Law, Power, and Justice

EARLY AFTERNOON NEWS NOTES: “If people would just pay attention…” Elie Mystal

Notes:

• It is still unclear to me what the United States gets out of this proposed grand agreement for Saudi to recognize Israel.  I understand what the Israelis get and what the Saudi’s get, but I don’t understand what we get.  I am not at all sure I want to see us join into a defense agreement with Saudi Arabia.
• I saw our red-bellied woodpecker today.  He is so beautiful.

News Notes

• The recognition of Palestinian statehood is largely symbolic.
• The families of several female soldiers released video of Hamas taking them hostage.  It is unclear when the families secured the video and unclear why they have released it now.  They are asking the Israeli government to renew the cease fire talks in hopes of having hostages released. New York Times (NYT) (Note: Some of these young women, lookouts on October 7, tried to warn the Israeli military that something was happening.  They were not listened to and then taken hostage.)  The young women have been hostages (if they are still alive) for 229 days.
• One of the Jan 6 rioters has won a Republican primary in Georgia (MSNBC).  Book: Erik Larson “The Demon of Unrest.” Larson talks about how much the current political situation resembles the lead up to the Civil War. 

Article Notes: Mystal, Elie (May 2024) “An Army of AGs,” The Nation.

• In 1999, The Republican Attorneys General Association was created. 
• It identifies Republican candidates, imposes Republican priorities at the state level, among other things.
• Few people “recognize the horrors that lie in store when Republicans commandeer the machinery of the law.”
• “…whichever rights the Supreme Court does not succeed in obliterating, Republican-controlled state courts and Republican attorneys general eagerly chisel away, state by state.”
• Republican AGs can “bend the law to their will and weaponize it against vulnerable communities.”
• There are 27 Republican Attorneys General.
• Kansas AG Kris Kobach is suing to try to stop Biden’s student debt relief program.
• “…hellish Republican policy idea, from destroying the environment to gutting voting rights to un-dermining vaccines, because apparently states need ‘defending’ from science, facts, and public health.”
• They are incredibly well funded by Federalist Society “Svengali Leonard Leo” and the usual donor-class “supervillains.”
• They work “hand in hand with preferred Trump judges to shape our national laws through targeted cases designed for appellate and eventually Supreme court review.”
• “…if people would just pay attention…”
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