I don’t recall Judy wearing this, and my pre-school intern archivist is in time out, so we will never know whether Judy has worn it before. Nothing flashy here, but solid blue is always a good look for her. I even accept the blue drop earrings, I guess.

In other sartorial news, RIP Brooks Brothers. Yes, its demise was due in part to the shift to casual wear at the office, but after 200 years, the firm also filed for bankruptcy because it couldn’t get out from under – you guessed it – its private equity creditors. The company has a $75 million loan from WHP Global, which gives the lender a senior lien on Brooks Brothers’ assets, according to the Wall Street Journal. Who’s behind WHP Global? Why non other than Oaktree Capital and Blackrock, two of our fave private equity shops.

Trump is pressuring states to open schools and he has threatened to cut federal funding to those that refuse to reopen. The Trump administration also told Tony Fauci not to attend today’s briefing. The head of the National Education Association (pictured below), Lily Eskelsen Garcia, made a fair point about the risks of opening schools when she said, “if there’s an ‘oops’ here, it probably means somebody died.” Something to think about.

I think Marcia Coyle of the National Law Journal does a great job every time she’s on the NewsHour. Today, she put the recent SCOTUS decisions on religious freedom into context as the court ruled that employers can refuse to fund birth control for employees on religious or moral grounds. Personally, I find these decisions scary.

Here’s an old photo of Marcia. I chose to use this one because she was having some mascara trouble on live tv today, and who among us hasn’t been there?

Meanwhile, and if you blinked, you missed it, Judy mentioned in the wrap-up that Harper’s magazine published a letter from more than 150 authors, journalists and authors about the chilling effect blind adherence to principles of resistance can have.

It’s worth a link and a long quote:

 “But this needed reckoning has also intensified a new set of moral attitudes and political commitments that tend to weaken our norms of open debate and toleration of differences in favor of ideological conformity. As we applaud the first development, we also raise our voices against the second… But resistance must not be allowed to harden into its own brand of dogma or coercion—which right-wing demagogues are already exploiting. The democratic inclusion we want can be achieved only if we speak out against the intolerant climate that has set in on all sides.”

https://harpers.org/a-letter-on-justice-and-open-debate/

I think it’s a brave letter and encourages us all to think beyond sloganeering (of any kind) and into deeper consideration of the issues.

On a lighter note, was this blogger the only one who noticed that the teleprompter couldn’t keep up with Judy during the news wrap up? It was cracking her up, which I thought was a classier response than hurling her vase white flowers at the camera.

I’m taking two days off, so I hope you will watch Judy and critique Judy’s look for me!