Democrat News

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I’m not sure why anyone would need a robotic dog equipped with a flamethrower but whatever floats your boat. The Ohio company that makes these things assures us that they’re perfectly legal in 48 states (though not Maryland and one other one).

And they are just expensive toys, a Unitree Go2 robot quadruped souped up with some fancy electronics and a bit of lethality in the flamethrower. They’re still quite a ways off from Boston Dynamics’ Spot, but that can set you back $75-300k, depending on how it’s configured.

Source: Arstechinca.com

If you’ve been wondering when you’ll be able to order the flame-throwing robot that Ohio-based Throwflame first announced last summer, that day has finally arrived. The Thermonator, what Throwflame bills as “the first-ever flamethrower-wielding robot dog” is now available for purchase. The price? $9,420.

Thermonator is a quadruped robot with an ARC flamethrower mounted to its back, fueled by gasoline or napalm. It features a one-hour battery, a 30-foot flame-throwing range, and Wi-Fi and Bluetooth connectivity for remote control through a smartphone.

It also includes a LIDAR sensor for mapping and obstacle avoidance, laser sighting, and first-person view (FPV) navigation through an onboard camera. The product appears to integrate a version of the Unitree Go2 robot quadruped that retails alone for $1,600 in its base configuration.

The company lists possible applications of the new robot as “wildfire control and prevention,” “agricultural management,” “ecological conservation,” “snow and ice removal,” and “entertainment and SFX.” But most of all, it sets things on fire in a variety of real-world scenarios.

Whenever I see robotic dogs though I just have flashbacks of that Black Mirror episode called Metalhead with robot dogs designed to kill humans.

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Oh noes…. a bunch of legal analysts and never-Trumpers who appear regularly on some other networks are having weekly Zoom meetings! It’s a “legal conspiracy.” I find it pretty rich that the network that’s been coordinating its talking points with Republicans since its inception is angry that anyone who doesn’t like Trump, and appears on television somewhere else, is speaking with each other when they’re not on the air.

Here’s Fox & Friends First hosts Carley Shimkus and Todd Piro talking to guest Joe Concha about a recent article in Politico’s article on the meetings, which have been going on for years and are nothing new, on this Wednesday morning’s show. About the only thing I agree with Concha on is the fact that CNN allowed Jeffery Toobin back on the air after what he did.

PIRO: A new Politico report claiming that anti-Trump legal pundits hold off-the-record calls about Donald Trump’s legal sagas. “The group’s gathering was not a one-time event but in fact an installment in an exclusive weekly digital salon… Every Friday they meet on Zoom to hash out the latest twist and turns in the Trump legal saga – and intellectually stress test the arguments facing Trump on his journey through the American legal system.”

Because that’s their job, right? The calls include several pundits make appearances on several major cable networks, that are not this one.

Actually, it is their job Todd, but go on…

SHIMKUS: Yeah, Jeffrey Toobin also on those phone calls apparently Joe Concha is a Fox news contributor, and he joins us now. Joe, what do you think about this? Is there a problem that you see here?

CONCHA: A huge problem, Carley, because Donald Trump has said repeatedly that there is a legal conspiracy against him, and to hear all these pundits who appear, what feels like on an hourly basis on those other cable news networks, getting together for a weekly meeting to discuss how they’re going to push the narrative that Donald Trump is absolutely guilty until proven innocent, boy, that’s really telling.

So the next time you watch any of these people on those networks, whether it’s Bill Kristol, whether it’s Father of the Year, George Conway, whether it’s Lawrence Tribe or Jennifer Rubin, do know that their analysis is all rehearsed and all an effort to try to take out Donald Trump.

And by the way, the fact that Jeffrey Toobin is one of the legal analysts that appears on these regular Zoom calls should be, you know, hands down potentially disturbing for anyone who has eyesight and is attending, because remember, he got the shaft over at CNN for doing what he did in front of female coworkers on a Zoom call a few years ago. Yet now CNN invites him back to be their star analyst when it comes to these Trump trials. Go figure.

