leaves power.

I take it this is more about Netanyahu’s apprent disinterest in the several remaining hostages more than it is about the ongoing inhumanity toward Palestinians in Gaza, but anything that might pry Netanyahu out of power is a step in the right direction.

Another source of friction that is getting less attention in the U.S. is the protected status of the ultra-orthodox, or Haredim, in Israel. the Haredi are exempt from military service and also receive government subsidies not available to non-Haredi. I understand this was done to allow them to spend more time at study. But at first they were a tiny portion of the Israeli population; now they are about 13 to 14 percent, and growing. I take it the non-Haredi in Israel have issues about this.

This happened last week:

A couple of hours ago, the Times of Israel reported that Haredi are protesting the Israeli Defense Force.

Hundreds of ultra-Orthodox, or Haredi, protesters block the Route 4 highway in the center of the country during a demonstration against IDF conscription, Hebrew media reports.

The demonstrators belong to the extremist Jerusalem Faction, Ynet reports, which numbers some 60,000 members and regularly demonstrates against the enlistment of yeshiva students.

The protest comes on the same day that a High Court of Justice order comes into effect, freezing financial support for Haredi yeshivas with students who receive annual deferrals from military service, and as the Defense Ministry has been instructed to begin the process of drafting Haredi men.

As I understand it — and full disclosure, this is not one of my areas of expertise — Netanyahu’s political coalition depends on the support of the Haredi. Josh Marshall explains,

Men from the ultra-orthodox community are exempted from the draft and a great proportion of their families live on public assistance, notionally because they spend their days in religious study. This has been a simmering issue for years. But for a complicated set of reasons it came to a head last week when there was a deadline to formalize a new system which would either continue these privileges and benefits, scrap them or do something in between.

The critical context is that over the last three decades the ultra-orthodox parties have become a central pillar of any right-wing government. They supply about a quarter of the seats. The issue is basically irresolvable if you rely on those votes and seats. No them, no majority. That all hit the fan last week. There was no decision Netanyahu could make and hold his government together. So basically he just didn’t. And we’re now seeing how long that lasts. This seems to have both thrown new light on the precariousness of Netanyahu’s government and shown again that the whole country is hostage to the Prime Minister’s need to give them basically anything they demand. In the context of a national emergency the existence of a whole community that refuses to serve in the army and lives off everyone’s taxes is simply too much for many people.

A big chunk of Netanyahu’s Likud party is made up of the ultra-orthodox and the “settler crazies,” per Josh Marshall. If that coalition falls apart, Netanyahu goes down too. And without Netanyahu the coalition will probably be shattered for some time.

Juan Cole wrote a couple of days ago,

The exemption from military service for the ultra-Orthodox has become enormously unpopular during the Israeli campaign against Gaza, where some 500 troops have been killed and thousands wounded. The resentment has grown in part because of the high birthrate among the ultra-Orthodox, such that they now make up some 13 percent of Israel’s population, up from 2 percent when Israel was founded. To have such a large group paid to pray while other Israelis are fighting and dying is increasingly untenable.

The need to subsidize the ultra-Orthodox, many of whom do not receive a practical education and therefore end up unemployed or under-employed, has driven the Israeli government to support their relocation to the Palestinian West Bank, where the government usurps Palestinian land for inexpensive housing for these Jewish fundamentalists. Some 55.8% of ultra-Orthodox men are unemployed.

Needless to say, this bears watching.

In Other News: Joyce Vance writes that she’s watching to see what happens with Trump’s gag order in the Manhattan hush-money trial. On Friday, Alvin Bragg asked the judge to toughen up the gag order. Trump responded to this by reposting images of the trial judge’s daughter, presumably so that Trump’s goons can recognize her. Joyce Vance also speculates how Trump might try to stop the trial, scheduled to start in two weeks. Sickness or a death in the family could do it. He might also try to fire his lawyers.

