Month: August 2022

On August 30, 2022, the United States of America filed a lengthy document with the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida, West Palm Beach Division. It was a response to disgraced ex-president Donald Trump’s “Motion for Judicial Oversight and Additional Relief” with respect to documents and materials seized by the government on August 8, 2022 at his Mar-a-Lago luxury resort. Specifically, Trump is asking for a “Special Master” to review the materials for signs of executive or attorney/client privilege, and then to have the materials returned to him.

The government’s response was signed by U.S. Attorney Juan Antonio Gonzalez and Jay Bratt, the Justice Department’s chief of the Counterintelligence in the National Security Division.

Their response covers a lot of ground and you may not have time to read it. You can save yourself a lot of trouble by simply scrolling down to the bottom where there are several attachments, listed A thru F. I believe attachments C thru F explain better than anything else why the Fed’s searched Mar-a-Lago.

Attachment C is a copy of a subpoena issued by the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia on May 11, 2022 to the Custodian of Records of The Office of Donald J. Trump. It reads in part:

YOU ARE COMMANDED to appear in this United States district court at the time, date, and place shown below to testify before the courtt’s grand jury. When you arrive, you must remain at the court until the judge or a court officer allows you to leave.

The subpoena was requested by Mr. Bratt, the DOJ’s counterintelligence chief. The date and time were May 24, 2022 at 9:00 am. And the custodian was instructed to bring all documents in Trump’s possession bearing the following classification markers:

Any and all documents or writings in the custody or control of Donald J. Trump and/or the Office of Donald J. Trump bearing classification markings, including but not limited to the following: Top Secret, Secret, Confidential, Top Secret/SI-G/NOFORN/ORCON, Top Secret/SI-G/NOFORN, Top Secret/HCS- 0/NOFORN/ORCON, Top Secret/HCS-0/NOFORN, Top Secret/HCS-P/NOFORN/ORCON, Top Secret/HCS-P/NOFORN, Top Secret/TK/NOFORN/ORCON, Top Secret/TK/NOFORN, Secret/NOFORN, Confidential/NOFORN, TS, TS/SAP, TS/SI-G/NF/OC, TS/SI-G/NF, TS/HCS- 0/NF/OC, TS/HCS-0/NF, TS/HCS-P/NF/OC, TS/HCS-P/NF, TS/HCS-P/SI-G, TS/HCS-P/SI/TK, TS/TK/NF/OC, TS/TK/NF, S/NF, S/FRD, S/NATO, S/SI, C, and C/NF.

I think it’s pretty clear what Trump needed to do at this point. But his custodian of records did not show up on May 24. Attachment D explains why.

Attachment D is a copy of a letter Mr. Bratt sent to a Trump attorney named Evan Corcoran on May 11, the same day the subpoena was issued. Bratt agreed to forego the grand jury appearance and instead have FBI agents travel to Mar-a-Lago to retrieve the documents (emphasis mine):

Dear Mr. Corcoran:

Thank you for agreeing to accept service of the grand jury subpoena on behalf of the custodian of records for the Office of Donald J. Trump.

As we discussed, in lieu of personally appearing on May 24, the custodian may comply with the subpoena by providing any responsive documents to the FBI at the place of their location. The FBI will ensure that the agents retrieving the documents have the proper clearances and will handle the materials in the appropriate manner. The custodian would also provide a sworn certification that the documents represent all responsive records. If there are no responsive documents, the custodian would provide a sworn certification to that effect.

Thank you again for your cooperation.

In the end, Bratt personally accompanied the FBI agents to Mar-a-Lago on June 3, 2022. Attachment E is a copy of the required “sworn certification” Trump’s lawyers provided Bratt that day.

I hereby certify as follows:

CERTIFICATION

1. I have been designated to serve as Custodian of Records for The Office of Donald J. Trump, for purposes of the testimony and documents subject to subpoena #GJ20222042790054.

2. I understand that this certification is made to comply with the subpoena, in lieu of a personal appearance and testimony.
3. Based upon the information that has been provided to me, I am authorized to certify, on behalf of the Office of Donald J. Trump, the following:
   1. A diligent search was conducted of the boxes that were moved from the White House to Florida;
   2. This search was conducted after receipt of the subpoena, in order to locate any and all documents that are responsive to the subpoena;
   3. Any and all responsive documents accompany this certification; and
   4. No copy, written notation, or reproduction of any kind was retained as to any responsive document.