PIRO: I caught two puns there. I’m not going to list them, but don’t want to think you put them over on me, Joe. Look, it’s always felt too coordinated, and when I speak with people, I’m sure you get the same thing, people always ask you, Joe, does the media coordinate their narratives? I think we now have an answer.

Which of course was followed by their coordinated talking points about how Trump has supposedly done nothing wrong, there was no crime, and oh, look how terrible Joe Biden is and listen to us lie about the economy and fear monger over immigrants coming into the country.

PIRRO: Clearly, there is coordination here, but with all that coordination and all that strategizing, this is the best they could come up with? A case where even the prosecution, if they prove every single fact to be true, there’s still no crime because the prosecution can’t come up with a crime.

CONCHA: Yeah, Todd, I love the Jonathan Turley analogy where he says, this is a Frankenstein case, right? Where they took a dead misdemeanor and then bootstrapped it to a dead felony and then zapped it back to life.

Yeah, we still, you know, haven’t heard what the crime here is exactly. And I think many Americans, those who live in places like Pennsylvania or Wisconsin, Michigan, Georgia, Arizona, who are struggling with food prices that continue to climb and crime out of control in American cities, and obviously, the border immigration, they see these wars going on overseas, they see what’s going on in American campuses, and they say, boy, we got bigger fish to fry than. Donald Trump allegedly paying a porn star eight years ago as a hush money situation, so he could interfere with the 2016 election? Yeah. No. I think most sane and sober people say this is obviously a witch-hunt and a politicization and weaponization of the justice system, guys.

PIRO: Yeah, quickly Turley’s best line on this is “The prosecution’s whole case is we are going to prove Donald Trump drove 55 miles an hour. Well, yeah, you can prove that, but it’s not a crime. You’re allowed to drive 55 miles per hour.”

SHIMKUS: Yeah, well also it’s just very interesting that people who are legal analysts on competing networks are coming together to sort of form one solid singular opinion, when the goal should be to offer the audience their own unique thoughts and different perspectives.

PIRO: Great point.

So there’s not enough covering for Trump and both-siding every issue on the other networks to suit Shimkus. The “goal” of anyone that wants to call themselves “news” should be to actually inform their viewers what the truth is, not worry about different “perspectives” when one of those “perspectives” is someone telling lies.

Of course the entire segment was also nothing but pure projection when you’ve got Trump sitting in the election interference trial, and his buddy David Pecker is testifying about how they colluded to get Trump elected.

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President Biden gave a speech to the North America’s Building Trade Union in which he targeted Trump’s claims of shooting bleach into your veins to fight Covid-19.

NABTU just endorsed President Biden and described Trump as a “dangerous threat to the nation.”

By the way, remember when he was trying to deal with COVID, he said, just inject a little bleach in your veins.

He missed, it all went to his hair.

I shouldn’t have said that.

You guys are a bad influence on me.

Okay.

It’s never a bad thing to remind Americans how truly pathetic and dangerous Trump was in handling the COVID19 pandemic.

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Twice impeached and four times indicted, former President Donald Trump issued a desperate plea for help to his Republican allies on Truth Social amid his hush-money case. Trump wrote at 2:00 AM, so he isn’t getting much sleep. It shouldn’t be called a hush-money case, though, since it’s about Donald interfering in the 2016 election. He also tried to interfere with the 2020 election. I’m starting to see a pattern here. And, of course, his posts are littered with lies.

“We have a Rigged Judge, who is working for the Democrat Party and refuses to terminate this “case,” which should have never been brought by Soft on Crime Alvin Bragg,” Trump falsely wrote. “Judge Merchan should immediately removed, and the Appellate Courts have to take over. That also applies to Corrupt Judge Engoron, who knew I did nothing wrong, and still fraudulently fined me $500 Million Dollars while having no knowledge of Valuation, Finance, or in any way what he was doing.”

“Same with Judge Kaplan, who allowed a woman, who I have never met (celebrity photo line does not count!), and know nothing about, to get a lawless judgment of $90 Million Dollars,” he continued. “New York Justice is in shambles, and only the Appellate Courts can save it. A Republican doesn’t stand a chance – This is not Justice.”

