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Abbreviated Pundit Roundup: Joni Ernst doubles down on stepping in crap [1]
['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']
Date: 2025-06-02
Des Moines Register:
Joni Ernst posts sarcastic apology video following comments that 'we all are going to die' Sen. Joni Ernst's response to a constituent's concern about Medicaid cuts, "we all are going to die," sparked controversy.
Ernst now has posted an apology video on Instagram, apparently filmed in a cemetery, in which she sarcastically reiterates her point.
The senator's comments drew criticism from Democrats concerned about the potential impact of Medicaid cuts proposed in President Donald Trump's tax plan. "I made an incorrect assumption that everyone in the auditorium understood that yes, we are all going to perish from this Earth," she said. "So I apologize. And I’m really, really glad that I did not have to bring up the subject of the tooth fairy as well. "But for those that would like to see eternal and everlasting life, I encourage you to embrace my lord and savior, Jesus Christ," she added… Later that day she blamed "hysteria that's out there coming from the left" for the response to her initial comments.
Really drives home the point that the Republican health plan is ‘die early’.
x Absolutely bonkers — Joni Ernst doubles down on her “we are all gonna die” defense of Medicaid cuts while walking through a cemetery — Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) 2025-05-31T21:43:39.678Z
New York Times:
Unease at F.B.I. Intensifies as Patel Ousts Top Officials Senior executives are being pushed out and the director, Kash Patel, is more freely using polygraph tests to tamp down on news leaks about leadership decisions and behavior. Behind the scenes, his vision of an F.B.I. under President Trump is quietly taking shape. Agents have been forced out. Others have been demoted or put on leave with no explanation. And in an effort to hunt down the sources of news leaks, Mr. Patel is forcing employees to take polygraph tests. Taken together, the moves are causing worrisome upheaval at the F.B.I., eliciting fear and uncertainty as Mr. Patel and his deputy, Dan Bongino, quickly restock senior ranks with agents and turn the agency’s attention to immigration. Their persistent claims that the bureau was politicized under previous directors, in addition to their swift actions against colleagues, have left employees to wonder whether they, too, will be ousted, either because they worked on an investigation vilified by Trump supporters or had ties to the previous administration.
Whatever you think of the FBI, to say that they should not be treated like this is to say no fed agency should. They are no different, and like the others, way less competent and worse off after Trump.
New York Times:
Trump to Withdraw Musk’s Ally as Nominee for Top NASA Job Jared Isaacman was a close associate of Elon Musk, whose SpaceX company has multiple contracts with NASA. Mr. Trump in recent days told associates he intended to yank Mr. Isaacman’s nomination after being told that he had donated to prominent Democrats, according to three people with knowledge of the deliberations who were not authorized to discuss them publicly. Mr. Trump said on social media on Saturday that he had conducted a “thorough review of prior associations” before deciding to withdraw the nomination. Mr. Trump added that he would “soon announce a new Nominee who will be Mission aligned, and put America First in Space.” The U-turn was the latest example of how Mr. Trump uses loyalty as a key criterion for top administration roles, and came at a fraught moment for the space agency.
New York Times:
Trump’s top economic officials insist that tariffs will remain, even after court ruling. They also signaled that Mr. Trump had no plans to extend an original 90-day pause on some of his steepest tariff rates, raising the odds that those duties — the mere announcement of which had roiled markets — could take effect as planned in July.
TACO, Mr. President. TACO.
x Excellent article on why NOT to allow Bear Hunting in CT! #hartford #putnamct #danburyct #connecticut #ctnews #kitm #ctdeep #newhaven #uconn @demfromct.bsky.social @blm860.bsky.social @kagrox.bsky.social ctmirror.org/2025/05/29/w... — Seth (@realpseudonymguy.bsky.social) 2025-06-01T19:40:13.659Z
Jill Lawrence/The Bulwark:
David Jolly’s Purple Campaign for Florida Governor He left the GOP and now wants to replace Ron DeSantis. Are Sunshine State voters ready for a reality-based candidacy? “I am coming into the Democratic party right now because I believe in its strength,” Jolly told me Wednesday on the phone. Republicans, he said, have failed to provide an economy for all people, to ensure government is delivering services to those who need them, and to “lift up and embrace the diversity of our communities and culture.” He called those fundamental Democratic values and the reasons he is excited to officially join the party. Anything else? “We get to accept science, and math, and public health. It’s pretty incredible, right?”
Yep, it is pretty incredible.
Jonathan Cohn/The Bulwark:
RFK Jr. May Have Just Ruined Our Best Weapon Against Bird Flu
He just made two bad decisions on vaccines, and he made them in the worst way possible. Moderna was trying to use its know-how from COVID to invent a vaccine platform it could deploy rapidly against several types of influenza, including the H5N1 bird flu—a version of which, if you haven’t heard, has spread to the United States and is ravaging poultry farms. But it’s not the price of eggs keeping infectious-disease doctors up at night. It’s the possibility that a strain mutates, jumps species, and ends up in humans, who then start transmitting it to each other. It’s happened before, in mostly isolated outbreaks, with mortality rates that reached 50 percent. That dwarfs the comparable figure for COVID-19, which in most countries was in the low single digits and yet still killed more than 7 million people around the world, including more than a million in the United States.2 That death toll would have been even higher if not for speedy development of COVID vaccines, including Moderna’s, whose secret sauce is mRNA technology that generally allows for much quicker production.3 That’s why two of the scientists most responsible for the breakthrough won the Nobel Prize in Medicine. And it’s why that bird flu contract went to Moderna, whose early tests on the bird flu vaccine have already produced promising results.
x Veteran lawyers have reached a curious conclusion about President Trump's deals with big law firms this year: they do not appear to be legally valid. 1- — Carrie Johnson (@johnson_carrie) May 31, 2025
x The problem with the law firm deals is … they're not deals at all," said Harold Hongju Koh, a professor and former dean at Yale Law School. "You know, a contract that you make with a gun to your head is not a contract." 3- — Carrie Johnson (@johnson_carrie) May 31, 2025
David Shuster with an assist from Ty Cobb take on Karoline Leavitt [aka Taco Belle]:
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