This is the sort of thing I wish got much bigger coverage in news media, especially television. Ronald Brownstein writes at The Atlantic:

House Republicans dramatically sharpened that partisan contrast last week when the Republican Study Committee—a conservative group whose membership includes more than four-fifths of the House Republican Conference’smembers and all of its leadership—issued a budget proposal that would not only repeal the ACA but also fundamentally restructure Medicare, Medicaid, and the federal tax incentive for employers to provide insurance for their workers.

Here’s a list of the members of the House Republican Study Committee. Yeah, there’s a mess of them. All running for re-election. But will the voters in their districts ever hear about this?

The sweep of the House GOP health plans, like similar proposals in the Project 2025 policy blueprint put together by a consortium of conservative groups, “sets up a clear contrast with the direction Democrats have gone,” Larry Levitt, the executive vice president for health policy at KFF, a nonpartisan think tank, told me. “At the root of a lot of these Republican Study Committee proposals is reducing what the federal government spends on health care, and putting the risk back on individuals, employers, and states.” …

… Among other things, the House Republican Study Committee blueprint would: repeal the federal protections the ACA established for people with preexisting conditions and instead allow states to decide whether to retain such reforms, transform Medicare into a “premium support” or voucher system that instead of paying seniors’ health-care bills directly would give them a stipend to purchase private insurance, end the federal entitlement to Medicaid and instead bundle the program into a block grant for states along with a separate federal program that covers children, and rescind the authority Biden won for Medicare to negotiate lower drug prices. (The Project 2025 plan embraces many of these same ideas.)

This is extreme stuff that, I believe, the enormous majority of voters oppose. This includes elderly conservative voters who depend on Medicare, flawed as it is, thank you very much.

This budget was released on about March 30. Here is what the President had to say about it.

My dad had an expression, “Don’t tell me what you value. Show me your budget, and I’ll tell you what you value.” The Republican Study Committee budget shows what Republicans value. This extreme budget will cut Medicare, Social Security, and the Affordable Care Act. It endorses a national abortion ban. The Republican budget will raise housing costs and prescription drugs costs for families. And it will shower giveaways on the wealthy and biggest corporations. Let me be clear: I will stop them.

My budget represents a different future. One where the days of trickle-down economics are over and the wealthy and biggest corporations no longer get all the breaks. A future where we restore the right to choose and protect other freedoms, not take them away. A future where the middle class finally has a fair shot, and we protect Social Security so the working people who built this country can retire with dignity. I see a future for all Americans and I will never stop fighting for that future.

I did some googling to see who did report on this. I realized I had seen something about this budget, at The Intercept:

ON WEDNESDAY, THE Republican Study Committee, of which some three-quarters of House Republicans are members, released its 2025 budget entitled “Fiscal Sanity to Save America.” Tucked away in the 180-page austerity manifesto is a block of text concerned with a crucial priority for the party: ensuring children aren’t being fed at school.

Eight states offer all students, regardless of household income, free school meals — and more states are trending in the direction. But while people across the country move to feed school children, congressional Republicans are looking to stop the cause.

The budget — co-signed by more than 170 House Republicans — calls to eliminate “the Community Eligibility Provision (CEP) from the School Lunch Program.” The CEP, the Republicans note, “allows certain schools to provide free school lunches regardless of the individual eligibility of each student.” 

House Republicans rise up to stop us from feeding our children. How noble. They aren’t against school lunches altogether; they just think only the “truly needy” should get it for free. Just feed the kids already. The Intercept discusses other outrages in the budget, such as blocking environmental and gun control initiatives. And they want to raise the retirement age for Social Security, But it doesn’t mention Medicare.

Axios Pro reported on it, but that report is behind a subscription paywall. And the Washington Post published a story under the headline “Democrats seize on a GOP budget proposal that would raise Social Security retirement age.” Why wasn’t it just “GOP budget proposal would raise Social Security retirement age”? But I also see,

Every Republican in the House who signed this thing should be repeatedly called on to answer for it.

In other stupid Republican news, see Greg Sargent in The New Republic, “MAGA’s Ugly, Hateful Response to Bridge Horror Is About to Get Worse.” The horrendous bridge collapse in Baltimore isn’t just an inconvenience for Baltimore. In this case, Sargent writes,

… the horror doesn’t only impact the immediate area. It has hamstrung operations at the Port of Baltimore, whose operations are essential to export traffic that comes from other regions, including storied Trump country.