Note: E. Jean Carroll can sue him for that again. And the case is in New York because that’s where the alleged crime was committed.

“This New York Cabal, run by Crooked Joe Biden’s White House, is a hit job on a Political Opponent the likes of which the USA has never seen before,” It added. “For the Good of our Country, it must be stopped. The Crooked Joe Biden Witch Hunts have to be ended. REPUBLICANS IN WASHINGTON MUST TAKE ACTION!”

Trump has repeatedly tried to blame President Biden for his legal woes while offering zero proof of his wild-eyed claim. Lumpy has gone as far as to blame Biden for the protest at Columbia. Trump is obsessed with Biden, and I can’t blame him. Joe Biden is the most forward-thinking President in my lifetime. Trump is listed as the worst President in US history. Trump is so obsessed that he created a social site to bash his successor daily. That must suck for the former President.

And now we are to believe that all of the judges are wrong, and he is right. Sure thing, buddy.

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Republican Voters Against Trump made a powerful ad. Donald Trump was charged with 88 felonies and was found liable for sexual assault. He could not get a job in a retail store for minimum wage. If the former president is too big a liability to get a job at a local mall, he is too big a liability to lead the United States.

Trump is making history this week, as the first ex-president to have a criminal trial. The Republicans Against Trump timed their latest ad to run during the former president’s criminal trial. Per the RVAT.org website,
“The ad uses first-person hidden-camera footage of a job applicant going to several stores and repeatedly being rejected after sharing that he has been indicted for stealing classified documents, paying hush money to porn stars, and attempting to overturn an election.”

Political Director of Republican Voters Against Trump, Gunner Ramer, made a statement about the new ad. “The MAGA base might rally to Trump’s defense in his criminal cases, but swing voters don’t want a potential felon in the White House,” said Ramer. “We’re sending the message that Donald Trump is unfit for office. If your local retailer won’t hire someone with Trump’s criminal record, why should the American people elect him to the nation’s highest office?”

In a Bloomberg February poll, 53 percent of voters in swing states said they would not vote for Trump if he were convicted of a criminal charge, per The Hill.

The outlet reported that Republican strategist Doug Heye stated Trump’s chances if he was convicted of a crime. Heye told Politico that a conviction “is absolutely a potential dealbreaker in an election that either [Trump or President Biden] could win or lose for a whole variety of reasons.” The Bloomberg poll occurred in key states that could make or break the election, including Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.

Please share these updates about the 2024 Trump Campaign with your friends, family, and co-workers who are unsure who to vote for in the upcoming election.

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Two new high-quality polls suggest an electoral dagger could be coming for Donald Trump—if their findings persist. Both polls, from Marist College and NBC News, show third-party candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. siphoning more support away from Trump than President Joe Biden.

The potential emerging trend was first spotted by The Washington Post’s Aaron Blake.

In the NBC poll, Biden trailed Trump by 2 points in the head-to-head matchup, 44% to 46%. But when the survey was expanded to include RFK Jr., Green Party candidate Jill Stein, and Harvard professor Cornel West, Biden notched a 2-point lead over Trump.

• Biden: 39%.

• Trump: 37%. 

• Kennedy: 13%. 

• Jill Stein: 3%.  

• Cornel West: 2%.

The disparity in outcomes is mainly driven by RFK Jr., who picks up 15% of Trump’s support in the head-to-head while attracting only 7% of Biden’s original voters.

Republican voters also hold a far more favorable view of Kennedy than Democratic voters do, according to the NBC poll. While a 40% plurality of GOP voters view Kennedy positively, he is 37 points underwater with Democrats at 16% positive vs. 53% negative.

The Marist poll shows the third-party candidates capturing a very similar amount of the electorate, with Kennedy at14%, Stein at 2%, and West at 2%. But Kennedy’s impact on Trump is slightly less pronounced, pulling only 6 more points away from him than Biden (vs. 8 points in the NBC poll): 17% of Trump voters threw their support behind Kennedy in this poll, compared to 11% of Biden voters. 