I swear or affirm that the above statements are true and correct to the best of my knowledge.

As you can see, the June 3 meeting at Mar-a-Lago was understood by all parties to be a substitute for the “commanded” 9:00 am appearance before a Washington DC grand jury on May 24. Trump’s attorneys turned over classified documents and certified that “a diligent search” guaranteed that Trump no longer possessed anything responsive to the subpoena.

But Attachment F shows that this was a false representation. It’s simply a photo of records found in Donald Trump’s office.

Everything else is academic. The counterintelligence chief of the Department of Justice realized that Trump had not complied with the demands of the grand jury and still retained highly classified information. He knew that Trump’s lawyers had lied to him. His search confirmed all this, as any “diligent” search would have discovered the documents, just as the FBI quickly located them during the execution of the warrant.

There’s nothing radical about what the government did to Trump. He brought all of this on himself. We can use teams of counterintelligence and psychologists to try to determine why he committed these crimes, but there really could not be an expectation that he could commit them with impunity.

You can’t blow off a grand jury’s demands, nor can you can make false declarations to the Feds. You also can’t simply retain highly classified material in an insecure manner just because you were once the president.

His resort got raided at as a result. He’s guilty of serious crimes. We should lock him up.

Hi everyone. It’s another midweek. I thought I’d try something different. Ever want to know what a black hole sounds like? It turns out to sound like something Brian Eno or Bjork would create:

The misconception that there is no sound in space originates because most space is a ~vacuum, providing no way for sound waves to travel. A galaxy cluster has so much gas that we've picked up actual sound. Here it's amplified, and mixed with other data, to hear a black hole! pic.twitter.com/RobcZs7F9e

— NASA Exoplanets (@NASAExoplanets) August 21, 2022

Now that is something completely different. You learn something new every day. Cheers!

Doug Mastriano was born in New Brunswick, New Jersey, in 1964. I was born in New Jersey in 1969. He’s the son of Italian Americans. My mother’s side of the family is Italian-American. He was raised in Hightstown, New Jersey. I owned a home in Hightstown from 1997 to 2002. He graduated from Hightstown High School in 1982. I graduated from rival Princeton High School in 1987. He was an Eagle Scout. I was a Cub Scout. He attended Mercer County Community College. I attended Mercer County Community College for a semester before deciding to move to California. He has lived in Pennsylvania since 2012 when he began teaching at the Army War College in Carisle. I lived in Pennsylvania in 1995-96, and I live there now and have since 2002.

I was raised to understand that New Jersey fought in the Civil War on the side of the Union. My ancestors fought for the North. The Confederacy was the enemy. A traitorous slaving enemy. Their defeat not only preserved the Union, but it was a major step in human development. That’s not only what Doug and I were taught in our public schools, it’s what I still believe today. For some reason, Doug believes something different.

Watch: Doug Mastriano in 2020 approached armed men next to a Confederate flag and thanked them for “being vigilant” in supposedly protecting Robert E. Lee’s statue at Gettysburg https://t.co/bZQXLIFufp pic.twitter.com/i3pmPxe79S

— Media Matters (@mmfa) August 29, 2022

In fact, Reuters discovered that Mastriano’s has had a Confederate fetish since at least 2013. Here’s more, from the New York Times:

Doug Mastriano, the far-right Republican nominee for governor of Pennsylvania, wore a Confederate uniform for a faculty photo at the Army War College that surfaced on Friday.

The photo, from the 2013 to 2014 academic year, shows Mr. Mastriano wearing a gray military uniform, including a gray cap with yellow trim, and holding a Civil War-era firearm.

Of course, Pennsylvania Republicans were quick to offer excuses:

Lee Snover, chair of the Republican Party in Northampton County, downplayed the significance of the photo.

“It happened years ago. There was something called the Civil War and that included Confederate soldiers, so not sure what the big deal is,” Snover said.

Asked whether she supported the college’s decision to take down the photo, she said, “I wouldn’t have. I don’t like liberals tearing down our history.”