For instance, billions of dollars in autos, coal, agricultural and construction machinery, soybeans, and many other products pass annually through the Port of Baltimore, according to U.S. Department of Transportation data. A lot of those products come from states like Wisconsin, Iowa, Ohio, West Virginia, and Pennsylvania (whose western part abuts northern Appalachia and the industrial Midwest), that data shows.

In other words, this bridge collapse is going to cause problems throughout the nation. But Republicans in Congress are acting as if appropriating money to set the harbor right and replace the bridge is doing Baltimore, and somehow Democrats, a favor.  And that such appropriation is an extraordinary burden that has to be offset with cuts to other programs, or no deal. What, exactly, do they think the federal government is for? Don’t bothering answer that.

In other news: Trump’s rhetoric is getting more and more vicious and violent. He’s been attacking Judge Juan M. Merchan of the hush-money trial, the trial that starts in two weeks, and his daughter. One assumes Trump is doing this because he thinks he can intimidate the judge into going easy on him. Otherwise it’s just insanity. And yesterday he shared a video that showed President Biden bound and gagged in the back of a truck.

Joyce Vance writes, “If you or I did this, the Secret Service would be on our doorstep within hours.”

Donald Trump, by the way, is out on bond ahead of trial in four separate criminal cases. Today, he threatened the President of the United States. It’s time for the people with authority to do so to deal with him. Sure, he’s the Republican Party’s presidential candidate, but they won’t reign him in. And someone is going to get hurt if he isn’t.

He can’t be allowed to get away with this.

I’m not missing him already. Let’s see if No Labels continues to attempt to float a presidential ticket, as I suspect Joe, along with No Labels CEO Nancy Jacobson, were the primary forces behind that project. Just yesterday Chris Christie declined to be their candidate. I understand Joe Manchin and even Krysten Sinema turned them down, also. NBC News:

Among the Republicans who have said no after approaches from the group: former Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming, former Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan, Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, former Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels and New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu, according to public statements and sources familiar with their responses. The group was still trying to lure Sununu to the ticket within the last two weeks as Sununu, an avowed critic of former President Donald Trump, fell in line behind Trump, the GOP’s presumptive nominee.

No Labels had also openly suggested that it was interested in former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, who shut down any openness to running on a third-party ticket in an interview early this month.

On the Democratic side, Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia and former Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick declined No Labels’ entreaties, as did Democratic-turned-independent Sen. Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona. The group also engaged with former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo.

Maybe Andy hasn’t turned them down, yet.

Well-known non-politicians like businessman Mark Cuban and retired Navy Adm. William McRaven did not reciprocate interest from No Labels, either. No Labels’ search has gone far and wide — it even tried to make overtures to Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson.

The latest rejection, on Monday, came from former Georgia Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan, an anti-Trump Republican who had been reported to be under consideration to lead the No Labels ticket. But Duncan told The Atlanta Journal Constitution that he withdrew himself from consideration to instead focus on “healing and improving the Republican Party.”

Apparently Nancy Jacobson sincerely believes that the moment is ripe for a centrist third party ticket to come forward and break us out of the two-party box. Nancy Jacobson is married to Mark Penn. Remember Mark Penn? Michael Tomasky wrote of Penn several years ago:

But there are two people who appear ready to stand by Penn, hell or high water, and they are the two who matter: Bill and Hillary Clinton. Penn joined Bill Clinton in the mid-90s, after the early woes (gays in the military, healthcare), and he kept the president on the ideological middle ground. He did the same for Hillary while overseeing her 2000 Senate campaign. In the course of these experiences, both Clintons came to swear by Penn’s advice. They saw his gift for numbers and demographic analysis, but they failed to grasp his obvious weak point.

Pennism is a kind of Democratic politics that one could argue was right for an era of conservative dominance: take few risks, and move as far to the centre and even right as possible so you couldn’t be labelled soft on defence or wobbly on support for the free market.