The Marist poll, however, puts Biden ahead of Trump in the two-way race, at 51% to 48%, and favors Biden by 5 points in a multi-candidate field, 43% to 38%. 

RFK Jr. potentially hurting Trump more than Biden with the electorate would be a significant development. While credible pollsters are just now starting to seriously weigh the possible impact of third-party candidates in the 2024 outcomes, some previous polling had suggested Kennedy’s candidacy might be a bigger drag on Biden.  

Last week, Biden and his allies kick-started an effort to dampen any Democratic enthusiasm for RFK Jr. A sizable cohort of the storied Kennedy family not only endorsed Biden, they also cut a 30-second ad likening the president to Junior’s father Robert F. Kennedy, and painting Biden as the true heir of the Kennedy legacy. 

Trump, who has fallen several points short of reaching 50% of the vote in two consecutive presidential cycles, needs third-party candidates to help him cut into Biden’s 51% winning coalition from 2020. But as we noted last week, it’s also plausible that RFK Jr. could be turned into a millstone around Trump’s neck if the anti-vaxxer insurgent draws significantly more voters away from Trump than Biden. 

It remains to be seen if the Trump campaign and the GOP can match the concerted effort being made by the Biden camp and Democrats to deter their own voters from defecting to RFK Jr. in November. 

Republished with permission from Daily Kos.

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WASHINGTON — 

The Supreme Court justices voiced doubt Wednesday about a strict Idaho law that would make it a crime for doctors to perform an abortion even for a woman who arrives at a hospital suffering from a serious, but not life-threatening, medical emergency.

Solicitor Gen. Elizabeth B. Prelogar, representing the Biden administration, said such cases are rare and tragic. They are not elective abortions, she said, but pregnancies that have turned into medical emergencies.

Prelogar urged the high court to rule that federal emergency care law applies nationwide and sometimes requires hospitals and their doctors to perform an abortion — regardless of any state restrictions on the procedure — if a pregnant patient’s health or life is at risk.

The justices sounded closely split, but Prelogar’s argument appeared to gain traction with some conservatives.

The clash over emergency rooms is the first direct challenge to a state’s abortion law to come before the high court since the justices overturned Roe vs. Wade in a 5-4 vote in 2022.

The court’s conservatives said then that states and their lawmakers were free to restrict or regulate abortion.

Idaho’s lawmakers voted to forbid abortion except when it is “necessary” to prevent the patient’s death. In court, their lawyers argued that the authority to regulate doctors and the practice of medicine rests with the state.

But the Biden administration sued Idaho and said it was violating the federal Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act that Congress adopted in 1986. The law requires hospitals receiving federal funds to provide “necessary stabilizing treatment” to patients who face a medical emergency.

“For some pregnant women suffering tragic emergency complications, the only care that can prevent grave harm to their health is termination of the pregnancy,” the administration’s attorney said. In such situations, delay is dangerous, Prelogar added.

Idaho’s attorney, Joshua Turner, ran into sharp questions from several conservatives.

Justice Amy Coney Barrett questioned whether Idaho would use its laws to prosecute doctors who perform emergency room abortions. Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh also voiced doubt about the state’s argument.

Barrett cast a key vote to strike down Roe vs. Wade, but took on the Idaho attorney Wednesday for refusing to say whether doctors could perform abortions in certain emergencies.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor cited real cases from Florida and elsewhere, but Turner refused to give a yes-or-no answer as to whether such abortions would be legal in Idaho.

“Counsel, I’m kind of shocked actually because I thought your own expert has said these kinds of case were covered,” Barrett said.

“It’s a subjective standard … and very case-by-case,” Turner replied.

The exchange highlighted the problem cited by emergency room doctors in Idaho. They cannot know for sure whether an abortion would be legal under the state’s law.

What happens if the state’s lawyers believe a doctor’s intervention was not justified? “Would they be prosecuted under Idaho’s law?” Barrett asked.

Even if other doctors support the decision, “what if the prosecutor thought differently?” she said.