Mastriano’s seat in the State Senate includes the historic Gettysburg battlefield where the Confederates suffered a disastrous defeat. Many people like to visit to reenact the battle, and obviously some of them need to wear Rebel grey. I did not automatically assume that Mastriano posed in a Confederate uniform because he sympathizes with their side.  But seeing him buddy up to defenders of Robert E. Lee puts an end to the speculation.

It makes me sick when people celebrate the South’s murderous decision to secede from the Union in defense of slavery. When someone who wants to be my governor does it, it makes me extraordinary angry. When someone with such a similar background to mine does it, I just wonder what the fuck happened to them. He has absolutely no excuse except for the worst kind of racism.

I’ve had my beefs with Steny Hoyer in the past, but I’ve been mostly satisfied with the House leadership group of Nancy Pelosi, Hoyer, and Jim Clyburn. If their time in power is indeed coming to an end irrespective of the outcome of the midterms, I think historians will give them incredibly high marks for what they accomplished. Pelosi may be considered among the most effective Speakers of the House in our nation’s history, and that’s setting aside the trail she blazed for women.

If Hakeem Jeffries of New York becomes the next leader of the House Democrats, and many expect, his trail will have been blazed in large part by Clyburn who proved quite capable in his role as whip, and always carried himself with dignity and professionalism.

But Pelosi and Clyburn are 82 years old, and Hoyer is eighty-three. By contrast, Jeffries is 52, and fellow contenders for leadership spots Katherine Clark (59) and Pete Aguilar (43) would breath new life and vitalism into the party.

These changes are going to happen whether or not the Democrats hang onto control of the House. On the other hand, win or lose, we’ll probably see no changes in the Senate leadership, at least for the top positions. We’ll continue to see Chuck Schumer and Dick Durbin in charge, with Patty Murray and Debbie Stabenow in the third and fourth positions, respectively.

One thing to watch, however, is the position of Senate Pro Tempore, currently held by the longest serving Democrat, Senator Patrick Leahy of Vermont. It’s important because it’s third in the line of succession to the presidency. As of today, if Joe Biden, Kamala Harris and Pelosi were to die or be incapacitated,  Leahy would become our president. Leahy is retiring, however, and if the Democrats retain their majority the new Senate Pro Tempore would be Dianne Feinstein of California, who unfortunately appears to be suffering for a bit of mental decline.

She should not be in the line of succession, and she probably can’t handle the other duties of the job.

The Constitution instructs the Senate to choose a president pro tempore to preside over the Senate in the absence of the vice president. Pro tempore is a Latin term meaning “for the time being,” signaling that the position was originally conceived as a temporary replacement. The framers of the Constitution assumed that the vice president would preside over the Senate on a regular basis, so the Senate would only need to elect a president pro tempore to fill in as presiding officer for short periods of time.

Although the Constitution does not specify who can serve as president pro tempore, the Senate has always elected one of its members to serve in this position. Since the mid-20th century, tradition has dictated that the senior member of the majority party serve as president pro tempore.

In addition to presiding over the Senate, the president pro tempore fulfills a number of other responsibilities. In consultation with Senate leaders, for example, the president pro tempore appoints the director of the Congressional Budget Office (jointly with the Speaker of the House), as well as Senate legislative and legal counsel. The president pro tempore also makes appointments to various national commissions and advisory boards and receives reports from certain government agencies.

In the absence of the vice president, the president pro tempore may administer all oaths required by the Constitution, may sign legislation, may jointly preside with the Speaker of the House when the two houses sit together in joint sessions or joint meetings, and may fulfill all other obligations of the presiding officer. Unlike the vice president, however, the president pro tempore cannot vote to break a tie in the Senate.

Feinstein may not seek the position, but in any case, she should not have it.

Bradley Moss is a high-powered attorney who specializes in national defense cases, and he now believes that Donald Trump will be indicted on counts stemming from his mishandling of highly classified material. His only question is whether this will occur before or after the upcoming midterm elections. Truthfully, I can’t think of anyone except a former president who could hope to avoid prosecution for what Trump has done.