Definitely a Joe Lieberman kind of guy. Stuck in the 1990s.

The New York Post is reporting that NBC has un-hired ex-RNC chair Ronna McDaniel after most of the senior on-air staff revolted this week. NBC News has yet to issue an announcement, so we’ll see. But when even Chuck Todd pushes back against the establishment, you’re in trouble. And Rachel Maddow pretty much had the last word.

Update: It’s now being announced on MSNBC that McDaniel is out.

In other news: Trump has a new gag order.

The judge presiding over the New York criminal case against Donald Trump on Tuesday slapped the former president with a partial gag order.

The ruling from Judge Juan Merchan orders Trump to “refrain” from “making or directing others to make public statements about known or reasonably foreseeable witnesses concerning their potential participation” in the falsifying business records case, as well as about individual prosecutors, court staff, jurors and potential jurors.

The order does not apply to the judge or Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg.

Today the Supreme Court heard arguments about mifepristone, the so-called abortion pill. The broad consensus in commentary today is that the Court doesn’t seem inclined to restrict the drug. Most of the rightie judges seem mostly concerned that physicians should be able to refuse to perform an abortion if it is against their personal beliefs. Which I’m pretty sure is how things work in this country anyway.

The arguments today included mention of the Comstock Act. I learned about the Comstock Act of 1873 in undergraduate college courses more than 50 years ago, and even then it was presented as some kind of freakish curiosity from less enlightened times. Like Victorian waist-cinchers. Back in the day the Comstock Act prevented information about birth control from being sent in the mail, because birth control was “obscene” and “illicit.” This part of the law was amended in the 1930s. I had not realized the law was still on the books, though. It was kind of unreal to have the Fetus People dredge it up in their argument in favor of a national abortion ban. The BBC reports,

Over the next century, various court rulings clarified the law’s meaning, gradually narrowing its scope. In 1971, Congress removed most of Comstock’s restrictions on contraceptives and two years later, through Roe, the Supreme Court established a constitutional right to abortion. By then, the act was seen as a largely unenforceable relic, and remained dormant for 50 years.

Good morning! As I write this, New York Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan is about to begin a hearing in the hush money case brought by Manhattan D.A. Alvin Bragg. I understand Trump has just arrived at the courthouse.

I hope Trump enjoyed staying in his gaudy penthouse apartment in Trump Tower. Hard to say how many more times he can stay there. His appeal bond is due today.

Today’s hearing is to discuss the belated disclosure of records and to re-set the trial date. .

NY Times:

Merchan doesn’t have a whole lot of patience for Trump’s attempt to take the late release of the Southern District documents and spin it, through the barrage of papers filed by his lawyers last week, into a broader narrative of prosecutorial shenanigans and misconduct.

There is no news anywhere saying that Trump will have the money to post his appeal bond, btw.

NY Times, again:

It is clear that Merchan is interested right now only in the timing of this trial. He is pressing Trump’s lawyers on the number of documents they think are relevant, but he says: “I just want to get a sense of how much time you need.”

NBC News reports that Trump wants to be compared to Jesus.

While Trump was sitting in the courtroom, the former president’s Truth Social account posted a message purportedly from a supporter that compared Trump to Jesus. Trump is not using his phone in the courtroom so it seems like a staffer posted it.

The post connected the timing of the hearing to Easter saying “It’s ironic that Christ walked through His greatest persecution the very week they are trying to steal your property from you.”

Trump called the sentiment “beautiful”.

According to the prosecutors, a big chunk of the recently released documents are Michael Cohen’s bank records.

NY Times:

1 minute ago

Alan Feuer

When the judge questions your professional biography, it’s probably time to change tactics.

 

NBC News:

The subtext of this entire hearing has been Judge Merchan appearing highly suspicious of the defense team’s effort to delay this trial. He’s pressing Blanche to now explain why he waited until this past January to request documents he likely knew existed last spring. He’s even brought up Blanche’s past experience in the U.S. Attorney’s office in New York to highlight he should know the diligence that’s required.