Roberts pressed the same point. “What happens if a dispute arises with respect to whether or not the doctor was within the confines of the Idaho law or wasn’t? Is the doctor subjected to review by a medical authority?”

Possibly, according to the state attorney. “The Board of Medicine has licensing oversight over a doctor,” Turner replied.

Kavanaugh said he was uncertain what was at stake because the state had changed its view over what emergency conditions could justify an abortion.

Justice Elena Kagan said the law has resulted in six pregnant women being airlifted to neighboring states to obtain abortions.

Justices Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson were also sharply skeptical of Idaho’s argument.

Prelogar, the Biden administration’s attorney, assured the conservative justices that federal law includes “conscience protections” for doctors and hospitals morally opposed to abortion.

The case of Moyle vs. United States poses a clash between the federal law that requires hospitals to provide emergency care and the state’s authority to regulate doctors and the practice of medicine.

Regardless of how the court rules in the Idaho case, the outcome should have no direct effect in California or other states where abortion remains legal.

Abortion-rights supporters gather outside the Supreme Court building Wednesday.

(Andrew Harnik / Getty Images)

Turner said 22 states now prohibit most abortions, and the court’s ruling could apply to all of them.

But Prelogar said Idaho is among only six states that make no exceptions for protecting the health of a pregnant patient.

Doctors in Idaho contend the law endangers patients.

In medical emergencies, “delay puts the patient’s life and health at risk. But the lack of clarity in the law is creating fear in our physicians,” said Dr. Jim Souza, chief physician executive for St. Luke’s Health System in Boise.

He said doctors in emergency rooms often see pregnant women whose water has broken, or who have a severe infection or are bleeding badly. An abortion may be called for in such a situation, but doctors know they could be subject to criminal prosecution if they act too soon, he said.

“Doctors are leaving the state because of the fear surrounding this law,” Souza said in an interview.

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This morning, the Supreme Court is hearing arguments in a case brought by the state of Idaho, which wants the nation’s highest court to rule that its abortion ban preempts federal law when it comes to emergency abortion care.

The Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act, known as EMTALA, requires that hospitals receiving Medicare funding provide stabilizing care for all ER patients—including abortion care, even if it conflicts with a state’s own stricter abortion rules.

Enter Idaho. That state’s draconian abortion ban was triggered the minute the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022. The ban allows for an abortion when “necessary to prevent the death of the pregnant woman,” but does not require emergency room doctors to provide stabilizing care. The Biden administration sued the state, saying the abortion ban violates EMTALA because its exceptions are too narrow to allow doctors to perform abortions if needed to stabilize a patient. 

Idaho’s doctors concur.

Dr. Caitlin Gustafson explains in an op-ed for Time magazine:

Idaho’s abortion ban makes it a crime for anyone to perform or assist with performing an abortion in nearly all circumstances. The ban does not even include an exception for when a person’s health is at risk—only for when a doctor determines that an abortion is necessary to prevent the pregnant person’s death. Ask any doctor and they’ll tell you that this “exception” leads to more questions than answers.

Gustafson writes that in Idaho, “we’ve lost nearly a quarter of our obstetricians since the state’s abortion ban went into effect—colleagues and friends who got into medicine to help people are being forced out of practicing obstetrics in our state.” Doctors in Idaho have pleaded with the legislature for a health exception, both to save women and to keep OB-GYNs in the state, to no avail.

It’s not just Idaho. Texas has sued the Biden administration, saying it’s using EMTALA as an end-run around state abortion bans to “mandate that every hospital and emergency-room physician perform abortions.” The administration did issue guidance in July 2022 to “remind hospitals of their existing obligation to comply with EMTALA … in light of new state laws prohibiting or restricting access to abortion.”

That guidance hasn’t been enough to protect women in states with life-threatening abortion bans. That includes Florida, where friends Anya Cook and Shanae Smith-Cunningham both faced health emergencies during their pregnancies. 