Think about it. Trump illegally possessed information that, if revealed, is deemed to be a severe threat to the nation’s security, defense, foreign relations, and intelligence capabilities. He did not keep this information secure. He reluctantly turned some of it over to the National Archives, but had his lawyers make false representations that he had turned it all over. He appears to have taken steps to conceal this fact by secreting documents in various locations at his Mar-a-Lago resort. He was caught in his lies when a court-approved search of his premises confirmed the government’s suspicions.

This kind of behavior will land a person in the hoosegow every single time. But ex-presidents are admittedly not ordinary persons. At one time, Trump had a legal right to possess these documents. In fact, many of them were probably prepared specifically for him. And, he at least has an argument that he had the power to unilaterally declassify the documents, which could be a defense against some possible criminal charges, although probably not the charges listed on the search warrant which do not depend on the classification status of the contraband. But, more than anything, having the government of one party prosecuting the de facto leader of the other party sets a dangerous precedent that no one wants to establish.

Trump’s best defense is jury nullification. All he needs to get off is one juror, irrespective of the strength of the evidence, to refuse to convict. On the merits, the defenses he’s offered will not fly. His argument is that he declassified all the material he possessed. That’s not an automatic defense, even if true, because he still had no right to maintain possession of them, and he still appears to have obstructed the investigation and caused false representations to be made to the FBI.

But the nature of the documents also presents a big problem. This can be seen by the classification markings. In the 15 boxes he voluntarily turned over in January 2022, there were more than two dozen top secret documents, and more were turned over in June, and more still were discovered during the execution of the search warrant in August. Some of these were reported to contain information on the identity of people who have been recruited by the CIA to spy on their on their own governments. Other documents pertained to highly sensitive electronic surveillance collection and capabilities. Some were marked to indicate they could not be shared with any foreign government, whether friend or foe. Lastly, some were marked in a way that distinguished them as so secret that virtually no one is authorized to see them, and then only in a highly secure setting.

It should be obvious that the president of the United States should not, under virtually any circumstances, declassify this kind of information and make it subject to Freedom of Information Act requests. To suggest Trump did exactly this to all these documents is admitting to worse behavior than anything he was accused of in the government’s affidavit. Perhaps fortunately for Trump there is no evidence that he actually did declassify these documents, and as Moss points out, his lawyers have not tried to make that argument in court.

There is the contention by Trump and his allies that he declassified the documents, whether through a “standing order” or more specific verbal action. No evidence has been produced corroborating that assertion, and there certainly is no indication that the classification markings themselves were ever revised to reflect the declassification. The Trump lawyers in May certainly did not provide any such evidence in their letter to DOJ, and they similarly provided no evidence of it in their “motion” filed earlier this week in district court in Florida seeking a Special Master.

And that is before we even consider if the classification status would matter for an Espionage Act prosecution, which only requires that the information relate to the national defense.

The reason Trump is arguing that he declassified the documents is because it at leasts offers an explanation that can be walked out by his allies. But it’s a lie that actually makes him look more irresponsible. As a legal defense, it’s sparse and mostly inapplicable.

It certainly offers nothing to protect him against obstruction of justice charges. He could have told the truth about what he possessed and fought in court to keep it. But he allowed his lawyers to falsely state that everything had been turned over, and appears to have dispersed the documents in an effort to prevent their discovery.

I don’t know why he did these things or if they have any relationship to this:

Top American counterintelligence officials warned every C.I.A. station and base around the world [in October 2021]  about troubling numbers of informants recruited from other countries to spy for the United States being captured or killed, people familiar with the matter said.

The message, in an unusual top secret cable, said that the C.I.A.’s counterintelligence mission center had looked at dozens of cases in the last several years involving foreign informants who had been killed, arrested or most likely compromised. Although brief, the cable laid out the specific number of agents executed by rival intelligence agencies — a closely held detail that counterintelligence officials typically do not share in such cables.

One reason our informants might have started dying by the dozens at the end of the Trump and beginning of the Biden administrations is that foreign adversaries have become better at tracking the movement of our CIA officers (through biometric data, for example), or through other surveillance techniques. Or maybe there’s a mole in the intelligence community. But there’s also an ex-president whose been keeping files on these matters in an insecure manner, and he’s repeatedly lied about it.