“Why did you wait until two months before trial. Why didn’t you do it in June or July,” Merchan asks.

 “It’s not our job,” says Blanche. Merchan shoots back that it’s not the D.A.’s job either.

The hearing is in recess.

Here we go: I’m seeing that the appeals court will allow Trump to post a smaller bond of $175 million within 10 days. 

I don’t know if A.G. Tish James could appeal that to a higher court.

[Update: I sincerely hope that Trump’s “babysitter,” Barbara Jones, be required to keep track on Trump’s business dealings and distribution of assets and keep reporting back to the court to be sure Trump has the means to pay the penalty when he loses his appeal. And when the time comes if Trump lacks the assets to pay the entire pentalty,. I think those five judges on the appeals court panel should have to make up the difference out of their own pockets.]

Here is the appeals court statement on the bond.

From the New York Daily News:

A New York appeals court showed Donald Trump some mercy Monday, allowing him to post a bond of $175 million in his civil fraud case — rather than half a billion — to ward off foreclosures while he appeals. 

In a brief order, the First Dept. Court of Appeals agreed to pause enforcement of the the most severe elements of the devastating February court decision finding Trump liable for fraud while he appeals it if he secures a portion of the money he’s been ordered to pay within 10 days.  …

… The appeals court also paused other parts of Engoron’s judgment from taking effect, including industry bans against Trump, his sons, Eric and Don Jr, and former finance execs Allen Weisselberg and Jeffrey McConney. They said the extended and enhanced role of court-appointed monitors to babysit Trump’s company would remain in place. 

The AG’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment, nor did Trump’s lawyers in his fraud case. 

Switching back to the hush money case, the Judge has set the new trial date for April 15. The Judge also ruled that no harm was done to Trump’s legal defense.

Trump Appeal Bond Watch: It’s Friday afternoon, and there’s still no bond. Nor have we heard from an appeals court. It’s reported that Trump posted today in ALL CAPS on his toy social media platform that he has $500 million in cash right now. Of course he does.

See also Josh Marshall.

As we can see, the New York State civil judgment against Donald Trump, totaling roughly $450 million, and Trump’s seeming inability to post a bond for the amount in order to appeal the judgment, is the real deal. But it has also reminded us, brought us back to the Russian nesting doll, the infinitely layered onion of Donald Trump not being real. The effort to collect the judgment spins us right back around to why there is a judgment in the first place. Trump is now fundraising off threats to “seize Trump Tower.” The New York Post is headlining the same basic idea. But as a friend reminded me yesterday evening, Trump doesn’t own Trump Tower. …

… At one level this is entirely obvious if you think about it. Trump Tower is owned by the people who own the apartment units. It’s not just apartment units of course. And … well, a lot of those are owned by foreigners trying to hide money in the U.S. But I digress. What he actually owns at Trump Tower is “the parking garage, the valet booth, room-service kitchens, lobby bathrooms, a restaurant space, and one unit.”

Even in Manhattan, a valet booth may not be worth that much.

But now I feel compelled to look at Congress. Congress is on shutdown brink again. I had thought there was a funding deal a few days ago. I guess I was wrong.  The House did pass a spending bill today to fund the government through September. We do not know if the Senate will be able to pass it before the shutdown begins at the end of today. I understand this is possible but doubtful.

Oh, and Marjorie Taylor Greene is on the warpath.

“This was our leverage,” Ms. Greene said of spending legislation. “This is our chance to secure the border, and he didn’t do it. And now this funding bill passed without the majority of the majority.”

I guess she was planning to hold the government hostage to pass a border security bill like the one she helped kill a few weeks ago. Got it. If she does decide to see, a vote on ousting McCarthy, House Dems have said they will vote to keep him if he allows a vote on funding Ukraine.

And the majority is about to become less of a majority. Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-Wis.) announced he will resign from Congress on April 19. And with the imminent departure of Rep. Ken Buck (R-Colo.), the House soon will be Republicans  217, Demolcrats 214. Matt Stieb writes at New York magazine that Gallagher’s departure will take the Republican majority down to one seat, but I’m not sure how he comes to that calculation. It looks like three seats to me. Maybe you can figure it out.