“The doctor said … ‘if I intervene, I could possibly be arrested’ … Getting pregnant now feels like a death sentence,” Cook told The Washington Post. Smith-Cunningham needed an emergency abortion for a nonviable pregnancy, but her doctors refused to treat her, advising her to go to New York for the procedure. 

“They are playing with people’s lives with this law,” Smith-Cunningham said.

Nicole Blackmon of Tennessee was told her pregnancy wasn’t viable and was potentially fatal. She was forced to continue the pregnancy due to Tennessee’s abortion ban. 

“I was condemned to endure both physical and emotional torture, knowing that I was going to deliver a stillborn. How can Tennessee politicians stand by while this happens to people like me?” 

Kelsie Norris-De La Cruz was diagnosed with an ectopic pregnancy that started to rupture after one Texas hospital turned her away.  

“I was scared I was going to … lose my entire reproductive system if they waited too long,” she told The Washington Post. 

Another woman in Texas miscarried in an ER lobby restroom after being refused treatment. And a North Carolina woman gave birth in a car, after she was refused treatment in the ER. Her baby later died.

There’s real jeopardy here: The lives of women and babies are clearly at stake. In a bad omen, the Supreme Court may have already tipped its hand in the case, as Slate’s Dahlia Lithwick explains. 

“When a federal district court ruled in 2022 that Idaho’s abortion ban cannot trump EMTALA if a pregnant patient has a medical emergency that requires an abortion, the U.S. Supreme Court stepped in and put that order on hold,” Lithwick reported.

Republished with permission from Daily Kos.

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The day to end all days when Donald Trump said the “inject bleach” thing. As our correspondent Red Painter reported on April 23, 2020:

Donald Trump is the dumbest person to ever hold political office in the history of the United States. He is uneducated, unwilling to learn, egotistical, arrogant, conceited, haughty and vain. He surrounds himself with sycophants whose only job is to say “Yes, Mr. President” at all times. When he is forced to talk to a professional like Dr. Fauci, he tries his best to break them with flattery and manipulation until they eventually support his crazy positions in public.

On Thursday night, Trump held his daily “MAGA Rally/Conference”. At the beginning, he brought out DHS official William Bryan, who said that during controlled tests, they found that high humidity (over 80%) and high heat had an effect on the virus. But he was clear that this study is in its early stages.

Trump didn’t hear that part. He just wanted to show the world that HE FOUND THE SOLUTION and the solution is SUN AND HEAT AND DISINFECTANT.

So, of course, he asks:

Yes, you heard that right. Donald Trump suggested that injecting disinfectant inside people could be a treatment for the coronavirus.

Twitter exploded:

This made me snort laugh:

(Not a) Dr. Donald Trump strikes again. How many people will die because of this?

Here’s a real doctor:

NEVER FORGET.

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Fox News’ The Five co-host Jesse Watters claimed Trump is being abused and severely punished because he has to appear in court like any other criminal defendant, rather than be out on the golf course.

The Five MAGA squad wondered why Trump isn’t booking a multitude of rallies while he’s forced to be in a Manhattan courtroom during his trial.

Idiot Watters said Trump should be doing gas stations, and Staten Island, and then launched into a rant so silly he didn’t give anyone time to react.

Watters: But the guy needs exercise. He’s usually golfing. And so, you’re going to put a man who’s almost 80, sitting in a room like this on his butt for all that time? It’s not healthy. You know how big of a health nut I am. He needs sunlight and he needs activity. He needs to be walking around, he needs action. It’s really cruel and unusual punishment to make a man do that. And any time he moves, they threaten to throw him in prison.

Trump’s exercise on the golf course is riding around in a golf cart while cheating anyone he plays.

Unknown to Watters’ MAGA cult-infected brain, Jesse is also describing Diminished Donald as a severely handicapped, weak old man incapable of sitting down quietly for several hours of the day because it’s hazardous to his health.

In Watters’ world, all people over 75 should not be required to appear in court for any criminal indictment and should instead get plenty of sun, refreshments, and some putting time. Otherwise, the Supreme Court should step in and rule that he’s being treated too cruelly.

Is Watters trying to be tagged as Trump’s VP candidate?