And when I say the file(s) on CIA informants were stored insecurely, consider that the photo at the top of this article was taken at Mar-a-Lago in May 2021. The woman is Inna Yashchyshyn, a Russian-speaking Ukrainian who falsely claimed to be Anna de Rothschild, a Monaco-raised child of the famous banking family.

Anna de Rothschild blended in perfectly as she rolled through the gates at Mar-a-Lago. Bearing the name of European banking royalty, she flashed a Rolex on her wrist, drove a new Mercedes Benz AMG G63, and touted her connections to big real estate developments.

The rich and powerful she mingled with at the Florida resort, including close family and friends of the 45th president of the United States, seemed unaware that the confident 33-year-old with long, flowing locks was no Rothschild.

I don’t know why she infiltrated Mar-a-Lago, but I know there was a poorly secured room in the basement that had some of our nation’s most sensitive secrets. If Trump does go to trial for this, it will be interesting to see if the jury hears about “Anna de Rothschild.”

Hello again painting fans.

This week I will be continuing with the painting of the Hudson River scene. The photo that I’m using (My own from a recent visit.) is seen directly below.

I’ll be using my usual acrylic paints on a 5×7 inch canvas panel.

When last seen the painting appeared as it does in the photo seen directly below.

Since that time I have continued to work on the painting.

For this week’s cycle I have added some paint to the left side and the sky. Note the cloud and the foliage. It’s starting to look like the photo.

The current state of the painting is seen in the photo directly below.

I’ll have more progress to show you next week. See you then.

Hi photo lovers.

It’s been about a month. I’ve been doing quite a bit of gardening this summer, which is definitely a departure from my normal behavior. This time around, I thought I’d treat you to another Hibiscus flower. Both plants are producing quite a few flowers, and the little bit of rain and more average temperatures have certainly helped. I expect that they will thrive through the growing season.

I am still using my same equipment, and am no professional. If you are an avid photographer, regardless of your skills and professional experience, you are in good company here. Booman Tribune was blessed with very talented photographers in the past. At Progress Pond, we seem to have a few talented photographers now, a few of whom seem to be lurking I suppose.

I have been using an LG v40 ThinQ for close to four years. My original phone is gone. The back of the phone came off. Apparently the battery began to burst. I am using a replacement (thanks to insurance) that is identical. I need more time to research smart phones, especially at the high end. I prefer to get a device and keep it for four or five years. Most of my family seems to be gravitating toward iPhones, so I suspect I may eventually have to succumb and go to the Dark Side of The Force. Given the times we live in, my default is to delay any major purchases as long as possible. So, unless something really goes wrong with my current phone, I’ll stick to the status quo for as long as possible. Keep in mind that my last Samsung kept going for over four years (the last year was a bit touch and go). Once I do have to make a new smart phone purchase, the camera feature is the one I consider most important. So any advice on such matters is always appreciated. Occasionally I get to use my old 35 mm, but one of my daughters seems to have commandeered it for now. So it goes.

This series of posts is in honor of a number of our ancestors. At one point, there were some seriously great photographers who graced Booman Tribune with their work. They are all now long gone. I am the one who carries the torch. I keep this going because I know that one day I too will be gone, and I really want the work that was started long ago to continue, rather than fade away with me. If I see that I am able to incite a few others to fill posts like these with photos, then I will be truly grateful. In the meantime, enjoy the photos, and I am sure between Booman and myself we can pass along quite a bit of knowledge about the photo flog series from its inception back during the Booman Tribune days.

Since this post usually runs only a day, I will likely keep it up for a while. Please share your work. I am convinced that us amateurs are extremely talented. You will get nothing but love and support here. I mean that. Also, when I say that you don’t have to be a photography pro, I mean that as well. I am an amateur. This is my hobby. This is my passion. I keep these posts going only because they are a passion. If they were not, I would have given up a long time ago. My preference is to never give up.

It’s very clear that the Republicans believe that they have a winning midterm election message centering on the Democrats’ decision to fund the Internal Revenue Service with $80 billion to modernize the department. In part, as New York Times White House correspondent Jim Tankersley argues, this flows from the fact that alternative strategies are not very attractive. Overall, the provisions of the Inflation Reduction Act are very popular.

…it’s notable that in a bill filled with corporate tax increases and hundreds of billions of dollars in tax credits and spending on health care and climate change, Republicans have focused so heavily on the I.R.S.