First, you need to see this headline from Vanity Fair.

Let it not be forgot that Jared was the guy who killed a plan for the federal government to direct pandemic supplies like PPE to where they were needed. This was while covid was slamming New York City especially hard. Jared decided this was a good thing. From the Vanity Fair article:

Yes, in a February interview at Harvard that was posted online this month and uncovered by the Guardian on Tuesday, Kushner opined that the Gaza Strip could be “very valuable” from a real estate perspective, if Israel could forcibly remove everyone currently living there to develop “waterfront property.” Speaking to Harvard professor Tarek Masoud, Kushner said: “It’s a little bit of an unfortunate situation there, but from Israel’s perspective, I would do my best to move the people out and then clean it up.” Where does Kushner suggest these people go? Ivanka Trump’s husband explained that if he were in charge of Israel, his top priority would be removing the people living in Rafah—a Palestinian city in southern Gaza—and moving them into Egypt “with diplomacy.” And that wasn’t his only piece of advice: “In addition to that,” he said, “I would just bulldoze something in the Negev, I would try to move people in there…. I think that’s a better option, so you can go in and finish the job.”

Such a mensch. Come to think of it, we never did hear what Jared was doing with all the supplies he was confiscating from states during covid. Somebody should really follow up on that.

So it’s Thursday and Trump still hasn’t coughed up a bond. Bloomberg is reporting that Attorney General James may be planning to go after Trump’s Westchester properties first.

New York state’s $454 million judgment against Donald Trump in a civil fraud lawsuit was formally registered in Westchester County just outside Manhattan, a sign that his properties in the area may be at risk of being seized if the former president fails to post an appeal bond.

New York Attorney General Letitia James registered the judgment on March 6, according to the Westchester County Clerk’s online database. The filing didn’t give a reason for the registration or identify any Trump assets, but it will allow James to more easily secure liens, should she decide to do so, on two of the real estate mogul’s most valuable properties: Trump National Golf Club Westchester and the mostly undeveloped 212-acre Seven Springs estate.

The Golf Club is maybe a couple of miles from where I’m living now, which is why I think it would be fun if it became public property. But I guess that wouldn’t happen right away.

Seven Springs featured heavily in the trial, and Engoron ruled the property had been wildly overvalued for years. Trump purchased the estate in 1995 for $7.5 million. It consists of two large homes, undeveloped land and a few other buildings. Trump valued the property at more than five times the appraised values in some years — as high as $291 million — often by including the value of mansions that didn’t exist.

This afternoon Judge Arthur Engoron ordered Trump to inform his court-appointed financial watchdog about any future efforts to obtain an appeal bond.

In his order Thursday, Engoron told the Trump Organization it must tell its financial overseer, Barbara Jones, “in advance, of any efforts to secure surety bonds.”

The company must tell Jones about any claims the Trump Organization makes to obtain the bonds, any personal guarantees by Trump or other defendants, and any condition imposed on the company.

That level of disclosure would well exceed what Trump has disclosed about a $91.6 million appeal bond he recently received from a Chubb insurance subsidiary to secure a civil defamation judgment in favor of the writer E. Jean Carroll.

Jones, who is a retired federal judge, was appointed by Engoron as the financial monitor for the Trump Organization. The company has chafed under her oversight, complaining about her in filings with Engoron.

Memo to Trump: Nobody trusts you. But the Wall Street Journal is reporting (from what I read elsewhere; it’s behind a firewall) that Trump will soon enjoy a a $3.5 billion windfall for taking Truth Social public, or something This makes no sense to me; does anyone other than Trump post on Truth Social? But we’ll see.

In other weird criminal justice news, the Mar-a-Lago documents case seems to be going south on a freight train. See ‘Very, very troubling’: Judges, lawyers flummoxed by Judge Cannon at WaPo.

This just in from the New York Times:

Donald J. Trump’s lawyers disclosed on Monday that he had failed to secure a roughly half-billion dollar bond in his civil fraud case in New York, arguing that doing so was “a practical impossibility.”

The filing, coming one week before the bond is due, raised the prospect that the former president might face a financial crisis unless an appeals court comes to his rescue. Mr. Trump has asked the appeals court to pause the $454 million judgment that a New York judge imposed on Mr. Trump last month, or accept a bond of only $100 million.

The former president has been unable to secure the full bond, his lawyers said in the court filing on Monday, despite “diligent efforts.” Those efforts included approaching about 30 companies, and yet, they said, he has encountered “insurmountable difficulties.”

So about thirty companies consider him too bad a credit risk to lend him that much money. The deadline — after which Letitia James can start seizing Trump’s assets — is March 25.

Axios is reporting that “Trump’s lawyers have asked an appeals court to delay the bond posting until his appeal of the case has run its court.” No way is Letitia James going to agree to that. We’ll see if someone gives him more time to come up with the money. I understand he’s got big mortgages on some of his signature properties, so clearing that much cash may be a reach.

In other news:

The “Plan” seems to be to destroy the November general election and declare Trump the winner. To illlustrate, this happened recently in Arizona:

As the board of supervisors for Arizona’s largest county abruptly ended a meeting late last month, a swarm of people rushed toward the dais, shouting that the members were illegitimate.

The Maricopa County leaders made a beeline for a side door and were swiftly escorted out of the chamber by security guards, who called for backup from the sheriff’s office. After the meeting’s live-feed went dead, a member of the crowd yelled that a “revolution” was underway.

“I’m here today to put you on public notice and to inform you that you are not our elected officials,” said Michelle Klann, co-founder of a pro-Trump group, from a podium she had commandeered. “This is an act of insurrection. Due to all the voter fraud, you have never been formally voted in.” …

…“This was an organized, coordinated attack,” said one top county official who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive security matters. “It was a dress rehearsal for the election.”

And, of course, later in the article it said,

In the case of last month’s meeting, the action taken ended peacefully.Outnumbered, the county’s security staff waited for sheriff’s deputies as they calmly ushered out the approximately 20-person crowd. No arrests were made.

They’ve got to start arresting these brownshirts and introducing them to the criminal justice system. This is ridiculous.

Kari Lake and Mike Lindell have petitioned the Supreme Court to declare electronic voting unconstitutional. This is an old suit filled by Lake that has been slapped down vigorously by lower courts, so Lake, joined by Lindell, are taking it to the top. “The MyPillow CEO spent much of last week hyping the lawsuit, making multiple appearances on Steve Bannon’s War Room podcast—in between plugs for his percale sheets—to tease ‘the most explosive evidence ever’ that is ‘going to save this country’ and ‘shock the world,’ The Arizona Republic reported.”

And now that the Trump family is running the RNC, the RNC is opposing early and mail-in voting. Instead of trying to win more Republican voters, the strategy is to suppress Democratic votes.

Last month True the Vote had to admit to a court that it had no evidence for its election fraud claims. But they’re going forward with the program anyway.

What to do when the rules don’t matter

This Monday we’ll discuss recent examples of lawlessness and talk through strategies to stand your ground. From free speech to personal security, US Elections to Agenda 2030, let’s plan now for what may be coming soon.@onwardsocial… pic.twitter.com/crNqOkVPt6

— True the Vote (@TrueTheVote) March 17, 2024

Meanwhile, Trump’s rhetoric continues to be unethered to reality.

Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, confused the crowd at an appearance in Vandalia by insisting that Biden had beaten “Barack Hussein Obama” in elections nationally that never took place.

Freewheeling during a speech in which his teleprompters were seemingly disabled by high winds, Trump – a frequent critic of the 81-year-old Biden’s age and mental acuity – struggled to pronounce the words “bite” and “largest”. And he left the crowd scratching their heads over the reference to Obama, whom Biden served as vice-president from 2009 to 2017 before taking the Oval Office from Trump in 2020.

“You know what’s interesting? Joe Biden won against Barack Hussein Obama. Has anyone ever heard of him? Every swing state, Biden beat Obama but in every other state, he got killed,” Trump said.