It’s largely a reflection of how popular other parts of the law, like reducing prescription drug costs for Medicare and even reducing the budget deficit, are in polls. The ways to raise tax revenue were always likely to be the easiest target.

It’s a near-certainty that if Democrats had substituted a different tax increase for the I.R.S. piece, Republicans would be attacking that instead.

Alan Rappeport, the New York Times Treasury Department reporter, says the GOP has found a ripe area of attack because, “nobody really loves paying taxes or being audited.” But Tankersley counters that “the politics of I.R.S. enforcement are a framing contest…” and “Americans love the idea of making tax-dodging corporations and rich people pay what they owe.”

Of course, there’s an argument on the merits, even if such arguments rarely are decisive in the heat of election season. The Republicans have starved the IRS of resources in the hope that they’ll be less effective in collecting revenues and enforcing the law. This is supposed to be popular, but that does depend on the framing.

The Democrats have promised that this $80 billion investment will make the tax system fairer while also improving customer service. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellin says that while the IRS will be more active, the increase in audits “will target only large companies and people earning more than $400,000 a year.” Meanwhile, in what can only be described as a politically savvy move, she’s decided to use the first tranche of money to “hire people who will answer taxpayers’ telephone calls during the 2023 tax-filing season.”

Nothing makes a voter less favorably disposed to a government agency or program than being put on hold. But this decision also sends a more immediate message that ordinary folks are going to benefit from these upgrades. It’s not about increasing their risk of an audit. It’s about providing a fair system and efficient, competent assistance.

On the audit risks, the Government Accountability Office found that between 2010-2019, the percentage of taxpayers experiencing an IRS audit plummeted from 0.9 percent to 0.25 percent, and that “Audit rates decreased the most for taxpayers with incomes of $200,000 and above.” The explanation is a shortage of staff combined with the increased complexity of examining high income returns.

Of course, many more people fear being audited than actually have to suffer through one, and the number of people audited is cumulative, meaning you could still resent an audit from the 1980s. Still, it seems a very small percentage of voters have had a direct negative experience from the IRS (deserved or not) compared to those with an interest in seeing the rich pay their share.

This is why I call the Republican Party “the tax cheat party.” They not only make it easier for the wealthy to legally avoid taxation, they make it easier from them to illegally evade taxation. And  a good chunk of their base is in the market for impunity for tax crimes. After all, the first person to fear an audit is the one who knows an audit would catch them in their lies. Cleaning up honest mistakes can be a hassle and involve fines, but it’s not the end of the world.

This is why I see the IRS-bashing midterm strategy as less than promising for the Republicans. It will fire up their tax-cheat base, but that base isn’t very big and is dwarfed by the number of people who are angry that the IRS lets rich people get away with murder while they have to pay the taxman.

But it is a messaging battle. The Democrats have to engage in that battle or they’ll lose it.

Jon Doyle produced a more-of-a-short-story-than-review of Nick Begich Jr.’s lunatic book, Angels Don’t Play this HAARP. I suppose it was his way of demonstrating that Begich’s conspiracy theories are just too crazy to merit open critique.

Of course, Nick, who describes himself as a “lifelong Republican” on his campaign website, has some reason to a bit wack-a-doo. In 1972, his father’s plane disappeared without a trace somewhere between Anchorage and Juneau, Alaska. It was the same crash that killed House Majority Leader and Warren Commission member Hale Boggs, who was the father of Cokie Roberts as well as the grandfather of one of my high school friends. It’s a small world.

I once sat in a conference room in Pittsburgh with Nick’s brother Mark, a Democrat who was then running for one of Alaska’s two U.S. Senate seats. He won and served a single term. Nick Sr. was a Democrat, too, but it’s just easier to be a Republican in Alaska.

HAARP refers to the High-frequency Active Auroral Research Program which is just a fancy way of saying it looks at the ionosphere. The headquarters are in Gakona, Alaska, which helps explain Nick’s interest in the project.

Nick Begich Jr., the son of the late U.S. Representative Nick Begich and brother of former U.S. Senator Mark Begich and retiring Alaska state senator Tom Begich, is the author of Angels Don’t Play This HAARP. He has claimed that the HAARP facility could trigger earthquakes and turn the upper atmosphere into a giant lens so that “the sky would literally appear to burn.” He maintains a website that claims HAARP is a mind control device.