It’s one thing to mix up a name or a place, but imagining elections that never happened is not a “normal” senior moment thing.

Back in 2015 I was furious with my senator, Chuck Schumer, for opposing the Obama Administration’s nuclear deal with Iran. According to several sources, Schumer opposed the deal because Bibi Netanyahu asked him to. I sent Chuck a sternly worded email about it, as I recall, vowing to never vote for him again. (And I didn’t, although I was living in Missouri the next time he ran.) Eventually Chuck and the mostly Republicans who opposed the deal were defeated. (Of course a certain Great Orange Idiot canceled the agreement some time later, promising he could negotiate something better, which he never even attempted to do. But that’s another rant.)

I take it Chuck’s speech of last week calling for new elections in Israel landed like a bomb in Israel. See, for example,  Schumer’s anti-Netanyahu speech stuns Israel at Axios.

In addition to being the most senior Jewish elected official in the country, Schumer has had one of the longest and closest relationships with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of any U.S. politician.

Schumer’s speech stunned officials and observers in both Washington and Jerusalem because he has been — and still is — the Democratic Party’s most avid supporter of Israel in decades.

His harsh remarks about Netanyahu create more political space for other Democratic members of Congress to publicly voice their criticism of the Israeli government amid the ongoing war in Gaza.

Pro-Palestinian protesters are giving themselves credit for Schumer’s shift in position, but I suspect what really happened is that he started hearing from Jewish constituents saying they were opposed to the Netanyahu government’s wholesale destruction of Gaza. See From her lips to Chuck’s ears: Schumer’s rabbi weighs in on his Israel speech.

“In this speech, he said what most of us think,” Timoner, senior rabbi of Congregation Beth Elohim, said in an interview with POLITICO. “There’s been a real fear in the American Jewish community of criticizing Israel. … He did something so great in breaking that silence.”

Schumer has attended Timoner’s synagogue near his home in Park Slope, Brooklyn for at least a decade. Timoner officiated his daughter’s wedding, blessed his three grandchildren and buried his father.

I’m reading that no one expects Netanyahu to change his course because of Schumer’s speech. The U.S. Right is outgaged about it, and Netanyahu probably figures if Trump wins re-election he can count on infinite support from the U.S. going forward. It does give President Biden more room to maneuver, though. For so long criticism of Israel has been something of a third rail here, and that has to change.

In other news: The Washington Post is running an opinion piece by Kathleen Parker headlined “For the country’s sake, Vice President Harris should step aside.” I’m not going to link to it because it’s garbage, but it’s easily found on their editorial page today.

Parker’s opening sentence is “The Democratic Party’s indulgence of identity politics has proved successful in building a diverse organization, but its strategy of courting (and pandering to) minority voters is the road to ruin.” OMG.

And then Parker goes on to trash Harris for … what, exactly? It’s not clear. Parker calls Harris’s speeches “rambling,” which is not something I’ve ever noticed. And she accuses Harris of having a bad laugh. A representative paragraph:

Whatever the reasons, it has seemed that Harris’s role was to be quiet, lest she embarrass her boss with her sometimes inane, rambling remarks and a laugh that erupts from nowhere about nothing obvious to others. I do, however, relish the thought of her face-to-face with Vladimir Putin and suddenly cackling at a linchpin moment during nuclear arms discussions.

I am old enough to remember Dwight Eisenhower being president, and in all those years I’ve noticed that the role of vice president is a mostly thankless one that doesn’t let anyone shine too brightly. But if Parker thinks that it would be good for Joe Biden’s election chances to switch veeps now — to another white guy, I assume — she’s a flaming idiot. The erupting controversy would drown out anything else the Biden Administration is trying to present. (Does the name “Thomas Eagleton” ring any bells?) Whatever “safe” candidate is chosen will still be ripped to shreds in right-wing media.

I’m absolutely disgusted with Kathleen Parker, and if any of you want to complain to WaPo about her, please don’t let me discourage you.

Update: See Your Regular Reminder That We Knew About Kathleen Parker’s Bigotry Years Ago at No More Mister Nice Blog.