Maybe you don’t care about any of this, but here’s why maybe you should. It’s looking more and more like Nick is going to come in third place in his bid to serve as Alaska’s lone House member in the U.S. Congress. He’s currently drawing 28 percent of the vote, which trails both Sarah Palin at 31 percent and Democrat Mary Peltola at 39 percent.

But Alaska has now adopted ranked choice voting, which means that if Nick remains in third place when all the counting is complete, his votes will be reassigned to either Palin or Peltola based on his supporters’ second preference.

If you combine Begich and Palin’s votes, 60 percent of the electorate voted for a Republican, which is actually a pretty poor result for the Democrats, and suggests that Palin will probably be the eventual winner. Who among us doesn’t relish seeing Palin in Congress?

But, of course, Begich voters didn’t vote for Palin for a reason, possibly because they really don’t like her.

As things stand (and there are, again, more votes to count), Palin would need to win the Begich split of votes 31,000-18,000 in order to pull even with Peltola. That’s about 63 percent, and it seems like a manageable number.

It’s hard to say who makes up Nick’s base of support. His own family is both supportive in a general sense and standoffish in a political sense.

When asked whether he would donate to Nick Begich’s congressional campaign, Tom Begich plainly responded, “Why would I do that? He’s a conservative Republican,” and added, “My nephew has never donated to any of my campaigns, which is disappointing.”

Nonetheless, many prominent Alaska Democrats have contributed to Nick either in this campaign or in his previous bid for a seat on the Anchorage Assembly. The moderate Begich brand may be stronger than the conservative pitch Nick has been making in 2022.

Then, again, Nick is a HAARP-lunatic and doubtless has many Alex Jones-style lunatic supporters. These folks’ second choice is probably Palin.

The non-lunatic in the race is Mary Peltola, who was profiled in the New York Times last week.

The woman leading the race to replace Representative Don Young after Tuesday’s electoral contests is in many ways his opposite: a Democrat with a reputation for kindness, even to the Republicans she is trying to beat.

On Election Day, Mary Peltola, 48, exchanged well wishes over text with her more famous and more outspoken Republican rival on the ballot, Sarah Palin. The two have been close since they were both expectant mothers working together in Alaska’s Statehouse, Ms. Palin as governor and Ms. Peltola as a lawmaker.

“I think respect is just a fundamental part of getting things done and working through problems,” Ms. Peltola told reporters Tuesday, explaining her approach to campaigning as the first vote tallies rolled in.

Ms. Peltola, who is Yup’ik, is seen as having the same independent streak and devotion to Alaskan interests as Mr. Young, who died in March. Her father and the longtime congressman were close friends, and, as a young girl, she would tag along as he campaigned for Mr. Young. But she sharply diverges from Mr. Young and her top Republican contenders, including Ms. Palin, in her support for abortion rights, her understanding of fishing industries, her clear warnings about climate change and her commitment to sustain communities over corporate interests in developing Alaska’s resources.

It would be nice if anyone other than Palin wins this race, but someone who acknowledges climate change and supports reproductive choice would be a real bonus.

Hi everyone. I am still swamped. Not much I can do about that. I suspect that is just my new normal now. Life goes on. I still try to decompress. One of my kids finally convinced me to try a series called Ozark. I often wonder how much thought Hollywood folks put in to stories set in what we think of as the “fly-over states”. The series is set in the city of Lake Ozark, which is right on the Lake of the Ozarks, which does have an impressive coastline. Dams do wonders. I spent a few years in Missouri and am well aware of what Party Cove is, for example. The area is not in southern Missouri, as is characterized in the series. It’s more central Missouri. I know the area. I can’t say I’ve driven through it in the last few years. I ran out of excuses to do so, I guess. The scenery is spectacular. Just avoid the politics. Really, outside of KC, St. Louis, and Columbia, it’s as red as it gets. If you’re adventurous, spend some time away from the Interstate freeways and drive through the state highways around the area. If you’re a photographer or artist, you really won’t be disappointed. This week’s song is from Radiohead, and was featured on the pilot for Ozark. Enjoy.

Cheers!